Edmund Burke: “The whole transaction, my Lords, was an act of gross violence, ushered in by a gross fraud.”

The improvements of the National Assembly are superficial, their errors fundamental.

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.

Let us imitate their caution, if we wish to deserve their fortune or to retain their bequests.

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.