With great power comes great responsibility

The adage particularly bears a close resemblance to the Christian bible verse of Parable of the Faithful Servant (Luke 12:48): "From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked." (Another translation: "To whomever much is given, of him will much be required; and to whom much was entrusted, of him more will be asked.")

Another expression about correlation between power of leadership and responsibility also found in a saying by Mohammed that, "Everyone of you is a leader and everyone of you will be held responsible about his subjects."[9]

Usage of the particular wording ("great power" and "great responsibility"), however, dates back to the time of the French Revolution at the very least, as the following sentence is found in the "Plan de travail, de surveillance et de correspondance" ('Work, surveillance and correspondence plan') proposed by the Comité de Salut Public ('Committee of Public Safety') during the 1793 French National Convention:[10]

Over two decades later, in 1817, British Member of Parliament William Lamb is recorded saying, "the possession of great power necessarily implies great responsibility."[11]

In 1885, in his memoirs, Ulysses S. Grant wrote "In positions of great responsibility every one should do his duty to the best of his ability."

In 1899, U.S. President William McKinley used the following in his State of the Union address: "Presented to this Congress are great opportunities. With them come great responsibilities."[12]

In 1906, Winston Churchill, as Under-Secretary of the Colonial Office, said: "Where there is great power there is great responsibility," even indicating that it was already a cultural maxim invoked toward government at the time.[13][14][15] In 1943, now as Prime Minister, Churchill evoked the proverb once again, though less exactly: "The price of greatness is responsibility."[16]

Though not the exact phrase, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt wrote in a 1908 letter that "responsibility should go with power."[17]

Meant to criticize the media barons who owned British newspapers of the time, British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin evoked the proverb in a March 1937 speech: "Power without responsibility — the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages.”[18]

In his 1945 State of the Union address, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt stated that "In a democratic world, as in a democratic Nation, power must be linked with responsibility, and obliged to defend and justify itself within the framework of the general good."[19]

In "Superman Comes to Earth", the first episode of the 1948 serial Superman, Clark Kent (Kirk Alyn) is told by his foster father, Eben Kent (Edward Cassidy), "Because of these great powers—your speed and strength, your x-ray vision and super-sensitive hearing—you have a great responsibility."

The thematic and often-quoted phrase "with great power comes great responsibility" is widely attributed to the character Uncle Ben in comic books published by Marvel Comics featuring Spider-Man.[2][3]

The phrase first appeared in Amazing Fantasy #15 (1962), in which it is not spoken by any character; instead, it appears in a narrative caption of the comic's last panel (emphasis not in original):[2][3][4]

And a lean, silent figure slowly fades in the gathering darkness, aware at last that in this world, with great power there must also come -- great responsibility![3]

While Uncle Ben incidentally had only two lines in that entire comic, later stories and flashbacks that took place when Ben was still alive retroactively made the phrase one of the many homilies he would lecture Peter with. The first mention of Ben saying the phrase to Peter was in 1972, when Ron Dante (of The Archies) included it his album, Spiderman: A Rockomic. However, this attribution would not catch on in the comics for at least another decade; the earliest appearance of a direct reference to Ben telling Peter the phrase is figured to be in Spider-Man vs. Wolverine #1 (1987) by Jim Owsley, M.D. Bright, and Al Williamson.[2][3] Even so, the first time that the phrase is explicitly spoken by Ben in a comic would not be until February 2002, when it appears in Amazing Spider-Man, Vol. 2, #38.[3]

The phrase gained popularity and pop cultural significance following its utterance in the 2002 live-action Spider-Man film directed by Sam Raimi, in which it is spoken by both Ben (portrayed by Cliff Robertson) and Parker (portrayed by Tobey Maguire).[3][2] The phrase also appears in the film Spider-Man: No Way Home, spoken by Aunt May (portrayed by Marisa Tomei) to Peter (portrayed by Tom Holland).

Contemporary reinterpretations of Spider-Man, including Raimi's 2002 film as well as the Ultimate Spider-Man comic, depict Ben as saying this phrase to Peter in their last conversation together. Comic book writer Greg Pak opined that the motto was "one of the greatest single moral injunctions in all of American pop culture."[20][21]