right of society to make laws to coerce the will of others, is
founded on the necessity of repelling the wanton encroachment of
that will on their rights; that is, strictly on the right of
self-defence or resistance to aggression. Society comes forward and
says, 'Let us alone, and we will let you alone, otherwise we must
see which is strongest'; its object is not to patronise or advise
individuals for their good, and against their will, but to protect
itself: meddling with others forcibly on any other plea or for any
other purpose is impertinence. But equal rights destroy one another;
nor can there be a right to impossible or impracticable things. Let
A, B, C, D, etc., be different component parts of any society, each
claiming to be the centre and master of a certain sphere of activity
and self-determination: as long as each keeps within his own line of
demarcation there is no harm done, nor any penalty incurred--it is
only the superfluous and overbearing will of particular persons that
must be restrained or lopped off by the axe of the law. Let A be the
culprit: B, C, D, etc., or the rest of the community, are plaintiffs
against A, and wish to prevent his taking any unfair or unwarranted
advantage over them. They set up no pretence to dictate or domineer
over him, but merely to hinder his dictating to and domineering over
them; and in this, having both might and right on their side, they
have no difficulty in putting it in execution. Every man's
independence and discretionary power over what peculiarly and
exclusively concerns himself, is his _castle_ (whether round,
square, or, according to Mr. Owen's new map of improvements, in the
form of a parallelogram). As long as he keeps within this, he is
safe--society has no hold of him: it is when he quits it to attack
his neighbours that they resort to reprisals, and make short work of
the interloper. It is, however, time to endeavour to point out in
what this natural division of right, and separate advantage
consists. In the first place, A, B, C, D have the common and natural
rights of persons, in so far that none of these has a right to offer
violence to, or cause bodily pain or injury to any of the others.
Sophists laugh at natural rights: they might as well deny that we
have natural persons; for while the last distinction holds true and
good by the constitution of things, certain consequences must and
will follow from it--'while this machine is to us Hamlet,' etc. For
instance, I should like to know whether Mr. Burke, with his _Sublime
and Beautiful_ fancies, would deny that each person has a particular
body and senses belonging to him, so that he feels a peculiar and
natural interest in whatever affects these more than another can,
and whether such a peculiar and paramount interest does not imply a
direct and unavoidable right in maintaining this circle of
individuality inviolate. To argue otherwise is to assert that
indifference, or that which does not feel either the good or the
ill, is as capable a judge and zealous a discriminator of right and
wrong as that which does. The right, then, is coeval and co-extended
with the interest, not a product of convention, but inseparable from
the order of the universe; the doctrine itself is natural and solid;
it is the contrary fallacy that is made of air and words. Mr. Burke,
in such a question, was like a man out at sea in a haze, and could
never tell the difference between land and clouds. If another break
my arm by violence, this will not certainly give him additional
health or strength; if he stun me by a blow or inflict torture on my
limbs, it is I who feel the pain, and not he; and it is hard if I,
who am the sufferer, am not allowed to be the judge. That another
should pretend to deprive me of it, or pretend to judge for me, and
set up his will against mine, in what concerns this portion of my
existence--where I have all at stake and he nothing--is not merely
injustice, but impudence. The circle of personal security and right,
then, is not an imaginary and arbitrary line fixed by law and the
will of the prince, or the scaly finger of Mr. Hobbes's _Leviathan_,
but is real and inherent in the nature of things, and itself the
foundation of law and justice. 'Hands off is fair play'--according
to the old adage. One, therefore, has not a right to lay violent
hands on another, or to infringe on the sphere of his personal
identity; one must not run foul of another, or he is liable to be
repelled and punished for the offence. If you meet an Englishman
suddenly in the street, he will run up against you sooner than get
out of your way, which last he thinks a compromise of his dignity
and a relinquishment of his purpose, though he expects you to get
out of his. A Frenchman in the same circumstances will come up close
to you, and try to walk over you, as if there was no one in his way;
but if you take no notice of him, he will step on one side, and make
you a low bow. The one is a fellow of stubborn will, the other a
_petit-maitre_. An Englishman at a play mounts upon a bench, and
refuses to get down at the request of another, who threatens to call
him to account the next day. 'Yes,' is the answer of the first, 'if
your master will let you!' His abuse of liberty, he thinks, is
justified by the other's want of it. All an Englishman's ideas are
modifications of his will; which shows, in one way, that right is
founded on will, since the English are at once the freest and most
wilful of all people. If you meet another on the ridge of a
