Edmund Burke Quotes - Page 2

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• It is a general popular error to suppose the loudest complainers for the public to be the most anxious for its welfare.

  Edmund Burke

  Errors, Liberty, Grumbling

  'Observations on...the Present State of the Nation' (1769)

  98 Copy quote

• The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.

  Edmund Burke

  Wisdom, Freedom, Giving Up

  Speech at County Meeting of Buckinghamshire, 1784

  54 Copy quote

• 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

  Wisdom, Evil, Liberty

  Edmund Burke (2005). “Burke, Select Works”, The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.

  60 Copy quote

• A coward's courage is in his tongue.

  Edmund Burke

  Coward, Tongue, Cowardice

  17 Copy quote

• The greatest sin is to do nothing because you can only do a little.

  Edmund Burke

  Making A Difference, Charity, Littles

  24 Copy quote

• By gnawing through a dike, even a rat may drown a nation.

  Edmund Burke

  Inspirational, Perseverance, May

  17 Copy quote

• When the leaders choose to make themselves bidders at an auction of popularity, their talents, in the construction of the state, will be of no service. They will become flatterers instead of legislators; the instruments, not the guides, of the people.

  Edmund Burke

  People, Leader, Auctions

  Edmund Burke (1790). “Reflections on the Revolution in France: And on the Proceedings in Certain Societies in London Relative to that Event. In a Letter Intended to Have Been Sent to a Gentleman in Paris”, p.353

  23 Copy quote

• Nothing turns out to be so oppressive and unjust as a feeble government.

  Edmund Burke

  Government, Unjust, Oppressive Governments

  Edmund Burke (1912). “Reflections on the French Revolution”, p.235, CUP Archive

  57 Copy quote

• Among a people generally corrupt liberty cannot long exist.

  Edmund Burke

  Long, People, Political

  'Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol' (1777) p. 71

  28 Copy quote

• Freedom without virtue is not freedom but license to pursue whatever passions prevail in the intemperate mind; man's right to freedom being in exact proportion to his willingness to put chains upon his own appetites; the less restraint from within, the more must be imposed from without.

  Edmund Burke

  Passion, Men, Mind

  14 Copy quote

• 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

  Taken, Loss, Opinion

  Edmund Burke (1868). “Reflections on the Revolution in France and on the Proceedings in Certain Societies in London Relative to that Event: 1790”, p.92

  27 Copy quote

• People must be taken as they are, and we should never try make them or ourselves better by quarreling with them.

  Edmund Burke

  Relationship, Taken, People

  42 Copy quote

• When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.

  Edmund Burke

  Honesty, Integrity, War

  Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents (1770) See Edmund Burke 28; Mill 18

  24 Copy quote

• Men love to hear of their power, but have an extreme disrelish to be told their duty.

  Edmund Burke

  Men, Duty, Extremes

  Edmund Burke (1999). “The Portable Edmund Burke”, p.457, Penguin

  12 Copy quote

• You will smile here at the consistency of those democratists who, when they are not on their guard, treat the humbler part of the community with the greatest contempt, whilst, at the same time they pretend to make them the depositories of all power.

  Edmund Burke

  Community, Consistency, Treats

  Edmund Burke (1834). “The Works of the Right Hon. Edmund Burke: With a Biographical and Critical Introduction, and Portrait After Sir Joshua Reynolds”, p.402

  14 Copy quote

• The great difference between the real leader and the pretender is that the one sees into the future, while the other regards only the present; the one lives by the day, and acts upon expediency; the other acts on enduring principles and for the immortality.

  Edmund Burke

  Leadership, Real, Differences

  15 Copy quote

• Despots govern by terror. They know that he who fears God fears nothing else; and therefore they eradicate from the mind, through their Voltaire, their Helvetius, and the rest of that infamous gang, that only sort of fear which generates true courage.

  Edmund Burke

  Mind, Gang, Infamous

  Edmund Burke (1852). “The works and correspondence of...Edmund Burke”, p.378

  49 Copy quote

• What ever disunites man from God, also disunites man from man.

  Edmund Burke

  God, Men, Unity

  14 Copy quote

• The credulity of dupes is as inexhaustible as the invention of knaves.

  Edmund Burke

  Knaves, Dupes, Invention

  Edmund Burke (1852). “The Works and Correspondance of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke”, p.363

  10 Copy quote

• Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites.

  Edmund Burke

  Men, Liberty, Moral

  Edmund Burke (1828). “The Beauties of Burke: Consisting of Selections from His Works”, p.86

  57 Copy quote

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

  Edmund Burke

  Change, Mean, Diversity

  Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790)

  26 Copy quote

• No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear.

  Edmund Burke

  Inspirational, Motivational, Success

  'On the Sublime and Beautiful' (1757) pt. 2, sect. 2

  32 Copy quote

• In history, a great volume is unrolled for our instruction, drawing the materials of future wisdom from the past errors and infirmities of mankind.

  Edmund Burke

  Wisdom, Past, Errors

  Edmund Burke (1790). “Reflections on the Revolution in France: And on the Proceedings in Certain Societies in London Relative to that Event. In a Letter Intended to Have Been Sent to a Gentleman in Paris”, p.208

  25 Copy quote

• The true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedience, and by parts.

  Edmund Burke

  Liberty, Libertarian, Internet

  Edmund Burke (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of Edmund Burke (Illustrated)”, p.3631, Delphi Classics

  32 Copy quote

• Power gradually extirpates from the mind every humane and gentle virtue.

  Edmund Burke

  Power, Mind, Politics

  "The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke: Collected in Three Volumes".

  8 Copy quote

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