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The Distinguishing Part Of Our Constitution Is Its Liberty. To Preserve That Liberty Inviolate, Is The Peculiar Duty And Proper Trust Of A Member Of The House Of Commons. But The Liberty, The Only Liberty I Mean, Is A Liberty Connected With Order, And That Not Only Exists With Order And Virtue, But Cannot Exist At All Without Them. It Inheres In Good And Steady Government, As In Its Substance And Vital Principle.

-Edmund Burke

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The Distinguishing Part Of

Edmund Burke

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The Distinguishing Part Of Our Constitution Is Its Liberty. To Preserve That Liberty Inviolate, Is The Peculiar Duty And Proper Trust Of A Member Of The House Of Commons. But The Liberty, The Only Liberty I Mean, Is A Liberty Connected With Order, And That Not Only Exists With Order And Virtue, But Cannot Exist At All Without Them. It Inheres In Good And Steady Government, As In Its Substance And Vital Principle.

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What Is It We All Seek For In An Election? To Answer Its Real Purposes, You Must First Possess The Means Of Knowing The Fitness Of Your Man; And Then You Must Retain Some Hold Upon Him By Personal Obligation Or Dependence.

Man Is By His Constitution A Religious Animal.

I Do Not Know How To Wish Success To Those Whose Victory Is To Separate From Us A Large And Noble Part Of Our Empire. Still Less Do I Wish Success To Injustice, Oppression And Absurdity.

In A Free Country Every Man Thinks He Has A Concern In All Public Matters,--that He Has A Right To Form And A Right To Deliver An Opinion On Them. This It Is That Fills Countries With Men Of Ability In All Stations.

The Starry Heaven, Though It Occurs So Very Frequently To Our View, Never Fails To Excite An Idea Of Grandeur. This Cannot Be Owing To The Stars Themselves, Separately Considered. The Number Is Certainly The Cause. The Apparent Disorder Augments The Grandeur, For The Appearance Of Care Is Highly Contrary To Our Ideas Of Magnificence. Besides, The Stars Lie In Such Apparent Confusion, As Makes It Impossible On Ordinary Occasions To Reckon Them. This Gives Them The Advantage Of A Sort Of Infinity.

Thank God, Men That Art Greatly Guilty Are Never Wise.

To Read Without Reflecting Is Like Eating Without Digesting.

Society Can Overlook Murder, Adultery Or Swindling; It Never Forgives Preaching Of A New Gospel.

Those Who Don't Know History Are Destined To Repeat It.

Oppression Makes Wise Men Mad; But The Distemper Is Still The Madness Of The Wise, Which Is Better Than The Sobriety Of Fools.

Example Is The School Of Mankind, And They Will Learn At No Other.

To Give Freedom Is Still More Easy. It Is Not Necessary To Guide; It Only Requires To Let Go The Rein. But To Form A Free Government; That Is, To Temper Together These Opposite Elements Of Liberty And Restraint In One Work, Requires Much Thought, Deep Reflection, A Sagacious, Powerful, And Combining Mind.

The Credulity Of Dupes Is As Inexhaustible As The Invention Of Knaves.

Poetry Is The Art Of Substantiating Shadows, And Of Lending Existence To Nothing.

Where Mystery Begins Religion Ends.

England And Ireland May Flourish Together. The World Is Large Enough For Both Of Us. Let It Be Our Care Not To Make Ourselves Too Little For It.

I Dread Our Own Power, And Our Own Ambition; I Dread Our Being Too Much Dreaded... We May Say That We Shall Not Abuse This Astonishing, And Hitherto Unheard-of-power. But Every Other Nation Will Think We Shall Abuse It. It Is Impossible But That, Sooner Or Later, This State Of Things Must Produce A Combination Against Us Which May End In Our Ruin.

Despots Govern By Terror. They Know That He Who Fears God Fears Nothing Else; And Therefore They Eradicate From The Mind, Through Their Voltaire, Their Helvetius, And The Rest Of That Infamous Gang, That Only Sort Of Fear Which Generates True Courage.

We Must Soften Into A Credulity Below The Milkiness Of Infancy To Think All Men Virtuous. We Must Be Tainted With A Malignity Truly Diabolical, To Believe All The World To Be Equally Wicked And Corrupt.

