Edmund Burke

From Conservapedia

Edmund Burke (born January 12, 1729 in Dublin, died July 9, 1797) was an Irish statesman, orator, political thinker, and author.

Burke served in the British Parliament, where he defended the rights of the American colonies and opposed the slave trade, making him a hero to many in America. He is also considered to the world's first political conservative, and many conservatives today praise him for that reason. His toughts are also the basement for liberal conservatism as we know it today. His works include:

• "Inquiries into the Sublime and Beautiful" (defending the American colonies and examining how people interpret what they see)
• "Reflections on the Revolution in France" (warning that the French Revolution was evil because a few would gain control and abuse their power)

Burke's "A Letter to a Member of the National Assembly," (1791) included the following:

"What is liberty without wisdom and without virtue?

It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and

madness, without restraint.

Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their

disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites; in

proportion as they are disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise

and good in preference to the flattery of knaves.

Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and

appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the

more there must be without.

It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of

intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters."

Edmund Burke's most famous quote is this: "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."