This outrage on all the rights of property was at first covered with what, on the system of their conduct, was the most astonishing of all pretexts,--a regard to national faith.
Edmund Burke: “This outrage on all the rights of property was at first covered with what, on the system of their conduct, was the most…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke argues that the initial justification for property seizure was a deceptive pretext for violating rights.
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If kings who did not owe their crown to the choice of their people had no title to make laws, what will become of the statute De tallagio non concedendo? of the Petition of Right? of the act of Habeas Corpus?
Though a king may abdicate for his own person, he cannot abdicate for the monarchy.
Who could doubt but that, at any expense to the state, of which they understood nothing, they must pursue their private interests, which they understood but too well?
They look on the frame of their commonwealth, such as it stands, to be of inestimable value; and they conceive the undisturbed succession of the crown to be a pledge of the stability and perpetuity of all the other members of our…





