Enlightenment thinkers held historical consciousness to be a key component of their thought, whether focusing on politics, human nature, identity or imagination.Footnote 1 While Edmund Burke's ideas on history straddle each of these areas of concern, and despite the fact that commentators have appreciated the significance of this, it remains historically under-researched.Footnote 2 A thorough analysis of the historical dimensions of his thought will provide a significant contribution to current scholarship on the historiography of the Enlightenment, as well as on that of Burke himself.
One of Burke's famous ideas closely related to his understanding of history was the concept of “chivalry”, advanced in Reflections on the Revolution in France. Burke's endorsement of chivalric principles has frequently led commentators to regard him as a medievalist or a nostalgic thinker who did not wish Europe to make any further progress. In James Currie's words, Burke expressed a preference for “the feudal relicts” of modern societies and dreaded “the progress of commerce, as leading to innovation and change”.Footnote 3 Such a misinterpretation was not fully corrected until John Pocock published his classic analysis of Burke's arguments against the backdrop of the political economy of the French Revolution. There Pocock suggested that Burke's ideas on chivalry needed to be understood within the context of eighteenth-century historiography and, in particular, within the context of some passages in William Robertson's “View of the Progress of Society in Europe” (1769) and John Millar's Origin of the Distinction of Ranks (1771). Chivalry for Burke and his contemporaries meant “a revolution in manners occurring within the feudal world”,Footnote 4 and this historical concept can be explored within the framework of Burke's overall views on European history.
Although scholars have not explored the matter in quite the way that this essay proposes, it has been well recognised that Burke held the view that European nations inherited similar manners and social systems.Footnote 5 Commentators are also well aware of Burke's notion that France had her own “ancient constitution”, which had been created in the course of history and was well fitted to her.Footnote 6 They have, however, drawn little attention to other historical ideas existing in his works. Burke's views on ancient history, the Reformation and religious wars in Europe, for example, have rarely been analysed to the same extent.
There is, in fact, much evidence of these wider views on European history scattered across his early manuscripts, in historical and literary writings, political speeches and essays and correspondence, and in his private collections. A careful survey of all these available materials that explores his views of European history in detail might suggest that for a considerable period of his career, Burke thought that (excepting the Roman Empire), Europe had been in a state of barbarism or confusion from the ancient era until the sixteenth century, even if the gradual development of society was achieved. It was, nevertheless, characteristic of Burke's views of European history that there had been, amidst confusion, gleams of hope which were to bring future prosperity. Moreover, his ideas on European history, including his idea of chivalry, were at times underpinned by his philosophical premise that nations could revive and develop unless they abandoned their own fundamental principles. This well-established idea, held since the late 1750s, is crucial to understanding his views on European history, as will be shown below.
BARBARISM AND GRANDEUR IN ANCIENT TIMES
Burke's knowledge of the history of ancient Europe owed much to his school and college education. At Trinity College, Dublin, Burke probably read the Roman historians such as Livy, Tacitus, Sallust and Justin, and also Caesar, Cicero and so forth. The great Greek historians, such as Herodotus and Thucydides, were not read there until the late eighteenth century, although Xenophon's Cyropaedia was studied.Footnote 7 In 1746, Burke once wrote, “Poetry and history are the Chief branches which are taught [in Trinity College]”.Footnote 8 Around the same period, he spoke highly of Sallust in a letter to Richard Shackleton.Footnote 9 By the late 1750s, nevertheless, Burke may have modified his opinions because of his reading of some important works by such contemporaries as Montesquieu and Hume. In one of his manuscripts of this period, Burke censured Sallust, who wrongly attributed the cause of the glory of the Roman republic to “the Virtues & Capacity of particular men”. In his view, Sallust was not sufficiently aware of the significance of the character or spirit of the Roman people. Although the fortunes of some ancient Greek city states, such as Thebes and Athens, fluctuated due to the actions of particular individuals, this was not the case with the constitutionally more sophisticated nations such as ancient Rome and eighteenth-century Britain. In such nations, the character of the people played a more important role in their fate. Like eighteenth-century Britons, the Romans had a distinct national character of “haughtiness & superiority & that fixedness of a sudden Resolution”.Footnote 10
As this manuscript indicates, it appears that Burke regarded ancient Rome as superior to ancient Greece or any other nation at this time. In fact, ancient Europe was, in his view, barbarous and uncertain, except for the society and the citizens of Rome. While this was probably an opinion held throughout his life, he detailed aspects of the ancient world in his writings of the same period. In the Vindication of Natural Society, while insisting that all history is full of war, he particularly stressed the misery and confusion of the ancient world, in which political factions and parties were formed to destroy their enemies.Footnote 11 The successors of Alexander the Great (356 BC–323 BC),Footnote 12 the rulers of ancient Egypt and the ancient Jews all carried out terrible massacres.Footnote 13 In the Vindication, even ancient Greece and Rome were clearly accused of massacres and of barbarism. The Vindication stated that Athens was a celebrated republic, but its form of government soon degenerated into tyranny.Footnote 14 Although this republic achieved prosperity, its excessive wealth corrupted the people.Footnote 15 A similar accusation was leveled at Rome. Julius Caesar (100 BC–44 BC) was, like many other major figures in history, guilty of massacres. The Roman Empire was, from its inception, equally full of war, massacres and strife.Footnote 16 Like Greece, it was also rife with political confusion and factional conflict.Footnote 17 These pseudo-Bolingbrokean views on history in the Vindication could not, of course, fully reflect Burke's genuine opinions on it. In particular, his views on ancient Rome were clearly different in other works.
