On the record
Forms are in their way important things: they may conceal perils to liberty, or they may lend dignity and call forth respect to all that liberty holds most dear.
Said by
Henry Cabot Lodge
Source
gutenberg.orgHenry Cabot Lodge: “Forms are in their way important things: they may conceal perils to liberty, or they may lend dignity and call forth…”
Editor's note · Context
Lodge reflects on the significance of forms in governance, suggesting they can either protect or endanger liberty.
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More from Henry Cabot Lodge
Some of them were the dreams of boyhood, from which he never departed, and which I have seen him carry out shyly and yet thoroughly and with intense personal satisfaction.
But his own personal ideals he never attempted to thrust upon the world until the day came when they were to be translated into realities of action.
His country asked the sacrifice and he gave it with solemn pride and uncomplaining lips.
He was also--and this is very revealing and explanatory, too, of his vast popularity--a man of ideals.