UN General Assembly
1953

141. We should look back also on the history of international organizations right through the nineteenth century, when, with a background of high-sounding phrases, the concerts of Europe were born and ultimately lapsed into balance-of-power groups. Once again I say that it would be a sad thing if the United Nations, willynilly, began to deteriorate into the position of the Holy Alliance or of the holders of legitimist conceptions of those days. 142. If I may say so with great respect and humility, what we perhaps require even more than the revision of the Charter is a greater adherence to the spirit of its provisions. That greater adherence comes about only by the resolving of the tensions to which reference has been made, by a more sincere and prompt adherence to such decisions as are made. The allegiance, the support and the moral backing that the nations and the peoples of the world give to the Charter are far more important than any kind of revision.