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He was not merely a chip off the old block, but the old block itself.

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
Chips
Block
Merely
Tree
Chip

More quotes by Edmund Burke

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Refined policy ever has been the parent of confusion, and ever will be so as long as the world endures. Plain good intention, which is as easily discovered at the first view as fraud is surely detected at last, is of no mean force in the government of mankind.
Edmund Burke
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Tyrants seldom want pretexts.
Edmund Burke
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Government is a contrivance of human wisdom to provide for human wants.
Edmund Burke
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A jealous lover lights his torch from the firebrand of the fiend.
Edmund Burke
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Superstition is the religion of feeble minds.
Edmund Burke
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Abstract liberty, like other mere abstractions, is not to be found.
Edmund Burke
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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.
Edmund Burke
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There is a boundary to men's passions when they act from feelings but none when they are under the influence of imagination.
Edmund Burke
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Vice itself lost half its evil, by losing all its grossness.
Edmund Burke
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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.
Edmund Burke
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Is it in destroying and pulling down that skill is displayed? The shallowest understanding, the rudest hand, is more than equal to that task.
Edmund Burke
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Free trade is not based on utility but on justice.
Edmund Burke
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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.
Edmund Burke
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Passion for fame: A passion which is the instinct of all great souls.
Edmund Burke
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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.
Edmund Burke
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I am convinced that we have a degree of delight, and that no small one, in the real misfortunes and pain of others
Edmund Burke
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Thank God, men that art greatly guilty are never wise.
Edmund Burke
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The use of force alone is but temporary. It may subdue for a moment but it does not remove the necessity of subduing again and a nation is not governed, which is perpetually to be conquered.
Edmund Burke
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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.
Edmund Burke
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It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do but what humanity, reason, and justice tell me I ought to do.
Edmund Burke