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Thank God, men that art greatly guilty are never wise.

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
Men
Greatly
Thank
Guilty
Wise
Wisdom
Art
Never

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The concessions of the weak are the concessions of fear.
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Man is by his constitution a religious animal atheism is against not only our reason, but our instincts.
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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.
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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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A definition may be very exact, and yet go but a very little way towards informing us of the nature of the thing defined.
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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.
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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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The grand instructor, time.
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People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors.
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I am not one of those who think that the people are never in the wrong. They have been so, frequently and outrageously, both in other countries and in this. But I do say that in all disputes between them and their rulers, the presumption is at least upon a par in favour of the people.
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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.
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Expense, and great expense, may be an essential part in true economy. If parsimony were to be considered as one of the kinds of that virtue, there is, however, another and a higher economy. Economy is a distinctive virtue, and consists not in saving, but in selection.
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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.
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It is by sympathy we enter into the concerns of others, that we are moved as they are moved, and are never suffered to be indifferent spectators of almost anything which men can do or suffer. For sympathy may be considered as a sort of substitution, by which we are put into the place of another man, and affected in many respects as he is affected.
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Over-taxation cost England her colonies of North America.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Crimes lead into one another. They who are capable of being forgers, are capable of being incendiaries.
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It is, generally, in the season of prosperity that men discover their real temper, principles, and designs.
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