1 For the “liberal” interpretation, see most notably, O'Brien, Conor Cruise, The Great Melody: A Thematic Biography and Commented Anthology of Edmund Burke (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), esp. “Introduction,” and pp. 595–97Google Scholar. For the “conservative” interpretation, see Kirk, Russell, The Conservative Mind: From Burke to Santayana (Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1958), esp. pp. 7–9, 24–25Google Scholar; Canavan, Francis P., The Political Reason of Edmund Burke (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1960)Google Scholar; and Stanlis, Peter J., Edmund Burke and the Natural Law (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1965).Google Scholar

2 For Hobbes's statement of this dilemma, see Leviathan, “The Epistle Dedicatory,” ed. Macpherson, C. B. (Harmondsworth: Penguin Press, 1968), p. 75Google Scholar; Hume, David, “On the Origin of Government,” p. 40Google Scholar; “Of the Parties of Great Britain,” pp. 64–65 in Essays: Moral, Political, and Literary, ed. Miller, Eugene F. (Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Press, 1987).Google Scholar

3 Reflections on the Revolution in France, ed. Mahoney, Thomas H. D. (Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill, 1955), p. 9Google Scholar. Unless otherwise indicated, all page references are to this edition.

4 Ibid., p. 289.

5 On the consistency of Burke's thought and his confrontation with this core constitutional dilemma, see his “Appeal from the Old to the New Whigs” in Further Reflections on the Revolution in France, ed. Ritchie, Daniel (Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Press, 1992), esp. pp. 100–102.Google Scholar

6 Taylor, Charles, “Atomism” in Philosophical Papers, Vol. 2: Philosophy and the Human Sciences (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Macpherson, C. B., The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism, Hobbes to Locke (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962)Google Scholar; Sandel, Michael, Democracy's Discontents: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 1996).Google Scholar

7 Sanford Lakoff so describes this Burkean impulse (“Tocqueville, Burke and the Origins of Liberal Conservatism,” Review of Politics 60 [1998]: 435–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar). Phillipe Raynaud also suggests Burke's affinity to nineteenth century liberals—Constant, de Stael and Tocqueville—who defended a moderate liberal center against reaction and radicalism on right and left. See his “Introduction,” Réflexions sur la révolution de France (Paris: Hachette, 1991), esp. pp. lvi–lvii, c–ciii.Google Scholar

8 The “civil” bond represents a linguistic and conceptual compound of civitas—or as Locke and Hobbes preferred, “commonwealth”—and the Latin societas, or voluntary association. For accounts of etymology, see Locke, John, Second Treatise, X, 133Google Scholar; Oakeshott, Michael, On Human Conduct (Oxford: Oxford University Press), esp. pp. 199–203.Google Scholar

9 Or, as the critical demurrer of Rousseau would have it, which allow conventional inequalities to ramify. Cf. Burke, , Reflections, p. 42.Google Scholar

10 On this conceptual transformation, see Shils, Edward, “The Virtue of Civility” in The Virtue of Civility and Other Essays (Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Press, 1997), pp. 320–25.Google Scholar

11 For passages that suggest Burke's indebtedness to the first tradition of civil society, see Reflections, “The engagement and pact of society, which generally goes by the name of the constitution,” (p. 23); “You had all these advantages in your ancient states, but you chose to act as though you had never been molded into civil society,” (p. 40); and his discussion of the original contract (esp. pp. 67–70). For a more Lockean view that suggests at least a rudimentary distinction between the social and political union, consider, “If civil society be the offspring of convention, that convention must be its law. That convention must limit and modify all descriptions of constitution which are formed under it” (pp. 67–68); “the change (in principles of succession) is to be effected without a decomposition of the whole civil and political mass for the purpose of originating a new civil order out of the first elements of society” (p. 24). Cf. Locke, John, Second Treatise, X, 132Google Scholar; Paine, Thomas, Rights of Man, Being an Answer to Mr, Burke's Attack on the French Revolution (New York: Putnam's, 1894), pp. 307–311.Google Scholar

12 Reflections, p. 109.

13 Ibid., pp. 8, 24, 67.

14 Ibid., p. 9.

15 Ibid., p. 53.

16 Ibid, p. 231.

17 Ibid., pp. 110, 87,112, 231.

18 Ibid., p. 110.

19 Ibid., p. 38.

20 Hobbes, Leviathan, chaps. 22,29; Hume, , “Of Parties in General” in Essays: Moral, Political, and Literary, p. 55.Google Scholar

21 Locke, , Second Treatise, X, 132Google Scholar; XIX, 211–12, 220.

22 Reflections, p. 113.

23 Ibid., pp. 111–17.

24 Ibid., pp. 102–103.

25 Russell Kirk appreciates this point (The Conservative Mind, pp. 28–29). On Mansfield's differing view of Burke's religion, see Statesmanship and PartyGovernment: A Study of Burke and Bolingbroke (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965), pp. 232–33Google Scholar. Clark, J. C. D. warns against attempts to supplant the religious basis of eighteenth century with secular rationalism, English Society: 1688–1832 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), p. 257.Google Scholar