"war," Says Machiavelli, "ought To Be The Only Study Of A Prince;" And By A Prince He Means Every Sort Of State, However Constituted. "he Ought," Says This Great Political Doctor, "to Consider Peace Only As A Breathing-time, Which Gives Him Leisure To Contrive, And Furnishes Ability To Execute Military Plans." A Meditation On The Conduct Of Political Societies Made Old Hobbes Imagine That War Was The State Of Nature.

No Government Ought To Exist For The Purpose Of Checking The Prosperity Of Its People Or To Allow Such A Principle In Its Policy.

There Are Some Men Formed With Feelings So Blunt That They Can Hardly Be Said To Be Awake During The Whole Course Of Their Lives.

One Source Of The Sublime Is Infinity.

I Know Of Nothing Sublime Which Is Not Some Modification Of Power.

The Method Of Teaching Which Approaches Most Nearly To The Method Of Investigation Is Incomparably The Best.

Politics Ought To Be Adjusted Not To Human Reasonings But To Human Nature, Of Which Reason Is But A Part And By No Means The Greatest Part.

In A Democracy, The Majority Of The Citizens Is Capable Of Exercising The Most Cruel Oppressions Upon The Minority.

To Tax And To Please, No More Than To Love And To Be Wise, Is Not Given To Men.

That Great Chain Of Causes, Which, Linking One To Another, Even To The Throne Of God Himself, Can Never Be Unraveled By Any Industry Of Ours.

To Drive Men From Independence To Live On Alms, Is Itself Great Cruelty.

I Venture To Say No War Can Be Long Carried On Against The Will Of The People.

Justice Is Itself The Great Standing Policy Of Civil Society; And Any Eminent Departure From It, Under Any Circumstances, Lies Under The Suspicion Of Being No Policy At All.

Taxing Is An Easy Business. Any Projector Can Contrive New Impositions; Any Bungler Can Add To The Old; But Is It Altogether Wise To Have No Other Bounds To Your Impositions Than The Patience Of Those Who Are To Bear Them?

No Man Can Mortgage His Injustice As A Pawn For His Fidelity.

Instead Of Casting Away All Our Old Prejudices, We Cherish Them To A Very Considerable Degree, And, To Take More Shame To Ourselves, We Cherish Them Because They Are Prejudices; And The Longer They Have Lasted And The More Generally They Have Prevailed, The More We Cherish Them. We Are Afraid To Put Men To Live And Trade Each On His Own Private Stock Of Reason; Because We Suspect That This Stock In Each Man Is Small, And That The Individuals Would Do Better To Avail Themselves Of The General Bank And Capital Of Nations And Of Ages.

A Great Empire And Little Minds Go Ill Together.

A Kind Providence Has Placed In Our Breasts A Hatred Of The Unjust And Cruel, In Order That We May Preserve Ourselves From Cruelty And Injustice. They Who Bear Cruelty, Are Accomplices In It. The Pretended Gentleness Which Excludes That Charitable Rancour, Produces An Indifference Which Is Half An Approbation. They Never Will Love Where They Ought To Love, Who Do Not Hate Where They Ought To Hate.

Fiction Lags After Truth, Invention Is Unfruitful, And Imagination Cold And Barren.

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 Opinion, High Respect; Their Business, Unremitted Attention.

In Doing Good, We Are Generally Cold, And Languid, And Sluggish; And Of All Things Afraid Of Being Too Much In The Right. But Theworks Of Malice And Injustice Are Quite In Another Style. They Are Finished With A Bold, Masterly Hand; Touched As They Are With The Spirit Of Those Vehement Passions That Call Forth All Our Energies, Whenever We Oppress And Persecute.

Dangers By Being Despised Grow Great.

Society Is Indeed A Contract. Subordinate Contracts For Objects Of Mere Occasional Interest May Be Dissolved At Pleasure - But The State Ought Not To Be Considered As Nothing Better Than A Partnership Agreement In A Trade Of Pepper And Coffee, Calico, Or Tobacco, Or Some Other Such Low Concern, To Be Taken Up For A Little Temporary Interest, And To Be Dissolved By The Fancy Of The Parties. It Is To Be Looked On With Other Reverence, Because It Is Not A Partnership In Things Subservient Only To The Gross Animal Existence Of A Temporary And Perishable Nature.

