Edmund Burke

"Taste and elegance, though they are rightly called the off-spring of judgment and strength, are far from being little trifles."

"To speak of it in the abstract is all very well, but we must come to practical details."

"The occupation of an aesthete is a sedentary trade."

"Liberty too must be limited in order to be possessed."

"The temple of honour will not be opened to you, the way is not through me."

"Our ancestors are not chosen by us, but our principles should be."

"There is but one law for all, namely that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator."

"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."

"Good order is the foundation of all good things."

"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact measure to which they are qualified for self-command."

"In what does real power consist? It consists, I believe, in the dominion over the affections and over the will."

"Every species of property has not the same operation, and every operation is not the same, and every operation is not to be considered upon the supposition that things remain always in the state in which they were."

"Whilst shame keeps its place in the minds of men, certain extremities of rigour cannot anyway be submitted to without destruction to the Empire that uses them."

"The machinery of government is observation to which wisdom must preside and vigilance attend."

"Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion."

"Learning is a pleasant alchemy, by which common things are converted into value."

"Clouds that threaten are not always clouds of despair and impending ruin; they may be the harbingers of refreshing showers."

"Falsehood is a perennial spring."

"The effect of frugality is not always to make people rich, but to make them less poor."

"The first palliation of labour is to regulate it properly."

"A man is glorified not in that he labours, but in that he knows for what he labours."

"Whenever we speak with heat and dissatisfaction of the liberal professions, we may take it for granted that we are not well acquainted with them."

"Moderation will be stigmatized as the virtue of cowards."

"The truly sublime is made up of a kind of delightful horror, a sort of tranquillity tinged by terror."

"The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance."

"Mere mechanics may be so cultivated as to rise to a considerable degree of science."

"The function of the executive authority is to preserve, protect and defend the constitution."

"The vain labour of the brain as employed in investigations of metaphysical philosophy is somewhat exhausting."

"Violent extremes in government are changed into one another."

"The great inlet by which unprincipled men come into power is by one principle of our nature: our indifference."