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If the past has been an obstacle and a burden, knowledge of the past is the safest and the surest emancipation.

Lord Acton

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Lord Acton
Obstacle
Obstacles
Burden
Knowledge
History
Past
Safest
Surest
Emancipation

More quotes by Lord Acton

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Socialism means slavery.
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The reward of history is that it releases and relieves us from present strife.
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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.
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History is the arbiter of controversy, the monarch of all she surveys.
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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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Monarchy hardens into despotism. Aristocracy contracts into oligarchy. Democracy expands into the supremacy of numbers.
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The idea that the object of constitutions is not to confirm the predominance of any interest, but to prevent it to preserve with equal care the independence of labour and the security of property to make the rich safe against envy, and the poor against oppression, marks the highest level attained by the statesmanship of Greece.
Lord Acton
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The few have not strength to achieve great changes unaided the many have not wisdom to be moved by truth unmixed.
Lord Acton
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Authority that does not exist for Liberty is not authority but force.
Lord Acton
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History is not a burden on the memory but an illumination of the soul.
Lord Acton
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Despotic power is always accompanied by corruption of morality.
Lord Acton
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There is no error so monstrous that it fails to find defenders among the ablest men.
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The common vice of democracy is disregard for morality.
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From the absolute will of an entire people there is no appeal, no redemption, no refuge but treason.
Lord Acton
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Political differences essentially depend on disagreement in moral principles.
Lord Acton
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Limitation is essential to authority. A government is legitimate only if it is effectively limited.
Lord Acton
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The law of liberty tends to abolish the reign of race over race, of faith over faith, of class over class. It is not the realisation of a political ideal: it is the discharge of a moral obligation.
Lord Acton
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History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, not on opinions.
Lord Acton
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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.
Lord Acton
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Truth is the only merit that gives dignity and worth to history.
Lord Acton