Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burkewas an Irish statesman born in Dublin, as well as an author, orator, political theorist, and philosopher who, after moving to London, served as a member of parliamentfor many years in the House of Commons with the Whig Party...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth12 January 1729
CountryIreland
psychological anxious ruined
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions than ruined by too confident a security.
success mind criteria
The only infallible criterion of wisdom to vulgar minds - success.
truth exercise men
Falsehood and delusion are allowed in no case whatever; but, as in the exercise of all the virtues, there is an economy of truth. It is a sort of temperance, by which a man speaks truth with measure, that he may speak it the longer.
stars views ideas
Magnificence is likewise a source of the sublime. A great profusion of things which are splendid or valuable in themselves is magnificent. The starry heaven, though it occurs so very frequently to our view, never fails to excite an idea of grandeur.
taken men flying
Unsociable humors are contracted in solitude, which will, in the end, not fail of corrupting the understanding as well as the manners, and of utterly disqualifying a man for the satisfactions and duties of life. Men must be taken as they are, and we neither make them or ourselves better by flying from or quarreling with them.
ideas solitude purpose
An entire life of solitude contradicts the purpose of our being, since death itself is scarcely an idea of more terror.
quality causes vices
Prudence is a quality incompatible with vice, and can never be effectively enlisted in its cause.
order silence may
If the prudence of reserve and decorum dictates silence in some circumstances, in others prudence of a higher order may justify us in speaking our thoughts.
power hands guilty
Power, in whatever hands, is rarely guilty of too strict limitations on itself.
character men power
Nothing, indeed, but the possession of some power can with any certainty discover what at the bottom is the true character of any man.
names ideas hatred
The very name of a politician, a statesman, is sure to cause terror and hatred; it has always connected with it the ideas of treachery, cruelty, fraud, and tyranny.
men years people
It is very rare, indeed, for men to be wrong in their feelings concerning public misconduct; as rare to be right in their speculations upon the cause of it. I have constantly observed that the generality of people are fifty years, at least, behind in their politics.
men animal cooks
Man is an animal that cooks his victuals.
men mind littles
I consider how little man is, yet, in his own mind, how great. He is lord and master of all things, yet scarce can command anything.