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Law and arbitrary power are at eternal enmity.

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
Eternal
Law
Power
Enmity
Arbitrary

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The most important of all revolutions, a revolution in sentiments, manners and moral opinions.
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The ocean is an object of no small terror.
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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.
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To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely.
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The very name of a politician, a statesman, is sure to cause terror and hatred it has always connected with it the ideas of treachery, cruelty, fraud, and tyranny.
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Those who have been once intoxicated with power, and have derived any kind of emolument from it, even though but for one year, never can willingly abandon it. They may be distressed in the midst of all their power but they will never look to anything but power for their relief.
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Whilst shame keeps its watch, virtue is not wholly extinguished in the heart nor will moderation be utterly exiled from the minds of tyrants.
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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.
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Men have no right to put the well-being of the present generation wholly out of the question. Perhaps the only moral trust with any certainty in our hands is the care of our own time.
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There are circumstances in which despair does not imply inactivity.
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It has all the contortions of the sibyl without the inspiration.
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In a democracy, the majority of the citizens is capable of exercising the most cruel oppressions upon the minority.
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A thing may look specious in theory, and yet be ruinous in practice a thing may look evil in theory, and yet be in practice excellent.
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Religious persecution may shield itself under the guise of a mistaken and over-zealous piety.
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They [Americans] augur misgovernment at a distance and snuff the approach of tyranny in every tainted breeze.
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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.
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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.
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Religion is essentially the art and the theory of the remaking of man. Man is not a finished creation.
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All the forces of darkness need to succeed ... is for the people to do nothing.
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Dogs are indeed the most social, affectionate, and amiable animals of the whole brute creation.
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