If presents, which when they are given were unlawful, can afterwards be legalized by an application of them to the Company's service, no sufferer can even resort to a remedial process at law for his own relief.
Edmund Burke: “If presents, which when they are given were unlawful, can afterwards be legalized by an application of them to the…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke argues that legalizing unlawful presents through their use in Company service denies victims any legal recourse.
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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.
Their objects would be enlarged with their elevation; but their disposition, and habits, and mode of accomplishing their designs must remain the same.
Those who are servants in name, as well as in effect, do not like to be told of their situation, their duty, and their obligations.
All your sophisters cannot produce anything better adapted to preserve a rational and manly freedom than the course that we have pursued, who have chosen our nature rather than our speculations, our breasts rather than our inventions, for…





