The powers and policies by which they have succeeded are not those of great statesmen or great military commanders, but the practices of incendiaries, assassins, housebreakers, robbers, spreaders of false news, forgers of false orders from authority, and other delinquencies, of which ordinary justice takes cognizance.
Burke critiques the methods used by revolutionaries, likening them to criminals rather than honorable leaders.
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But the course of succession is the healthy habit of the British Constitution.
As he is not to obey us, but we are to obey the law in him, our Constitution has made no sort of provision towards rendering him, as a servant, in any degree responsible.
Their trust for the future preservation of the Constitution was not in future revolutions.
This idea of a liberal descent inspires us with a sense of habitual native dignity, which prevents that upstart insolence almost inevitably adhering to and disgracing those who are the first acquirers of any distinction.
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