He

conditions, to Ireland, Wales and the Counties Palatine. consults the genius of the English Constitution.' In the latter he dwells with convincing force upon the danger arising to the whole Constitution from the violation of any part of it. In form,

no doubt, he differs from Chatham. But, in substance, he follows him more closely than he himself would perhaps have cared to own.

That Burke should lay marked stress upon the constitutional argument was only to be expected. Alike on principle and by temperament, he was bound to do so. His conservative instinct, his resolve to test everything by experience, left him no choice in the matter. And his appeal to the Constitution is only one form among many of the argument from expediency. It remains only to state that argument in all its bearings, as it appears and reappears throughout the speeches and writings of Burke not only during the first period of his career, but also during his years of conflict with the Revolution in France. It is as valid in application to the internal affairs of England as to her dealings with the Colonies or with India. It is hardly less valid-if employed with the same knowledge and wisdom, it would have been, within certain limits, not one whit less valid—when applied to the affairs of France.

The first thing which struck Burke, as he looked out on the field of politics, was the enormous complexity of the needs and interests at stake. Each fresh question that presents itself has its own peculiarities; no one of them can be rightly decided unless those peculiarities are reckoned with, unless all crucial conditions and circumstances are taken into account.1 This alone makes it impossible for the statesman to act on abstract principles; such principles as the Rights, on either side, to which reference has been made in connection with American Taxation. General principles, indeed, he may and ought to have. But these general principles must themselves be drawn not from the schools,' but from experience; and they must be modified to suit the circumstances of the particular case. 'Circumstances, which with some gentlemen pass for nothing, in reality give to every political principle its distinguishing colour and discriminating effect.' Nor is this all. Each part of a nation's life is so closely intertwined with the others that it is impossible to touch one organ of its activity without gravely affecting the action of the rest. The statesman has, therefore, to consider not only a single train of circumstances, stretching back into the past and pointing forward to the future. That, in itself, would be difficult enough. He has also to consider the numberless threads and fibres by which those circumstances are inextricably woven into the general contexture of the whole. He has to look not only before and after, but also, and with no less 1 Conciliation: Works, i. p. 183.

vigilance, to the right hand and the left. Touch the existing system of parliamentary representation, and you run more than a risk of upsetting the balance of the whole constitution. Employ high-handed methods in America, and you will soon come to tolerate them in your own country. Give a free hand to the lawbreakers' in India, and you will soon see them become the lawmakers' in your own Parliament at home.

6

For these reasons, caution is the first duty of the statesman. And by caution, when he is true to himself, Burke means not blind timidity, but an anxious consideration of all the circumstances, collateral as well as immediate, of the given case. He means, that

is, an appeal to the experience of the past. He means also that the clue by which the statesman guides himself through the tangled web of that experience is the principle of expediency. And expediency, as he conceived it, is not the interest of the moment; it is the permanent welfare of the whole nation and its dependencies. It is not only, nor is it mainly, the material-still less the selfishprofit of the community; it includes also all that makes for its moral and spiritual growth. In other words, the 'expediency' of Burke comprises two ideas which, in common speech, we are careful to hold apart. On the one hand, it denotes enlightened self-interest; on the other hand, the whole train of ideas which we sum up under the word 'duty.' If we may adapt his own phrase, It is what a generous prudence tells me it is wise to do; but it is also and no less-what humanity, reason and justice tell me I ought to do.' The use of the same term to cover conceptions so different may pitfall to the unwary. In the practical issues of life, expediency and duty are closely intertwined, and Burke refuses to mark the bounds between them. But it is intensely characteristic of Burke's method and temper that of the two terms which offered themselves to choice, he deliberately prefers the more modest and unassuming; he fastens on that which, from the beginning, bars the road of mere intuition or personal caprice, and at once throws the statesman on the path of close enquiry and the lessons of experience.

be a

That it is a path strewn with difficulties, Burke himself would be very ready to admit. But this, in his eyes, is among the strongest arguments in its favour. How can we expect, he argues, that the art of politics should be exempt from the law which governs all other fields of human energy and enquiry; the law which ordains that nothing shall be given to man save what is wrung from the sweat of his brow and the toil of his intelligence? Difficulty is a severe instructor, set over us by the supreme ordinance of a parental Guardian and Legislator, who knows us better than we know ourselves, and loves us better too. Pater ipse colendi haud facilem esse 1 'Complexional timidity,' Reflections: Works, i. p. 474.

viam voluit. He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper. This amicable conflict with difficulty obliges us to an intimate acquaintance with our object. It will not suffer us to be superficial.' And it is among the heaviest charges against the revolutionists of France that they have shown a degenerate fondness for tricking short cuts and little fallacious facilities'; that their purpose everywhere seems to have been to evade and slip aside from difficulty.'

2

Such passages bring us to the heart of Burke's thoughts upon this matter. In the first instance it is a question of method. But behind the question of method is a question of tendencies and ideas. The first business of the statesman is to make himself master of all the circumstances which bear, directly or indirectly, upon the problem he has to solve. And in the act of doing so, it is Burke's faith that he will already have committed himself to a conservative solution. The two points must be taken separately; for it is manifest that the one does not of necessity follow from the other.

