on of property in your country; having the con- | ervation of that property, and the substantial asis of your monarchy, as principal objects in all our reforms. mmons. A wealth. If I refer you to your original constitution, and think it, as I do, substantially a good one, I do not amuse you in this, more than in other things, with any inventions of mine. certain intemperance of intellect is the disease of the time, and the source of all its other diseases. I will keep myself as untainted by it as I can. Your architects build without a foundation. I would readily lend a helping hand to any superstructure, when once this is effectually securedbut first I would say, dos s I do not advise a house of lords to you. Your ncient course by representatives of the noblesse In your circumstances) appears to me rather a etter institution. I know that, with you, a set f men of rank have betrayed their constituents, heir honour, their trust, their king, and their ountry, and levelled themselves with their footen, that through this degradation they might You think, Sir, and you might think rightly, terwards put themselves above their natural upon the first view of the theory, that to provide quals. Some of these persons have entertained for the exigencies of an empire, so situated and so project, that, in reward of this their black per-related as that of France, its king ought to be inly and corruption, they may be chosen to give se to a new order, and to establish themselves to a house of lords. Do you think that, under e name of a British constitution, I mean to remmend to you such lords, made of such kind of ff? I do not however include in this descripon all of those who are fond of this scheme. If you were now to form such a house of ers, it would bear, in my opinion, but little renblance to ours in its origin, character, or the rposes which it might answer, at the same time at it would destroy your true natural nobility: t if you are not in a condition to frame a use of lords, still less are you capable, in my inion, of framing any thing which virtually and bstantially could be answerable (for the purposes a stable, regular government) to our house of That house is, within itself, a much re subtle and artificial combination of parts d powers, than people are generally aware of. hat knits it to the other members of the constitun; what fits it to be at once the great support d the great controul of government; what makes of such admirable service to that monarchy ich, if it limits, it secures and strengthens, would quire a long discourse, belonging to the leisure a contemplative man, not to one whose duty it to join in communicating practically to the ople the blessings of such a constitution. Your tiers etat was not in effect and substance ouse of commons. You stood in absolute need something else to supply the manifest defects such a body as your tiers etat. On a sober d dispassionate view of your old constitution, as nnected with all the present circumstances, I sfully persuaded, that the crown, standing as ings have stood, (and are likely to stand, if you e to have any monarchy at all,) was and is incable, alone and by itself, of holding a just balance tween the two orders, and at the same time of ecting the interiour and exteriour purposes of a otecting government. I, whose leading prinle it is, in a reformation of the state, to make e of existing materials, am of opinion, that the presentation of the clergy, as a separate order, is an institution which touched all the orders ore nearly than any of them touched the other; at it was well fitted to connect them; and to ld a place in any wise, monarchical common vested with powers very much superiour to those which the king of England possesses under the letter of our constitution. Every degree of power necessary to the state, and not destructive to the rational and moral freedom of individuals, to that personal liberty, and personal security, which contribute so much to the vigour, the prosperity, the happiness, and the dignity of a nation-every degree of power which does not suppose the total absence of all controul, and all responsibility on the part of ministers,-a king of France, in common sense, ought to possess. But whether the exact measure of authority, assigned by the letter of the law to the king of Great Britain, can answer to the exteriour or interiour purposes of the French monarchy, is a point which I cannot venture to judge upon. Here, both in the power given, and its limitations, we have always cautiously felt our way. The parts of our constitution have gradually, and almost insensibly, in a long course of time, accommodated themselves to each other, and to their common, as well as to their separate, purposes. But this adaptation of contending parts, as it has not been in ours, so it can never be in yours, or in any country, the effect of a single instantaneous regulation, and no sound heads could ever think of doing it in that manner. I believe, Sir, that many on the continent altogether mistake the condition of a king of Great Britain. He is a real king, and not an executive officer. If he will not trouble himself with contemptible details, nor wish to degrade himself by becoming a party in little squabbles, I am far from sure, that a king of Great Britain, in whatever concerns him as a king, or indeed as a rational man, who combines his publick interest with his personal satisfaction, does not possess a more real, solid, extensive power, than