If, through mistake or passion, they are led to contribute to its ruin, we shall at least have a consolation denied to the ruined country that adjoins us: we shall not be destroyed by men of mean or secondary capacities.
Burke reflects on the potential for great leaders to either uplift or ruin the nation, emphasizing the importance of their character.
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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.
When such an unwarrantable maxim is once established, that no throne is lawful but the elective, no one act of the princes who preceded this era of fictitious election can be valid.
But supposing they had ranked as they ought to do, and as with us they do actually, the sides of sick-beds are not the academies for forming statesmen and legislators.
But the course of succession is the healthy habit of the British Constitution.
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