What Shadows We Are, And What Shadows We Pursue!

God Has Sometimes Converted Wickedness Into Madness; And It Is To The Credit Of Human Reason That Men Who Are Not In Some Degree Mad Are Never Capable Of Being In The Highest Degree Wicked.

Among A People Generally Corrupt Liberty Cannot Long Exist.

I Decline The Election. It Has Ever Been My Rule Through Life, To Observe A Proportion Between My Efforts And My Objects. I Have Never Been Remarkable For A Bold, Active, And Sanguine Pursuit Of Advantages That Are Personal To Myself.

I Despair Of Ever Receiving The Same Degree Of Pleasure From The Most Exalted Performances Of Genius Which I Felt In Childhood From Pieces Which My Present Judgment Regards As Trifling And Contemptible.

Education Is A Nation's Cheapest Defence

Manners Are Of More Importance Than Laws. Manners Are What Vex Or Soothe, Corrupt Or Purify, Exalt Or Debase, Barbarize Or Refine Us, By A Constant, Steady, Uniform, Insensible Operation, Like That Of The Air We Breathe.

It Is In The Relaxation Of Security; It Is In The Expansion Of Prosperity; It Is In The Hour Of Dilatation Of The Heart, And Of Its Softening Into Festivity And Pleasure, That The Real Character Of Men Is Discerned.

Good Company, Lively Conversation, And The Endearments Of Friendship Fill The Mind With Great Pleasure.

For As Wealth Is Power, So All Power Will Infallibly Draw Wealth To Itself By Some Means Or Other; And When Men Are Left No Way Of Ascertaining Their Profits But By Their Means Of Obtaining Them, Those Means Will Be Increased To Infinity.

Never Despair, But If You Do, Work On In Despair.

The Greatest Sin Is To Do Nothing Because You Can Only Do A Little.

Making A Difference

Men Love To Hear Of Their Power, But Have An Extreme Disrelish To Be Told Their Duty.

Reflect How You Are To Govern A People Who Think They Ought To Be Free, And Think They Are Not. Your Scheme Yields No Revenue; It Yields Nothing But Discontent, Disorder, Disobedience; And Such Is The State Of America, That After Wading Through Up To Your Eyes In Blood, You Could Only End Up Where You Begun; That Is, To Tax Where No Revenue Is To Be Found... All Is Confusion Beyond It.

It Is The Function Of A Judge Not To Make But To Declare The Law, According To The Golden Mete-wand Of The Law And Not By The Crooked Cord Of Discretion.

In The Weakness Of One Kind Of Authority, And In The Fluctuation Of All, The Officers Of An Army Will Remain For Some Time Mutinous And Full Of Faction, Until Some Popular General, Who Understands The Art Of Conciliating The Soldiery, And Who Possesses The True Spirit Of Command, Shall Draw The Eyes Of All Men Upon Himself. Armies Will Obey Him On His Personal Account. There Is No Other Way Of Securing Military Obedience In This State Of Things.

The Traveller Has Reached The End Of The Journey!

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 Have Been Intoxicated With Power... Can Never Willingly Abandon It.

They Made And Recorded A Sort Of Institute And Digest Of Anarchy, Called The Rights Of Man.

Virtue Will Catch As Well As Vice By Contact; And The Public Stock Of Honest Manly Principle Will Daily Accumulate. We Are Not Too Nicely To Scrutinize Motives As Long As Action Is Irreproachable. It Is Enough (and For A Worthy Man Perhaps Too Much) To Deal Out Its Infamy To Convicted Guilt And Declared Apostasy.

No Sound Ought To Be Heard In The Church But The Healing Voice Of Christian Charity.

But The Age Of Chivalry Is Gone. That Of Sophisters, Economists, And Calculators Has Succeeded; And The Glory Of Europe Is Extinguished Forever.

A Populace Never Rebels From Passion For Attack, But From Impatience Of Suffering.

I Thought Ten Thousand Swords Must Have Leaped From Their Scabbards To Avenge Even A Look That Threatened Her With Insult. But The Age Of Chivalry Is Gone.

