Lord Acton Quotes - Page 6

Quotes about:

• Liberty is the harmony between the will and the law.

  Lord Acton

  Law, Liberty, Harmony

  6 Copy quote

• History is the arbiter of controversy, the monarch of all she surveys.

  Lord Acton

  Surveys, Controversy, Arbiter

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• Advice to Persons About to Write History - Don't.

  Lord Acton

  Writing, History, Advice

  Lord Acton (2016). “Historical Essays and Studies: Great Event”, p.447, VM eBooks

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• Before men can find peace and harmony within themselves they must first fall in love with their country.

  Lord Acton

  Country, Falling In Love, Peace

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• The light that has guided us is still unquenched, and the causes that have carried us so far in the van of free nations have not spent their power; because the story of the future is written in the past, and that which hath been is the same thing that shall be.

  Lord Acton

  Past, Light, Stories

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.74, Jazzybee Verlag

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• It is dangerous, at any time, to multiply sources of weakness.

  Lord Acton

  Weakness, Source, Dangerous

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• The epoch of doubt and transition during which the Greeks passed from the dim fancies of mythology to the fierce light of science was the age of Pericles, and the endeavour to substitute certain truth for the prescriptions of impaired authorities, which was then beginning to absorb the energies of the Greek intellect, is the grandest movement in the profane annals of mankind, for to it we owe, even after the immeasurable progress accomplished by Christianity, much of our philosophy and far the better part of the political knowledge we possess.

  Lord Acton

  Philosophy, Light, Political

  Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom: Great Event”, p.7, VM eBooks

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• Liberty, next to religion has been the motive of good deeds and the common pretext of crime, from the sowing of the seed at Athens, 2,460 years ago, until the ripened harvest was gathered by men of our race. It is the delicate fruit of a mature civilization; and scarcely a century has passed since nations, that knew the meaning of the term, resolved to be free. In every age its 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.

  Lord Acton

  Strong, Ignorance, Men

  "The History of Freedom in Antiquity". Lord Acton's opening statement of his speech on February 28, 1877; later quoted in "The History of Freedom and Other Essays" edited by John Neville Figgis and Reginald Vere Laurence, 1907.

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• History is not only a particular branch of knowledge, but a particular mode and method of knowledge in other branches.

  Lord Acton

  History, Branches, Method

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• Machiavelli's teaching would hardly have stood the test of Parliamentary government, for public discussion demands at least the profession of good faith.

  Lord Acton

  Teaching, Government, Political

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.59, Jazzybee Verlag

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• It was from America that the plain ideas that men ought to mind their business, and that the nation is responsible to Heaven for the acts of the State, - ideas long locked in the breast of solitary thinkers, and hidden among Latin folios, - burst forth like a conqueror upon the world they were destined to transform, under the title of the Rights of Man... and the principle gained ground, that a nation can never abandon its fate to an authority it cannot control.

  Lord Acton

  Latin, Fate, Men

  "The History of Freedom in Antiquity". Lord Acton's opening statement of his speech on February 28, 1877; later quoted in "The History of Freedom and Other Essays" edited by John Neville Figgis and Reginald Vere Laurence, 1907.

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• The barbarians, who possessed no books, no secular knowledge, no education, except in the schools of the clergy, and who had scarcely acquired the rudiments of religious instruction, turned with childlike attachment to men whose minds were stored with the knowledge of Scripture, of Cicero, of St. Augustine; and in the scanty world of their ideas, the Church was felt to be something infinitely vaster, stronger, holier than their newly founded States.

  Lord Acton

  Religious, Book, School

  Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom: Great Event”, p.29, VM eBooks

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• There is no evidence to support the belief that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev ever questioned Americas power. He questioned only the President's John F. Kennedys readiness to use it. Elie Abel, The Missile Crisis (1966) Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

  Lord Acton

  Power, Support, President

  Letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton, 3 April 1887, in Louise Creighton 'Life and Letters of Mandell Creighton' (1904) vol. 1, ch. 13.

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• A history that should pursue all the subtle threads from end to end might be eminently valuable, but not as a tribute to peace and conciliation.

  Lord Acton

  Might, Ends, Subtle

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.76, Jazzybee Verlag

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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.

  Lord Acton

  Government, Democracy, Social

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.253, Jazzybee Verlag

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• Government by idea tends to take in everything, to make the whole of society obedient to the idea. Spaces not so governed are unconquered, beyond the border, unconverted, a future danger.

  Lord Acton

  Government, Ideas, Space

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• The reward of history is that it releases and relieves us from present strife.

  Lord Acton

  Rewards, Release, Strife

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• Towns were the nursery of freedom.

  Lord Acton

  Towns, Nursery

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• Every error pronounces judgment on itself when it attempts to apply its rules to the standard of truth.

  Lord Acton

  Errors, Judgment, Standards

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.193, Jazzybee Verlag

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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

  Politics, Politician, Crime

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.61, Jazzybee Verlag

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• Good and evil lie close together. Seek no artistic unity in character.

  Lord Acton

  Lying, Character, Evil

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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.

  Lord Acton

  Fate, Government, Hands

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• Whenever a single definite object is made the supreme end of the State, be it the advantage of a class, the safety of the power of the country, the greatest happiness of the greatest number, or the support of any speculative idea, the State becomes for the time inevitably absolute. Liberty alone demands for its realization the limitation of the public authority, for liberty is the only object which benefits all alike, and provokes no sincere opposition.

  Lord Acton

  Country, Class, Ideas

  Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom: Great Event”, p.239, VM eBooks

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• Neither an enlightened philosophy, nor all the political wisdom of Rome, nor even the faith and virtue of the Christians availed against the incorrigible tradition of antiquity. Something was wanted, beyond all the gifts of reflection and experience - a faculty of self government and self control, developed like its language in the fibre of a nation, and growing with its growth.

  Lord Acton

  Christian, Philosophy, Reflection

  "The History of Freedom in Christianity". Lord Acton's Address Delivered to the Members of the Bridgnorth Institute, acton.org. May 28, 1877.

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• Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end. It is not for the sake of a good public administration that it is required, but for the security in the pursuit of the highest objects of civil society, and of private life.

  Lord Acton

  Mean, Political, Liberty

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.45, Jazzybee Verlag

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