On the record
It generally happens that a new nation, with a new method of making war, succeeds against a people only exercised in arms by their own civil dissensions.
Said by
Edmund Burke
Source
gutenberg.orgEdmund Burke: “It generally happens that a new nation, with a new method of making war, succeeds against a people only exercised in…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke notes that new nations with innovative warfare tactics often succeed against established powers embroiled in civil strife.
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More from Edmund Burke
Jan 1, 1790
The House of Lords, for instance, is not morally competent to dissolve the House of Commons,--no, nor even to dissolve itself, nor to abdicate, if it would, its portion in the legislature of the kingdom.
Jan 1, 1790
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.
Jan 1, 1790
A few years ago I should be ashamed to overload a matter so capable of supporting itself by the then unnecessary support of any argument; but this seditious, unconstitutional doctrine is now publicly taught, avowed, and printed.
Jan 1, 1790
No experience has taught us that in any other course or method than that of an hereditary crown our liberties can be regularly perpetuated and preserved sacred as our hereditary right.
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