Edmund Burke: “We are not made at once to pity the oppressor and the oppressed.”

The engagement and pact of society, which generally goes by the name of the Constitution, forbids such invasion and such surrender.

But the course of succession is the healthy habit of the British Constitution.

Who could flatter himself that these men, suddenly, and as it were by enchantment, snatched from the humblest rank of subordination, would not be intoxicated with their unprepared greatness?

But supposing they had ranked as they ought to do, and as with us they do actually, the sides of sick-beds are not the academies for forming statesmen and legislators.