REFLECTIONS ON THE REVOLU TION IN FRANCE, published in 1790, re mains to-day one of the most interesting and important of the writings of Edmund Burke (1724-97). The immediate object was an answer to a famous sermon which Dr. Price had preached in favor of the Revolution, but it amounts to a very comprehensive indictment of the entire revolutionary movement. Re garding the issue as of unparalleled importance, Burke devoted the greater part of the year to the preparation of the book. The spirit animat ing him was his • dislike of revolution in com parison with the slower and less disrupting proc esses of reform. As such, the book has been cited (cf. Lord Hugh Cecil's as the Bible, primer and textbook of modern British conservatism, as the most distinguished commendation of the principles which domi nated the present Conservative party in England, at least up to the outbreak of the World War. The book is a great philippic and jeremiad against the spirit of revolution in general and the French Revolution in particular. It is re
plete with sound, sober principles on the one hand and warnings and prophecy of disaster on the other. Many of these prophecies were justified by the Napoleonic event, and Burke's wisdom appears in very favorable and dignified light The (Reflections) were written with great care and elaboration in Burke's most weighty style, and no one of his writings is more replete with political philosophy and strildng aphorism. He discusses such fundamental matters as the use of prejudice, superstition and power as forming valuable assets in government. Some of these passages are famous, such as his dia tribe against revolutionary finance or his analysis of the principles of the great bad men like Cromwell; but the most resplendent paragraph in the book is that describing the Dauphiness and lamenting the decay of, chivalry in the world. John Morley's 'Burke) gives the best short account of the 'Reflections) and their re lation to Burke's other writings. '