“The belief that it is useless to employ partial and palliative means against radical evils, because they only remedy them in part, is an article of faith never preached unsuccessfully by meanness to simplicity, but it is none the less absurd.”

Vol. 4, pt. 2, translated by W.P.Dickson.
The History of Rome - Volume 4: Part 2

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The belief that it is useless to employ partial and palliative means against radical evils, because they only remedy th…" by Theodor Mommsen?
Theodor Mommsen photo
Theodor Mommsen 65
German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, po… 1817–1903

Related quotes

Aldous Huxley photo

“Successfully (whatever that may mean) or unsuccessfully, we all overact the part of our favorite character in fiction.”

Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) English writer

Source: The Doors of Perception & Heaven and Hell

Wilhelm Reich photo

“If, by being revolutionary, one means rational rebellion against intolerable social conditions, if, by being radical, one means "going to the root of things," the rational will to improve them, then fascism is never revolutionary.”

Preface to the Third Edition (August 1942)
The Mass Psychology of Fascism (1933)
Context: If, by being revolutionary, one means rational rebellion against intolerable social conditions, if, by being radical, one means "going to the root of things," the rational will to improve them, then fascism is never revolutionary. True, it may have the aspect of revolutionary emotions. But one would not call that physician revolutionary who proceeds against a disease with violent cursing but the other who quietly, courageously and conscientiously studies and fights the causes of the disease. Fascist rebelliousness always occurs where fear of the truth turns a revolutionary emotion into illusions.

L. P. Jacks photo

“Of all the media of expression employed by man (and let us never forget that they are many) none are so unstable, none so quick to change their meaning, as words.”

L. P. Jacks (1860–1955) British educator, philosopher, and Unitarian minister

The Usurpation Of Language (1910)
Context: Of all the media of expression employed by man (and let us never forget that they are many) none are so unstable, none so quick to change their meaning, as words. Even sculpture, architecture, painting, in their noblest works, speak differently under different conditions; but these arts are relatively immortal compared with speech.

Abraham Joshua Heschel photo

“Faith is not belief, an assent to a proposition, faith is attachment to the meaning beyond the mystery.”

Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972) Polish-American Conservative Judaism Rabbi

Source: Who Is Man? (1965), Ch. 5<!-- The sense of the ineffable, p. 89 -->
Context: Faith is not belief, an assent to a proposition, faith is attachment to the meaning beyond the mystery.
Knowledge is fostered by curiosity; wisdom is fostered by awe. Awe precedes faith; it is the root of faith. We must be guided by awe to be worthy of faith.
Forfeit your sense of awe, let your conceit diminish your ability to revere, and the world becomes a market place for you. The loss of awe is the avoidance of insight. A return to reverence is the first prerequisite for a revival of wisdom, for the discovery of the world as an allusion to God.

Theodore Roosevelt photo

“The demand for a statement of a candidate’s religious belief can have no meaning except that there may be discrimination for or against him because of that belief. Discrimination against the holder of one faith means retaliatory discrimination against men of other faiths. The inevitable result of entering upon such a practice would be an abandonment of our real freedom of conscience and a reversion to the dreadful conditions of religious dissension which in so many lands have proved fatal to true liberty, to true religion, and to all advance in civilization.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

1900s
Context: You ask that Mr. Taft shall "let the world know what his religious belief is." This is purely his own private concern; it is a matter between him and his Maker, a matter for his own conscience; and to require it to be made public under penalty of political discrimination is to negative the first principles of our Government, which guarantee complete religious liberty, and the right to each to act in religious affairs as his own conscience dictates. Mr. Taft never asked my advice in the matter, but if he had asked it, I should have emphatically advised him against thus stating publicly his religious belief. The demand for a statement of a candidate’s religious belief can have no meaning except that there may be discrimination for or against him because of that belief. Discrimination against the holder of one faith means retaliatory discrimination against men of other faiths. The inevitable result of entering upon such a practice would be an abandonment of our real freedom of conscience and a reversion to the dreadful conditions of religious dissension which in so many lands have proved fatal to true liberty, to true religion, and to all advance in civilization.

Letter to Mr. J.C. Martin concerning religion and politics (6 November 1908) http://www.theodore-roosevelt.com/images/research/txtspeeches/307.txt

Ernest Barnes photo

“Human experience has pronounced "black magic" a delusion. Its practice is criminal folly: criminal because its objective is evil, folly because the means employed are futile.”

Ernest Barnes (1874–1953) English mathematician and clergyman

Spiritualism and the Christian Faith (1918)

Rex Stout photo
Jeremy Bentham photo

“No power of government ought to be employed in the endeavor to establish any system or article of belief on the subject of religion.”

Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) British philosopher, jurist, and social reformer

Source: Constitutional Code; For the Use All Nations and All Governments Professing Liberal Opinions Volume 1

Kalki Krishnamurthy photo

“There are many evils in this country. The only remedy for every one of them is freedom for the nation.”

Kalki Krishnamurthy (1899–1954) writer

"The Poison Cure", as translated by Gowri Ramnarayan in Kalki : Selected Stories (1999)

Related topics