Reflections on the Revolution in France: Section 7 Summary & Analysis

Burke turns to Price’s comments regarding “the favorableness of the present times to […] exertions in the cause of liberty.” Burke argues that liberty is rather “a possession to be secured than […] a prize to be contended for.” He wonders, “What is that cause of liberty, and what are those exertions in its favor, to which the example of France is so singularly auspicious?” The members of the Revolution Society seem to look with contempt on those aspects of English governance which Burke has supposed to be England’s “glory.” They disdain the supposed “inequality in our representation,” hoping for the provocation of “some great calamity” which will encourage England to throw off this yoke.

Given the Revolution Society’s contempt for Britain’s own constitution and government, it’s not surprising that they now look to France for another model. They are so obsessed that it’s fruitless to talk to them about their ancestors’ practices or their country’s long-tested constitution: “They despise experience as the wisdom of unlettered men […] they have ‘the rights of men.’”

Burke explains that he does not deny “the real rights of men.” People have a right to justice, to the fruits of their labor, and whatever they desire to do without trespassing on the rights of others. Burke denies, however, that each has a right to “the share of power, authority, and direction” in the management of the state. He argues that one of the conventions of civil society is that “no man should be judge in his own cause.” That is, he gives up some of his liberty in order to secure some of it.

Burke uses the above as an example of the point that government doesn’t rest on clear, abstract “natural rights,” because the “perfection” of such rights “is their practical defect.” Government is, rather, “a contrivance of human wisdom to provide for human wants.”

For example, one such “want” is “a sufficient restraint upon […] passions.” Both individual and collective passions must necessarily be thwarted sometimes, for the good of both individuals and the whole; only someone besides themselves has the power to do this. But the circumstances of this vary greatly, so it doesn’t make sense to create an “abstract rule” about them. This is part of why governance is so difficult—it “requires a deep knowledge of human nature.”

Burke goes on, asking, “What is the use of discussing a man’s abstract right to food or to medicine? The question is upon the method of procuring and administering them,” which is better answered by a farmer or physician, “rather than the professor of metaphysics.” A “plausible scheme” may turn out to have “lamentable conclusions”; likewise, “obscure” causes might end up being critical to a nation’s prosperity.

Because, then, “the science of government” is so inherently practical, it requires experience—far more than the experience of even a single wise person. Even such a wise person ought to show “infinite caution” in “pulling down an edifice which  has answered in any tolerable degree for ages the common purposes of society,” or trying to rebuild without the aid of time-tested models.

Burke goes on to suggest that “the pretended rights of these theorists are all extremes”; even when theoretically correct, they often prove “morally and politically false. “The rights of men defy precise definitions, and government can only put them into practice through compromise, never with exactness.

Burke wonders if people, in their revolutionary fervor, have become so taken up with the “rights of man” that they’ve forgotten human nature. Such an obsession, cautions Burke, is dangerous. To such people, “plots, massacres, assassinations, seem […] a trivial price for obtaining a revolution.” They seem to be satisfied with nothing less than a “grand spectacle,” lulled by the privileges of security and prosperity. Burke argues that the present condition of France’s government is a “burlesque” and “perversion,” of which its own participants must have felt ashamed.