On the recordJanuary 1, 1790
The usurpation, which, in order to subvert ancient institutions, has destroyed ancient principles, will hold power by arts similar to those by which it has acquired it.
Said by
Edmund Burke
Source
gutenberg.orgThe usurpation, which, in order to subvert ancient institutions, has destroyed ancient principles, will hold power by arts similar to those by which it has acquired it.
From his critique of the French Revolution, this passage describes how revolutionary power, having destroyed old principles, will maintain itself through similar means.
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Governments must be abused and deranged indeed, before it can be thought of; and the prospect of the future must be as bad as the experience of the past.
Their trust for the future preservation of the Constitution was not in future revolutions.
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.
A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation.