Edmund Burke Quotes


I take toleration to be a part of religion. I do not know which I would sacrifice; I would keep them both: it is not necessary that I should sacrifice either.


Citations

Burke, Edmund. "Speech on a Bill for the Relief of Protestant Dissenters." The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, vol. 10, F. and C. Rivington, 1812, p. 23.

Related Quotes

Anne was a Protestant but her father James II was a Roman Catholic. There was always suspicion about her true religious allegiance by the extremists in the Church of England. The Act of Toleration, despite its name, required the Church of England to be the established church and the sovereign’s to be the heads of the church.


His protest was focused on Middle East policies which he believed did not value the lives of Muslims as highly as Christians and Jews. The irony of this protest is that United States policy claims to value all life equally as do virtually all industrialized democracies. Omeish however is unusual among world Islamic leaders and politicians in that he values Christian and Jewish life as much as Muslim. Most, typically value Muslims almost exclusively and many advocate the killing of Christians and Jews.


Benjamin Franklin used almost the exact statement in a dispute of the Catholic Schools in the same year. It was unlikely that Frederick followed American politics so closely that he would have learned of Franklin’s statement, but Franklin was attuned to all the events of Europe, and this official act of the Emperor was big new for religious toleration enthusiasts. Therefore we suspect that Franklin was quoting Frederick without attribution.


Those who claim that the founding fathers contemplated religion as a critical component of government often point to this article of the South Carolina Constitution. However, they ignore the almost simultaneous passage of the New York constitution as in {612166}. When the framers of the Constitution met in 1787 in Philadelphia the separation of church and state issue was not really resolved and awaited the Bill of Rights where the separatists won out.


Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
  • Born: January 12, 1729
  • Died: July 9, 1797
  • Nationality: Irish
  • Profession: Statesman

Edmund Burke was an Irish statesman, economist, and philosopher. Born in Dublin, Burke served as a member of parliament (MP) between 1766 and 1794 in the House of Commons of Great Britain with the Whig Party after moving to London in 1750.