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It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.

Edmund Burke

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Edmund Burke
Age: 68 †
Born: 1729
Born: January 12
Died: 1797
Died: July 9
Philosopher
Politician
Statesman
Writer
Dublin city
Free
Fetters
Cannot
Ordained
Character
Virtuous
Mind
Passions
Things
Minds
Men
Constitution
Eternal
Intemperate
Passion
Forge

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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.
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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.
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Liberty must be limited in order to be possessed.
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Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.
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Between craft and credulity, the voice of reason is stifled.
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Tyrants seldom want pretexts.
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When slavery is established in any part of the world, those who are free are by far the most proud and jealous of their freedom.
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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.
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Whenever our neighbour's house is on fire, it cannot be amiss for the engines to play a little on our own.
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He was not merely a chip off the old block, but the old block itself.
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Under the pressure of the cares and sorrows of our mortal condition, men have at all times, and in all countries, called in some physical aid to their moral consolations - wine, beer, opium, brandy, or tobacco.
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Somebody has said, that a king may make a nobleman but he cannot make a gentleman.
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And having looked to Government for bread, on the very first scarcity they will turn and bite the hand that fed them.
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Corrupt influence is itself the perennial spring of all prodigality, and of all disorder it loads us more than millions of debt takes away vigor from our arms, wisdom from our councils, and every shadow of authority and credit from the most venerable parts of our constitution.
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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.
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Circumspection and caution are part of wisdom.
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Parliament is a deliberate assembly of one nation, with one interest, that of the whole where, not local purpose, not local prejudices ought to guide but the general good, resulting from the general reason of the whole.
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Nothing, indeed, but the possession of some power can with any certainty discover what at the bottom is the true character of any man.
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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.
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Make the Revolution a parent of settlement, and not a nursery of future revolutions.
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