> > "We must be aware of the dangers which lie in our most generous
> > wishes. Some paradox of our nature leads us, when once we have made
> > our fellow men the objects of our enlightened interest, to go on to
> > make them the objects of our pity, then of our wisdom, ultimately of
> > our coercion."
>
<snip>
>
> I found it in Joan Didion's essay "On Morality", which is in her
> _Slouching Towards Bethlehem_ collection. The book doesn't give any
> further cite, only "Lionel Trilling once wrote"
It turns out it's the next to last page of his essay "Manners, Morals and the Novel," reprinted in the collection _The Liberal Imagination_. Sadly, it's less interesting in context then it is out of it.
Michael