The finest opportunity ever given to the world was thrown away because the passion of equality made vain the hope for freedom.
LORD ACTONIf some great catastrophe is not announced every morning, we feel a certain void. Nothing in the paper today, we sigh.
More Lord Acton Quotes
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Despotic power is always accompanied by corruption of morality.
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Liberty, next to religion has been the motive of good deeds and the common pretext of crime, from the sowing of the seed at Athens, 2,460 years ago, until the ripened harvest was gathered by men of our race
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There is no error so monstrous that it fails to find defenders among the ablest men.
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A people averse to the institution of private property is without the first elements of freedom
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Ink was not invented to express our real feelings.
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No public character has ever stood the revelation of private utterance and correspondence.
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The passion for power over others can never cease to threaten mankind, and is always sure of finding new and unforseen allies in continuing its martyrology.
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False principles, which correspond with the bad as well as with the just aspirations of mankind, are a normal and necessary element in the social life of nations.
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Liberty is not the power of doing what we like, but the right of being able to do what we ought.
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Liberty, next to religion has been the motive of good deeds and the common pretext of crime.
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Political differences essentially depend on disagreement in moral principles.
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. It is the delicate fruit of a mature civilization; and scarcely a century has passed since nations, that knew the meaning of the term, resolved to be free.
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If some great catastrophe is not announced every morning, we feel a certain void. Nothing in the paper today, we sigh.
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Socialism easily accepts despotism. It requires the strongest execution of power — power sufficient to interfere with property.
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Feudalism made land the measure and the master of all things.
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