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It has all the contortions of the sibyl without the inspiration.

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
Sibyl
Inspiration
Without

More quotes by Edmund Burke

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Unsociable humors are contracted in solitude, which will, in the end, not fail of corrupting the understanding as well as the manners, and of utterly disqualifying a man for the satisfactions and duties of life. Men must be taken as they are, and we neither make them or ourselves better by flying from or quarreling with them.
Edmund Burke
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There was an ancient Roman lawyer, of great fame in the history of Roman jurisprudence, whom they called Cui Bono, from his having first introduced into judicial proceedings the argument, What end or object could the party have had in the act with which he is accused.
Edmund Burke
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If the people are happy, united, wealthy, and powerful, we presume the rest. We conclude that to be good from whence good is derived.
Edmund Burke
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Contempt is not a thing to be despised. It may be borne with a calm and equal mind, but no man, by lifting his head high, can pretend that he does not perceive the scorns that are poured down on him from above.
Edmund Burke
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It is the nature of tyranny and rapacity never to learn moderation from the ill-success of first oppressions on the contrary, all oppressors, all men thinking highly of the methods dictated by their nature, attribute the frustration of their desires to the want of sufficient rigor.
Edmund Burke
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It is an advantage to all narrow wisdom and narrow morals that their maxims have a plausible air and, on a cursory view, appear equal to first principles. They are light and portable. They are as current as copper coin and about as valuable.
Edmund Burke
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Nothing so effectually deadens the taste of the sublime as that which is light and radiant.
Edmund Burke
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A definition may be very exact, and yet go but a very little way towards informing us of the nature of the thing defined.
Edmund Burke
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My vigour relents. I pardon something to the spirit of liberty.
Edmund Burke
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Nothing in progression can rest on its original plan. We may as well think of rocking a grown man in the cradle of an infant.
Edmund Burke
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It is better to cherish virtue and humanity, by leaving much to free will, even with some loss of the object , than to attempt to make men mere machines and instruments of political benevolence. The world on the whole will gain by a liberty, without which virtue cannot exist.
Edmund Burke
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The grand instructor, time.
Edmund Burke
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The love of lucre, though sometimes carried to a ridiculous excess, a vicious excess, is the grand cause of prosperity to all States.
Edmund Burke
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Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.
Edmund Burke
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Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.
Edmund Burke
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All virtue which is impracticable is spurious.
Edmund Burke
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Law and arbitrary power are at eternal enmity.
Edmund Burke
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The worthy gentleman who has been snatched from us at the moment of the election, and in the middle of the contest, whilst his desires were as warm and his hopes as eager as ours, has feelingly told us what shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue.
Edmund Burke
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An appearance of delicacy, and even fragility, is almost essential to beauty.
Edmund Burke
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There is nothing in the world really beneficial that does not lie within the reach of an informed understanding and a well-protected pursuit.
Edmund Burke