The Abridgment of English History begins with an overview of the state of Europe before the Romans were dominant. In northern Europe, there had been repeated conquests between barbarous nations across generations, but these conquests did not bring progress to northern Europe until the Romans arrived.Footnote 18 The situation of southern Europe, including Spain, Greece and Italy, was better. There, geography, climate and interaction with relatively civilized countries nearby, such as Phoenicia, Asia Minor and Egypt, “the great fountains of the ancient civility and learning”, helped to stabilize and improve them, although the last two also promoted effeminate manners. The “original inhabitants of Italy and Greece were of the same race with the people of northern Europe”, but these countries “came greatly to excel the northern nations in every respect, and particularly in the art and discipline of war”.Footnote 19 Although the Gauls frequently attacked Rome, Roman discipline was very much superior to their ferocity. By the time Caesar defeated the Gauls, Rome “contained many citizens of immense wealth, eloquence and ability”.Footnote 20 The Romans were also much superior to the Britons and the Germans. Like Hume and Smith, Burke did not accept Montesquieu's claim that the origins of modern European liberty were rooted in the Germanic tribes.Footnote 21 For Burke, the Germans were utterly barbarous and militaristic, subsisting by pasturage and hunting. They did not govern by laws, and only customs shaped the nature of the governors and the people. Their ideas on government were imperfect.Footnote 22
Burke's Rome was a promoter of world civilization, whereas Montesquieu's was a predator.Footnote 23 Indebted to Tacitus’ Agricola, Burke nevertheless applied the Montesquieuan idea of desirable manners of conquest to the Roman rule of Britain: “Agricola reconciled the Britains to the Roman government, by reconciling them to the Roman manners”.Footnote 24 As a result of Agricola's conquest, Britain could advance. Rome practised a moderate policy and did not attempt to destroy its enemies completely: “Rem Romanam huc, satietate gloriœ provectam, ut cœteris quoque nationibus quietem velit”.Footnote 25
The Romans were also “the legislators of mankind”,Footnote 26 and their civil institutions prevailed across all Europe, except Britain. Burke referred to the civil wars which took place after the death of Caesar,Footnote 27 the “fierce republican spirit” of the republic,Footnote 28 the later tension between emperors and generals, the death of Nero followed by the “commotions”,Footnote 29 and hence he was probably well aware of the confusion and defects of imperial Rome, but he generally described the Romans as much more civilized than other ancient Europeans.
Although it is well known, it is worth repeating the fact that the eighteenth-century British elite were very familiar with Roman history through their education, and that is crucial in considering Burke's references to ancient Rome in his political works. Indeed, he often appealed to its example in order to support his contemporary political arguments. In his rhetoric, Rome was often idealized,Footnote 30 whereas its negative aspects were also occasionally employed as a historical lesson.Footnote 31 Burke certainly regarded ancient Rome as a model of civilization,Footnote 32 but probably saw it as less civilized than eighteenth-century Britain or Europe at large.Footnote 33
Yet the fall of Rome was a great discussion point for eighteenth-century intellectuals, including Burke, because it was not only a historical question, but also a warning of the potential collapse of contemporary Britain. In an early manuscript discussing the importance of party divisions, Burke maintained that political factions had prospered during the “Decay” of Rome, such as during the cabals of Caesar and Pompey under the republic and the Greens and the Blues under the Byzantine Empire. In doing so, he was probably very conscious of the history of political discourse that had focused on the adverse effects of factionalism from Sallust via Machiavelli to the radical Whigs of the early eighteenth century.Footnote 34 Burke also knew of the common allegation that the influx of wealth from the provinces had corrupted the virtue of the Romans.Footnote 35 In his writings and speeches, he discussed the decline of the Roman Empire more frequently than the fall of its earlier republic. In his Abridgment, Burke maintained that the heavy taxesFootnote 36 and the overextension of its dominions helped to cause the decay and ruin of this great empire.Footnote 37 When discussing Indian affairs, he claimed that the fall of the Roman Empire had begun with the misgovernment of the provinces, and he did so in order to warn his hearers that the same might happen to the British Empire.Footnote 38 Later, in his Reflections, Burke referred to the “unnatural combination” of despotism and popularity as a great cause of the decline of the Roman Empire.Footnote 39 These points were, of course, quite familiar to eighteenth-century European observers. Unlike Gibbon and Voltaire, however, Burke never insisted that the Christian religion had been a chief cause of the enervation and collapse of the Roman Empire.Footnote 40
BARBARISM AND CONFUSION BUT GLEAMS OF HOPE: FROM THE POST-ROMAN ERA TO THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY
Like the other historians of his age, Burke believed that disorder spread over Europe after the collapse of the Roman Empire. In particular, Britain suffered devastating damage when “desolated of its inhabitants, abandoned by its masters, stripped of its artizans, and deprived of all its spirit”.Footnote 41 According to Burke, the northern nations which had overrun the Roman Empire were initially “rather actuated by avarice than ambition, and were more intent upon plunder than conquest”. Although later they began to establish systems of government in their conquered territories, they did not have effective institutions with right notions of legislation. This resulted in a lengthy period of disorder and a lack of vision in their politics. The Goths, the Burgundians, the Franks, the Vandals and the Suevi first spread over the Roman Empire and afterwards waged continual wars upon one another. Their wars, like those of other savage tribes, were devoid of military discipline and were very brutal. “Tumult, anarchy, confusion overspread the face of Europe”, Burke wrote, “and an obscurity rests upon the transactions of that time, which suffers us to discover nothing but its extreme barbarity”.Footnote 42 It was not only the northern tribes who attempted invasions. Some European nations such as Spain and Italy were harassed by different barbarians who came from the south, although these invasions never entirely succeeded in France (Burke meant the Muslim invasions of the eighth century). While Europe generally remained in confusion, the rise of the papal and imperial powers provided a framework of European politics which was to continue into subsequent ages.Footnote 43 Burke's view of Charlemagne (742–814) was quite favourable. The contention between the imperial and the papal powers that ensued, and the division into factions comprising the supporters of each side led to the rise of the city states in Italy, such as Venice, Genoa, Florence, Sienna, Pisa and other republics. Although their martial governments did not fully appreciate the value of commerce, these cities became very powerful and prosperous.Footnote 44
