All too often arrogance accompanies strength, and we must never assume that justice is on the side of the strong. The use of power must always be accompanied by moral choice.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Often times, the more power and prestige a person achieves, the more arrogant a person can become.
Some folks hesitate to seize additional strength because they think it wrong or dangerous to be a powerful individual. Somehow they have acquired the false notion that tyranny or dictatorship or cruelty are the outcomes of a powerful personality. These characteristics are not power. They are weaknesses disguised as power.
The one characteristic of authentic power that most people overlook is humbleness. It is important for many reasons. A humble person walks in a friendly world. He or she sees friends everywhere he or she looks, wherever he or she goes, whomever he or she meets. His or her perception goes beyond the shell of appearance and into essence.
The possession of arbitrary power has always, the world over, tended irresistibly to destroy humane sensibility, magnanimity, and truth.
We are taught that revenge is strong and compassion is weak. We are taught that power is more important than love.
The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant.
In the intellectual order, the virtue of humility is nothing more nor less than the power of attention.
Pretensions to moral superiority are devastatingly destructive.
Superior virtue must be the fruit of superior intelligence.
Power over others is weakness disguised as strength.