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Many men can no more be kept straight by spiritual motives than we can live without policemen.

Lord Acton

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Lord Acton
Live
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Many
Policemen
Men
Motives
Motive
Straight
Kept
Spiritual

More quotes by Lord Acton

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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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At all times sincere friends of freedom have been rare, and its triumphs have been due to minorities.
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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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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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Remember that one touch of ill-nature makes the whole world kin.
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I'm not a driven businessman, but a driven artist. I never think about money. Beautiful things make money.
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Authority that does not exist for Liberty is not authority but force.
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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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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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A liberal is only a bundle of prejudices until he has mastered, has understood, experienced the philosophy of Conservatism.
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History is not a burden on the memory but an illumination of the soul.
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We are not sure we are right until we have made the best case possible for those who are wrong.
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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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Feudalism made land the measure and the master of all things.
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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.
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When you perceive a truth, look for the balancing truth.
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Limitation is essential to authority. A government is legitimate only if it is effectively limited.
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History is the arbiter of controversy, the monarch of all she surveys.
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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.
Lord Acton