The Works of the Right Honorable Edmund Burke, Volume 5Little, Brown, 1866 - Great Britain |
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allies ambition ancient appear assignats Atheism Austrian Netherlands authority Brissot Britain called cause conduct consider Constitution crown danger declaration dignity Directory disposition dreadful Duke of Bedford Duke of Portland duty effect enemy England equal Europe everything evil exist faction favor force fortune France French French Revolution friends give Grace Holland honor hope House of Commons House of Lords human Increase to 1791 interest Jacobin justice kind king kingdom labor liberty Lord Lord Fitzwilliam Lord Keppel Lord Malmesbury Louis the Fourteenth Majesty mankind manner massacre matter means ment merit mind ministers mode monarchy moral murder nation nature negotiation never object opinion Paris Parliament party peace persons political present principles proceedings produce reason Regicide religion republic Revolution ruin sans-culottes sort sovereign spirit suffered things thought tion treaty virtue whilst whole wish
Popular passages
Page 314 - Manners are of more importance than laws. Upon them, in a great measure, the laws depend. The law touches us but here and there, and now and then. Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, insensible operation, like that of the air we breathe in. They give their whole form and color to our lives. According to their quality, they aid morals, they supply them, or they totally destroy them.
Page 211 - ... in generosity, in humanity, in every liberal sentiment and every liberal accomplishment, would not have shown himself inferior to the Duke of Bedford, or to any of those whom he traces in his line. His Grace very soon would have wanted all plausibility in his attack upon that provision which belonged more to mine than to me. HE would soon have supplied every deficiency, and symmetrized every disproportion.
Page 240 - The death of a man at a critical juncture, his disgust, his retreat, his disgrace, have brought innumerable calamities on a whole nation. A common soldier, a child, a girl at the door of an inn, have changed the face of fortune, and almost of nature.
Page 313 - ... that all kings, as such, are usurpers ; and, for being kings, may and ought to be put to death, with their wives, families, and adherents. The commonwealth which acts uniformly upon those principles, and which, after abolishing...
Page 344 - What I say, I must say at once. Whatever I write is in its nature testamentary. It may have the weakness but it has the sincerity of a dying declaration. For the few days I have to linger here, I am removed completely from the busy scene of the world ; but I hold myself to be still responsible for every thing that I have done whilst I continued on the place of action.
Page 178 - Why will they not let me remain in obscurity and inaction ? Are they apprehensive, that, if an atom of me remains, the sect has something to fear? Must I be annihilated, lest, like old John Zisca's, my skin might be made into a drum, to animate Europe to eternal battle against a tyranny that threatens to overwhelm all Europe and all the human race...
Page 246 - ... a great state is too much envied, too much dreaded, to find safety in humiliation. To be secure, it must be respected. Power, and eminence, and consideration, are things not to be begged. They must be commanded : and they, who supplicate for mercy from others, can never hope for justice through themselves.
Page 241 - But out of the tomb of the murdered Monarchy in France, has arisen a vast, tremendous, unformed spectre, in a far more terrific guise than any which ever yet have overpowered the imagination, and subdued the fortitude of man. Going straight forward to its end, unappalled by peril, unchecked by remorse, despising all common maxims and all common means...
Page 222 - ... ticketed, sorted, and numbered ; suited to every season and every fancy; some with the top of the pattern at the bottom, and some with the bottom at the top ; some plain, some flowered ; some distinguished for their simplicity; others for their complexity ; some of blood...
Page 212 - I do not know that it is forbidden to repel the attacks of unjust and inconsiderate men. The patience of Job is proverbial. After some of the convulsive struggles of our irritable nature, he submitted himself, and repented in dust and ashes. But even so, I do not find him blamed for reprehending, and with a considerable degree of verbal asperity, those ill-natured neighbors of his, who visited his dunghill, to read moral, political, and economical lectures on his misery. I am alone. I have none to...