precipice, are you to throw each other down? Certainly not. You are
to pass as well as you can. 'Give and take,' is the rule of natural
right, where the right is not all on one side and cannot be claimed
entire. Equal weights and scales produce a balance, as much as
where the scales are empty: so it does not follow (as our votaries
of absolute power would insinuate) that one man's right is nothing
because another's is something. But suppose there is not time to
pass, and one or other must perish, in the case just mentioned, then
each must do the best for himself that he can, and the instinct of
self-preservation prevails over everything else. In the streets of
London, the passengers take the right hand of one another and the
wall alternately; he who should not conform to this rule would be
guilty of a breach of the peace. But if a house were falling, or a
mad ox driven furiously by, the rule would be, of course, suspended,
because the case would be out of the ordinary. Yet I think I can
conceive, and have even known, persons capable of carrying the point
of gallantry in political right to such a pitch as to refuse to take
a precedence which did not belong to them in the most perilous
circumstances, just as a soldier may waive a right to quit his post,
and takes his turn in battle. The actual collision or case of
personal assault and battery, is, then, clearly prohibited, inasmuch
as each person's body is clearly defined: but how if A use other
means of annoyance against B, such as a sword or poison, or resort
to what causes other painful sensations besides tangible ones, for
instance, certain disagreeable sounds and smells? Or, if these are
included as a violation of personal rights, then how draw the line
between them and the employing certain offensive words and gestures
or uttering opinions which I disapprove? This is a puzzler for the
dogmatic school; but they solve the whole difficulty by an
assumption of _utility_, which is as much as to tell a person that
the way to any place to which he asks a direction is 'to follow his
nose.' We want to know by given marks and rules what is best and
useful; and they assure us very wisely, that this is infallibly and
clearly determined by what is best and useful. Let us try something
else. It seems no less necessary to erect certain little
_fortalices_, with palisades and outworks about them, for RIGHT to
establish and maintain itself in, than as landmarks to guide us
across the wide waste of UTILITY. If a person runs a sword through
me, or administers poison, or procures it to be administered, the
effect, the pain, disease or death is the same, and I have the same
right to prevent it, on the principle that I am the sufferer; that
the injury is offered to me, and he is no gainer by it, except for
mere malice or caprice, and I therefore remain master and judge of
my own remedy, as in the former case; the principle and definition
of right being to secure to each individual the determination and
protection of that portion of sensation in which he has the
greatest, if not a sole interest, and, as it were, identity with it.
Again, as to what are called _nuisances_, to wit offensive smells,
sounds, etc., it is more difficult to determine, on the ground that
_one man's meat is another man's poison_. I remember a case occurred
in the neighbourhood where I was, and at the time I was trying my
best at this question, which puzzled me a good deal. A rector of a
little town in Shropshire, who was at variance with all his
parishioners, had conceived a particular spite to a lawyer who lived
next door to him, and as a means of annoying him, used to get
together all sorts of rubbish, weeds, and unsavoury materials, and
set them on fire, so that the smoke should blow over into his
neighbour's garden; whenever the wind set in that direction, he
said, as a signal to his gardener, 'It's a fine Wicksteed wind
to-day'; and the operation commenced. Was this an action of assault
and battery, or not? I think it was, for this reason, that the
offence was unequivocal, and that the only motive for the proceeding
was the giving this offence. The assailant would not like to be
served so himself. Mr. Bentham would say, the malice of the motive
was a set-off to the injury. I shall leave that _prima philosophia_
consideration out of the question. A man who knocks out another's
brains with a bludgeon may say it pleases him to do so; but will it
please him to have the compliment returned? If he still persists, in
spite of this punishment, there is no preventing him; but if not,
then it is a proof that he thinks the pleasure less than the pain to
himself, and consequently to another in the scales of justice. The
_lex talionis_ is an excellent test. Suppose a third person (the
physician of the place) had said, 'It is a fine Egerton wind
to-day,' our rector would have been non-plussed; for he would have
found that, as he suffered all the hardship, he had the right to
complain of and to resist an action of another, the consequences of
which affected principally himself. Now mark: if he had himself had
any advantage to derive from the action, which he could not obtain
in any other way, then he would feel that his neighbour also had the
same plea and right to follow his own course (still this might be a
doubtful point); but in the other case it would be sheer malice and
wanton interference; that is, not the exercise of a right, but the
invasion of another's comfort and independence. Has a person, then,
