Skip to content

When what is ordered by an authority is opposed to the object for which that authority was constituted, ... not only is there no obligation to obey the authority, but one is obliged to disobey it, as did the holy martyrs who suffered death rather than obey the impious commands of tyrants.

— Thomas Aquinas

Another quote →

Topics

Power

More quotes by Thomas Aquinas

Charity, by which God and neighbor are loved, is the most perfect friendship.

Virtue’s true reward is happiness itself, for which the virtuous work, whereas if they worked for honor, it would no longer be virtue, but ambition.

Reason in man is rather like God in the world.

The highest perfection of human life consists in the mind of man being detached from care, for the sake of God.

Summa contra Gentiles (1259)

It must be said that charity can, in no way, exist along with mortal sin.

All Thomas Aquinas quotes →

You may also like

The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.

John Adams A Defence of the Constitutions of Government (1787)

There is no governor anywhere; you are all absolutely free. There is no restraint that cannot be escaped.

Robert Anton Wilson

When we see a great man desiring power instead of his real goal we soon recognize that he is sick, or more precisely that his attitude to his work is sick.

Martin Buber What is Man? (1938)

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

C. S. Lewis God in the Dock (1970)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Thomas Aquinas (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.