Quote #18

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.

More from John Acton

  1. Liberty and good government do not exclude each other; and there are excellent reasons why they should go together. Liberty is not a means …
  2. The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by for…
  3. It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority. For there is a reserve of latent power in the masse…
  4. Truth is the only merit that gives dignity and worth to history.
  5. In ancient times the State absorbed authorities not its own, and intruded on the domain of personal freedom. In the Middle Ages it possesse…
  6. Writers the most learned, the most accurate in details, and the soundest in tendency, frequently fall into a habit which can neither be cur…
  7. By liberty I mean the assurance that every man shall be protected in doing what he believes his duty against the influence of authority and…
  8. Machiavelli's teaching would hardly have stood the test of parliamentary government, for public discussion demands at least the profession …

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