Historical admirers often attribute modern liberal values to illiberal figures.

Evidence

Your later admirers have made you a liberal icon, a martyr for freedom of conscience. They see in you certain secular virtues that you would have despised as vices. You were not tolerant and would have thought it shameful to be so. — Hilary Mantel, A Memoir of My Former Self- A Life in…, 1162

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Academic interpretations of Rome’s fall reflect current social values. — Stephen Kershaw, A Brief History of the Roman Empire, 1852