Edmund Burke

Edmund Burke was born in Dublin to a Protestant father and Catholic mother and studied at Trinity College. He moved to London to study law but turned to writing; his book on the sublime and the beautiful made his name. In 1765 he entered Parliament, where he served for nearly thirty years as a leading Whig. He urged conciliation with the American colonies, arguing that taxing them against their will was unwise. He worked against the persecution of Catholics in Ireland, and for years he led the impeachment of Warren Hastings, governor-general of India, for abuses there. In 1790 he published Reflections on the Revolution in France, warning that the revolution's attempt to remake society from abstract principles would lead to violence and tyranny, as happened in the Terror. He argued that society is a partnership between the living, the dead and those yet to be born, and that change should come gradually, building on inherited institutions. Thomas Paine answered him in Rights of Man. Burke died in 1797.

Edmund Burke is also an author in the library: author page and works.

Faith: His family's historic heritage was Roman Catholic. Source: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy