First Paragraph

This is a portrait of a pessimist. He dominated the political life of Portugal for forty years, never wavering in his scepticism about the ability of the Portuguese, and indeed wider humanity, to be virtuous and rational in political matters. An outlook sustained by thinkers from Thucydides to St Augustine and from Hobbes to Sigmund Freud convinced him that democracy was a dangerous innovation quite likely to end in disaster, except in a few exceptional countries like Britain and Switzerland.

- From Salazar: The Dictator Who Refused to Die by Tom Gallagher