The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations.

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 discovered at the first view as fraud is surely detected at last, is of no mean force in the government of mankind.

If the people are happy, united, wealthy, and powerful, we presume the rest. We conclude that to be good from whence good is derived.

A nation is not conquered which is perpetually to be conquered.

It is undoubtedly the business of ministers very much to consult the inclinations of the people, but they ought to take great care that they do not receive that inclination from the few persons who may happen to approach them.

Magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wisdom; and a great empire and little minds go ill together.

Good order is the foundation of all things.