Whilst kings stand firm on their base, though under that base there is a sure-wrought mine, there will not be wanting to their levees a single person of those who are attached to their fortune, and not to their persons or cause; but hereafter none will support a tottering throne.
Burke reflects on the loyalty of those who support a king based on fortune rather than principle.
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More from Edmund Burke
If all the absurd theories of lawyers and divines were to vitiate the objects in which they are conversant, we should have no law and no religion left in the world.
This is the spirit of our Constitution, not only in its settled course, but in all its revolutions.
By adhering in this manner and on those principles to our forefathers, we are guided, not by the superstition of antiquarians, but by the spirit of philosophic analogy.
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