There Is A Sort Of Enthusiasm In All Projectors, Absolutely Necessary For Their Affairs, Which Makes Them Proof Against The Most Fatiguing Delays, The Most Mortifying Disappointments, The Most Shocking Insults; And, What Is Severer Than All, The Presumptuous Judgement Of The Ignorant Upon Their Designs.

The Whole Compass Of The Language Is Tried To Find Sinonimies [synonyms] And Circumlocutions For Massacres And Murder. Things Never Called By Their Common Names. Massacre Is Sometimes Called Agitation, Sometimes Effervescence, Sometimes Excess Sometimes Too Continued An Exercise Of Revolutionary Power.

Old Religious Factions Are Volcanoes Burned Out; On The Lava And Ashes And Squalid Scoriae Of Old Eruptions Grow The Peaceful Olive, The Cheering Vine And The Sustaining Corn.

All Virtue Which Is Impracticable Is Spurious.

Applause Is The Spur Of Noble Minds, The End And Aim Of Weak Ones.

All Writers On The Science Of Policy Are Agreed, And They Agree With Experience, That All Governments Must Frequently Infringe The Rules Of Justice To Support Themselves; That Truth Must Give Way To Dissimulation, Honesty To Convenience, And Humanity Itself To The Reigning Of Interest. The Whole Of This Mystery Of Iniquity Is Called The Reason Of State.

Over-taxation Cost England Her Colonies Of North America.

True Religion Is The Foundation Of Society. When That Is Once Shaken By Contempt, The Whole Fabric Cannot Be Stable Nor Lasting.

There Is But One Law For All, Namely That Law Which Governs All Law, The Law Of Our Creator, The Law Of Humanity, Justice, Equity - The Law Of Nature And Of Nations.

Men Have No Right To What Is Not Reasonable, And To What Is Not For Their Benefit.

Man Acts From Adequate Motives Relative To His Interest, And Not On Metaphysical Speculations.

Good Order Is The Foundation Of All Things.

The Public Interest Requires Doing Today Those Things That Men Of Intelligence And Good Will Would Wish, Five Or Ten Years Hence, Had Been Done.

Those Who Quit Their Proper Character To Assume What Does Not Belong To Them Are, For The Greater Part, Ignorant Both Of The Character They Leave And Of The Character They Assume.

A Disposition To Preserve, And An Ability To Improve, Taken Together, Would Be My Standard Of A Statesman.

The Marketplace Obliges Men, Whether They Will Or Not, In Pursuing Their Own Selfish Interests, To Connect The General Good With Their Own Individual Success.

The Superfluities Of A Rich Nation Furnish A Better Object Of Trade Than The Necessities Of A Poor One. It Is The Interest Of The Commercial World That Wealth Should Be Found Everywhere.

Freedom And Not Servitude Is The Cure Of Anarchy; As Religion, And Not Atheism, Is The True Remedy Of Superstition.

The Religion Most Prevalent In Our Northern Colonies Is A Refinement On The Principles Of Resistance: It Is The Dissidence Of Dissent, And The Protestantism Of The Protestant Religion.

That Cardinal Virtue, Temperance.

The Effect Of Liberty To Individuals Is That They May Do What They Please: We Ought To See What It Will Please Them To Do, Before We Risk Congratulations.

Congratulations

Facts Are To The Mind What Food Is To The Body. On The Due Digestion Of The Former Depend The Strength And Wisdom Of The One, Just As Vigor And Health Depend On The Other. The Wisest In Council, The Ablest In Debate, And The Most Agreeable Companion In The Commerce Of Human Life, Is That Man Who Has Assimilated To His Understanding The Greatest Number Of Facts.

The Unbought Grace Of Life, The Cheap Defence Of Nations, The Nurse Of Manly Sentiment And Heroic Enterprise, Is Gone!

Tyrants Seldom Want Pretexts.

The Most Important Of All Revolutions, A Revolution In Sentiments, Manners And Moral Opinions.

To Make Us Love Our Country, Our Country Ought To Be Lovely.

As Mankind Becomes More Enlightened To Know Their Real Interests, They Will Esteem The Value Of Agriculture; They Will Find It In Their Natural--their Destined Occupation.

There Are Cases In Which A Man Would Be Ashamed Not To Have Been Imposed Upon. There Is A Confidence Necessary To Human Intercourse, And Without Which Men Are Often More Injured By Their Own Suspicions Than They Would Be By The Perfidy Of Others.