Feudalism spread over every corner of continental Europe at about the same period. All the kingdoms developed similar forms of government, from which “arose a great similitude in the matters of their inhabitants”. The conduct of the courts and the manners of the people were certainly influenced by this feudal discipline. Nearly forty years later, Burke maintained that the similarities of European nations had contributed to securing the peace of the region, but the younger Burke had emphasized the backwardness of the politics of the age. Unlike modern Europe, sovereigns in this period were “only a greater lord, among great lords”, and did not possess any substantial political power to control their subordinates. Instead, subjects conducted war and peace “at pleasure”, and justice was dispensed arbitrarily. Another hundred years were needed before military discipline and better systems of government had developed.Footnote 45
Nevertheless, there were some gleams of hope in the darkness. The first crusade, which Burke called “one of the most extraordinary events, which are contained in the history of mankind”, was one of them.Footnote 46 In an age when the power of the Pope was being enlarged, the first crusade contributed to diffusing “a spirit of adventure”. Crusades were able to recruit many participants when the Pope approved of them. Canon law had fully developed by the time of Innocent III (1161–1216), and its object was the extension of the Pope's prerogative powers.Footnote 47 Significantly, Burke linked the first crusade to the development of chivalry:
A great part of Europe was in the same deplorable condition. It was then that some gallant spirits, struck with a generous indignation at the tyranny of these miscreants, blessed solemnly by the Bishop, and followed by the praises and vows of the people, sallied forth to vindicate the chastity of women, and to redress the wrongs of travellers and peaceable men. The adventurous humour, inspired by the Crusade, heightened and extended this spirit; and thus the idea of knight errantry was formed.Footnote 48
This passage may anticipate Burke's later idea of chivalry, although his general opinion of this period was extremely low. In his view, a sluggish state of society continued over the next several centuries.Footnote 49
According to William Robertson's History of Scotland, which Burke may have reviewed,Footnote 50 although the political system in Europe changed in some significant ways before the fourteenth century, there still remained the aristocratic spirit of the feudal constitutions. In the feudal age, splendour and luxury were unknown to the courts, a martial spirit prevailed and commerce was not developed.Footnote 51 As Adam Anderson stressed, although navigation improved and commerce advanced with the invention of the compass in the fourteenth century, darkness and ignorance still prevailed in most parts of Europe.Footnote 52 Nevertheless, it was not true that these barbarous periods had left nothing of benefit to subsequent ages; on the contrary, the foundations of modern Europe could be traced to the distant past. This was the focal point about European history that Burke emphasized during the 1790s when he was obsessed with the idea that Revolutionary France threatened to ruin these foundations. In his First Letter on a Regicide Peace, he wrote that European states had grown up from common historical origins, such as ancient German and Gothic customs, feudal institutions, Roman jurisprudence and the spirit of monarchy.Footnote 53 These common origins of societies established considerable homogeneity over the region. Europe also enjoyed unity through Christianity. All religious denominations agreed in their fundamentals while “varying a little in the ceremonies and in the subordinate doctrines”.Footnote 54 In their effect, these institutions, manners and religions were helpful in securing peace in the region.Footnote 55 Moreover, as Burke famously declared in his Reflections, the principle of chivalry had provided modern Europe with its main characteristics. It was to this principle that modern Europe owed its superiority over Asian states and excellent ancient countries (in maintaining this, Burke may well have had in mind the flourishing state of ancient Rome).Footnote 56 What he praised was the “principle” of chivalry, whose influence, he claimed, had continued to his own age, not the period itself when this principle was formed. Burke was not a medievalist. He wanted to claim that the development of chivalry had been an important step leading towards modern society. A few pages later, the principle of chivalry was rephrased as “the spirit of a gentleman, and the spirit of religion”, and we are told that the nobility and the clergy have also been the protectors of learning.Footnote 57 Learning was, however, not the only thing which owed its advancement to such traditional manners and to the people who embodied them. Commerce also grew for the same reasons, and “may decay with their natural protecting principles”. He further maintained,
Where trade and manufactures are wanting to a people, and the spirit of nobility and religion remains, sentiment supplies, and not always ill supplies their place; but if commerce and the arts should be lost in an experiment to try how well a state may stand without these old fundamental principles, what sort of a thing must be a nation of gross, stupid, ferocious, and at the same time, poor and sordid barbarians, destitute of religion, honour, or manly pride, possessing nothing at present, and hoping for nothing hereafter?Footnote 58
This was not the first time he put forward the idea of a commerce whose growth owed much to the Christian religion.Footnote 59 Despite his generally low opinion of the ancient and medieval worlds, Burke at times maintained that the flourishing state of the modern periods was indebted to some significant systems and styles of life that had been shaped by these eras.
