Edmund Burke Quotes - Page 2

But what is liberty without wisdom and without virtue? It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition or restraint. Those who know what virtuous liberty is, cannot bear to see it disgraced by incapable heads, on account of their having high-sounding words in their mouths.

Mere parsimony is not economy . . . expense and great expense may be an essential part of true economy.

People will not look forward to posterity who never look backward to their ancestors.

A disposition to preserve and an ability to improve taken together would be my standard of a statesman.

History is a pact between the dead the living and the yet unborn.

Certainly, Gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinions high respect; their business unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his /pleasure, his satisfactions, to theirs/, --- and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own.But his unbiased opinion, his mature judgement, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not derive from your pleasure, --- no, nor from the law and the Constitution. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your Representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgement; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinions.

All government - indeed every human benefit and enjoyment every virtue and every prudent act - is founded on compromise and barter.

The nature of things is, I admit, a sturdy adversary.

Dangers by being despised grow great.

The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.

A nation without the means of reform is without the means of survival.

Well is it known that ambition can creep as well as soar.

All That Is Needed For Evil To Succeeded, Is For Good People To Do Nothing

If we command our wealth, we shall be rich and free. If our wealth commands us, we are poor indeed.

Society is indeed a contract ... it becomes a participant not only between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born.

The effect of liberty on individuals is that they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them to do before we risk congratulations.