Power will intoxicate the best hearts, as wine the strongest heads. No man is wise enough, nor good enough to be trusted with unlimited power.

Charles Caleb Colton
About This Quote

This quote is an extension of the idea that power unequally distributes itself. People who are just “good enough” to get by in life rarely receive any great gifts of power. Power, on the other hand, can be an intoxicating gift. It can make people act in ways that are not wise or good.

Sadly, too many people misuse their power for selfish ends, and they don’t think things through before making decisions. As a result, they get caught up in the moment and become victims of their own choices.

Some Similar Quotes
  1. Power is not revealed by striking hard or often, but by striking true. - Unknown
  2. As time and space are bent by gravity, so too is truth bent by power. - James Rozoff
  3. It is the destiny of the weak to be devoured by the strong. - Otto Von Bismarck
  4. The worship of power is an old religion. - George Santayana
  5. What a curious power words have. - Tadeusz Borowski
More Quotes By Charles Caleb Colton
  1. If you cannot inspire a woman with love of you, fill her above the brim with love of herself ~ all that runs over will be yours.
  2. Friendship often ends in love. But love in friendship never.
  3. Men spend their lives in anticipations, –in determining to be vastly happy at some period when they have time. But the present time has one advantage over every other–it is our own. Past opportunities are gone, future have not come. We may lay in a...
  4. Suicide sometimes proceeds from cowardice, but not always; for cowardice sometimes prevents it; since as many live because they are afraid to die, as die because they are afraid to live
  5. Our admiration of fine writing will always be in proportion to its real difficulty and its apparent ease.
Related Topics