Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, insensible operation, like that of the air we breathe in.
Edmund Burke: “Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady…”
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Edmund Burke
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gutenberg.orgEditor's note · Context
Burke discusses the pervasive impact of manners on human behavior and society.
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I think our happy situation owing to our Constitution,--but owing to the whole of it, and not to any part singly,--owing in a great measure to what we have left standing in our several reviews and reformations, as well as to what we have…
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They will become flatterers instead of legislators,--the instruments, not the guides of the people.
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Let us imitate their caution, if we wish to deserve their fortune or to retain their bequests.