On the question of method, as a general principle, enough has been said already. It would, however, be unjust not to remind ourselves that Burke in no way contents himself with laying down the principle. He is also a shining example-in all probability, the most complete example ever known-of its practical application. His enquiry into the historical grounds of the dispute between the Colonies and the mother country, his practical suggestions as to the best means of settling it, are remarkable enough. But his investigation of the conditions of Indian life and the tangled web of Indian politics, and his exposition of the havoc wrought in them by English oppression, are little short of a miracle. The industry with which, in the face of enormous obstacles, he collects his facts, the skill with which he marshals them, the genius with which he drives them home to the imagination of his hearers-can we honestly say that, in these qualities, he has ever been approached? The two speeches on America, the speeches on Fox's East India Bill and the Impeachment of Hastings remain models of the manner in which the historical method may be applied to the current problems of the day. They are to those problems what the great work of Montesquieu is to the recorded annals of the past.

So far as to the question of method. Burke, however, was the last man in the world to treat method as a thing apart; the first to admit that it is inseparably interwoven with questions which, until we pause to reflect, we are apt sharply to distinguish from it, as questions of principle and idea. To him, the historical method means the appeal to experience; the appeal to experience means the acceptance of expediency; and the acceptance of 1 Reflections: Works, i. p. 444.

2 Ib.

expediency, in its turn, means the absolute rejection of all considerations of Right. How far, we ask, is the connection between these four things as invariable and as inevitable as he supposed? How far, in fact, is he justified in the scorn which he habitually pours on all forms of the principle of Right? The first link in the chain is clearly not to be disputed. To a statesman, the historical method does necessarily mean the appeal to experience. But does it follow that, when he appeals to experience, he commits himself to the principle of expediency, pure and simple? Does it follow that he bars out all considerations of Right?

This question brings us back once more to the various senses in which the two terms, Expediency as well as Right, may be employed. Expediency may mean no more than enlightened self-interest. But it can also be used, and by Burke is habitually used, to include the idea of reason, justice and humanity.' Unless this be remembered, all kinds of false distinctions, distinctions which Burke himself flatly repudiates, will be imported into the question. Still more fatal are the confusions arising from the various senses of Right. A legal Right, a constitutional Right, a moral Right, an abstract Right-here we have four conceptions, each manifestly distinct from the others, and three at least of them -for in the case of a moral Right there may conceivably be difference of opinion-capable of being contrasted with Expediency.

Now a legal Right-a right which is legal and nothing more -is undoubtedly barred out by Burke's interpretation—perhaps by any possible interpretation-of Expediency. And the same is true also of Constitutional Right. Either of these can be invoked to enforce a plea already established by Expediency. Neither the one nor the other can stand for a moment, if Expediency be against them. This is Burke's contention, and it is justified a hundred times over by both reason and experience. No instance could have proved it more conclusively than the issue of the American war; and never was Burke more convincing than when, towards the close of the war, he reminded the Ministry how fatally his prophecies had been borne out by the event. 'Oh excellent rights, oh valuable rights, which have cost us so much, and which are likely to cost us all! Oh miserable and infatuated ministers, miserable and undone country, not to know that right signifies nothing without might.'

When, however, we turn to 'moral rights,' the difficulties thicken. The reason is twofold. In the first place, the phrase 'moral right' is itself ambiguous. It may denote a right which, though denied by the Law, is yet sanctioned by the general conscience of the community or mankind: for instance, the 1 Prior's Life of Burke (ed. Bohn), p. 209 (an. 1781).

right of a starving man to steal a loaf, or the right of the wife to shield her husband from the clutches of the Law. In such cases, the moral right' is explicitly contrasted with a legal right; and it is hardly on grounds of expediency, even in the widest sense, that the question will be decided. Blind impulse, pity, affection, will have far more to say in the matter than considerations of utility.

But 'moral right' may bear quite a different sense; and in this sense we do undoubtedly oppose it to expediency. I may have a moral as well as a legal right to exact payment of that which is owing to me. Yet it may be to the last degree inexpedient because entirely against humanity to enforce it. My conscience may tell me that it is not only legal, but, as a general rule, just and equitable to exact restitution of my debts.' It may also tell me that, in the given case, it would be unjust and inequitable to do so. Here the moral right' is, in reality, a purely abstract right; and, owing to the particular circumstances of the case, it has become, for me here and now, a manifest wrong. It will be observed, however, that this example belongs to the field of private, not to that of public, right; to the sphere of morality rather than of politics. And the question may be raised whether, in the field of politics, a precisely parallel case could ever arise. The question admits of an easy answer. Suppose the State, as in Ireland at the present moment,1 to be, either avowedly or virtually, in the position of landlord. Suppose the original terms of the 'lease' to prove, at a given moment, unduly burdensome to the tenant.' Who can doubt that, in such a case, it is the duty of the landlord to abate his just 'rights'-rights, which, in the abstract, are not only legal but moral rights-and to take the loss upon himself? The balance of humanity, and therefore the balance of expediency, is against the enforcement of the right; and there is nothing for it but that the right should be abandoned.

And this brings us to the second ground of confusion in this matter; a ground which is closely connected with the first, and still better calculated to throw light upon the manner in which Burke approaches the whole question. The real reason why, in such cases, the 'moral right' must be abandoned is that it is a right only in the abstract; and that in the concrete case it may easily become has in this instance actually become a wrong. This brings it directly under the general principle laid down, in words which have already been quoted, by Burke: 'Circumstances, which with some gentlemen pass for nothing, in reality give to every political'-would it be too much to add to every moral principle also?' its distinguishing colour and discriminating 1 [Written in 1910.]

VOL. II

с