You see there is not a word he says upon this occasion which has common sense in it; you see one great leading principle in it,--that he does not once attempt to deny the charge.
Edmund Burke: “You see there is not a word he says upon this occasion which has common sense in it; you see one great leading principle…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke critiques the lack of sense in Hastings' arguments and highlights a key principle of his defense.
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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.
The ceremony of cashiering kings, of which these gentlemen talk so much at their ease, can rarely, if ever, be performed without force.
We procure reverence to our civil institutions on the principle upon which Nature teaches us to revere individual men: on account of their age, and on account of those from whom they are descended.
A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation.