Once more, among eighteenth-century intellectuals, he was, of course, not alone in advancing the idea of chivalry and the Christian religion as driving forces behind European civilization. Ferguson, Millar, Robertson, Kames and even Hume appreciated the positive influence of chivalry on later ages. Many of them also acknowledged that Christianity had polished manners and promoted learning.Footnote 60 Burke nevertheless stressed more than any of them the indebtedness of modern society to ancient manners for its development. What was unique was the link he established between ancient manners and commercial arts. These were clearly pointed out by Pocock in 1982, but one can go even further. This view of chivalry and Christianity was underpinned by Burke's strong conviction that society could develop under any circumstances if it did not undermine the fundamental principles on which it was substantially based. Closely combined with his powerful rhetoric, such a way of thinking was one of the causes of Burke's ideas on European history, including those on chivalry, becoming unique and more philosophical than those advanced by his contemporary historians. As will be shown below, the same philosophical underpinnings also existed in Burke's descriptions of the subsequent ages of European history.
MORE CHANGE AND HOPE BUT STILL CONFUSION: THE FIFTEENTH AND SIXTEENTH CENTURIES
For Burke, Europe from the ancient era to the fourteenth century was dominated by barbarism and confusion, but nevertheless there were also in this period some important seeds of future developments. Burke's views on the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were quite similar to those he expressed on the previous century. For example, in his review of John Jortin's Life of Erasmus of 1758,Footnote 61 Burke claimed that the age of Erasmus (1469–1536) was the era of “the first dawn of literature”, and that Erasmus himself contributed to enlightening the European world, which had been barbarous and ignorant for many centuries.Footnote 62 In fact, there had been “an extraordinary coincidence of events” around the time of Erasmus and the discovery of the Americas. A series of epochal events, such as the invention of printing, the making of gunpowder, the improvement of navigation, the revival of ancient learning and the Reformation, as well as the general awareness of new continents, occurred one after another in a relatively short space of time. According to Edmund and William Burke, “all of these conspired to change the face of Europe entirely”. The powerful monarchies in Europe also began to emerge around the same period.Footnote 63 The age of Columbus, in reality, marked a watershed in European history, from which the nations of the region began to move towards the prosperity of the modern age. The Burkes, however, immediately turned back to the barbarity of society which had existed before this time in history. According to them, before “this period, the manners of Europe were wholly barbarous”. Even in Italy, “where the natural mildness of the climate, and the dawning of literature had a little softened the minds of the people, and introduced something approaching towards politeness”, the authors maintained, “the history preceding this æra, and indeed for some time after it, is nothing but one series of treasons, usurpations, murders, and massacres: nothing of a manly courage, nothing of a solid and rational policy”.Footnote 64 The Burkes criticized medieval society by using the contemporary language of manners and politeness, whereas they regarded their own age as enlightened and contrasted it with the darkness of the Middle Ages. Although Italy was considered to have been the first among European countries to move into modernity, what they emphasized was the barbarity and confusion present in its society in the Middle Ages. The authors were also highly critical of the monarchs of the fifteenth century: Louis XI (1423–83), Charles VIII (1470–98) and Edward IV (1442–83) were blamed for their short-sightedness, barbarity and lack of politeness. “If the courts had made such poor advances in policy and politeness, which might seem the natural growth of courts at any time”, the Burkes went on to say, “both the courts and the people were yet less advanced in useful knowledge”. Around that time, scholars focused their interests on Latin, whose learning the authors viewed as “only the dotage of the scholastic philosophy of words”. Mathematics was little valued or barely developed.Footnote 65
If the progress of learning was one barometer of modernity, commerce was another. According to the Burkes, by the second half of the eighteenth century, the study of commerce had become one of “the liberal sciences” and “one of the most considerable branches of political knowledge”. In the age of Columbus, however, it was not a subject which the elite class of people had earnestly pursued. At that time, commerce was “in the hands of a few, great in its profits, but confined in its nature”. The concept of the balance of trade was far from being understood. A great number of “clogs” (imposts, customs and duties) were imposed upon commercial trade without judicious thought. Even in England, where there were “the most trading and reasoning people in Europe”, the right opinions about economic policies did not prevail, but advanced only slowly. What the Burkes lamented was the lack of sagacious minds reflecting on national wealth rather than the absence of free trade.Footnote 66
Burke depicted the fifteenth century as still barbarous and ignorant, although he frequently pointed to the germs of progress which would bring Europe prosperity. His descriptions of the next century carried a similar tone. While acknowledging the great advantage of the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation, he emphasized that the sixteenth century had still been an age of confusion and disorder. This point was particularly made in one of his speeches which addressed his constituents in Bristol in 1780. In this speech, Burke maintained that, although the age of the Reformation was “one of the greatest periods of human improvement”, it was also certainly “a time of trouble and confusion”. Before this period, European nations were still within a “vast structure of superstition and tyranny”, which had taken ages to build. This evil structure evidently linked up with a large number of political interests and influenced various aspects of a nation, including its manners, laws, institutions and policies. It was so deeply rooted in society that it was impossible to eliminate it “without a violent concussion of itself and all about it”.Footnote 67 Burke's emphasis on the confusion caused by religious conflicts was striking, but it has been neglected by his commentators. He went on to say,
When this great revolution was attempted in a more regular mode by government, it was opposed by plots and seditions of the people; when by popular efforts, it was repressed as rebellion by the hand of power; and bloody executions (often bloodily returned) marked the whole of its progress through all its stages.
