On the record
My feeble nature might shrink, though theirs did not, from the proof; but my reason and my ambition tell me that it would be a good bargain to purchase their merits with their fate.
Said by
Edmund Burke
Source
gutenberg.orgEdmund Burke: “My feeble nature might shrink, though theirs did not, from the proof; but my reason and my ambition tell me that it…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke contemplates the value of sacrificing personal comfort for the sake of honoring the merits of others.
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More from Edmund Burke
Jan 1, 1790
When such an unwarrantable maxim is once established, that no throne is lawful but the elective, no one act of the princes who preceded this era of fictitious election can be valid.
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Those who are servants in name, as well as in effect, do not like to be told of their situation, their duty, and their obligations.
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But the king of Great Britain obeys no other person; all other persons are individually, and collectively too, under him, and owe to him a legal obedience.
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The House of Lords, for instance, is not morally competent to dissolve the House of Commons,--no, nor even to dissolve itself, nor to abdicate, if it would, its portion in the legislature of the kingdom.
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