It is not the incompatibility or agreeableness of incidents, characters, or sentiments with the probable in fact, but with propriety in design, that admits or excludes them from a place in any composition.
Burke articulates that the appropriateness of elements in a composition is determined by their alignment with the design's intent, not just their realism.
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More from Edmund Burke
A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation.
They look upon the legal hereditary succession of their crown as among their rights, not as among their wrongs,--as a benefit, not as a grievance,--as a security for their liberty, not as a badge of servitude.
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?
This is the spirit of our Constitution, not only in its settled course, but in all its revolutions.
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