m.

If Burke began his "Vindication of Natural Society," with intent to
produce a burlesque, he missed his aim, and came very near convincing
himself of the truth of his proposition. And in fact, the book was
hailed by the rationalists as a vindication of Rousseau's philosophy.

Burke was a conservative rationalist, which is something like an
altruistic pessimist. In the society of rationalists Burke was a
conservative, and when with the conservatives he was a rationalist. That
he was absolutely honest and sincere there is not a particle of doubt,
and we will have to leave it to the psychologists to tell us why men
hate the thing they love.

"The Vindication of Natural Society" is a great book, and the fact that
in the second edition Burke had to explain that it was an ironical
paraphrase does not convince us it was. The things prophesied have come
about and the morning stars still sing together. Wise men are more and
more learning by inclining their hearts toward Nature. Not only is this
true in pedagogics, but in law, medicine and theology as well. Dogma has
less place now in religion than ever before; many deeply religious men
eschew the creed entirely; and in all pulpits may be heard that the
sublime truths of simple honesty and kindness are quite enough basis for
a useful career. That is good which serves. Religions are many and
diverse, but reason and goodness are one.

Burke's attempt to prove that without "revealed religion" mankind would
sit in eternal darkness makes us think of the fable of the man who
planted potatoes, hoed them, and finally harvested the crop. Every day
while this man toiled, there was another man who sat on the fence,
chewed a straw and looked on. And the author of the story says that if
it were not for the Bible, no one would have ever known to whom the
potatoes belonged.

Burke wrote and talked as all good men do, just to clear the matter up
in his own mind. Our wisest moves are accidents. Burke's first book was
of a sort so striking that both sides claimed it. Men stopped other men
on the street and asked if they had read the "Vindication"; at the
coffeehouses they wrangled and jangled over it; and all the time Dodsley
smiled and rubbed his hands in glee.

Burke soon blossomed out in clean ruffled shirt every morning, and
shortly moved to a suite of rooms, where before he had received his mail
and his friends at a coffeehouse.

Then came William Burke, a distant cousin, and toget