How is it possible to expect that mankind will take advice when they will not so much as take warning.
Arbitrary power is the natural object of temptation to a prince, as wine and women to a young fellow, or a bribe to a judge, or avarice to old age.
When dunces are satiric, I take it for a panegyric.
There is nothing constant in this world but inconsistency.
Praise is the daughter of present power.
Arbitrary power is but the first natural step from anarchy, or the savage life.