A man who should act, for one day, on the supposition that all the people about him were influenced by the religion which they professed would find himself ruined by nights. Thomas Babington Macaulay
Nothing is so useless as a general maxim. Thomas Babington Macaulay
Perhaps no person can be a poet, or can even enjoy poetry, without a certain unsoundness of mind. Thomas Babington Macaulay
More sinners are cursed at not because we despise their sins but because we envy their success at sinning. Thomas Babington Macaulay
It is possible to be below flattery as well as above it. Thomas Babington Macaulay
I have long been convinced that institutions purely democratic must, sooner or later, destroy liberty, or civilization, or both. Thomas Babington Macaulay
We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality. Thomas Babington Macaulay
The Puritan hated bear-baiting not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators. Thomas Babington Macaulay
An acre in Middlesex is better than a principality in Utopia. Thomas Babington Macaulay
There were gentlemen and there were seamen in the navy of Charles the Second. But the seamen were not gentlemen; and the gentlemen were not seamen. Thomas Babington Macaulay
The object of oratory alone is not truth, but persuasion. Thomas Babington Macaulay
Persecution produced its natural effect on them. It found them a sect; it made them a faction. Thomas Babington Macaulay
Wherever literature consoles sorrow or assuages pain; wherever it brings gladness to eyes which fail with wakefulness and tears, and ache for the dark house and the long sleep, – there is exhibited in its noblest form the immortal influence of Athens. Thomas Babington Macaulay