Vol. 06 · Misquoted ·Book ·280 of 348
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
They never said that.
What people say
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
What was actually said
"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." Edmund Burke — Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents (1770)
Why it stuck
Burke never wrote the quoted sentence. His nearest statement is the 1770 passage above. The modern form first appears — without attribution — in the 1910s.
John Stuart Mill wrote something closer ("Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends…") in 1867. Burke did not.
Know another line by heart?
Play the duel and see how many you can spot. Or browse the whole shelf.