The lion, having sucked the blood of his prey, threw the offal carcass to the jackal in waiting.
Edmund Burke: “The lion, having sucked the blood of his prey, threw the offal carcass to the jackal in waiting.”
Editor's note · Context
Burke uses a metaphor to illustrate the predatory nature of power dynamics.
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I would not exclude alteration neither; but even when I changed, it should be to preserve.
They will become flatterers instead of legislators,--the instruments, not the guides of the people.
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.
Let us add, if we please, but let us preserve what they have left; and standing on the firm ground of the British Constitution, let us be satisfied to admire, rather than attempt to follow in their desperate flights, the aëronauts of…





