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Fanaticism displays itself in the masses but the masses were rarely fanaticised and the crimes ascribed to it were commonly due to the calculations of dispassionate politicians.

Lord Acton

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Lord Acton
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More quotes by Lord Acton

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Monarchy hardens into despotism. Aristocracy contracts into oligarchy. Democracy expands into the supremacy of numbers.
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Despotic power is always accompanied by corruption of morality.
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Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority: still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority.
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Before men can find peace and harmony within themselves they must first fall in love with their country.
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History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, not on opinions.
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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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The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.
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At all times sincere friends of freedom have been rare, and its triumphs have been due to minorities.
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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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To develop and perfect and arm conscience is the great achievement of history.
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From the absolute will of an entire people there is no appeal, no redemption, no refuge but treason.
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Government rules the present. Literature rules the future.
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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.
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The strong man with the dagger is followed by the weak man with the sponge.
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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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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
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The test of liberty is the position and security of minorities.
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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.
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Many things are better for silence than for speech: others are better for speech than for stationery.
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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.
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