On the record
If any inquiry thus carefully conducted should fail at last of discovering the truth, it may answer an end perhaps as useful, in discovering to us the weakness of our own understanding.
Said by
Edmund Burke
Source
gutenberg.orgEdmund Burke: “If any inquiry thus carefully conducted should fail at last of discovering the truth, it may answer an end perhaps as…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke emphasizes the value of inquiry, even if it leads to recognizing our own limitations.
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This is the spirit of our Constitution, not only in its settled course, but in all its revolutions.
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But an absurd theory on one side of a question forms no justification for alleging a false fact or promulgating mischievous maxims on the other.
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If all the absurd theories of lawyers and divines were to vitiate the objects in which they are conversant, we should have no law and no religion left in the world.
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