Yesterday I posted about what a treat it was to read two essays by Lord Acton. Here are some of his more-humorous lines.
On Heraclitus:
Heraclitus is, unfortunately, so obscure that Socrates could not understand him, and I won’t pretend to have succeeded better.
On Machiavelli:
I have shown you how Machiavelli supplied the immoral theory needful for the consummation of royal absolutism; the absolute oligarchy of Venice required the same assurance against the revolt of conscience. It was provided by a writer as able as Machiavelli, who analysed the wants and resources of aristocracy, and made known that its best security is poison.
His retelling of an old philosophical joke:
At that time there was some truth in the old joke which describes the English dislike of speculation by saying that all our philosophy consists of a short catechism in two questions: “What is mind? No matter. What is matter? Never mind.”
READER COMMENTS
ThomasH
Nov 7 2015 at 12:29pm
Acton was the best know opponent of the declaration of the Dogma of Papal Infallibility in 1870 and the “Absolute power” quote was directed at the Papal monarchy.
Joseph Hertzlinger
Nov 7 2015 at 10:50pm
I thought “The Prince” was ‘dog-whistle’ to opponents of monarchy saying that rule by a prince means rule by a psychopath.
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