the king of France was possessed of before this miserable Revolution. The direct power of the king of England is considerable. His indirect, and far more certain power, is great indeed. He stands in need of nothing towards dignity; of nothing towards splendour; of nothing towards authority; of nothing at all towards consideration abroad. When was it that a king of England wanted wherewithal to make him respected, courted, or perhaps even feared, in every state of Europe? I am constantly of opinion, that your states, in Opposed to these, in appearance, but in appear ance only, is another band, who call themselves the moderate. These, if I conceive rightly of the conduct, are a set of men who approve hearty of the whole new constitution, but wish to heavily on the most atrocious of those crimes, ty which this fine constitution of theirs has been o tained. They are a sort of people who affect t three orders, on the footing on which they stood in 1614, were capable of being brought into a proper and harmonious combination with royal authority. This constitution by estates, was the natural and only just representation of France. It grew out of the habitual conditions, relations, and reciprocal claims of men. It grew out of the circumstances of the country, and out of the state of property. The wretched scheme of your pre-proceed as if they thought that men may decen sent masters is not to fit the constitution to the people, but wholly to destroy conditions, to dissolve relations, to change the state of the nation, and to subvert property, in order to fit their country to their theory of a constitution. Until you make out practically that great work, a combination of opposing forces, a work of la"bour long, and endless praise," the utmost caution ought to have been used in the reduction of the royal power, which alone was capable of holding together the comparatively heterogeneous mass of your states. But, at this day, all these considerations are unseasonable. To what end should we discuss the limitations of royal power? Your king is in prison. Why speculate on the measure and standard of liberty? I doubt much, very much indeed, whether France is at all ripe for liberty on any standard. Men are unqualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites; in proportion as their love to justice is above their rapacity; in proportion as their soundness and sobriety of understanding is above their vanity and presumption; in proportion as they are more disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise and good, in preference to the flattery of knaves. Society cannot exist unless a controuling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere, and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters. This sentence the prevalent part of your countrymen execute on themselves. They possessed not long since, what was next to freedom, a mild paternal monarchy. They despised it for its weakness. They were offered a well-poised, free constitution. It did not suit their taste nor their temper. They carved for themselves; they flew out, murdered, robbed, and rebelled. They have succeeded, and put over their country an insolent tyranny made up of cruel and inexorable masters, and that too of a description hitherto not known in the world. The powers and policies by which they have succeeded are not those of great statesmen, or great military commanders, but the practices of incendiaries, assassins, housebreakers, robbers, spreaders of false news, forgers of false orders from authority, and other delinquencies, of which ordinary justice takes cognizance. Accordingly the spirit of their rule is exactly correspondent to the means by which they obtained it. They act more in the manner of thieves who have got possession of a house, than of conquerors who have subdued a nation. without fraud, rob without injustice, and overturn every thing without violence. They are who would usurp the government of their count with decency and moderation. In fact they nothing more or better, than men engaged in de perate designs, with feeble minds. They are a honest; they are only ineffectual and unsys matick in their iniquity. They are persons w want not the dispositions, but the energy vigour, that is necessary for great evil mac tions. They find that in such designs they fa best into a secondary rank, and others take the place and lead in usurpation, which they are qualified to obtain or to hold. They envy to t companions the natural fruit of their crimes; the join to run them down with the hue and cry mankind, which pursues their common offen. and then hope to mount into their places or credit of the sobriety with which they shew t selves disposed to carry on what may seem plausible in the mischievous projects they p in common. But these men are naturally spised by those who have heads to know, a hearts that are able to go through, the necess demands of bold wicked enterprises. They naturally classed below the latter description. will only be used by them as inferiour instrure They will be only the Fairfaxes of your (*: wells. If they mean honestly, why do thes strengthen the arms of honest men, to s their ancient, legal, wise, and free gover...! given to them in the spring of 1718, against inventions of craft, and the theories of in and folly? If they do not, they must co the scorn of both parties; sometimes the sometimes the incumbrance, of that, whose 17 they approve, whose conduct they decry. T people are only made to be the sport of t They never can obtain or communicate free, You ask me too, whether we have a com of research. No, Sir,-God forbid! It s necessary instrument of tyranny and usurpe and therefore I do not wonder that it has ha early establishment under your present lords " do not want it. Excuse my length. I have been somewhat cupied since I was honoured with your and I should not have been able to answer 1 all, but for the holidays, which have give means of enjoying the leisure of the country am called to duties which I am neither able willing to evade. I must soon return to my conflict with the corruptions and oppressions have prevailed in our eastern deminions. 