On the record
I parted with it as with a limb, but as a limb to save the body: and I would have parted with more, if more had been necessary; anything rather than a fruitless, hopeless, unnatural civil war.
Said by
Edmund Burke
Source
gutenberg.orgEdmund Burke: “I parted with it as with a limb, but as a limb to save the body: and I would have parted with more, if more had been…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke expresses the deep personal sacrifice he is willing to make to avoid civil war.
Share
More from Edmund Burke
Jan 1, 1790
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…
Jan 1, 1790
Not being illuminated with the light of which the gentlemen of France tell us they have got so abundant a share, they acted under a strong impression of the ignorance and fallibility of mankind.
Jan 1, 1790
Whatever they are, I wish my countrymen rather to recommend to our neighbors the example of the British Constitution than to take models from them for the improvement of our own.
Jan 1, 1790
I would not exclude alteration neither; but even when I changed, it should be to preserve.
Other voices in this conversation