26 Mill, , “Utility of Religion”, in Three Essays on Religion (New York: Henry Holt, 1878), p. 70.Google Scholar

27 Tocqueville, , Ancien Regime and the French Revolution, ed. Stuart, Gilbert (New York: Anchor, 1983), pp. 6–7, 205Google Scholar; Democracy in America, ed. Mayer, (New York: Harper, 1966), Vol. I, Pt. 2, chap. 9, pp. 294–301.Google Scholar

28 This argument presumes that Burke should in principle prefer an established state religion. However, there is also some evidence to support the view that in ideal terms Burke might well have seen the advantages of religious disestablishment. In principle, the advantages of a separation between religion and politics are evident in his favorable assessment of the role of voluntary religious association among the New England colonists” (A Speech on Conciliation with America”, in Pre-Revolutionary Writings, ed. Harris, Ian [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993], esp. pp. 221–24Google Scholar). This was also a position he supported in the context of the Irish question (“Tracts on the Popery Laws,” Ibid., pp. 95–96). In both these cases Burke appreciates that a spirit of religious dissent is at least potentially compatible with an independent and pious liberty.

29 Reflections, pp. 169–71.

30 Ibid., p. 117.

31 “Speech on a Motion for Leave to Bring in a Bill to Quiet the Possessions of the Subject Against Dormant Claims of the Church”, 17 February 1772 in The Works of Edmund Burke (Boston: Little Brown, 1894), 7: 139.Google Scholar

32 Reflections, p. 115.

33 Ibid., p. 13.

34 “Speech on the Petition of the Unitarians”, Works, 7: esp. 47–57.Google Scholar

35 Reflections, p. 12.

36 Conniff, James, The Useful Cobbler: Edmund Burke and the Politics of Progress (Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1994)Google Scholar, importantly suggests that the “Lockeanism” Burke attacks is not Locke's own (p. 105). Burke discounts Locke's presumption of “tacit consent,” which resembles his own in many respects. The “Lockeanism” Burke finally indicts appears closer to Rousseau.

37 “Speech on the Acts of Uniformity”, Works, 7: 17.Google Scholar

38 Reflections, p. 173.

39 Cf. the arguments of Smith, Adam, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of The Wealth of Nations (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976), Bk. V, Ch. 1, Pt. III Art. 3, esp. pp. 314–15Google Scholar; Madison, James, The Complete Madison: His Basic Writings, ed. Padover, Saul K. (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1953), p. 304.Google Scholar

40 Reflections, p. 13.

41 Burke here expresses the possibility of a “Protestant theory of persecution” later explored by Lord Acton. Dalberg-Acton, John E. E., “The Protestant Theory of Persecution”, in Essays in the Study and Writing of History (Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Press, 1985), esp. pp. 98–102.Google Scholar

42 Reflections, pp. 25–26.

43 See Clark, , English Society, esp. pp. 250–57.Google Scholar

44 “Speech on Relief of Protestant Dissenters,” Works, 7: 24–26.Google Scholar

45 “Speech on the Petition of the Unitarians,” Ibid., p. 48.

46 “Regicide Peace 2,” 5: 312Google Scholar; compare Reflections, pp. 12–13, 72–73, 78, 144.

47 Reflections, p. 144.

48 Procés-Verbaux du comité d'instruction publique, 1791–92. Quoted in Hsiao, Kung Chuan, Political Pluralism (New York: Harper, 1927), p. 263Google Scholar. My translation.

49 Hsiao, , Political Pluralism, p. 263.Google Scholar

50 Reflections, p. 231; cf. Rousseau, , Social Contract, Bk. II, chap. 3, pp. 156–57.Google Scholar

51 Ibid., p. 53.

52 Ibid., p. 231.

53 Bolingbroke, , The Works of Lord Bolingbroke (Philadelphia: Carey and Hart, 1841), 3: 485–488; 4:108–109.Google Scholar

54 Hobbes, , Behemoth, Or The Long Parliament (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990), esp. pp. 2–3,18–19, 22–27Google Scholar; Hume, “Of Parties in General” and “Of Superstition and Enthusiasm.”.

