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It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.

Lord Acton

Piety sometimes gives birth to scruples, and faith to superstition, when they are not directed by wisdom and knowledge.
LORD ACTON

Birth Directed Faith Giving Knowledge Piety Scruple Sometimes Superstition Wisdom
The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections.
LORD ACTON

Democracies Force Fraud Majority Party Prevaiding Rule Succeed Tyranny
It is easier to find people fit to govern themselves than people fit to govern others.
LORD ACTON

Easier Find Fit Govern People Themselves
Authority that does not exist for Liberty is not authority but force.
LORD ACTON

Authority Exist Force Liberty
The minority can seldom resist. But from the absolute will of an entire people there is no appeal, no redemption, no refuge but treason.
LORD ACTON

Absolute Appear Entire Minority People Redemption Resist Seldom Treason
There are many things the government cant do, many good purposes it must renounce. It must leave them to the enterprise of others. It cannot feed the people. It cannot enrich the people. It cannot teach the people. It cannot convert the people.
LORD ACTON

Enterprise Good Government Leave Many People Purpose Renounce
If some great catastrophe is not announced every morning, we feel a certain void. Nothing in the paper today, we sigh.
LORD ACTON

Anxiety Generous Morning Nothing Today Paper
Government rules the present. Literature rules the future.
LORD ACTON

Future Government Literature Present Rule
A wise person does at once, what a fool does at last. Both do the same thing; only at different times.
LORD ACTON

Both Different Fool Last Once Person Same Time Wise
The common vice of democracy is disregard for morality.
LORD ACTON

Common Democracy Morality Vice Vices
The test of liberty is the position and security of minorities.
LORD ACTON

Liberty Minorities Security Test
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.
LORD ACTON

End Higher Liberty Mean Political
In every age its (liberty’s) progress has been beset by its natural enemies, by ignorance and superstition, by lust of conquest and by love of ease, by the strong man’s craving for power, and the poor man’s craving for food
LORD ACTON

Ignorance Liberty Progress Strong Superstition Wisdom
I have reached the end of my time, and have hardly come to the beginning of my task.
LORD ACTON

Begining Come End Hardly Task Time
And remember, where you have a concentration of power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters get control. History has proven that.
LORD ACTON

Concentration Control Frequently Hand Men Mentality Peace Power Remember
At all times sincere friends of freedom have been rare, and its triumphs have been due to minorities, that have prevailed by associating themselves with auxiliaries whose objects often differed from their own; and this association, which is always dangerous, has sometimes been disastrous.
LORD ACTON

Associate Association Country Friend Minorities Person Racem People Sincere Themselves Time Triumph

It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.

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It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.

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