We are not sure we are right until we have made the best case possible for those who are wrong.
LORD ACTON
There is not a more perilous or immoral habit of mind than the sanctifying of success.
More Lord Acton Quotes
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The principle of the Inquisition was murderous. . . . The popes were not only murderers in the great style, but they also made murder a legal basis of the Christian Church and a condition of salvation.
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When the revolutionary theory of government began to prevail, and Church and State found that they were educating for opposite ends and in a contradictory spirit, it became necessary to remove children entirely from the influence of religion.
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Though oppression may give rise to violent and repeated outbreaks, like the convulsions of a man in pain, it cannot mature a settled purpose and plan of regeneration, unless a new notion of happiness is joined to the sense of present evil.
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I have reached the end of my time, and have hardly come to the beginning of my task.
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Men cannot be made good by the state, but they can easily be made bad. Morality depends on liberty.
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It is easier to find people fit to govern themselves than people fit to govern others.
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Political differences essentially depend on disagreement in moral principles.
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A public man has no right to let his actions be determined by particular interests. He does the same thing as a judge who accepts a bribe. Like a judge he must consider what is right, not what is advantageous to a party or class.
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Live both in the future and the past. Who does not live in the past does not live in the future.
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Federalism is the best curb on democracy. [It] assigns limited powers to the central government. Thereby all power is limited. It excludes absolute power of the majority.
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Government rules the present. Literature rules the future.
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The finest opportunity ever given to the world was thrown away because the passion of equality made vain the hope for freedom.
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