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The State is competent to assign duties and draw the line between good and evil only in its immediate sphere. Beyond the limits of things necessary for its well-being, it can only give indirect help to fight the battle of life by promoting the influences which prevail against temptation--religion, education, and the distribution of wealth.

Lord Acton

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Lord Acton
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The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority.
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Before God, there is neither Greek nor barbarian, neither rich nor poor, and the slave is as good as his master, for by birth all men are free they are citizens of the universal commonwealth which embraces all the world, brethren of one family, and children of God.
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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.
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The fate of every democracy, of every government based on the sovereignty of the people, depends on the choices it makes between these opposite principles, absolute power on the one hand, and on the other the restraints of legality and the authority of tradition.
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Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral law is written on the tablets of eternity.
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History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, not on opinions.
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Government rules the present. Literature rules the future.
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Many men can no more be kept straight by spiritual motives than we can live without policemen.
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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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Property is not the sacred right. When a rich man becomes poor it is a misfortune, it is not a moral evil. When a poor man becomes destitute, it is a moral evil, teeming with consequences and injurious to society and morality.
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It is dangerous, at any time, to multiply sources of weakness.
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To develop and perfect and arm conscience is the great achievement of history.
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The form of government and the condition of society must always correspond. Social equality is therefore a postulate of pure democracy.
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The true guide of our conduct is no outward authority, but the voice of God, who comes down to dwell in our souls, who knows all our thoughts, to whom are owing all the truth we know, and all the good we do for vice is voluntary, and virtue comes from the grace of the heavenly spirit within.
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Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
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There is not a soul who does not have to beg alms of another, either a smile, a handshake, or a fond eye.
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Every error pronounces judgment on itself when it attempts to apply its rules to the standard of truth.
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When the last of the Reformers died, religion, instead of emancipating the nations, had become an excuse for the criminal art of despots. Calvin preached, and Bellarmine lectured but Machiavelli reigned.
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A liberal is only a bundle of prejudices until he has mastered, has understood, experienced the philosophy of Conservatism.
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It is easier to find people fit to govern themselves than people fit to govern others.
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