Reason discerns in [Power] three settled qualities: force, legitimacy, beneficience. But try to isolate these qualities, and, as with some chemical bodies, they steal away into thin air. And this they do because they exist, not absolutely, but only in the minds of men. What for practical purposes exists is human belief in the legitimacy of Power, hope of its beneficence, consciousness of its strength. But, quite clearly, it wins its title to be legitimate only by conforming to what is in the general view the legitimate form of Power; it wins its title to be beneficent only by making its ends conform to those which men in general esteem; lastly, its only strength is, at any rate ine most cases, the strength which men think it is their duty to lend to it. - Bertrand de Jouvenel, On Power: The Natural History of Its Growth
Posted on: Tue, 16 Dec 2014 18:54:27 +0000
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