"If you are truly convinced that there is some solution to all human problems, that one can conceive an ideal society which men can reach if only they do what is necessary to attain it, then you and your followers must believe that no price can be too high to pay in order to open the gates of such a paradise. Only the stupid and malevolent will resist once certain simple truths are put to them. Those who resist must be persuaded; if they cannot be persuaded, laws must be passed to restrain them; if that does not work, then coercion, if need be violence, will inevitably have to be used— if necessary, terror, slaughter."
Isaiah Berlin was a Russian-born British philosopher and historian of ideas known for his defense of liberalism and value pluralism. Born in Riga on 1909-06-06, he became influential through essays such as Two Concepts of Liberty and through his work on intellectual history. He died in Oxford on 1997-11-05.