Edmund Burke book An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs
Source: An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs (1791), p. 409
Source: An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs (1791), p. 436
Edmund Burke book An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs
Source: An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs (1791), p. 409
William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne (1779–1848) British Whig statesman
Letter to Lord Holland (10 December 1815), quoted in Philip Ziegler, Melbourne. A Biography of William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne (London: Collins, 1976), p. 70
Edmund Burke book An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs
Source: An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs (1791), p. 476
David Hume (1711–1776) Scottish philosopher, economist, and historian
Letter to Henry Home (9 February 1848), quoted in J. Y. T. Greig, The Letters of David Hume: Volume I (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1932), p. 111
Herbert Butterfield book The Whig Interpretation of History
Source: The Whig Interpretation of History (1931)
Bernard Bailyn book The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution
Source: The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (1967), Chapter V, TRANSFORMATION, p. 198.
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) Anglo-Irish statesman
Letter to the Bishop of Salisbury John Douglas (31 July 1791), quoted in Alfred Cobban and Robert A. Smith (eds.), The Correspondence of Edmund Burke, Volume VI: July 1789–December 1791 (1967), p. 309
1790s
Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey (1764–1845) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
Speech in the House of Commons (25 April 1800), reported in The Parliamentary History of England, from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803. Vol. XXXV (London: 1819), pp. 91-93.
1800s
Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery (1847–1929) British politician
Letter to Strachey (19 October 1921), quoted in Leo McKinstry, Rosebery: Statesman in Turmoil (John Murray, 2006), p. 526.
James Fitzjames Stephen (1829–1894) Indian judge
Source: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity (1873-1874), Ch. 1
Context: I am not the advocate of Slavery, Caste, and Hatred, nor do I deny that a sense may be given to the words, Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, in which they may be regarded as good. I wish to assert with respect to them two propositions.
First, that in the present day even those who use those words most rationally — that is to say, as the names of elements of social life which, like others, have their advantages and disadvantages according to time, place, and circumstance — have a great disposition to exaggerate their advantages and to deny the existence, or at any rate to underrate the importance, of their disadvantages.
Next, that whatever signification be attached to them, these words are ill-adapted to be the creed of a religion, that the things which they denote are not ends in themselves, and that when used collectively the words do not typify, however vaguely, any state of society which a reasonable man ought to regard with enthusiasm or self-devotion.