Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.… There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it. —LORD ACTON, letter (1887) [Lord Acton’s words are the most frequently quoted, but he was not the first to make this observation. See William Pitt, in this section.] I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature; and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and like the grave, cries