a right to play on the horn or on a flute, on the same staircase? I
say, yes; because it is for his own improvement and pleasure, and
not to annoy another; and because, accordingly, every one in his own
case would wish to reserve this or a similar privilege to himself. I
do not think a person has a right to beat a drum under one's window,
because this is altogether disagreeable, and if there is an
extraordinary motive for it, then it is fit that the person should
be put to some little inconvenience in removing his sphere of
liberty of action to a reasonable distance. A tallow-chandler's shop
or a steam-engine is a nuisance in a town, and ought to be removed
into the suburbs; but they are to be tolerated where they are least
inconvenient, because they are necessary somewhere, and there is no
remedying the inconvenience. The right to protest against and to
prohibit them rests with the suffering party; but because this point
of the greatest interest is less clear in some cases than in others,
it does not follow that there is no right or principle of justice
in the case. 3. As to matters of contempt and the expression of
opinion, I think these do not fall under the head of force, and are
not, on that ground, subjects of coercion and law. For example, if a
person inflicts a sensation upon me by material means, whether
tangible or otherwise, I cannot help that sensation; I am so far the
slave of that other, and have no means of resisting him but by
force, which I would define to be material agency. But if another
proposes an opinion to me, I am not bound to be of this opinion; my
judgment and will is left free, and therefore I have no right to
resort to force to recover a liberty which I have not lost. If I do
this to prevent that other from pressing that opinion, it is I who
invade his liberty, without warrant, because without necessity. It
may be urged that material agency, or force, is used in the adoption
of sounds or letters of the alphabet, which I cannot help seeing or
hearing. But the injury is not here, but in the moral and artificial
inference, which I am at liberty to admit or reject, according to
the evidence. There is no force but argument in the case, and it is
reason, not the will of another, that gives the law. Further, the
opinion expressed, generally concerns not one individual, but the
general interest; and of that my approbation or disapprobation is
not a commensurate or the sole judge. I am judge of my own
interests, because it is my affair, and no one's else; but by the
same rule, I am not judge, nor have I a _veto_ on that which appeals
to all the world, merely because I have a prejudice or fancy against
it. But suppose another expresses by signs or words a contempt for
me? _Answer._ I do not know that he is bound to have a respect for
me. Opinion is free; for if I wish him to have that respect, then he
must be left free to judge for himself, and consequently to arrive
at and to express the contrary opinion, or otherwise the verdict and
testimony I aim at could not be obtained; just as players must
consent to be hissed if they expect to be applauded. Opinion cannot
be forced, for it is not grounded on force, but on evidence and
reason, and therefore these last are the proper instruments to
control that opinion, and to make it favourable to what we wish, or
hostile to what we disapprove. In what relates to action, the will
of another is force, or the determining power: in what relates to
opinion, the mere will or _ipse dixit_ of another is of no avail but
as it gains over other opinions to its side, and therefore neither
needs nor admits of force as a counteracting means to be used
against it. But in the case of calumny or indecency: 1. I would say
that it is the suppression of truth that gives falsehood its worst
edge. What transpires (however maliciously or secretly) in spite of
the law, is taken for gospel, and as it is impossible to prevent
calumny, so it is impossible to counteract it on the present system,
or while every attempt to answer it is attributed to the people's
not daring to speak the truth. If any single fact or accident peeps
out, the whole character, having this legal screen before it, is
supposed to be of a piece; and the world, defrauded of the means of
coming to their own conclusion, naturally infer the worst. Hence the
saying, that reputation once gone never returns. If, however, we
grant the general licence or liberty of the press, in a scheme where
publicity is the great object, it seems a manifest _contre-sens_
that the author should be the only thing screened or kept a secret:
either, therefore, an anonymous libeller would be heard with
contempt, or if he signed his name thus --, or thus -- --, it would
be equivalent to being branded publicly as a calumniator, or marked
with the T. F. (_travail force_) or the broad R. (rogue) on his
back. These are thought sufficient punishments, and yet they rest on
opinion without stripes or labour. As to indecency, in proportion as
it is flagrant is the shock and resentment against it; and as vanity
is the source of indecency, so the universal discountenance and
shame is its most effectual antidote. If it is public, it produces
immediate reprisals from public opinion which no brow can stand;
and if secret, it had better be left so. No one can then say it is
obtruded on him; and if he will go in search of it, it seems odd he
should call upon the law to frustrate the object of his pursuit.