A Great Deal Of The Furniture Of Ancient Tyranny Is Torn To Rags; The Rest Is Entirely Out Of Fashion.

If We Command Our Wealth, We Shall Be Rich And Free; If Our Wealth Commands Us, We Are Poor Indeed.

Greatest Wealth

I Cannot Conceive How Any Man Can Have Brought Himself To That Pitch Of Presumption, To Consider His Country As Nothing But Carte Blanche, Upon Which He May Scribble Whatever He Pleases.

As The Rose-tree Is Composed Of The Sweetest Flowers And The Sharpest Thorns, As The Heavens Are Sometimes Overcast—alternately Tempestuous And Serene—so Is The Life Of Man Intermingled With Hopes And Fears, With Joys And Sorrows, With Pleasure And Pain.

Surely The Church Is A Place Where One Day's Truce Ought To Be Allowed To The Dissensions And Animosities Of Mankind.

Early And Provident Fear Is The Mother Of Safety.

There Is A Wide Difference Between Admiration And Love. The Sublime, Which Is The Cause Of The Former, Always Dwells On Great Objects And Terrible; The Latter On Small Ones And Pleasing; We Submit To What We Admire, But We Love What Submits To Us: In One Case We Are Forced, In The Other, We Are Flattered, Into Compliance.

Magnanimity In Politics Is Not Seldom The Truest Wisdom; And A Great Empire And Little Minds Go Ill Together.

Falsehood Is A Perennial Spring.

Freedom Without Virtue Is Not Freedom But License To Pursue Whatever Passions Prevail In The Intemperate Mind; Man's Right To Freedom Being In Exact Proportion To His Willingness To Put Chains Upon His Own Appetites; The Less Restraint From Within, The More Must Be Imposed From Without.

There Is A Time When The Hoary Head Of Inveterate Abuse Will Neither Draw Reverence Nor Obtain Protection.

Magnificence Is Likewise A Source Of The Sublime. A Great Profusion Of Things Which Are Splendid Or Valuable In Themselves Is Magnificent. The Starry Heaven, Though It Occurs So Very Frequently To Our View, Never Fails To Excite An Idea Of Grandeur.

Evil Prevails When Good Men Fail To Act.

Religion Is Among The Most Powerful Causes Of Enthusiasm.

Taxing Is An Easy Business. Any Projector Can Contrive New Compositions, Any Bungler Can Add To The Old.

My Good Friends, While I Do Most Earnestly Recommend You To Take Care Of Your Health And Safety, As Things Most Precious To Us, I Would Not Have That Care Degenerate Into An Effeminate And Over-curious Attention, Which Is Always Disgraceful To A Man's Self, And Often Troublesome To Others.

Nothing Less Will Content Me, Than Wholeamerica.

Government Is A Contrivance Of Human Wisdom To Provide For Human Wants.

They Defend Their Errors As If They Were Defending Their Inheritance.

The Wise Determine From The Gravity Of The Case; The Irritable, From Sensibility To Oppression; The High Minded, From Disdain And Indignation At Abusive Power In Unworthy Hands.

The Wisdom Of Our Ancestors.

Silence Is Golden But When It Threatens Your Freedom It's Yellow.

The Perfection Of Conversation Is Not To Play A Regular Sonata, But, Like The Aeolian Harp, To Await The Inspiration Of The Passing Breeze.

In General The Languages Of Most Unpolished People Have A Great Force And Energy Of Expression; And This Is But Natural. Uncultivated People Are But Ordinary Observers Of Things, And Not Critical In Distinguishing Them; But, For That Reason, They Admire More, And Are More Affected With What They See, And Therefore Express Themselves In A Warmer And More Passionate Manner.

General Rebellions And Revolts Of A Whole People Never Were Encouraged Now Or At Any Time. They Are Always Provoked.

Religious Persecution May Shield Itself Under The Guise Of A Mistaken And Over-zealous Piety.

It Is By Bribing, Not So Often By Being Bribed, That Wicked Politicians Bring Ruin On Mankind. Avarice Is A Rival To The Pursuits Of Many.

Turn Over A New Leaf.