55 Burke, , “Vindication ”, in Harris, Pre-Revolutionary Writings, p. 56.Google Scholar

56 Reflections, p. 115.

57 Ibid.

58 Ibid., p. 116.

59 Ibid., p. 106; see also, pp. 115–16.

60 Mansfield, Harvey, “A Sketch of Burke's Life” in Selected Letters of Edmund Burke, ed. Mansfield, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), p. 31.Google Scholar

61 Hume, , “That Politics may be reduced to a Science,” in Essays, pp. 29,26–27,31.Google Scholar

62 Hume, “Of Parties in General,” Ibid., p. 61

63 See for example Coltman, Irene, Private Men & Public Causes: Philosophy and Politics in the English Civil War (London: Faber and Faber, 1962).Google Scholar

64 For Burke's own words on this “political school,” see “Thoughts,” p. 133. For an account of its pervasiveness and Burke's “counterrevolution,” see Mansfield, , Statesmanship and Party Government, esp. pp. 98–105, 111, 121,178.Google Scholar

65 Burke, , “Thoughts,” p. 184.Google Scholar

66 Burke, , “Observations on a Late Pamphlet Intitled ‘The Present State of the Nation,’” Works 1: 9.Google Scholar

67 “Thoughts,” p. 185.

68 Ibid., p. 184.

69 See Hobbes, Thomas, Leviathan, Bk. I, chap. 22, pp. 274–75Google Scholar; chap. 29, pp. 374–75; Hume, David, “Of Parties in General” and “The Parties of Great Britain,” in Essays, Moral, Political and Literary, esp. pp. 60–62, 65–66.Google Scholar

70 “Thoughts,” P. 184.

71 “I remember an old scholastic aphorism, which says, ‘that the man who lives wholly detached from others, must be either an angel or a devil.’” Cf. Aristotle, , Politics, I,1Google Scholar; quoted in Ibid., p. 190.

72 Ibid., p. 190.

73 Ibid., p. 185–86.

74 Ibid., pp. 185.

75 Aristotle, Politics, Bk. I; Bk. Ill, x, xv.

76 See for example, Rommen, Heinrich, The State in Catholic Thought (New York: Greenwood, 1969), esp. pp. 143–44, 301–302Google Scholar; Troeltsch, Ernst, The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches (London: Allen and Unwin, 1949), 1: esp. 145–50.Google Scholar

77 Sanford Lakoff similarly takes Burke and Tocqueville's attention to pluralism as a distinguishing element of their “liberal conservatism.” See his “Tocqueville, Burke and the Origins of Liberal Conservatism,”esp. p. 456.

78 Here I follow Nancy Rosenblum's multiple liberal traditions thesis, Another Liberalism: Romanticism and Reconstruction in Liberal Thought (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987).Google Scholar

79 For Burke's attack on the legal positivism which would treat property, church, and private association as “fictitious persons, creatures of the state, whom at pleasure they may destroy” (Reflections, p. 121).

80 Ibid., pp. 70–71. Hannah Arendt later acknowledged Burke's prescience on this point (The Origins of Totalitarianism [New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1951], pp. 294–96Google Scholar).

81 Reflections, p. 88.

82 Ibid., p. 40.

83 Ibid.

84 Ibid., pp. 51, 217, 258.

85 Ibid., pp. 217, 258. Unlike Burke, Tocqueville saw the advent of this atomization in the centuries-old administrative centralization of the Bourbons. But the two agree about its disastrous consequences. Cf. Tocqueville, , Ancien Regime, pp. 205–207.Google Scholar

86 Reflections, p. 258.

87 Ibid., p. 48.

88 Ibid.

89 Ibid.

90 Ibid., pp. 69, 9. Burke also decries the concealed vanity of the spirit of philosophical reform: “A spirit of innovation is generally the result of a selfish temper and confined views. People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors” (Ibid., pp. 37–38).

91 In Burke's thought, as well as in social reality, the distinction between voluntary association and prescriptive institution blurs. For example, Harvey Mansfield has properly emphasized the sense in which Burke envisions political parties to be “establishments”—that is, inherited, quasi-institutional structures rooted in social gradations and vested interests—and not voluntary “associations,” as Jefferson intended. See his Statesmanship, esp. pp. 193–96. Yet even “voluntary” associations have ascriptive dimensions: they are rooted in traditions, we tend to belong from habit, and often exit is an unimaginable option. Tocqueville's later account of American associational life does not escape this ambiguity. Consider Democracy in America, esp. Vol. I, Pt. 2, chap. 9, where Tocqueville describes religious association as a “moeur” and as a “political institution” Vol. II, Pt. 1, chap. 7, where civic associations are characterized as a “general habit or taste” a “technique” or “spirit,” which must be “taught.”

92 Hirschman, Notably Albert, Passions and Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism Before Its Triumph (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977)Google Scholar; Holmes, Stephen, Passions and Constraint: On the Theory of Liberal Democracy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995)Google Scholar; Lerner, Ralph, “Commerce and Character” in The Thinking Revolutionary: Principle and Practice in the New Republic (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987).Google Scholar

93 Reflections, p. 114.

94 Ferguson, , An Essay on the History of Civil Society (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 1995), p. 56.Google Scholar

95 Far from presuming the harmony of pluralism, classical political thought was also well aware of its tensions. Compare the predicament described by Augustine, City of God, Bk. XIX, chaps. 7–10,17.