Albert Barnes (1798–1870) American theologian
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 289.
“When the last of the Reformers died, religion, instead of emancipating the nations, had become an excuse for the criminal art of despots. Calvin preached, and Bellarmine lectured; but Machiavelli reigned.”
The History of Freedom in Christianity (1877)
Context: John Knox thought that every Catholic in Scotland ought to be put to death; and no man ever had disciples of a sterner or more relentless temper. But his counsel was not followed.
All through the religious conflict, policy kept the upper hand. When the last of the Reformers died, religion, instead of emancipating the nations, had become an excuse for the criminal art of despots. Calvin preached, and Bellarmine lectured; but Machiavelli reigned.
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John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton112
British politician and historian 1834–1902Related quotes
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The Surplice Question; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).
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324: Some keep the Sabbath going to Church —
The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (1960)
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Source: Les Misérables
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From an essay in Cruelties of Civilization (1897) as quoted in Roderick Nash, The Rights of Nature, University of Wisconsin Press, 1989, p. 29 https://books.google.it/books?id=f9tJZz6jDUIC&pg=PA29.
