^* It is odd but necessary to begin with a note about the Notes. In several of the notes conservative views will be attributed tovarious people. This is not meant to imply that the people who hold these views are conservatives. They are conservative in respect to these views, but they also hold other views, and they may or may not be conservative. It is often very difficult to say whether or not a person is conservative, especially since few of the people referred to were concerned with formulating an explicit political morality.

¹ This discussion is provided in the author's Conservatism: A Moral Basis for a Good Society, work-in-progress.Google Scholar

² This conception of good lives is described and defended in John, Kekes, Moral Wisdom and Good Lives, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995), see especially chapter 2.Google Scholar

³ Reliable accounts of some of these disagreements may be found in Noel, O'Sullivan, Conservatism (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1976)Google Scholar and Anthony, Quinton, The Politics of Imperfection (London: Faber & Faber, 1978).Google Scholar For general surveys and bibliographies of conservative ideas, see Kenneth, Minogue, ‘Conservatism,’ Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Paul, Edwards, (New York: Macmillan, 1967),Google ScholarAnthony, O'Hear, ‘Conservatism,’ The Oxford Companion to Philosophy, edited by Ted, Honderich, (Oxford University Press, 1995),Google ScholarAnthony, Quinton, ’ A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy, edited by Gooden, Robert E. & Philip, Pettit (Oxford: Blackwell, 1993), andGoogle ScholarRudolf, Vierhaus, ‘Conservatism,’ Dictionary of the History of Ideas, edited by Wiener, Philip P., (New York: Scribner's, 1968).Google Scholar Two useful anthologies of conservatives writings are Russell, Kirk, Conservative Reader, (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1982)Google Scholar and Roger, Scruton, Conservative Texts, (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1991).Google Scholar Some of the classic works that have influenced the development of conservatism are Plato's, Republic,Google ScholarAristotle's, Politics, Nicomachean Ethics, and Rhetoric,Google ScholarMachiavelli's, The Prince and Discourses,Google ScholarMontaigne's, Essays,Google ScholarHobbes's, Leviathan,Google ScholarHume's, Treatise, Enquiries, Essays, and History of England,Google ScholarBurke's, Reflections on the Revolutionin France,Google ScholarTocqueville's, Democracy in America and The Old Regime and the French Revolution,Google ScholarHegel's, Philosophy of Right,Google ScholarStephen's, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,Google ScholarBradley's, Ethical Studies,Google ScholarSantayana's, Dominations and Powers,Google ScholarWittgenstein's, Philosophical Investigations and On Certainty,Google Scholar and Oakeshott's, Rationalism in Politics and On Human Conduct.Google Scholar

⁴ This is the view of many religious conservatives mainly, but not exclusively, in the Catholic tradition. Perhaps the most uncompromising representative of this view is Joseph de, Maistre, Works, selected, translated, and introduced by Lively, J., (London: Allen & Unwin, 1965).Google Scholar For surveys and bibliographies divided along national lines, see O'Sullivan, , Conservatism, chapter 2 for France and chapter 3 for Germany;Google ScholarKlemens von, Klemperer, Germany's NewConservatism (Princeton University Press, 1957)Google Scholar for Germany; Quinton, , The Politics for Imperfection for England;Google ScholarKirk, , The Conservative Mind, for England and America;Google ScholarDunn, Charles W. & Woodward, J. David, The Conservative Tradition in America (Lanham, Maryland, Rowman & Littlefield, 1996),Google ScholarEast, John P., The American Conservative Movement (Chicago: Regnery, 1986),Google ScholarNash, George H., The Conservative Intellectual Movementin America (New York: Basic Books, 1976),Google Scholar and Clinton, Rossiter, Conservatism in America (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982), second revised edition for America.Google Scholar

⁵ The roots of sceptical conservatism are to be foundscattered in Montaigne's, Essays,Google ScholarHobbes's, Leviathan,Google ScholarHume's, Treatise, Enquiries, Essays, and History of England,Google ScholarBurke's, Reflections on the Revolution in France,Google ScholarTocqueville's, Democracy in America and The Old Regime and the French Revolution,Google ScholarSantayana's, Dominations and Powers,Google Scholar and Wittgenstein's, Philosophical Investigations and On Certainty.Google Scholar On Montaigne's conservatism, see John, Kekes, The Examined Life (University Park: Penn State Press, 1992),Google Scholar chapter 4; on Hobbes's conservatism, see Michael, Oakeshott, Hobbes on Civil Association (Oxford: Blackwell, 1974);Google Scholar on Hume's conservatism, see Shirley Robin, Letwin, The Pursuit of Certainty, (Cambridge University Press,1965),Google Scholar part I, Livingston, Donald.W, Hume's Philosophy of Common Life (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984),Google Scholar chapter 12, and Wolin, Sheldon S., ‘Hume and Conservatism,’ American Political Science Review, vol. 98 (12 1954), pp. 999–1016;CrossRefGoogle Scholar on Tocqueville's conservatism, see Roger, Boesche, The Strange Liberalism of Alexis de Tocqueville (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987,Google ScholarFrohnen, , Virtue and the Promise of Conservatism,Google Scholar and Kahan, Alan S., Aristocratic Liberalism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986);Google Scholar on Santayana's conservatism, see John, Gray, ‘George Santayana and the Critique of Liberalism,’ The World and I(02 1989), pp. 593–607;Google Scholar on Wittgenstein's conservatism, see Charles, Covell, The Redefinition of Conservatism, chapter 1Google Scholar and Nyiri, J. C., ‘Wittgenstein's Later Work in Relation to Conservatism’ in Wittgenstein and His Times, edited by Brian, McGuinness, (Oxford: Blackwell, 1982).Google Scholar Some contemporary sceptical conservative works are Lincoln, Allison, Right Principles (Oxford: Blackwell, 1984),Google ScholarJohn, Gray, Liberalisms (London: Routledge, 1989),Google ScholarPost-liberalism, (New York: Routledge, 1993),Google Scholar and Beyond the New Right (London: Routledge, 1993),Google ScholarShirley Robin, Letwin, The Gentleman in Trollope (Cambridge: Harvard, 1982);Google ScholarMichael, Oakeshott, Rationalism in Politics and On Human Conduct.Google Scholar

