Laudator Temporis Acti

Albert Jay Nock (1870-1945), Memoirs of a Superfluous Man (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1943), pp. 6-7:

I am forever with Falkland, true martyr of the Civil War,—one of the very greatest among the great spirits of whom England has ever been so notoriously unworthy,—as he stood facing Hampden and Pym. "Mr. Speaker," he said, "when it is not necessary to change, it is necessary not to change."

Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592), Essais 2.17 (tr. E.J. Trechmann):

According to my way of thinking, in public matters no course of proceeding is so bad, provided it have age and continuity to recommend it, but that it is better than change and uncertainty.

Et pourtant, selon mon humeur, és affaires publiques, il n'est aucun si mauvais train, pourveu qu'il aye de l'aage et de la constance, qui ne vaille mieux que le changement et le remuement.

Id.:

Many of our laws and customs are barbarous and monstrous; yet, by reason of the difficulty of improving our condition, and the danger of the whole State toppling to pieces, if I could put a spoke into our wheel and stop it at this point, I would do it with a light heart.

De nos loix et usances, il y en a plusieurs barbares et monstrueuses: toutesfois, pour la difficulté de nous mettre en meilleur estat et le danger de ce crollement, si je pouvoy planter une cheville à nostre roue et l'arrester en ce point, je le ferois de bon coeur.

Id.:

It is very easy to condemn a government for its imperfection, for all mortal things are full of it. It is very easy to generate in a people a contempt for their ancient observances; no man ever attempted it without succeeding. But many have come to grief in their attempt to establish a better state of things in place of what they have destroyed.

Il est bien aisé d'accuser d'imperfection une police, car toutes choses mortelles en sont pleines; il est bien aisé d'engendrer à un peuple le mespris de ses anciennes observances: jamais homme n'entreprint cela qui n'en vint à bout; mais d'y restablir un meilleur estat en la place de celuy qu'on a ruiné, à cecy plusieurs se sont morfondus, de ceux qui l'avoient entreprins.