1turn myself wholly from those of France. In England we cannot work so hard as French- | your measures on their objects. You cannot feel en. Frequent relaxation is necessary to us. You distinctly how far the people are rendered better re naturally more intense in your application. I and improved, or more miserable and depraved, id not know this part of your national character, by what you have done. You cannot see with ntil I went into France in 1773. At present, this your own eyes the sufferings and afflictions you our disposition to labour is rather encreased than cause. You know them but at a distance, on the essened. In your Assembly you do not allow your-statements of those who always flatter the reignelves a recess even on Sundays. We have two ays in the week, besides the festivals; and bedes five or six months of the summer and autumn. This continued, unremitted effort of the embers of your Assembly, I take to be one among e causes of the mischief they have done. They ho always labour can have no true judgment. ou never give yourselves time to cool. an never survey, from its proper point of sight, he work you have finished, before decree its nal execution. You can never plan the future the past. You never go into the country, sorly and dispassionately to observe the effect of you You ing power, and who, amidst their representations of the grievances, inflame your minds against those who are oppressed. These are amongst the effects of unremitted labour, when men exhaust their attention, burn out their candles, and are left in the dark.-Malo meorum negligentiam, quam istorum obscuram diligentiam. I have the honour, &c. (Signed) Beaconsfield, EDMUND BURKE. AN APPEAL FROM THE NEW TO THE OLD WHIGS, IN CONSEQUENCE OF SOME LATE DISCUSSIONS IN PARLIAMENT, RELATIVE TO THE REFLECTIONS ON THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 1791. ADVERTISEMENT TO THE SECOND EDITION. There are some corrections in this edition, which tend to render the sense less obscure in on two places. The order of the two last members is also changed, and I believe for the better. T change was made on the suggestion of a very learned person, to the partiality of whose friend I owe much; to the severity of whose judgment I owe more. AT Mr. Burke's time of life, and in his dispositions, petere honestam missionem was all he had to do with his political associates. This boon they have not chosen to grant him. With many expressions of good-will, in effect they tell him he has loaded the stage too long. They conceive it though an harsh yet a necessary office, in full parliament to declare to the present age, and to as late a posterity as shall take any concern in the proceedings of our day, that by one book he has disgraced the whole tenour of his life. Thus they dismiss their old partner of the war. He is advised to retire, whilst they continue to serve the publick upon wiser principles, and under better auspices. Whether Diogenes the Cynic was a true philosopher, cannot easily be determined. He has writ * Newspaper intelligence ought always to be received with some degree of caution. I do not know that the following paragraph is founded on any authority; but it comes with an air of authority. The paper is professedly in the interest of the modern Whigs, and under their direction. The paragraph is not disclaimed on their part. It professes to be the decision of those whom its author calls "the great and firm body of the Whigs of England." Who are the Whigs of a different composition, which the promulgator of the sentence considers as composed of fleeting and unsettled particles, I know not, nor whether there be ten nothing. But the sayings of his which r handed down by others are lively; and may easily and aptly applied on many occasions those whose wit is not so perfect as their mers This Diogenes (as every one will recollect citizen of a little, bleak town situated on the cas of the Euxine, and exposed to all the buffets that inhospitable sea. He lived at a great c tance from those weather-beaten walls, in a and indolence, and in the midst of literary les when he was informed that his townsmen had demned him to be banished from Sinope; be swered coolly, "And I condemn them to l Sinope." The gentlemen of the party in which Mr. B has always acted, in passing upon him the sent of retirement, have done nothing more tha! * confirm the sentence which he had long before passed upon himself. When that retreat was choice, which the tribunal of his peers inflict as punishment, it is plain he does not think their sentence intolerably severe. Whether they, who are to continue in the Sinope which shortly he is to leave, will spend the long years which, I hope, remain to them, in a manner more to their satisaction, than he shall slide down, in silence and