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Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought QUOTES

Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought QUOTES

1 " Having thus disposed in his merciless way of an incautious adversary, Randolph proceeded to expose the follies of seeking abstract harmony in government, of expecting the great venerable Gothic edifice of society to conform to ideal classical proportions; with Burke, he believed that a state is better governed by the irregular patterns formed by common sense and tradition than by the laws of mathematics and the Procrustean methods of omnipotent majorities. "

― Russell Kirk , Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought

2 " All policy is very suspicious, says an eminent statesman, that sacrifices the interest of any part of a community to the ideal good of the whole; and those governments only are tolerable, where, by the necessary contraction of the political machine, the interests of all the parts are obliged to be protected by it.... "

― Russell Kirk , Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought

3 " It is ordained,” said Burke, “in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions form their fetters. "

― Russell Kirk , Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought

4 " A thorough survey of Randolph’s reading defeats such an effort. The Virginian had, certainly, a lively interest in the writers of his day, but his admiration for the Romantics was strictly qualified, as his correspondence with Francis Walker Gilmer, Brockenbrough, Francis Scott Key, and Josiah Quincy shows. "

― Russell Kirk , Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought

5 " Prudence is the foundation of all true statesmanship; in its political application, prudence is the application of principles to particular circumstances. "

― Russell Kirk , Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought

6 " No “right,” however natural it may seem, can exist unqualified in society. A man may have a right to self-defense; therefore, he may have a right to a sword; but if he is mad or wicked, and intends to do his neighbors harm, every dictate of prudence will tell us to disarm him. Rights have no being independent of circumstance and expediency. "

― Russell Kirk , Randolph Of Roanoke A Study In Conservative Thought