The Reward Of History Is

Whenever A Single Definite Object Is Made The Supreme End Of The State, Be It The Advantage Of A Class, The Safety Of The Power Of The Country, The Greatest Happiness Of The Greatest Number, Or The Support Of Any Speculative Idea, The State Becomes For The Time Inevitably Absolute. Liberty Alone Demands For Its Realization The Limitation Of The Public Authority, For Liberty Is The Only Object Which Benefits All Alike, And Provokes No Sincere Opposition.

Neither An Enlightened Philosophy, Nor All The Political Wisdom Of Rome, Nor Even The Faith And Virtue Of The Christians Availed Against The Incorrigible Tradition Of Antiquity. Something Was Wanted, Beyond All The Gifts Of Reflection And Experience - A Faculty Of Self Government And Self Control, Developed Like Its Language In The Fibre Of A Nation, And Growing With Its Growth.

I Exhort You Never To Debase The Moral Currency Or To Lower The Standard Of Rectitude, But To Try Others By The Final Maxim That Governs Your Own Lives, And To Suffer No Man And No Cause To Escape The Undying Penalty Which History Has The Power To Inflict On Wrong.

To Develop And Perfect And Arm Conscience Is The Great Achievement Of History.

Do Not Turn Yourself From An End Into A Means-one Does Not Justify The Other.