Edmund Burke: “The operation of dangerous and delusive first principles obliges us to have recourse to the true ones.”

Unquestionably there was at the Revolution, in the person of King William, a small and a temporary deviation from the strict order of a regular hereditary succession; but it is against all genuine principles of jurisprudence to draw a…

An irregular, convulsive movement may be necessary to throw off an irregular, convulsive disease.

They have little regard to the obvious consequences of their doctrine, though they may see that it leaves positive authority in very few of the positive institutions of this country.

This is the spirit of our Constitution, not only in its settled course, but in all its revolutions.