What Ever Disunites Man From God, Also Disunites Man From Man.

By Looking Into Physical Causes Our Minds Are Opened And Enlarged; And In This Pursuit, Whether We Take Or Whether We Lose The Game, The Chase Is Certainly Of Service.

Men Are Qualified For Civil Liberty In Exact Proportion To Their Disposition To Put Moral Chains Upon Their Own Appetites.

Taste And Elegance, Though They Are Reckoned Only Among The Smaller And Secondary Morals, Yet Are Of No Mean Importance In The Regulations Of Life. A Moral Taste Is Not Of Force To Turn Vice Into Virtue; But It Recommends Virtue With Something Like The Blandishments Of Pleasure, And It Infinitely Abates The Evils Of Vice.

All Government, Indeed Every Human Benefit And Enjoyment, Every Virtue, And Every Prudent Act, Is Founded On Compromise And Barter.

The Science Of Constructing A Commonwealth Or Renovating It, Or Reforming It, Is...not To Be Taught A Priori...that Which In The First Instance Is Prejudicial May Be Excellent In Its Remoter Operation, And Its Excellence May Rise Even From The Ill Effects It Produces In The Beginning. The Reverse Also Happens; And Very Plausible Schemes, With Very Pleasing Commencements, Have Often Shameful And Lamentable Conclusions.

I Would Rather Sleep In The Southern Corner Of A Little Country Churchyard Than In The Tomb Of The Capulets.

The Love Of Lucre, Though Sometimes Carried To A Ridiculous Excess, A Vicious Excess, Is The Grand Cause Of Prosperity To All States.

Responsibility Prevents Crimes.

Man Is By His Constitution A Religious Animal; Atheism Is Against Not Only Our Reason, But Our Instincts.

A Jealous Lover Lights His Torch From The Firebrand Of The Fiend.

The Moment That Government Appears At Market, The Principles Of The Market Will Be Subverted.

Nothing, Indeed, But The Possession Of Some Power Can With Any Certainty Discover What At The Bottom Is The True Character Of Any Man.

Men Are Qualified For Civil Liberty In Exact Proportion To Their Disposition To Put Moral Chains Upon Their Own Appetites…in Proportion As They Are More Disposed To Listen To The Counsels Of The Wise And Good, In Preference To The Flattery Of Knaves. Society Cannot Exist, Unless A Controlling Power Upon Will And Appetite Be Placed Somewhere; And The Less Of It There Is Within, The More There Must Be Without. It Is Ordained In The Eternal Constitution Of Things, That Men Of Intemperate Minds Cannot Be Free. Their Passions Forge Their Fetters.

All Men Have Equal Rights, But Not To Equal Things.

To Be Attached To The Subdivision, To Love The Little Platoon We Belong To In Society, Is The First Principle (the Germ As It Were) Of Public Affections. It Is The First Link In The Series By Which We Proceed Toward A Love To Our Country And To Mankind. The Interest Of That Portion Of Social Arrangement Is A Trust In The Hands Of All Those Who Compose It; And As None But Bad Men Would Justify It In Abuse, None But Traitors Would Barter It Away For Their Own Personal Advantage.

Facts Are To The Mind What Food Is To The Body.

People Must Be Taken As They Are, And We Should Never Try Make Them Or Ourselves Better By Quarreling With Them.

If You Can Be Well Without Health, You May Be Happy Without Virtue.

The Question Is Not Whether You Have A Right To Render People Miserable, But Whether It Is Not In Your Best Interest To Make Them Happy.

The Concessions Of The Weak Are The Concessions Of Fear.

In This Choice Of Inheritance We Have Given To Our Frame Of Polity The Image Of A Relation In Blood; Binding Up The Constitution Of Our Country With Our Dearest Domestic Ties; Adopting Our Fundamental Laws Into The Bosom Of Our Family Affections; Keeping Inseparable And Cherishing With The Warmth Of All Their Combined And Mutually Reflected Charities, Our State, Our Hearths, Our Sepulchres, And Our Altars.

No Men Can Act With Effect Who Do Not Act In Concert; No Men Can Act In Concert Who Do Not Act With Confidence; No Men Can Act With Confidence Who Are Not Bound Together With Common Opinions, Common Affections, And Common Interests.

