Quotations and Literature Forum

Who said, "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing."

'It is only necessary for the good man to do nothing for evil to triumph.'
- Common misquotation often attributed to Edmund Burke but not found in his writings

The nearest Burke comes is;
"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle."
~Edmund Burke (1729-1797), in Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents (April 23, 1770)

…seems to have been popularized by JFK who attributed it to Burke and used it in his speeches. It was also used by the ad agency Young and Rubicam and when the journalist George Seldes asked for the reference they couldn't provide any. Seldes himself had attributed it to Burke in his 1960 book- Great Quotations.
~taken from Nice Guys Finish Seventh, by Ralph Keyes

“We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.”
~Dr Martin Luther King Jr

'When in doubt what should be done, do nothing.' - Lord Melbourne

To do nothing evil is good; to wish nothing evil is better.
-- Claudius

I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.
-- Mohandas K. Gandhi

Let a good man do good deeds with the same zeal that the evil man does bad ones.
-- The Belzer Rabbi

We often do good in order that we may do evil with impunity.
-- Francois De La Rochefoucauld

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.
-- Blaise Pascal

We may draw good out of evil; we must not do evil, that good may come.
-- Maria Weston Chapman

Destroy the seed of evil, or it will grow up to your ruin.
--Aesop

One who condones evil is just as guilty as the one who perpetrates it.
-- Martin Luther King, Jr.

To overcome evil with good is good, to resist evil by evil is evil.
-- Mohammed

The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it.
-- Ayn Rand

The man who does evil to another does evil to himself, and the evil counsel is most evil for him who counsels it.
-- Hesiod

Nothing baffles the schemes of evil people so much as the calm composure of great souls.
~ Gabriel Riqueti Mirabeau ~