Lord Acton
To be able to look back upon one's past life with satisfaction is to live twice.
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.
The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the party that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections.
The long term versus the short term argument is one used by losers.
The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern.
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.
Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral laws are written on the table of eternity.
Machiavelli's teaching would hardly have stood the test of Parliamentary government, for public discussion demands at least the profession of good faith.
Look at a day when you are supremely satisfied at the end. It's not a day when you lounge around doing nothing; it's when you've had everything to do, and you've done it.
If some great catastrophe is not announced every morning, we feel a certain void. Nothing in the paper today, we sigh.
I'm not a driven businessman, but a driven artist. I never think about money. Beautiful things make money.
Every thing secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.
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. All power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.
A wise person does at once, what a fool does at last. Both do the same thing; only at different times.