Hastings is his having avowedly looked to such a tyrant and such a usurper as his model, and followed that pernicious example with a servile fidelity.
Edmund Burke: “Hastings is his having avowedly looked to such a tyrant and such a usurper as his model, and followed that pernicious…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke criticizes Hastings for emulating a tyrant, highlighting the moral implications of leadership.
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They will become flatterers instead of legislators,--the instruments, not the guides of the people.
Whatever they are, I wish my countrymen rather to recommend to our neighbors the example of the British Constitution than to take models from them for the improvement of our own.
Not being illuminated with the light of which the gentlemen of France tell us they have got so abundant a share, they acted under a strong impression of the ignorance and fallibility of mankind.
They come from one who has been no tool of power, no flatterer of greatness, and who in his last acts does not wish to belie the tenor of his life.