Further, at the worst, society has its remedy in its own hands
whenever its moral sense is outraged, that is, it may send to
Coventry, or excommunicate like the church of old; for though it may
have no right to prosecute, it is not bound to protect or patronise,
unless by voluntary consent of all parties concerned. Secondly, as
to rights of action, or personal liberty. These have no limit but
the rights of persons or property aforesaid, or to be hereafter
named. They are the channels in which the others run without injury
and without impediment, as a river within its banks. Every one has a
right to use his natural powers in the way most agreeable to
himself, and which he deems most conducive to his own advantage,
provided he does not interfere with the corresponding rights and
liberties of others. He has no right to coerce them by a decision of
his individual will, and as long as he abstains from this he has no
right to be coerced by an expression of the aggregate will, that is,
by law. The law is the emanation of the aggregate will, and this
will receives its warrant to act only from the forcible pressure
from without, and its indispensable resistance to it. Let us see how
this will operate to the pruning and curtailment of law. The rage of
legislation is the first vice of society; it ends by limiting it to
as few things as possible. 1. There can, according to the principle
here imperfectly sketched, be no laws for the enforcement of morals;
because morals have to do with the will and affections, and the law
only puts a restraint on these. Every one is politically constituted
the judge of what is best for himself; it is only when he encroaches
on others that he can be called to account. He has no right to say
to others, You shall do as I do: how then should they have a right
to say to him, You shall do as we do? Mere numbers do not convey
the right, for the law addresses not one, but the whole community.
For example, there cannot rightly be a law to set a man in the
stocks for getting drunk. It injures his health, you say. That is
his concern, and not mine. But it is detrimental to his affairs: if
so, he suffers most by it. But it is ruinous to his wife and family:
he is their natural and legal guardian. But they are thrown upon the
parish: the parish need not take the burden upon itself, unless it
chooses or has agreed to do so. If a man is not kind to or fond of
his wife I see no law to make him. If he beats her, or threatens her
life, she as clearly has a right to call in the aid of a constable
or justice of peace. I do not see, in like manner, how there can be
law against gambling (against cheating there may), nor against
usury. A man gives twenty, forty, a hundred per cent. with his eyes
open, but would he do it if strong necessity did not impel him?
Certainly no man would give double if he could get the same
advantage for half. There are circumstances in which a rope to save
me from drowning, or a draught of water, would be worth all I have.
In like manner, lotteries are fair things; for the loss is
inconsiderable, and the advantage may be incalculable. I do not
believe the poor put into them, but the reduced rich, the
_shabby-genteel_. Players were formerly prohibited as a nuisance,
and fortune-tellers still are liable to the Vagrant Act, which the
parson of the parish duly enforces, in his zeal to prevent cheating
and imposture, while he himself has his two livings, and carries off
a tenth of the produce of the soil. Rape is an offence clearly
punishable by law; but I would not say that simple incontinence is
so. I will give one more example, which, though quaint, may explain
the distinction I aim at. A man may commit suicide if he pleases,
without being responsible to any one. He may quit the world as he
would quit the country where he was born. But if any person were to
fling himself from the gallery into the pit of a playhouse, so as to
endanger the lives of others, if he did not succeed in killing
himself, he would render himself liable to punishment for the
attempt, if it were to be supposed that a person so desperately
situated would care about consequences. Duelling is lawful on the
same principle, where every precaution is taken to show that the act
is voluntary and fair on both sides. I might give other instances,
but these will suffice. 2. There should be a perfect toleration in
matters of religion. In what relates to the salvation of a man's
soul, he is infinitely more concerned than I can be; and to pretend
to dictate to him in this particular is an infinite piece of
impertinence and presumption. But if a man has no religion at all?
