Machiavelli’s teaching would hardly have stood the test of Parliamentary government, for public discussion demands at least the profession of good faith.
Category Archive: Lord Acton
There are two things which cannot be attacked in front: ignorance and narrow-mindedness. They can only be shaken by the simple development of the contrary qualities. They will not bear discussion.
Every thing secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.
Socialism means slavery.
Liberty is not the power of doing what we like, but the right to do what we ought.
Be not content with the best book; seek sidelights from the others; have no favourites.
The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern: every class is unfit to govern.
Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral laws are written on the table of eternity.
The science of politics is the one science that is deposited by the streams of history, like the grains of gold in the sand of a river; and the knowledge of the past, the record of truths revealed by experience, is eminently practical, as an instrument of action and a power that goes to making the future.
The man who prefers his country before any other duty shows the same spirit as the man who surrenders every right to the state. They both deny that right is superior to authority.