Although Burke insisted that religious affairs were no longer the cause of political tumults in the late eighteenth century, they were certainly so in the age of the Reformation. It was religion that “made a principal ingredient in the wars and politics of that time”. The wild enthusiasm of religion contaminated politics, and vice versa. Political interests in the period “poisoned and perverted the spirit of religion upon all sides”.Footnote 68 Protestants were “infected, as the Popish had been before, by worldly interests and worldly passions”, and became persecutors of Roman Catholics and sometimes of other denominations of Protestantism. The spirit of persecution arose not only from “the bitterness of retaliation”, but also from “the merciless policy of fear”:
It was long before the spirit of true piety and true wisdom, involved in the principles of the Reformation, could be depurated from the dregs and feculence of the contention with which it was carried through. However, until this be done, the Reformation is not complete; and those who think themselves good Protestants, from their animosity to others, are in that respect no Protestants at all. It was at first thought necessary, perhaps, to oppose to Popery another Popery, to get the better of it.
Whatever the cause was, laws against Catholics had been passed in several European nations, especially in England and Ireland. These laws were as “bloody” as those previously enacted against Protestants in Catholic nations. In some cases, the laws were not particularly savage, but had an even worse effect, since “they were slow, cruel outrages on our nature, and kept men alive only to insult in their persons, every one of the rights and feelings of humanity”.Footnote 69 His analysis of the Reformation was now being directed toward criticism of the persecution of Roman Catholicism, which still lingered in his own age. The Reformation, however beneficial, had been accompanied by great confusion in society and fierce religious hostility toward enemies. In his Life of Erasmus, Jortin approved of Erasmus's latitudinarian attitude to Christianity.Footnote 70 Burke would have found such a characterization satisfactory and endorsed its theological position. Although Burke and Jortin differed from Erasmus in their endorsement of the advent of Protestantism, all three were of the same opinion in lamenting gruesome sectarian conflicts within the Christian religion, which continued over extended periods of time.
On 21 February 1782, writing to Viscount Kenmare, in the context of his censure of the religious persecution of Catholics (especially their limited chance of education), Burke commended the Council of Trent for establishing the discipline of Catholic seminaries.Footnote 71 In his Thoughts on French Affairs (1791), Burke developed an analogy between the French Revolution and the Reformation. According to him, the French Revolution scarcely resembled any previous revolutions “which have been brought about in Europe, upon principles merely political”. It was a revolution of doctrine and theoretical dogma, and rather resembled “those changes which have been made upon religious grounds, in which a spirit of proselytism makes an essential part”. The last revolution of this kind was the Reformation. Both the Reformation and the French Revolution were not limited events taking place within a single country, but great political and religious events which profoundly affected all countries in Europe.Footnote 72 The division between Catholic and Protestant not only divided one nation from another, but led to every state being divided within itself. The effects of the Reformation had been dominant over European history during the last two centuries.Footnote 73
The French Revolution clearly reminded Burke of the major disturbances caused by the religious conflicts of the sixteenth century, and the knowledge of these conflicts supplied him with a language to depict this contemporary catastrophe. One of these conflicts was the St Bartholomew's Day massacre (23–4 August 1572). Intending to denounce Revolutionary France, he was highly critical of Louis II de Guise (1555–88) and the religious persecution of the sixteenth century.Footnote 74 Burke was also unfavourable to Henry IV (1553–1610). Although approving of the Edict of Nantes (1598), Burke did not refer to it as this French monarch's achievement. For him, Henri IV was a cause of the confusion of the French civil wars rather than the man who terminated this disorder.Footnote 75 Nevertheless, according to Burke, the civil wars in the late sixteenth century were not fatal to the vital force of France:
It is a thing to be wondered at, to see how very soon France, when she had a moment to respire, recovered and emerged from the longest and most dreadful civil war that ever was known in any nation. Why? Because, among all their massacres, they had not slain the mind in their country. A conscious dignity, a noble pride, a generous sense of glory and emulation, was not extinguished. On the contrary, it was kindled and inflamed. The organs also of the state, however shattered, existed. All the prizes of honour and virtue, all the rewards, all the distinctions, remained.Footnote 76
The civil wars in France were more ferocious, whereas those in England were more moderate, than was usual. In both cases, social order was not so entirely subverted as it was in Revolutionary France.Footnote 77
The Münster Rebellion of the 1530s was another example of religious conflict. The Anabaptists of Münster “filled Germany with confusion by their system of levelling and their wild opinions concerning property”.Footnote 78 The contemporary catastrophe taking place in Revolutionary France before his eyes reminded him of the European past as a violent struggle with the spirit of “epidemical fanaticism”. Burke detested such religious enthusiasm and lamented the social disorder caused by it.Footnote 79 Nevertheless, none of these cases fundamentally subverted the social order of Europe. It was only Revolutionary France which threatened to do so.