That does not hinder me from having any. If he stood at the church
door and would not let me enter, I should have a right to push him
aside; but if he lets me pass by without interruption, I have no
right to turn back and drag him in after me. He might as well force
me to have no religion as I force him to have one, or burn me at a
stake for believing what he does not. Opinion, 'like the wild goose,
flies unclaimed of any man': heaven is like 'the marble air,
accessible to all'; and therefore there is no occasion to trip up
one another's heels on the road, or to erect a turnpike gate to
collect large sums from the passengers. How have I a right to make
another pay for the saving of my soul, or to assist me in damning
his? There should be no secular interference in sacred things; no
laws to suppress or establish any church or sect in religion, no
religious persecutions, tests, or disqualifications; the different
sects should be left to inveigh and hate each other as much as they
please; but without the love of exclusive domination and spiritual
power there would be little temptation to bigotry and intolerance.
3. AS TO THE RIGHTS OF PROPERTY. It is of no use a man's being left to
enjoy security, or to exercise his freedom of action, unless he has a
right to appropriate certain other things necessary to his comfort and
subsistence to his own use. In a state of nature, or rather of
solitary independence, he has a right to all he can lay his hands on:
what then limits this right? Its being inconsistent with the same
right in others. This strikes a mathematical or logical balance
between two extreme and equal pretensions. As there is not a natural
and indissoluble connection between the individual and his property,
or those outward objects of which he may have need (they being
detached, unlimited, and transferable), as there is between the
individual and his person, either as an organ of sensation or action,
it is necessary, in order to prevent endless debate and quarrels, to
fix upon some other criterion or common ground of preference. Animals,
or savages, have no idea of any other right than that of the
strongest, and seize on all they can get by force, without any regard
to justice or an equal claim. 1. One mode of settling the point is to
divide the spoil. That is allowing an equal advantage to both. Thus
boys, when they unexpectedly find anything, are accustomed to cry
'_Halves!_' But this is liable to other difficulties, and applies only
to the case of joint finding. 2. Priority of possession is a fair way
of deciding the right of property; first, on the mere principle of a
lottery, or the old saying, '_First come, first served_'; secondly,
because the expectation having been excited, and the will more set
upon it, this constitutes a powerful reason for not violently forcing
it to let go its hold. The greater strength of volition is, we have
seen, one foundation of right; for supposing a person to be absolutely
indifferent to anything, he could properly set up no claim to it. 3.
Labour, or the having produced a thing or fitted it for use by
previous exertion, gives this right, chiefly, indeed, for moral and
final causes; because if one enjoyed what another had produced, there
would be nothing but idleness and rapacity; but also in the sense we
are inquiring into, because on a merely selfish ground the labour
undergone, or the time lost, is entitled to an equivalent _caeteris
manentibus_. 4. If another, voluntarily, or for a consideration,
resigns to me his right in anything, it to all intents and purposes
becomes mine. This accounts not only for gifts, the transfer of
property by bargains, etc., but for legacies, and the transmission of
property in families or otherwise. It is hard to make a law to
circumscribe this right of disposing of what we have as we please; yet
the boasted law of primogeniture, which is professedly the bulwark and
guardian of property, is in direct violation of this principle. 5, and
lastly. Where a thing is common, and there is enough for all, and no
one contributes to it, as air or water, there can be no property in
it. The proximity to a herring-fishery, or the having been the first
to establish a particular traffic in such commodities, may perhaps
give this right by aggravating our will, as having a nearer or longer
power over them; but the rule is the other way. It is on the same
principle that poaching is a kind of honest thieving, for that which
costs no trouble and is confined to no limits seems to belong to no
one exclusively (why else do poachers or country people seize on this
kind of property with the least reluctance, but that it is the least
like stealing?); and as the game laws and the tenaciousness of the
rights to that which has least the character of property, as most a
point of honour, produced a revolution in one country, so they are not
unlikely to produce it in another. The object and principle of the
laws of property, then, is this: 1. To supply individuals and the
community with what they need. 2. To secure an equal share to each
individual, other circumstances being the same. 3. To keep the peace
and promote industry and plenty, by proportioning each man's share to
his own exertions, or to the good-will and discretion of others. The
intention, then, being that no individual should rob another, or be
starved but by his refusing to work (the earth and its produce being
the natural estate of the community, subject to these regulations of
individual right and public welfare), the question is, whether any
individual can have a right to rob or starve the whole community: or
if the necessary discretion left in the application of the principle
has led to a state of things subversive of the principle itself, and
destructive to the welfare and existence of the state, whether the end
being defeated, the law does not fall to the ground, or require either
