Francesco di Paola Satolli

"Every historical epoch has its special conflict, and from the sixteenth century down to our own time the conflict has been between liberty and authority. It is the office of religious and social truth to establish harmony between these two terms. The excess of social authority leads to oppression, and the excess of liberty leads to license and the disorganization of the social fabric. The equilibrium of the two constitutes and maintains the life of all society. Proofs are not needed to show that it has ever been the highest glory of the Catholic Church, I do not say to have invented either social authority or social freedom, but to have maintained the equilibrium and established the harmony of the one with the other."