Political Quotes

Edmund Burke: But the very habit of stating these extreme cases is not very laudable or safe; because, in general, it is not right to…

On the record
But the very habit of stating these extreme cases is not very laudable or safe; because, in general, it is not right to turn our duties into doubts.
Said by
Edmund Burke

Editor's note · Context

Burke warns against the tendency to question our duties excessively, as it can lead to moral confusion.

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Jan 1, 1790

If kings who did not owe their crown to the choice of their people had no title to make laws, what will become of the statute De tallagio non concedendo? of the Petition of Right? of the act of Habeas Corpus?

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Jan 1, 1790

So far is it from being true that we acquired a right by the Revolution to elect our kings, that, if we had possessed it before, the English nation did at that time most solemnly renounce and abdicate it, for themselves, and for all their…

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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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Who could conceive that men who are habitually meddling, daring, subtle, active, of litigious dispositions and unquiet minds, would easily fall back into their old condition of obscure contention, and laborious, low, and unprofitable…

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