a powerful corrective or a total reconstruction. The end is superior
to the means, and the use of a thing does not justify its abuse. If a
clock is quite out of order and always goes wrong, it is no argument
to say it was set right at first and on true mechanical principles,
and therefore it must go on as it has done, according to all the rules
of art; on the contrary, it is taken to pieces, repaired, and the
whole restored to the original state, or, if this is impossible, a new
one is made. So society, when out of order, which it is whenever the
interests of the many are regularly and outrageously sacrificed to
those of the few, must be repaired, and either a reform or a
revolution cleanse its corruptions and renew its elasticity. People
talk of the poor laws as a grievance. Either they or a national
bankruptcy, or a revolution, are necessary. The labouring population
have not doubled in the last forty years; there are still no more than
are necessary to do the work in husbandry, etc., that is indispensably
required; but the wages of a labouring man are no higher than they
were forty years ago, and the price of food and necessaries is at
least double what it was then, owing to taxes, grants, monopolies, and
immense fortunes gathered during the war by the richer or more
prosperous classes, who have not ceased to propagate in the
geometrical ratio, though the poor have not done it, and the
maintaining of whose younger and increasing branches in becoming
splendour and affluence presses with double weight on the poor and
labouring classes. The greater part of a community ought not to be
paupers or starving; and when a government by obstinacy and madness
has reduced them to that state, it must either take wise and effectual
measures to relieve them from it, or pay the forfeit of its own
wickedness and folly.
It seems, then, that a system of just and useful laws may be
constructed nearly, if not wholly, on the principle of the right of
self-defence, or the security for person, liberty, and property. There
are exceptions, such, for instance, as in the case of children,
idiots, and insane persons. These common-sense dictates for a general
principle can only hold good where the general conditions are complied
with. There are also mixed cases, partaking of civil and moral
justice. Is a man bound to support his children? Not in strict
political right; but he may be compelled to forego all the benefits of
civil society, if he does not fulfil an engagement which, according to
the feelings and principles of that society, he has undertaken. So in
respect to marriage. It is a voluntary contract, and the violation of
it is punishable on the same plea of sympathy and custom. Government
is not necessarily founded on common consent, but on the right which
society has to defend itself against all aggression. But am I bound to
pay or support the government for defending the society against any
violence or injustice? No: but then they may withdraw the protection
of the law from me if I refuse, and it is on this ground that the
contributions of each individual to the maintenance of the state are
demanded. Laws are, or ought to be, founded on the supposed infraction
of individual rights. If these rights, and the best means of
maintaining them, are always clear, and there could be no injustice or
abuse of power on the part of the government, every government might
be its own lawgiver: but as neither of these is the case, it is
necessary to recur to the general voice for settling the boundaries of
right and wrong, and even more for preventing the government, under
pretence of the general peace and safety, from subjecting the whole
liberties, rights, and resources of the community to its own advantage
and sole will.
1828.
ESSAY XII
ON THE CHARACTER OF BURKE
There is no single speech of Mr. Burke which can convey a satisfactory
idea of his powers of mind: to do him justice, it would be necessary
to quote all his works; the only specimen of Burke is, _all that he
wrote_. With respect to most other speakers, a specimen is generally
enough, or more than enough. When you are acquainted with their
manner, and see what proficiency they have made in the mechanical
exercise of their profession, with what facility they can borrow a
simile, or round a period, how dexterously they can argue, and object,
and rejoin, you are satisfied; there is no other difference in their
speeches than what arises from the difference of the subjects. But
this was not the case with Burke. He brought his subjects along with
him; he drew his materials from himself. The only limits which
circumscribed his variety were the stores of his own mind. His stock
of ideas did not consist of a few meagre facts, meagrely stated, of
half-a-dozen commonplaces tortured into a thousand different ways; but
his mine of wealth was a profound understanding, inexhaustible as the
human heart, and various as the sources of human nature. He therefore
enriched every subject to which he applied himself, and new subjects
were only the occasions of calling forth fresh powers of mind which
had not been before exerted. It would therefore be in vain to look for
the proof of his powers in any one of his speeches or writings: they
all contain some additional proof of power. In speaking of Burke,
then, I shall speak of the whole compass and circuit of his mind--not
of that small part or section of him which I have been able to give:
to do otherwise would be like the story of the man who put the brick
in his pocket, thinking to show it as the model of a house. I have
been able to manage pretty well with respect to all my other speakers,
and curtailed them down without remorse. It was easy to reduce them
within certain limits, to fix their spirit, and condense their
variety; by having a certain quantity given, you might infer all the
rest; it was only the same thing over again. But who can bind Proteus,
or confine the roving flight of genius?
