This is exactly the excuse which the savages of America, who have no regular government, make at this day upon the like occasions; but it would be a strange apology from one of the modern states of Europe that had employed armies against another.
Burke draws a parallel between the excuses of ancient Britons and the justifications used by contemporary groups without formal governance.
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More from Edmund Burke
They will become flatterers instead of legislators,--the instruments, not the guides of the people.
The improvements of the National Assembly are superficial, their errors fundamental.
It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition or restraint.
Rome, under her emperors, united the evils of both systems; and this unnatural combination was one great cause of her ruin.
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