The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 02 (of 12)

There was a circumstance (justice will not suffer me to pass it over) which, if anything could enforce the reasons I have given, would fully justify the act of relief, and rende...

For my part, I should choose (if I could have my wish) that the proposition of the honorable gentleman[13] for the repeal could go to America without the attendance of the penal...

I am aware that the age is not what we all wish. But I am sure that the only means of checking its precipitate degeneracy is heartily to concur with whatever is the best in our...

Gentlemen, I never relished acts of grace, nor ever submitted to them but from despair of better. They are a dishonorable invention, by which, not from humanity, not from policy...

It is argued, as a part of the bill derogatory to the prerogatives of the crown, that the commissioners named in the bill are to continue for a short term of years, too short in...

With regard to the first charge, my friends have spoken to ms of it in the style of amicable expostulation,--not so much blaming the thing as lamenting the effects. Others, less...

Gentlemen,--I cannot avoid sympathizing strongly with the feelings of the gentleman who has received the same honor that you have conferred on me. If he, who was bred and passed...

Whoever seriously considers the excellent argument of Lord Somers, in the Bankers' Case, will see he bottoms himself upon the very same maxim which I do; and one of his principa...

We must follow the nature of our affairs, and conform ourselves to our situation. If we do, our objects are plain and compassable. Why should we resolve to do nothing, because w...

It has been usual for a candidate who declines to take his leave by a letter to the sheriffs: but I received your trust in the face of day, and in the face of day I accept your...

It is, Sir, because I wish to keep this business of subordinate treasuries as much as I can together, that I brought the _ordnance office_ before you, though it is properly a mi...

Thus, Sir, I have disposed of this falsehood. But falsehood has a perennial spring. It is said that no conjecture could be made of the dislike of the colonies to the principle....

Sir, the agents and distributors of falsehoods have, with their usual industry, circulated another lie, of the same nature with the former. It is this: that the disturbances aro...

Such an universal proscription, upon any pretence, has few examples. Such a proscription, without even a pretence of delinquency, has none. It stands by itself. It stands as a m...

The manner of proceeding in the duties on paper and glass, imposed by the same act, was exactly in the same spirit. There are heavy excises on those articles, when used in Engla...

I cannot set my face against such arguments. Is it quite fair to suppose that I have no other motive for yielding to them but a desire of acting _against_ my constituents? It is...

Gentlemen, America--When the English nation seemed to be dangerously, if not irrecoverably divided,--when one, and that the most growing branch, was torn from the parent stock,...

If all the colonies do not appear at the outcry, what is the condition of those assemblies who offer, by themselves or their agents, to tax themselves up to your ideas of their...

Nor is it the worst effect of this unnatural contention, that our _laws_ are corrupted. Whilst _manners_ remain entire, they will correct the vices of law, and soften it at leng...

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Ireland, before the English conquest, though never governed by a despotic power, had no Parliament. How far the English Parliament itself was at that time modelled according to...

First, the people of the colonies are descendants of Englishmen. England, Sir, is a nation which still, I hope, respects, and formerly adored, her freedom. The colonists emigrat...

If I have the misfortune of differing with some of my fellow-citizens on this great and arduous subject, it is no small consolation to me that I do not differ from you. With you...

My idea is nothing more. Refined policy ever has been the parent of confusion,--and ever will be so, as long as the world endures. Plain good intention, which is as easily disco...

Sir, I am well aware that the state and the result of the French economy which I have laid before you are even now lightly treated by some who ought never to speak but from info...

Civil freedom, Gentlemen, is not, as many have endeavored to persuade you, a thing that lies hid in the depth of abstruse science. It is a blessing and a benefit, not an abstrac...

Men will not look to acts of Parliament, to regulations, to declarations, to votes, and resolutions. No, they are not such fools. They will ask, What is the road to power, credi...

Coming upon this ground of the civil list, the first thing in dignity and charge that attracts our notice is the _royal household_. This establishment, in my opinion, is exceedi...

From time to time, therefore, Parliament provided for their government according to its discretion, and to its opinion of what was required by the public necessities. We do not...

My third assertion, relative to the abuse made of the right of war and peace, is, that there are none who have ever confided in us who have not been utterly ruined. The examples...

It is an empire of this extent, of this complicated nature, of this dignity and importance, that I have compared to Germany and the German government,--not for an exact resembla...

This Board of Trade and Plantations has not been of any use to the colonies, as colonies: so little of use, that the flourishing settlements of New England, of Virginia, and of...

In all those acts the system of commerce is established as that from whence alone you proposed to make the colonies contribute (I mean directly and by the operation of your supe...

An attempt was lately made to improve this branch of local influence, and to transfer it to the fund of general corruption. I have on the seat behind me the constitution of Mr....

On the 28th of January, 1756,[26] a message from the king came to us, to this effect:--"His Majesty, being sensible of the zeal and vigor with which his faithful subjects of cer...

This dangerous innovation we, his faithful Commons, think it our duty to mark; and as these admonitions from the throne, by their frequent repetition, seem intended to lead grad...

The territory of this Fizulla Khân, Mr. Speaker, is less than the County of Norfolk. It is an inland country, full seven hundred miles from any seaport, and not distinguished fo...

When any community is subordinately connected with another, the great danger of the connection is the extreme pride and self-complacency of the superior, which in all matters of...

I think it is nearly as little in our power to change their republican religion as their free descent, or to substitute the Roman Catholic as a penalty, or the Church of England...

Here your Governor stimulates a rapacious and licentious soldiery to the personal search of women, lest these unhappy creatures should avail themselves of the protection of thei...

"The noble and learned lord on the woolsack, in the debate which opened the business of this day, asserted that your Lordships were incompetent to make any alteration in a money...