Man Is An Animal That Cooks His Victuals.

The Same Sun Which Gilds All Nature, And Exhilarates The Whole Creation, Does Not Shine Upon Disappointed Ambition.

The Esteem Of Wise And Good Men Is The Greatest Of All Temporal Encouragements To Virtue; And It Is A Mark Of An Abandoned Spirit To Have No Regard To It.

They [americans] Augur Misgovernment At A Distance And Snuff The Approach Of Tyranny In Every Tainted Breeze.

The Great Difference Between The Real Leader And The Pretender Is That The One Sees Into The Future, While The Other Regards Only The Present; The One Lives By The Day, And Acts Upon Expediency; The Other Acts On Enduring Principles And For The Immortality.

To Complain Of The Age We Live In, To Murmur At The Present Possessors Of Power, To Lament The Past, To Conceive Extravagant Hopes Of The Future, Are The Common Dispositions Of The Greatest Part Of Mankind.

All The Forces Of Darkness Need To Succeed ... Is For The People To Do Nothing.

You Will Not Think It Unnatural That Those Who Have An Object Depending, Which Strongly Engages Their Hopes And Fears, Should Be Somewhat Inclining To Superstition.

The Tyranny Of A Multitude Is A Multiplied Tyranny.

We Must Not Always Judge Of The Generality Of The Opinion By The Noise Of The Acclamation.

There Never Was A Bad Man That Had Ability For Good Service.

When The Leaders Choose To Make Themselves Bidders At An Auction Of Popularity, Their Talents, In The Construction Of The State, Will Be Of No Service. They Will Become Flatterers Instead Of Legislators; The Instruments, Not The Guides, Of The People.

Ambition Can Creep As Well As Soar.

Vice Incapacitates A Man From All Public Duty; It Withers The Powers Of His Under- Standing, And Makes His Mind Paralytic.

Teach Me, O Lark! With Thee To Greatly Rise, To Exalt My Soul And Lift It To The Skies.

Prejudice Renders A Man's Virtue His Habit, And A Series Of Unconnected Arts. Though Just Prejudice, His Duty Becomes A Part Of His Nature.

Politics And The Pulpit Are Terms That Have Little Agreement.

He That Accuses All Mankind Of Corruption Ought To Remember That He Is Sure To Convict Only One.

The Person Who Grieves Suffers His Passion To Grow Upon Him; He Indulges It, He Loves It; But This Never Happens In The Case Of Actual Pain, Which No Man Ever Willingly Endured For Any Considerable Time.

When Ancient Opinions And Rules Of Life Are Taken Away, The Loss Cannot Possibly Be Estimated. From That Moment, We Have No Compass To Govern Us, Nor Can We Know Distinctly To What Port To Steer.

That The Greatest Security Of The People, Against The Encroachments And Usurpations Of Their Superiors, Is To Keep The Spirit Of Liberty Constantly Awake, Is An Undeniable Truth

Religion Is The Basis Of Civil Society, And The Source Of All Good And Of All Comfort.

If The Prudence Of Reserve And Decorum Dictates Silence In Some Circumstances, In Others Prudence Of A Higher Order May Justify Us In Speaking Our Thoughts.

War Is The Matter Which Fills All History; And Consequently The Only, Or Almost The Only, View In Which We Can See The External Of Political Society Is In A Hostile Shape: And The Only Actions To Which We Have Always Seen, And Still See, All Of Them Intent, Are Such As Tend To The Destruction Of One Another.

But A Good Patriot, And A True Politician, Always Considers How He Shall Make The Most Of The Existing Materials Of His Country. A Disposition, To Preserve, And An Ability To Improve, Taken Together, Would Be My Standard Of A Statesman. Everything Else Is Vulgar In The Conception, Perilous In The Execution.

The Nerve That Never Relaxes, The Eye That Never Blanches, The Thought That Never Wanders, The Purpose That Never Wavers - These Are The Masters Of Victory.

Continue To Instruct The World; And - Whilst We Carry On A Poor Unequal Conflict With The Passions And Prejudices Of Our Day, Perhaps With No Better Weapons Than Other Passions And Prejudices Of Our Own - Convey Wisdom To Future Generations.

Evils We Have Had Continually Calling For Reformation, And Reformations More Grievous Than Any Evils.

