The Papal authority, so often subservient, so often prejudicial to his designs, he called to his assistance in a cause which did not misbecome it,--the cause of a father attacked by his children.
Edmund Burke: “The Papal authority, so often subservient, so often prejudicial to his designs, he called to his assistance in a cause…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke discusses the complexities of Papal authority in the context of familial conflict.
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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…
But when the leaders choose to make themselves bidders at an auction of popularity, their talents, in the construction of the state, will be of no service.
Our people will find employment enough for a truly patriotic, free, and independent spirit, in guarding what they possess from violation.
If any of them should happen to propose a scheme of liberty soberly limited, and defined with proper qualifications, he will be immediately outbid by his competitors, who will produce something more splendidly popular.





