“It was said of President Wilson that he had faith in humanity but distrusted all men. The true leader distrusts humanity but has faith in a few men.”

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 225.

Madison's notes (11 July 1787) http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/debates_711.asp<!-- Reports of Debates in the Federal Convention (11 July 1787), in The Papers of James Madison (1842), Vol. II, p. 1073 -->
Variants:
1780s, The Debates in the Federal Convention (1787)
Context: Two objections had been raised against leaving the adjustment of the representation, from time to time, to the discretion of the Legislature. The first was, they would be unwilling to revise it at all. The second, that, by referring to wealth, they would be bound by a rule which, if willing, they would be unable to execute. The first objection distrusts their fidelity. But if their duty, their honor, and their oaths, will not bind them, let us not put into their hands our liberty, and all our other great interests; let us have no government at all. In the second place, if these ties will bind them we need not distrust the practicability of the rule. It was followed in part by the Committee in the apportionment of Representatives yesterday reported to the House. The best course that could be taken would be to leave the interests of the people to the representatives of the people.
Mr. Madison was not a little surprised to hear this implicit confidence urged by a member who, on all occasions, had inculcated so strongly the political depravity of men, and the necessity of checking one vice and interest by opposing to them another vice and interest. If the representatives of the people would be bound by the ties he had mentioned, what need was there of a Senate? What of a revisionary power? But his reasoning was not only inconsistent with his former reasoning, but with itself. At the same time that he recommended this implicit confidence to the Southern States in the Northern majority, he was still more zealous in exhorting all to a jealousy of a western majority. To reconcile the gentleman with himself, it must be imagined that he determined the human character by the points of the compass. The truth was, that all men having power ought to be distrusted, to a certain degree. The case of Pennsylvania had been mentioned, where it was admitted that those who were possessed of the power in the original settlement never admitted the new settlements to a due share of it. England was a still more striking example.

Our America (1881)
Context: One must have faith in the best in men and distrust the worst. One must allow the best to be shown so that it reveals and prevails over the worst. Nations should have a pillory for whoever stirs up useless hate, and another for whoever fails to tell them the truth in time.

Counterterrorism and Cybersecurity: Total Information Awareness (2nd Edition), 2015

Source: The Cream of the Jest (1917), Ch. 40 : Which Mr. Flaherty Does Not Quite Explain

"The Holy Dimension", p. 337.
Heschel made similar statements in earlier writings: The great insight is not attained when we ponder or infer the beyond from the here. In the realm of the ineffable, God is not a hypothesis derived from logical assumptions, but an immediate insight, self-evident as light. He is not something to be sought in the darkness with the light of reason. He is the light.
Man Is Not Alone : A Philosophy of Religion (1951)
Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays (1997)
Context: In the realm of faith, God is not a hypothesis derived from logical assumptions, but an immediate insight, self-evident as light. To rationalists He is something after which they seek in the darkness with the light of their reason. To men of faith He is the light.

Twitter post https://twitter.com/McCormickProf/status/949813370651336707 (6 January 2018)
2018