⁶ For historical surveys of absolutist conservatism, see Note 4 above. Some contemporary absolutist conservative works are John, Finnis, Natural Law and Natural Rights (Oxford: Clarendon, 1980)Google Scholar and Fundamentals of Ethics (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983),Google ScholarGermain, Grisez, Beyond the New Morality (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988),Google ScholarVeatch, Henry B., Human Rights (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1985),Google Scholar and Eric, Voegelin, Order in History, 5 vols, (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1954-1987).Google Scholar

⁷ The historical origins of relativistic conservatism are to be found in Giambattista, Vico, New Science,Google ScholarJohann Gottfried von, Herder, Reflections on the Philosophy of the History of Mankind,Google ScholarWilhelm, Dilthey, Gesammelte Schriften, 18 vols, (Stuttgart: B. G. Teubner and Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1914-1977),Google Scholar and, a step removed, in Edmund, Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France.Google Scholar This tradition is most illuminatingly treated by Karl, Mannheim, ‘Conservative Thought,’ in Essays on Sociology and Social Psychology, edited by Paul, Kecskemeti, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1953),Google Scholar and by Isaiah, Berlin, ‘The Counter-Enlightenment’ in Against the Current, edited by Henry, Hardy, (New York: Viking, 1980)Google Scholar and Vico and Herder, (London: Hogarth, 1976).Google ScholarSee also Michae, Earmarth, Wilhelm Dilthey: The Critique of Historical Reason (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978).Google Scholar

⁸ Contemporary works of pluralistic conservatism by and large coincide with those of sceptical conservatism, see Note 5 above. For an account of pluralism in general, see John, Kekes, The Morality of Pluralism (Princeton University Press, 1993)Google Scholar and Nicholas, Rescher, Pluralism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993).Google Scholar

⁹ For a general account of the political significance of human nature for politics, see Berry, Christopher J., Human Nature (London: Macmillan, 1986).CrossRefGoogle Scholar For the specific connection between human nature and conservatism, see Berry, Christopher J., “Conservatism and Human Nature” in Politics and Human Nature, edited by Ian, Forbes and Steve, Smith, (London: Frances Pinter, 1983).Google Scholar

¹⁰ Traditionalism is an expression that does not appear in any of the works listed below, but the position defended in them is very close to traditionalism so it is perhaps justified to claim affinity with them. See Francis Herbert, Bradley, Ethical Studies, second edition, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1927), essays 5–6;Google ScholarJohn, Kekes, Moral Tradition and Individuality (Princeton University Press, 1989);Google ScholarAlastair, Maclntyre, After Virtue (University of Notre Dame Press, 1981)Google Scholar and Whose Justice? Which Rationality (University of Notre Dame Press, 1988);Google ScholarOakeshott, , On Human Conduct,Google Scholar and Scruton, , The Meaning of Conservatism.Google Scholar

¹¹ For an account of tradition in general, see Edward, Shils, Tradition (University of Chicago Press, 1981).Google ScholarSee also John, Casey, ‘Tradition and Authority,’ in Conservative Essays, edited by Maurice, Cowling, (London: Cassell, 1978),Google ScholarThomas Steams, Eliot, ‘Tradition and the Individual Talent,’ in Selected Prose of T. S. Eliot, edited by Frank, Kermode, (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1975)Google Scholar and Maclntyre, , After Virtue, chapter 15.Google Scholar

¹² By O'Sullivan, , Conservatism, chapter 1 and Quinton, The Politics of Imperfection.Google Scholar

¹³ This sort of pessimism may be found in the tragedies of Sophocles, especially in Antigone,Google ScholarThucydides, , The Peloponnesian War,Google ScholarMachiavelli, , The Prince and The Discourses,Google ScholarMontaigne, , Essays,Google ScholarStephen, , Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,Google ScholarBradley, , Ethical Studies,Google Scholar essay VII, and Santayana, , Dominations and Powers.Google ScholarA recent statement of it is John, Kekes, Facing Evil, (Princeton University Press, 1990).Google Scholar

¹⁴ The author gratefully acknowledges the Editor's comments that helped to strengthen the argument.