Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burkewas an Irish statesman born in Dublin, as well as an author, orator, political theorist, and philosopher who, after moving to London, served as a member of parliamentfor many years in the House of Commons with the Whig Party...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth12 January 1729
CountryIreland
men giving way
Men who undertake considerable things, even in a regular way, ought to give us ground to presume ability.
good-friend men self
My good friends, while I do most earnestly recommend you to take care of your health and safety, as things most precious to us, I would not have that care degenerate into an effeminate and over-curious attention, which is always disgraceful to a man's self, and often troublesome to others.
imagination understanding mind
It is from this absolute indifference and tranquillity of the mind, that mathematical speculations derive some of the most considerable advantages; because there is nothing to interest the imagination; because the judgment sits free and unbiased to examine the point. All proportions, every arrangement of quantity, is alike to the understanding, because the same truths result to it from all; from greater from lesser, from equality and inequality.
christian character healing
Politics and the pulpit are terms that have little agreement. No sound ought to be heard in the church but the healing voice of Christian charity. The cause of civil liberty and civil government gains as little as that of religion by this confusion of duties. Those who quit their proper character to assume what does not belong to them are, for the greater part, ignorant both of the character they leave and of the character they assume.
people care may
It is undoubtedly the business of ministers very much to consult the inclinations of the people, but they ought to take great care that they do not receive that inclination from the few persons who may happen to approach them.
country thinking people
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.
beauty delicacy essentials
An appearance of delicacy, and even fragility, is almost essential to beauty.
law judging golden
It is the function of a judge not to make but to declare the law, according to the golden mete-wand of the law and not by the crooked cord of discretion.
prison crime capable
Crimes lead one into another; they who are capable of being forgers are capable of being incendiaries.
men evil good-man
Evil prevails when good men fail to act.
adversity instructors severe
Adversity is a severe instructor, set over us by one who knows us better than we do ourselves.
numbers imagination shadow
Because half a dozen grasshoppers under a fern make the field ring with their importunate chink, whilst thousands of great cattle, reposed beneath the shadow of the British oak, chew the cud and are silent, pray, to not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field; that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little, shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome insects of the hour.
mean world moral
There is nothing that God has judged good for us that He has not given us the means to accomplish, both in the natural and the moral world.
sacrifice should toleration
I take toleration to be a part of religion. I do not know which I would sacrifice; I would keep them both: it is not necessary that I should sacrifice either.