" them happy. It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do, but what humanity, reason, and justice tell me I ought to do. Is a politic act the worse for being a generous one? Is no concession proper but that which is made from your want of right to keep what you grant?" The key to a true policy, as he endeavoured to convince the House of Commons and the country, was to be sought in a recognition of the fact that the Americans would have no interest contrary to the grandeur and glory of England, when they are not oppressed by the weight of it." 'My hold on the colonies," thus he sums up his plea for conciliation, in words applicable perhaps to more than one modern controversy, "is in the close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from similar privileges, and equal protection. These are ties which, though light as air, are as strong as links of iron. Let the colonies always keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your government; they will cling and grapple to you, and no force under heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance. But let it be once understood that your government may be one thing and their privileges another, that these two things may exist without any mutual relation, the cement is gone, the cohesion is loosened, and everything hastens to decay and dissolution." To attempt to appraise in detail the permanent value of Edmund Burke's writings would be an impertinence. I will rather quote Mr. Morley (on the whole, Burke's greatest critic, and no mean arbiter whether of literature or politics) in his reference to three of the principal pieces contained in this volume-the Speech on American Taxation (April 19, 1774), the Speech on Conciliation with America (March 22, 1775), and the Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol (1777),— which compose, he says, the most perfect manual in our literature, or in any literature, for one who approaches the study of public affairs whether for knowledge or for practice." In the same passage Mr. Morley dwells on the masterly effect of Burke's treat ment, "the vigorous grasp of compressed detail, the wide illumination from great principles of human experience, the strong and masculine feeling for the two great political ends of Justice and Freedom, the large and generous interpretation of expediency, the morality, the vision, the noble temper." . It is impossible to think that any one will quarrel with Mr. Morley's judgment in this matter. Burke may surely still be read with profit. Time has not taken from, but rather added to, the value of his writings by dwarfing that which was momentary and adventitious in the subject-matter, and displaying the rest in its true and gigantic proportions. Though the particular controversy which provoked these speeches has long since been determined, to-day presents to us and tomorrow will surely bring other controversies in the conduct of which it will be well for us to remember his teaching. Mutato nomine de nobis. Every generation has its George the Thirds and its Lord Norths-slaves of complacent prejudice and easy-going, short-sighted opportunism. There will always be those whose instinct, when they are brought face to face with some great crisis, is to coerce rather than conciliate, to punish the disturber rather than to seek out the cause of the disturbance, who, when compelled at length to concession, perversely seek to concede something other than has been demanded, who "imagine that their souls are cooped and cabined in unless they have some men, or body of men, dependent upon their mercy." Against the narrow spirit of such men Burke's writings are a perpetual antidote. On almost every page of these speeches and letters one may find some maxim of imperishable worth. How many errors might not have been avoided in the past, how great disasters may not be escaped in the future, by observance of these three only, that "the natural effect of fidelity, clemency, kindness in governors is peace, good-will, order, and esteem in the governed," that "if you mean to please any people you must give them the boon they ask; not what you think better for them but of a kind totally different," and above all (a maxim frequently quoted yet little observed) that "magnanimity in politics is not seldom the truest wisdom; and a great empire and little minds go ill together"? April 1908. HUGH LAW. The following is a list of Burke's published works: A Vindication of Natural Society, etc., 1756; A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of the Sublime and the Beautiful, 1756; second edition, including A Discourse on Taste, 1757; The Present State of the Nation, 1769; Thoughts on the Causes of the Present Discontents, 1770; Political Tracts and Speeches, Dublin, 1777; Speeches, 4 vols., London, 1816; Reflections on the Revolution in France, 1790; Thoughts and Details on Scarcity, 1795; Thoughts on the Prospect of a Peace with the Regicide Directory, Letters I. and II., 1796; Letter III., 1797; Letter IV., 1812. COLLECTED WORKS.-1792-1827, 8 vols. (vols. 4-8 edited by Walker King, Bishop of Rochester, and were published at irregular periods); a new edition, 16 vols., 1803-27; 12 vols., 1808-13. Works and Correspondence, 8 vols., London, 1852; Works, Bohn's British Classics, 8 vols., 1853, with life by Prior; Works, revised edition, Boston, Mass., 12 vols., 1865-67; Correspondence, edited by Earl Fitzwilliam and Sir R. Bourke, 4 vols., 1844. LIFE.-Charles MacCormick, 1798; Robert Bisset, 1798, 1800; Sir James Prior (with specimens of poetry and letters, etc.), 1824; second edition, 1826; fifth edition (Works, Bohn's British Classics), 1854; George Croby (Blackwood's Magazine), 1840; P. Burke, 1851; MacKnight, "History of the Life and Times of Edmund Burke,' 1858; Sir Joseph Napier (Lecture), 1863; John Morley," Burke, a Historical Study," 1867; English Men of Letters, 1879; E. A. Pankhurst, "Edmund Burke, a Study of Life and Character,' 1886; W. Willis (Lecture), 1889; O. Schaedel, 1898; T. D. Pillans, "Edmund Burke Apostle of Justice and Liberty," 1905. |