Great men are almost always bad men.
Lord ActonRead
Federalism is the best curb on democracy. [It] assigns limited powers to the central government. Thereby all power is limited. It excludes absolute power of the majority.
Interpretation
Federalism restricts government power to prevent tyranny of the majority.
In this quote, Lord Acton argues that federalism serves as a safeguard against the potential excesses of democracy by limiting the powers assigned to the central government. This framework ensures that no single entity or majority can wield unchecked power, promoting a system of governance that respects individual rights and diversifies authority across different levels of government.
In practice
During a seminar on political systems, to illustrate the importance of checks and balances.
Great men are almost always bad men.
Save for the wild force of Nature, nothing moves in this world that is not Greek in its origin.
Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Liberty and good government do not exclude each other; and there are excellent reasons why they should go together. Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.
Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end...liberty is the only object which benefits all alike, and provokes no sincere opposition...The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. ~ Every class is unfit to govern ... Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.
Limitation is essential to authority. A government is legitimate only if it is effectively limited.
Jesus Christ as only an example will crush you. You'll never be able to live up to it. But Jesus Christ as the Lamb will save you.
Man walks the moon but his soul remains riveted to earth. Once upon a time it was the opposite.
Only those persons who have lived, really lived, are ready, welcoming, receptive, thankful to death. Then death is not the enemy. Then death becomes the fulfillment.
I started off believing all men were equal. I now know that's the most unlikely thing ever to have been, because millions of years have passed over evolution, people have scattered across the face of this earth, been isolated from each other, developed independently, had different intermixtures between races, peoples, climates, soils... I didn't start off with that knowledge. But by observation, reading, watching, arguing, asking, that is the conclusion I've come to.
Can man, the finite and sinful one, cooperate with God, the Infinite and Holy One? Yes, he can, precisely because God Himself has become man, become body, and here (in the liturgy), again and again, he comes through his body to us who live in the body.
Science is very good at answering the 'how' questions. 'How did the universe evolve to the form that we see?' But it is woefully inadequate in addressing the 'why' questions. 'Why is there a universe at all?' These are the meaning questions, which many people think religion is particularly good at dealing with.
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