Burke's writings are better than his speeches, and indeed his speeches
are writings. But he seemed to feel himself more at ease, to have a
fuller possession of his faculties in addressing the public, than in
addressing the House of Commons. Burke was _raised_ into public life;
and he seems to have been prouder of this new dignity than became so
great a man. For this reason, most of his speeches have a sort of
parliamentary preamble to them: he seems fond of coquetting with the
House of Commons, and is perpetually calling the Speaker out to dance
a minuet with him before he begins. There is also something like an
attempt to stimulate the superficial dulness of his hearers by
exciting their surprise, by running into extravagance: and he
sometimes demeans himself by condescending to what may be considered
as bordering too much upon buffoonery, for the amusement of the
company. Those lines of Milton were admirably applied to him by some
one--'The elephant to make them sport wreathed his proboscis lithe.'
The truth is, that he was out of his place in the House of Commons; he
was eminently qualified to shine as a man of genius, as the instructor
of mankind, as the brightest luminary of his age; but he had nothing
in common with that motley crew of knights, citizens, and burgesses.
He could not be said to be 'native and endued unto that element.' He
was above it; and never appeared like himself, but when, forgetful of
the idle clamours of party, and of the little views of little men, he
applied to his country and the enlightened judgment of mankind.
I am not going to make an idle panegyric on Burke (he has no need of
it); but I cannot help looking upon him as the chief boast and
ornament of the English House of Commons. What has been said of him
is, I think, strictly true, that 'he was the most eloquent man of his
time: his wisdom was greater than his eloquence.' The only public man
that in my opinion can be put in any competition with him, is Lord
Chatham; and he moved in a sphere so very remote, that it is almost
impossible to compare them. But though it would perhaps be difficult
to determine which of them excelled most in his particular way, there
is nothing in the world more easy than to point out in what their
peculiar excellences consisted. They were in every respect the reverse
of each other. Chatham's eloquence was popular: his wisdom was
altogether plain and practical. Burke's eloquence was that of the
poet; of the man of high and unbounded fancy: his wisdom was profound
and contemplative. Chatham's eloquence was calculated to make men
_act_: Burke's was calculated to make them _think_. Chatham could have
roused the fury of a multitude, and wielded their physical energy as
he pleased: Burke's eloquence carried conviction into the mind of the
retired and lonely student, opened the recesses of the human breast,
and lighted up the face of nature around him. Chatham supplied his
hearers with motives to immediate action: Burke furnished them with
_reasons_ for action which might have little effect upon them at the
time, but for which they would be the wiser and better all their lives
after. In research, in originality, in variety of knowledge, in
richness of invention, in depth and comprehension of mind, Burke had
as much the advantage of Lord Chatham as he was excelled by him in
plain common sense, in strong feeling, in steadiness of purpose, in
vehemence, in warmth, in enthusiasm, and energy of mind. Burke was
the man of genius, of fine sense, and subtle reasoning; Chatham was a
man of clear understanding, of strong sense, and violent passions.
Burke's mind was satisfied with speculation: Chatham's was essentially
_active_; it could not rest without an object. The power which
governed Burke's mind was his Imagination; that which gave its
_impetus_ to Chatham was Will. The one was almost the creature of pure
intellect, the other of physical temperament.
