The early history of the world is the history of a few great men. Their Wirkungskreis is immense—vaster than that of God himself.

Private notes, quoted in Herbert Butterfield, ‘Acton: His Training, Methods and Intellectual System’, in A. O. Sarkissian (ed.), Studies in Diplomatic History and Historiography in honour of G. P. Gooch, C.H. (1961), p. 194