I do not deny, that, in small, truckling states, a timely compromise with power has often been the means, and the only means; of drawling out their puny existence; but a great state is too much envied, too much dreaded, to find safety in humiliation.
Burke argues that great nations cannot find safety in humiliation, unlike smaller states that may compromise for survival.
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If kings who did not owe their crown to the choice of their people had no title to make laws, what will become of the statute De tallagio non concedendo? of the Petition of Right? of the act of Habeas Corpus?
But an absurd theory on one side of a question forms no justification for alleging a false fact or promulgating mischievous maxims on the other.
They look upon the legal hereditary succession of their crown as among their rights, not as among their wrongs,--as a benefit, not as a grievance,--as a security for their liberty, not as a badge of servitude.
Do they mean to attaint and disable backwards all the kings that have reigned before the Revolution, and consequently to stain the throne of England with the blot of a continual usurpation?
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