Burke's opinions on these periods need to be evaluated in the context of the historiography of his age. His view of the Reformation is, for example, worthy of attention, but not entirely novel. It was similar to the notion expressed by the Scottish Moderates and other contemporaries who saw the sixteenth-century reformers as still tainted with superstitious Catholic dogmas, although Burke, on the available evidence, did not assign to this great event such clear-cut status within European history as Robertson did.Footnote 80 Unlike Robertson, Hume and others, Burke barely discussed the rise of the balance of power in these eras.Footnote 81 More significantly, Burke did not expatiate on the collapse of feudalism and the rise of absolutism, which, many historians of his age and of the previous century claimed, characterized the historical period between the late fifteenth century and the early sixteenth. Bacon and Harrington drew attention to Henry VII's statutes of alienation, which caused the decline of the barons and the rise of the commons.Footnote 82 These statutes brought the destruction of the law of entail, which had prevented the sale and division of lands for a long period of time. Henry VIII's confiscation of church property was often seen as similar.Footnote 83 In his History of England, Hume introduced a novel view of this. According to him, not only Henry VII's statutes, but, rather more important, the changing manners of the aristocracy, i.e. their extended luxury, helped bring about their own decline, in addition to the centralization of royal government.Footnote 84 Smith fitted Hume's narrative into his interpretation of the economic history of Europe as a whole.Footnote 85 That Burke did not explore this theme in detail may not mean that he did not accept these interpretations. As well-established views on the past, he might have accepted several basic points of the narrative, but may not have agreed with them entirely. It was, for instance, never Burke's opinion to insist that “the power of the nobles has allways been brought to ruin before a system of liberty has been established”, since “the nobility are the greatest opposers and oppressors of liberty that we can imagine”.Footnote 86 As a man who was favourable to primogeniture and entail,Footnote 87 and who vehemently censured Henry VIII's confiscation of church property,Footnote 88 the decline of feudalism in Europe might not have been a favourite part of history. Clearly, he preferred a different explanation of the modernization process, drawing attention to more fundamental forces existing in society.
EMERGING FROM BARBARISM AND CONFUSION? THE SEVENTEENTH AND EARLY EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES
On the available evidence, Burke's views on the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, which are largely about seventeenth-century French politics, are frequently more positive. In their Account, for instance, the Burkes were favourable to the Cardinal et Duc de Richelieu (1585–1642) and Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619–83). Although earlier French politics had been marked by civil wars and had not previously shown much interest in commerce, Richelieu and Colbert changed the country's direction. The Burkes maintained that the period of Richelieu's dominance must be regarded as the true era of progressive French policy. “This great man” stabilized domestic affairs, exalted “the royal authority upon the ruins of the power of the nobility”, and established a great system of diplomacy, which “has raised France to such a pitch of greatness”. Richelieu was also well informed about the importance of commerce and of colonies, i.e. “what serves most effectually to support commerce”.Footnote 89 During the first half of the seventeenth century, France, which had struggled with civil wars in the previous century, at last achieved substantial progress: the establishment of a powerful monarchy and diplomatic system, and the development of commercial arts. What Richelieu initiated was, however, not completed by himself. It was “that great, wise, and honest minister Colbert, one of the ablest that ever served any prince”, who brought Richelieu's plan to perfection; carried his commercial policies in particular into execution; and left “things in such order, that it was not difficult, when favourable circumstances offered, to make France one of the first trading powers in Europe, and her colonies the most powerful, their nature considered, of any in America”.Footnote 90 Commerce finally emerged into the spotlight of history,Footnote 91 having been led by such a distinguished politician as Colbert. In the seventeenth century, the Europeans came to recognize how their nations could develop by advancing commerce and establishing their settlements. France was damaged by the War of the Spanish Succession, and her commerce was plunged into a deplorable condition. Nevertheless, she quickly recovered and increased her trade again substantially, despite her engagement in new wars. The Burkes did not hesitate to generalize their point:
Nations like France and England, full of people of spirit and of industry, easily recover all the losses of war . . . Wherever the vital principle subsists in full vigour, wounds are soon healed. Disorders themselves are a species of remedies; and every new loss not only shews how it may be repaired, but, by the vigour it inspires, makes new advantages known. Such losses renew the spirit of industry and enterprise; they reduce things to their first principles; they keep alive motion, and make the appetites of traders sharp and keen.Footnote 92
Immediately after the passage above in the second edition published in 1758 was added, “While the spirit of trade subsists, trade itself can never be destroyed”. By contrast, the Netherlands, which had historically grown up to be a great commercial and prosperous country despite her involvement in savage and costly wars, saw her trade shrink over the forty years after the Treaty of Utrecht of 1713 when she enjoyed a long period of peace. Here the Burkes were building up the idea that war could animate national vigour, whereas peace could debilitate it. Although all European nations continued to engage in wars during the eighteenth century, they were still able to thrive.Footnote 93 The above quote may well remind us of an important passage already cited from the Reflections, and this, as well as other evidence,Footnote 94 clearly tells us that even before 1789 he believed that nations could revive and develop, despite all difficulties they might face, so long as their social foundations remained intact. His vocabulary reminds us of Montesquieu's esprit général, although Montesquieu himself did not advance such an analysis of society and history as did Burke here and elsewhere. Although Burke does not attempt to identify wholly what these foundations are (he presumably assumed that these could not be fully articulated), they certainly include long-established religion in regions (and the code of chivalry in the case of Europe). Such social foundations also vary from one country or region to another as they are shaped into various forms over time.
