Speeches of Henry Lord Brougham, Upon Questions Relating to Public Rights, Duties, and Interests: With Historical Introductions ...Lea and Blanchard, 1841 - 1249 pages |
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Popular passages
Page 27 - Me miserable ! which way shall I fly Infinite wrath, and infinite despair? Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell; And, in the lowest deep, a lower deep Still threatening to devour me opens wide, To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heaven.
Page 388 - ... reasoning, the most luminous statement, the most persuasive display of all the motives that could influence, and of all the details that could enlighten his audience. Often a different strain was heard, and it was declamatory and vehement — or pity was to be moved, and its pathos was touching as it was simple — or, above all, an adversary sunk in baseness, or covered with crimes, was to be punished or to be destroyed, and a storm of the most terrible invective raged, with all the blights...
Page 126 - Henceforward, nothing shall prevail upon us to praise or to blame any one for that which he can no more change than he can the hue of his skin or the height of his stature. Henceforward, treating with entire respect those who conscientiously differ from ourselves, the only practical effect of the difference will be, to make us enlighten the ignorance on one side or the other from which it springs, by instructing them, if it be theirs; ourselves if it be our own, to the end that the only kind of unanimity...
Page 126 - As men will no longer suffer themselves to be led blindfold in ignorance, so will they no more yield to the vile principle of judging and treating their fellow-creatures, not according to the intrinsic merit of their actions, but according to the accidental and involuntary coincidence of their opinions. The Great Truth has finally gone forth to all the ends of the earth, THAT MAN SHALL NO MORE RENDER ACCOUNT TO MAN TOR HIS BELIEF, OVER WHICH HE HAS HIMSELF NO CONTROL.
Page 54 - Favour, and a good number of supporters, our adversaries allow it has among the people ; the Ministers, too, are for it ; but the Aristocracy, say they, is strenuously opposed to it. I broadly deny this silly, thoughtless assertion. What, my Lords ! the Aristocracy set themselves in a mass against the people — they who sprang from the people — are inseparably connected with the people — are supported by the people — are the natural chiefs of the people ! They set themselves against the people,...
Page 138 - ... habit to the turmoil of public affairs, or the more ordinary strifes of the world, may in all quiet and innocence enjoy the noblest gratification of which the, most aspiring nature is susceptible ; he may influence by his single exertions the character and the fortunes of a whole generation, and thus wield a power to be envied even by vulgar ambition for the extent of its dominion — to be cherished by virtue itself for the unalloyed blessings it bestows.
Page 41 - Grave, intelligent, rational, fond of thinking for themselves, they consider a subject long before they make up their minds on it ; and the opinions they are thus slow to form, they are not swift to abandon.
Page 52 - Sea islands, the frenzy of believing, or making believe, that the adults of the Nineteenth Century can be led like children or driven like barbarians. This it is that has conjured up the strange sights, at which we now stand aghast.
Page 376 - I take to be the wrong way — if, unfortunately, the first be answered in the affirmative, and the second in the negative, and it shall appear that although the illegal Instructions have been issued, yet no warning has been given to neutral powers, — then comes my third question...
Page 53 - ... of law founded upon injustice. Spring came, but no ethereal mildness was its harbinger, or followed in its train — the Catholics became stronger by every month's delay, displayed a deadlier resolution, and proclaimed their wrongs in a tone of louder defiance than before. And what course did you, at this moment of greatest excitement, and peril, and menace, deem it most fitting to pursue ? Eight months before you had been told how unworthy it would be to yield when men clamoured and threatened....