A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful

A PHILOSOPHICAL ENQUIRY INTO THE ORIGIN OF OUR IDEAS OF THE SUBLIME AND BEAUTIFUL

AND OTHER PRE-REVOLUTIONARY WRITINGS

EDMUND BURKE (1729–97) was born in Dublin, and educated at Abraham Shackleton’s Quaker school in Ballitore and Trinity College, Dublin. In 1750 he entered the Middle Temple in London, but soon left law for literature and, later, politics. His first publication, the parodic A Vindication of Natural Society (1756), was followed in 1757 by A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful, a text that was to influence the writers of the Romantic period. His political career began in 1765 when, having become secretary to the then Prime Minister, the Marquis of Rockingham, he was made Member of Parliament for Wendover. His oratory gained him influence in the Whig party, although he was not to hold office until the downfall of the Tories under Lord North in 1783. Burke became MP for Bristol in 1774, but his support for the unpopular causes of Catholic emancipation and the relaxation of the Irish trade laws cost him the seat in 1780. Subsequently elected MP for Malton in 1781, he became Paymaster of the Forces in 1782, resigned with Fox, and returned to the same office under the coalition government in 1783. He retired in 1794 and received a large pension from the ministry.

A large part of Burke’s political career was dedicated to the problem of India (he took part in the investigation of the East India Company affair) and he wrote widely on the subject. Throughout his career he wrote and spoke on many of the major governmental and constitutional issues of his day: the troubles in America resulted in his Thoughts on the Present Discontents (1770) and Letter to the Sheriffis of Bristol (1777), and the French Revolution produced one of his most famous works, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790). This latter work explained at some length his opposition to the doctrines of the revolution, and it was this subject that was to be the last great political theme of his public life.

DAVID WOMERSLEY is a Fellow and Tutor in English Literature at Jesus College, Oxford. His book The Transformation of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was published by Cambridge University Press in 1988. He has also edited Augustan Critical Writing and a three-volume edition of Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, both for Penguin Classics.

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This edition first published 1998

The moral right of the editor has been asserted

Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

EISBN: 978–0–141–90811–3

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

A CHRONOLOGY OF EDMUND BURKE

INTRODUCTION

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

Correspondence	The Correspondence of Edmund Burke, ed. Thomas W. Copeland, 10 vols (Cambridge University Press, 1958–78).
Decline and Fall	Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. David Womersley, 3 vols (Allen Lane, London, 1994).
Essays	David Hume, Essays Moral, Political, and Literary, ed. E. F. Miller (Liberty Classics, Indianapolis, 1985).
History of the Rebellion	Clarendon, The History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, ed. W. Dunn Macray, 6 vols (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1888).
Reflections	Reflections on the Revolution in France, in Volume 8 of The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke, ‘The French Revolution 1790–1794’, ed. L. G. Mitchell (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989).
Todd	William B. Todd, A Bibliography of Edmund Burke (Rupert Hart-Davis, London, 1964).
Writings and Speeches	The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke, general editor Paul Langford (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1981–).

A CHRONOLOGY OF EDMUND BURKE

1729	Born on 12 January in Dublin, the son of Richard Burke, Attorney of the Irish Court of Exchequer, and his wife Mary.
1741–4	Attends boarding school run by Abraham Shackleton.
1744–9	Attends Trinity College, Dublin.
1750	Enters Middle Temple, London.
1756	A Vindication of Natural Society.
1757	Marries Jane Nugent. A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful.
1759–64	Private secretary to William Hamilton, Irish Chief Secretary.
1764	Founder member of ‘The Club’.
1765	Private secretary to the Marquis of Rockingham, Whig leader and First Lord of the Treasury.
1765–74	Member of Parliament for Wendover.
1768	Buys ‘Gregories’, his estate at Beaconsfield, by borrowing heavily.
1770	Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents.
1774	Speech on American Taxation.
1774–80	Member of Parliament for Bristol.
1775	Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies.
1777	Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol on the Affairs of America.
1780–94	Member of Parliament for Malton.
1781	Appointed to the Commons Select Committee on Indian Affairs.
1782	Paymaster of the Forces.
1786–94	Takes a leading role in the impeachment of Warren Hastings.
1790	Reflections on the Revolution in France.
1791	Splits with Fox over the French Revolution. Letter to a Member of the National Assembly, Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs,and Thoughts on French Affairs.
1794	Death of Burke’s brother and son.
1796	Letter to a Noble Lord, Thoughts on Scarcity and Letters on a Regicide Peace.
1797	Dies at Beaconsfield, 9 July.