Seventeenth-century France not only advanced the commercial arts. The constitution of the nation also developed during this period. While Burke seems to have believed that the French constitution had been properly founded in 1614,Footnote 95 when the Estates General last met before 1789, the French monarch had become considerably more powerful by the mid-seventeenth century. According to Burke, the French monarchy was historically a great supporter of some republican countries in Europe. Both the Swiss Republic and the Dutch Republic had grown up under French protection. At the Peace of Westphalia (1648), a republican constitution was established in the Holy Roman Empire, which shattered the Habsburg dynasty's “pretensions” to creating a centralized empire. Nevertheless, this did not mean that the French government had allowed a republican system to develop within France. Through these political actions, the power of the French monarchy was consolidated. Although the monarchy in France substantially contributed to establishing Protestantism in Germany in the seventeenth century, especially through the Treaty of Westphalia, under Louis XIII it had destroyed “the republican system of the Protestants at home”, i.e. the Huguenots, who had adopted a defiant attitude towards royal authority.Footnote 96
From the mid-seventeenth century to the early eighteenth was, in fact, a period when the system of international relations in Europe was being shaped. In his writings of the 1790s, chiefly in the context of advancing his claim that Revolutionary France threatened to ruin the European diplomatic system, Burke often referred to the Treaty of Westphalia and the Treaty of Utrecht. The former treaty, dominated by France, established the independence of the German states and a measure of religious toleration in Europe. France was “the author of the treaty”Footnote 97 and “the Protector of the three religions”, i.e. Catholicism, Lutheranism and Calvinism.Footnote 98 The latter treaty, which Burke regarded as “one of the fundamental treaties that compose the publick law of Europe”, prevented the ambitions for universal monarchy of Louis XIV, by concluding that no part of the Spanish dominions in the West Indies should be ceded to France.Footnote 99 Burke denounced Revolutionary France for destroying the established order of early modern Europe.
Despite the fact that he admitted that the constitution, commerce and science had advanced in France (as will be seen below), Burke was also highly critical of some aspects of France in this period. In particular, he vehemently censured the political ambitions and religious persecution of Louis XIV. As early as 1765, Burke, in his Tracts Relating to Popery Laws, denounced the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in October 1685 while criticizing the Penal Laws in Ireland and seeking to establish a historical analogy.Footnote 100 His latitudinarian attitudes were already conspicuous in his early works and this naturally led to his criticism of Louis XIV's decision to renew the persecution of the French Huguenots. This act of revocation, he argued, “threw so dark a cloud over all the splendour of a most illustrious reign”.Footnote 101 In his later political speeches in the Commons, he drew more attention to Louis XIV's vast military and political despotism.Footnote 102 As the French Revolution advanced, Burke continued to stress the threat posed by the revolutionaries and insisted on the need for military intervention in the affairs of France. He claimed that the present crisis was worthy of comparison with that brought to Europe by Louis XIV and that British and European intervention would be as justified now as it had been in the previous century. Although critical of the king's efforts toward universal monarchyFootnote 103 and religious intolerance,Footnote 104 Burke nevertheless acknowledged the growth of arts, manners and science during Louis XIV's reign. In a significant passage in the Reflections, where he wrote about the dreadful union between the monied interest and the political men of letters, he did not fail to refer to Louis XIV's patronage of these intellectuals.Footnote 105 While Burke's view of Louis XIV was close to the typical view held by his British contemporaries,Footnote 106 he was prepared to maintain that this great French monarch had not destroyed “the mind of the French nation”.
Apart from looking at France, Burke occasionally turned his attention to Poland and Russia. He clearly believed that the Polish constitution had been defective for ages up to this period, chiefly due to the Polish nobility's unique parliamentary device, the Liberum veto.Footnote 107 Burke was also probably critical of the politics and constitution of Russia, although he seems to have been favourable to the introduction of European manners and institutions to the country during the reign of Peter the Great (1672–1725).Footnote 108 As Poland and Russia were not regarded by him as major powers in Europe, however, his views on these countries did not immediately relate to his evaluation of the general state of Europe. Moreover, he barely referred to the other countries in Europe.Footnote 109 Although Burke may well have regarded Europe-wide events such as the Thirty Years War (1618–48) as another example of political confusion or an explosion of barbarism, there is almost no evidence of his views on this great historical event. In the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, with improved science and commerce, in addition to the international order established by the treaties of Westphalia and Utrecht, Europe was evidently moving towards a civilized state. It is, actually, most likely that Burke, like many of his contemporaries, regarded Europe after Utrecht as having moved out of a chronic state of barbarism with the establishment of ancien régime.Footnote 110 The limited evidence about his views on European history during this period, however, must prevent us reaching more substantial conclusions.
