These were the liberties which their ancestors had received by the free concession of a former king, and these the rights which their virtue was to force from the present, if (which God forbid!) they should find it necessary to have recourse to such extremities.
Burke highlights the ancestral rights of the barons and their determination to reclaim them.
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Our people will find employment enough for a truly patriotic, free, and independent spirit, in guarding what they possess from violation.
Let us imitate their caution, if we wish to deserve their fortune or to retain their bequests.
The improvements of the National Assembly are superficial, their errors fundamental.
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.
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