Edmund Burke

The public interest requires doing today those things that men of intelligence and good will would wish, five or ten years hence, had been done.

It is the nature of all greatness not to be exact.

Good order is the foundation of all things.

Whilst shame keeps its watch, virtue is not wholly extinguished in the heart; nor will moderation be utterly exiled from the minds of tyrants.

The tyranny of a multitude is a multiplied tyranny.

A State without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation.

The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations.

I know of nothing sublime which is not some modification of power.

Fraud is the ready minister of injustice.

There is America, which at this day serves for little more than to amuse you with stories of savage men and uncouth manners, yet shall, before you taste of death, show itself equal to the whole of that commerce which now attracts the envy of the world.

A spirit of innovation is generally the result of a selfish temper and confined views. People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors.

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.

Taxing is an easy business. Any projector can contrive new impositions; any bungler can add to the old; but is it altogether wise to have no other bounds to your impositions than the patience of those who are to bear them?

The concessions of the weak are the concessions of fear.

I dread our own power, and our own ambition; I dread our being too much dreaded... We may say that we shall not abuse this astonishing, and hitherto unheard-of-power. But every other nation will think we shall abuse it. It is impossible but that, sooner or later, this state of things must produce a combination against us which may end in our ruin.

Crimes lead into one another. They who are capable of being forgers, are capable of being incendiaries.

Of this stamp is the cant of, Not men, but measures.

Wars are just to those to whom they are necessary.

Nnothing tends more to the corruption of science than to suffer it to stagnate. These waters must be troubled, before they can exert their virtues.

A populace never rebels from passion for attack, but from impatience of suffering.

Dangers by being despised grow great.