If there is any lesson which history can teach us, it is that absolute power always corrupts. Such unchecked domination proves in the end, and in the religious world, as bad for the dominator as for those dominated. It breeds weaknesses in him and retards the spiritual growth of his victims. This is not less but even more true when it is exercised by a group, for the risk with the creation of all institutions and organizations is that everything is thereafter done more for the sake of the institution or the organization than of the principle it was embodied to spread. That this risk is very real and almost unavoidable is proved by all history, whether in the Orient or the Occident, whether in ancient times or in modern. It is not long before a time comes when an organization defeats its own ends, when it does as much harm as good, or even more, when its proclaimed purposes become deceptive; external attacks and internal disputes increase with the increase of the organization. No religious organization is so all-wise and so all-selfless that, being entrusted with totalitarian power, it will not yield in time to the temptation of abusing that power. It will practise intolerance and paralyse free thought. The history of every religious monopoly proves this. Thus the individual's need to follow whatever faith he pleases, to think and act for himself, to find the sect that suits him best, is endangered by the monopoly's demand for blind obedience and blinder service. The organization which begins by seeking to spread truth ends by obstructing it. The inheritors of a message of peace and goodwill themselves bequeath hate and bitterness.
-- Notebooks Category 17: The Religious Urge > Chapter 4 : Problems of Organized Religion > # 190
