Consider the ravages committed in the bowels of all commonwealths by ambition, by avarice, envy, fraud, open injustice, and pretended friendship; vices which could draw little support from a state of nature, but which blossom and flourish in the rankness of political society.

— Edmund Burke A Vindication of Natural Society (1756)

More quotes by Edmund Burke

Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790)

Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents (1770)

Speech at a County Meeting of Buckinghamshire (1784)

A Letter to a Member of the National Assembly (1791)

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Edmund Burke (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.