Skip to content

Practically, the Church was an immense vested interest, implicated to the hilt in the economic fabric, especially on the side of agriculture and land tenure. Itself the greatest of landowners, it could no more quarrel with the feudal structure than the Ecclesiastical Commission, the largest of mineral owners today, can lead a crusade against royalties.

— R. H. Tawney Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (1926)

Another quote →

More quotes by R. H. Tawney

The foundation of democracy is the sense of spiritual independence which nerves the individual to stand alone against the powers of this world.

Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (1926)

Freedom for the pike is death for the minnows.

It is probable that democracy owes more to Nonconformity than to any other single movement.

Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (1926)

A right should not be absolute for the same reason that a power should not be absolute.

The Acquisitive Society (1920)

The certainties of one age are the problems of the next.

Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (1926)

All R. H. Tawney quotes →

Attribution

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