CONCLUSION: THE CONSEQUENCES OF ANIMATED SPIRITS
Although Burke's Europe was full of barbarism and confusion, at least until the sixteenth century, he pointed to several elements in past eras leading towards a modern society. Roman law, Christianity and the principle of chivalry, in particular, provided the foundations for the prosperity achieved in his own era. Although some great historical events, such as the discovery of America and the Reformation, were certainly significant steps towards the development of modern Europe, the era when these events occurred was still full of confusion and disorder. In France, the late sixteenth century witnessed civil wars and the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries saw the growth of Louis XIV's absolutism and religious intolerance. Nevertheless, neither the civil wars nor any monarch of France destroyed the foundations of French society. Rather, various arts and systems had considerably advanced since the early seventeenth century. Similarly, in England, the consequences of both the Civil Wars of the 1640s and Cromwell were not fatal to the future development of society. French history had experienced ebbs and flows, but its society had, by the late eighteenth century, reached an advanced stage of development.Footnote 111 The fact that the French population had continued to grow from the late seventeenth century up to the late eighteenth century proved the soundness of French politics,Footnote 112 however absolute its governmental system was. According to Burke, monarchy was a fundamental component of the French constitution, and a republican form of government did not suit the nation. “France had been always taken and understood as a Monarchy”, and the nation had been powerful and prosperous under this form of government.Footnote 113 Royal authority had been in harmony with the three estates composed of the clergy, the nobility and the commoners on the foundations established in 1614. In fact, 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”.Footnote 114 Although Burke certainly believed that the French constitution under the old regime had been far from ideal,Footnote 115 and inferior to the British one, it was also true that he acknowledged that this constitution, which was the product of history, was well developed and well suited to the circumstances of the nation. In other words, for Burke, France was still a paradigm of civilization and prosperity even though parts of the political system there included defects.
Burke certainly believed that not only France, but also Europe at large, had gradually achieved real progress and that his age was the highest point of history.Footnote 116 With their improved arts, laws and military discipline, modern European civilizations excelled when compared to all Asian civilizations and to their own previous civilizations.Footnote 117 Although this progress was largely indebted to the inheritance of the ancient manners and political systems of the region,Footnote 118 it did not mean that prosperity had been achieved as the result of any blueprint. European nations rather “have grown up to their present magnitude in a great length of time, and by a great variety of accidents”.Footnote 119
Clearly, Burke shared with many of his contemporary intellectuals the belief that people of Europe had rendered their style of life and their passions “civilized” and “polite” during relatively recent times. Behind this civilizing process there was the lasting influence of the chivalric code, which was more concerned with veneration for women than with pride for a courageous soldier. Like many contemporaries, Burke may also have believed that sophistication of manners drew on the development of the commercial arts as well, although he did not stress it to the extent that Scottish Enlightened thinkers did. There is, however, some evidence that he also had in mind a very distinct concept of commercial society, chiefly related to the consequences of urbanization.
His early manuscript “Considerations on a Militia” (1757) is a minute in which the early Burke put forward his defence of the establishment of a constitutional standing army in Britain from 1689, and opposed those who argued for the substitution of a militia. In this manuscript, in seeking to warn people of possible danger caused by the introduction of a militia, Burke maintained that people in commercial cities tended to have a “mutinous & turbulent” spirit and that their governments were always in danger of collapse. According to Burke, this had been historically true. “Whilst Paris remained unbound by a strong Military force her mutinies were frequent & violent to the last degree”, Burke wrote; “she has often besieged & has often forced her kings to fly”. The cases of other great cities such as Ghent and Constantinople were similar. So are the cities in Britain: in “our Manufacturing towns the people are almost constantly engaged in seditious Cabals or open risings”.Footnote 120
Although he did not accept John Brown's interpretation that the British people had recently degenerated into frivolity and effeminacy, Burke was certainly well acquainted with contemporary discourse about the effects of commercial activities on a people's manners and spirit.Footnote 121 The idea of urban inhabitants as rebellious was, however, clearly incompatible with the more prevalent concept of commercial citizens as polite and unwarlike. It was also not reconcilable with Montesquieu's idea of improved communications in modern times preventing conspiracies against sovereigns.Footnote 122 All of these ideas are, nevertheless, alike in asserting that people in towns were sociable in the sense that they frequently communicated with each other and tried to combine in their work. For Burke, as well as for others, commerce promotes a people's communications within a nation as well as with the wider world.Footnote 123 The idea of unruly people living in cities might be considered a development of the eighteenth-century idea of commerce as a strong force bringing together large numbers of people.
This idea may help us to understand some passages in Burke's writings on the French Revolution. According to Pocock, “energy” and “combination” were key terms for an understanding of the Reflections and Letters on a Regicide Peace.Footnote 124 In the Revolution of 1789, the conspiracy against the French government was shaped between the burghers and the monied interest, whereas rural society, i.e. the landed gentleman, the yeoman and the peasant, could not influence such affairs. This was because the style of their lives did not allow them to unite in order to plan a conspiracy.Footnote 125 Such a “combination” was clearly different from the “connection” in the politics of ancient Rome and the English politics of Anne's reign, which brought various social and political interests into harmony:Footnote 126
In towns combination is natural. The habits of burghers, their occupations, their diversion, their business, their idleness, continually bring them into mutual contact. Their virtues and their vices are sociable; they are always in garrison; and they come embodied and half disciplined into the hands of those who mean to form them for civil, or for military action.Footnote 127
Although it is not easy to appreciate what Burke really meant here, the idea of people becoming unruly citizens because they lived in urban concentrations may provide a clue to the riddle. Burke believed that French society was being subverted by the combined efforts of her own people living in towns. These people were fanatic in ways comparable to zealots during the violent religious wars of the sixteenth century, but they were also “energetic” in the ways in which city dwellers always were. This was not the first time such riots had occurred, as Burke well knew. Manufacturing and commercial cities, including Paris, had suffered from such uprisings in the past. The poor became desperate when they were short of provisions, as had often been the case during history. This time, however, the people, being both energetic and vigorous, were inspired by the novel concept of human rights, which had been utterly unknown in the past,Footnote 128 and their conspiracy threatened to subvert not only their government, but all the social systems which European nations had built up over the long course of history.