Among Precautions Against Ambition, It May Not Be Amiss To Take Precautions Against Our Own. I Must Fairly Say, I Dread Our Own Power And Our Own Ambition: I Dread Our Being Too Much Dreaded.

Neither The Few Nor The Many Have A Right To Act Merely By Their Will, In Any Matter Connected With Duty, Trust, Engagement, Or Obligation.

He Who Calls In The Aid Of An Equal Understanding Doubles His Own; And He Who Profits By A Superior Understanding Raises His Powers To A Level With The Height Of The Superior Standing He Unites With.

I Have Not Yet Lost A Feeling Of Wonder, And Of Delight, That The Delicate Motion Should Reside In All The Things Around Us, Revealing Itself Only To Him Who Looks For It.

Beauty Is The Promise Of Happiness.

Wise Men Will Apply Their Remedies To Vices, Not To Names; To The Causes Of Evil Which Are Permanent, Not The Occasional Organs By Which They Act, And The Transitory Modes In Which They Appear.

Religion Is Essentially The Art And The Theory Of The Remaking Of Man. Man Is Not A Finished Creation.

Hypocrisy Is No Cheap Vice; Nor Can Our Natural Temper Be Masked For Many Years Together.

The Great Must Submit To The Dominion Of Prudence And Of Virtue, Or None Will Long Submit To The Dominion Of The Great.

The Grand Instructor, Time.

Frugality Is Founded On The Principal That All Riches Have Limits.

You Had That Action And Counteraction Which, In The Natural And In The Political World, From The Reciprocal Struggle Of Discordant Powers Draws Out The Harmony Of The Universe.

Liberty, Without Wisdom, Is License.

By Gnawing Through A Dike, Even A Rat May Drown A Nation.

It Is Undoubtedly True, Though It May Seem Paradoxical,--but, In General, Those Who Are Habitually Employed In Finding And Displaying Faults Are Unqualified For The Work Of Reformation.

People Will Not Look Forward To Posterity, Who Never Look Backward To Their Ancestors.

A State Without The Means Of Some Change Is Without The Means Of Its Conservation.

But Whoever Is A Genuine Follower Of Truth, Keeps His Eye Steady Upon His Guide, Indifferent Whither He Is Led, Provided That She Is The Leader.

An Extreme Rigor Is Sure To Arm Everything Against It.

I Cannot Help Concurring With The Opinion That An Absolute Democracy, No More Than Absolute Monarchy, Is To Be Reckoned Among The Legitimate Forms Of Government.

The Greatest Crimes Do Not Arise From A Want Of Feeling For Others But From An Over-sensibilit Y For Ourselves And An Over-indulgence To Our Own Desires

All Persons Possessing Any Portion Of Power Ought To Be Strongly And Awfully Impressed With An Idea That They Act In Trust, And That They Are To Account For Their Conduct In That Trust To The One Great Master, Author, And Founder Of Society.

Of All Things, Wisdom Is The Most Terrified With Epidemical Fanaticism, Because, Of All Enemies, It Is That Against Which She Is The Least Able To Furnish Any Kind Of Resource.

Water And Oil, Simply Considered, Are Capable Of Giving Some Pleasure To The Taste. Water, When Simple, Is Insipid, Inodorous, Colorless, And Smooth; It Is Found, When Not Cold, To Be A Great Resolver Of Spasms, And Lubricator Of The Fibres; This Power It Probably Owes To Its Smoothness.

It Is For The Most Part In Our Skill In Manners, And In The Observations Of Time And Place And Of Decency In General, That What Is Called Taste By Way Of Distinction Consists; And Which Is In Reality No Other Than A More Refined Judgment.

Because Half A Dozen Grasshoppers Under A Fern Make The Field Ring With Their Importunate Chink, Whilst Thousands Of Great Cattle, Reposed Beneath The Shadow Of The British Oak, Chew The Cud And Are Silent, Pray, To Not Imagine That Those Who Make The Noise Are The Only Inhabitants Of The Field; That, Of Course, They Are Many In Number; Or That, After All, They Are Other Than The Little, Shriveled, Meagre, Hopping, Though Loud And Troublesome Insects Of The Hour.

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Harry Frankfurt

Navjot Singh Sidhu

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