If the people are happy, united, wealthy, and powerful, we presume the rest. We conclude that to be good from whence good is derived. – Edmund Burke
But what is liberty without wisdom, and without virtue? It is the greatest of all possible evils for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition or restraint. – Edmund Burke
Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites…
Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. – Edmund Burke
The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion. – Edmund Burke