Family life is too intimate to be preserved by the spirit of justice. It can be sustained by a spirit of love which goes beyond justice.
Reinhold NiebuhrThe separation of church and state is necessary partly because if religion is good then the state shouldn't interfere with the religious vision or with the religious prophet.
Reinhold NiebuhrHuman Beings are just good enough to make democracy possible...just bad enough to make it neccessary.
Reinhold NiebuhrI wouldn't judge a man by the presuppositions of his life, but only by the fruits of his life. And the fruits - the relevant fruits - are, I'd say, a sense of charity, a sense of proportion, a sense of justice.
Reinhold NiebuhrAdam Smith's was a real universalism in intent. Laissez Faire was intended to establish a world community as well as a natural harmony of interests within each nation... But the "children of darkness" were able to make good use of his creed. A dogma which was intended to guarantee the economic freedom of the individual became the "ideology" of vast corporate structures of a later period of capitalism, used by them, and still used, to prevent a proper political control of their power.
Reinhold Niebuhr