The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12)
The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12)
Edmund Burke wrote with the conviction that civilizations are fragile things, easily shattered by men who mistake their abstractions for reality. This first volume of his collected works presents his devastating critique of what he called "artificial society" - the notion that humans can construct political systems from pure reason and expect them to flourish. Beginning with "A Vindication of Natural Society," Burke argues that while humanity has built complex governments and institutions, these creations often become engines of tyranny rather than protection. He traces the history of civil unrest and warfare, demonstrating how political systems designed without regard for human nature's limitations inevitably produce suffering. Written in the 18th century yet speaking directly to every generation tempted by utopian revolutions, Burke's prose remains a bracing antidote to political naivety. This volume is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the foundations of modern political philosophy - and why skepticism of ideological certainty remains vital to democratic life.
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“In the court of Nero, a person of learning, of unquestioned merit, and of unsuspected loyalty, was put to death for no other reason, than that he had a pedantic countenance which displeased the emperor. This very monster of mankind appeared in the beginning of his reign to be a person of virtue. Many of the greatest tyrants on the records of history have begun their reigns in the fairest manner. But the truth is, this unnatural power corrupts both the heart and the understanding. And to prevent the least hope of amendment, a king is ever surrounded by a crowd of infamous flatterers, who find their account in keeping him from the least light of reason, till all ideas of rectitude and justice are utterly erased from his mind. When Alexander had in his fury inhumanly butchered one of his best friends and bravest captains; on the return of reason he began to conceive an horror suitable to the guilt of such a murder. In this juncture his council came to his assistance. But what did his council? They found him out a philosopher who gave him comfort. And in what manner did this philosopher comfort him for the loss of such a man, and heal his conscience, flagrant with the smart of such a crime? You have the matter at length in Plutarch. He told him, "that let a sovereign do what he wilt, all his actions are just and lawful, because they are his.””
— Edmund Burke
“On considering political societies, their origin, their constitution, and their effects, I have sometimes been in a good deal more than doubt, whether the Creator did ever really intend man for a state of happiness. He has mixed in his cup a number of natural evils, (in spite of the boasts of stoicism they are evils,) and every endeavor which the art and policy of mankind has used from the beginning of the world to this day, in order to alleviate or cure them, has only served to introduce new mischiefs, or to aggravate and inflame the old. Besides this, the mind of man itself is too active and restless a principle ever to settle on the true point of quiet. It discovers every day some craving want in a body, which really wants but little.””
— Edmund Burke
“There is a sort of gloss upon ingenious falsehoods that dazzles the imagination, but which neither belongs to, nor becomes the sober aspect of truth.””
— Edmund Burke
“There is an air of plausibility which accompanies vulgar reasonings and notions, taken from the beaten circle of ordinary experience, that is admirably suited to the narrow capacities of some, and to the laziness of others.””
— Edmund Burke
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Burke, Edmund. The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12). Lex, lex-books.com/book/the-works-of-the-right-honourable-edmund-burke-vol-01-of-12-95819cdc-1244-4d09-a7e3-cffaed18003e.Burke, E. (n.d.). The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12). Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/the-works-of-the-right-honourable-edmund-burke-vol-01-of-12-95819cdc-1244-4d09-a7e3-cffaed18003eBurke, Edmund. The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12). Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/the-works-of-the-right-honourable-edmund-burke-vol-01-of-12-95819cdc-1244-4d09-a7e3-cffaed18003e.
