In every age its [liberty's] progress has been beset by its natural enemies, by ignorance and superstition, by lust of conquest and by love of ease, … - John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton

A government which cannot be reformed does not merit to be preserved.

A century ago it was perfectly well known that whoever had one audience of a Master in Chancery was made to pay for three, but no man heeded the enormity until it suggested to a young lawyer that it might be well to question and examine with rigorous suspicion every part of a system in which such things were done. The day on which that gleam lighted up the clear hard mind of Jeremy Bentham is memorable in the political calendar beyond the entire administration of many statesmen.

Socialism. Sanctioned by Religion, by philosophy, by the experience of great nations—Revelation. Catholic and Protestant authorities supported it. ... Idea not repugnant to Canon Law, of administering the wealth of the rich for the good of the poor. ... Socialism common wherever there is intense religious zeal.