There are two very different ends which a man of genius may propose to
himself, either in writing or speaking, and which will accordingly
give birth to very different styles. He can have but one of these two
objects; either to enrich or strengthen the mind; either to furnish us
with new ideas, to lead the mind into new trains of thought, to which
it was before unused, and which it was incapable of striking out for
itself; or else to collect and embody what we already knew, to rivet
our old impressions more deeply; to make what was before plain still
plainer, and to give to that which was familiar all the effect of
novelty. In the one case we receive an accession to the stock of our
ideas; in the other, an additional degree of life and energy is
infused into them: our thoughts continue to flow in the same channels,
but their pulse is quickened and invigorated. I do not know how to
distinguish these different styles better than by calling them
severally the inventive and refined, or the impressive and vigorous
styles. It is only the subject-matter of eloquence, however, which is
allowed to be remote or obscure. The things themselves may be subtle
and recondite, but they must be dragged out of their obscurity and
brought struggling to the light; they must be rendered plain and
palpable (as far as it is in the wit of man to do so), or they are no
longer eloquence. That which by its natural impenetrability, and in
spite of every effort, remains dark and difficult, which is impervious
to every ray, on which the imagination can shed no lustre, which can
be clothed with no beauty, is not a subject for the orator or poet. At
the same time it cannot be expected that abstract truths or profound
observations should ever be placed in the same strong and dazzling
points of view as natural objects and mere matters of fact. It is
enough if they receive a reflex and borrowed lustre, like that which
cheers the first dawn of morning, where the effect of surprise and
novelty gilds every object, and the joy of beholding another world
gradually emerging out of the gloom of night, 'a new creation rescued
from his reign,' fills the mind with a sober rapture. Philosophical
eloquence is in writing what _chiaro-scuro_ is in painting; he would
be a fool who should object that the colours in the shaded part of a
picture were not so bright as those on the opposite side; the eye of
the connoisseur receives an equal delight from both, balancing the
want of brilliancy and effect with the greater delicacy of the tints,
and difficulty of the execution. In judging of Burke, therefore, we
are to consider, first, the style of eloquence which he adopted, and,
secondly, the effects which he produced with it. If he did not produce
the same effects on vulgar minds as some others have done, it was not
for want of power, but from the turn and direction of his mind.[10] It
was because his subjects, his ideas, his arguments, were less vulgar.
The question is not whether he brought certain truths equally home to
us, but how much nearer he brought them than they were before. In my
opinion, he united the two extremes of refinement and strength in a
higher degree than any other writer whatever.
The subtlety of his mind was undoubtedly that which rendered Burke a
less popular writer and speaker than he otherwise would have been. It
weakened the impression of his observations upon others, but I cannot
admit that it weakened the observations themselves; that it took
anything from their real weight or solidity. Coarse minds think all
that is subtle, futile: that because it is not gross and obvious and
palpable to the senses, it is therefore light and frivolous, and of no
importance in the real affairs of life; thus making their own confined
understandings the measure of truth, and supposing that whatever they
do not distinctly perceive, is nothing. Seneca, who was not one of the
vulgar, also says, that subtle truths are those which have the least
substance in them, and consequently approach nearest to nonentity. But
for my own part I cannot help thinking that the most important truths
must be the most refined and subtle; for that very reason, that they
must comprehend a great number of particulars, and instead of
referring to any distinct or positive fact, must point out the
combined effects of an extensive chain of causes, operating gradually,
remotely, and collectively, and therefore imperceptibly. General
principles are not the less true or important because from their
nature they elude immediate observation; they are like the air, which
is not the less necessary because we neither see nor feel it, or like
that secret influence which binds the world together, and holds the
planets in their orbits. The very same persons who are the most
forward to laugh at all systematic reasoning as idle and impertinent,
you will the next moment hear exclaiming bitterly against the baleful
effects of new-fangled systems of philosophy, or gravely descanting on
the immense importance of instilling sound principles of morality into
the mind. It would not be a bold conjecture, but an obvious truism, to
say, that all the great changes which have been brought about in the
mortal world, either for the better or worse, have been introduced,
not by the bare statement of facts, which are things already known,
and which must always operate nearly in the same manner, but by the
development of certain opinions and abstract principles of reasoning
on life and manners, or the origin of society and man's nature in
general, which being obscure and uncertain, vary from time to time,
and produce corresponding changes in the human mind. They are the
wholesome dew and rain, or the mildew and pestilence that silently
destroy. To this principle of generalisation all wise lawgivers, and
the systems of philosophers, owe their influence.