obscurity, the slope of his declining days, is best known to Him who measures out years, and days, ind fortunes. The quality of the sentence does not however lecide on the justice of it. Angry friendship is ometimes as bad as calm enmity. For this reason he cold neutrality of abstract justice is, to a ood and clear cause, a more desirable thing than n affection liable to be any way disturbed. When e trial is by friends, if the decision should hapen to be favourable, the honour of the acquittal lessened; if adverse, the condemnation is exeedingly embittered. It is aggravated by coming om lips professing friendship, and pronouncing dgment with sorrow and reluctance. Taking in e whole view of life, it is more safe to live uner the jurisdiction of severe but steady reason, an under the empire of indulgent but caprious passion. It is certainly well for Mr. Burke at there are impartial men in the world. To em I address myself, pending the appeal which his part is made from the living to the dead, om the modern whigs to the ancient. The gentlemen, who, in the name of the party, ve passed sentence on Mr. Burke's book, in the tht of literary criticism, are judges above all allenge. He did not indeed flatter himself, that a writer he could claim the approbation of men ose talents, in his judgment and in the publick dgment, approach to prodigies; if ever such rsons should be disposed to estimate the merit a composition upon the standard of their own lity. | in representation recognised by the body of the people, than if he were to be ranked in point of ability (and higher he could not be ranked) with those whose critical censure he has had the misfortune to incur. In their critical censure, though Mr. Burke may d himself humbled by it as a writer, as a man, d as an Englishman, he finds matter not only of nsolation, but of pride. He proposed to convey a foreign people, not his own ideas, but the evalent opinions and sentiments of a nation, reowned for wisdom, and celebrated in all ages for well understood and well regulated love of freem. This was the avowed purpose of the far eater part of his work. As that work has not en ill received, and as his criticks will not only mit but contend, that this reception could not owing to any excellence in the composition pable of perverting the public judgment, it is ear that he is not disavowed by the nation whose ntiments he had undertaken to describe. His reesentation is authenticated by the verdict of his untry. Had his piece, as a work of skill, been ought worthy of commendation, some doubt ght have been entertained of the cause of his But the matter stands exactly as he shes it. He is more happy to have his fidelity | cess. It is not from this part of their decision which the author wishes an appeal. There are things which touch him more nearly. To abandon them would argue, not diffidence in his abilities, but treachery to his cause. Had his work been recognised as a pattern for dexterous argument, and powerful eloquence, yet if it tended to establish maxims, or to inspire sentiments, adverse to the wise and free constitution of this kingdom, he would only have cause to lament, that it possessed qualities fitted to perpetuate the memory of his offence. Oblivion would be the only means of his escaping the reproaches of posterity. But, after receiving the common allowance due to the common weakness of a man, he wishes to owe no part of the indulgence of the world to its forgetfulness. He is at issue with the party before the present, and, if ever he can reach it, before the coming, generation. The author, several months previous to his publication, well knew, that two gentlemen, both of them possessed of the most distinguished abilities, and of a most decisive authority in the party, had differed with him in one of the most material points relative to the French Revolution; that is, in their opinion of the behaviour of the French soldiery, and its revolt from its officers. At the time of their publick declaration on this subject, he did not imagine the opinion of these two gentlemen had extended a great way beyond themselves. He was however well aware of the probability, that persons of their just credit and influence would at length dispose the greater number to an agreement with their sentiments; and perhaps might induce the whole body to a tacit acquiescence in their declarations, under a natural, and not always an improper, dislike of shewing a difference with those who lead their party. I will not deny, that in general this conduct in parties is defensible; but within what limits the practice is to be circumscribed, and with what exceptions the doctrine which supports it is to be received, it is not my present purpose to define. The present question has nothing to do with their motives; it only regards the publick expression of their sentiments. The author is compelled, however reluctantly, to receive the sentence pronounced upon him in the house of commons as that of the party. It proceeded from the mouth of him who must be regarded as its authentick organ. In a discussion which continued for two days, no one gentleman of the opposition interposed a negative, or even a doubt, in favour of him or his opinions. If an idea consonant to the doctrine of his book, or favourable to his conduct, lurks in the minds of any persons in that description, it is to be considered only as a peculiarity which they indulge to their own private liberty of thinking. The author can |