They defend their errors as if they were defending their inheritance. – Edmund Burke
And having looked to government for bread, on the very first scarcity they will turn and bite the hand that fed them. To avoid that evil, government will redouble the causes of it; and then it will become inveterate and incurable. – 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
When ancient opinions and rules of life are taken away, the loss cannot possibly be estimated. From that moment, we have no compass to govern us, nor can we know distinctly to what port to steer. – Edmund Burke