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descent from the historical Burke: in the writings of the more thor–
oughgoing antinomians there isn't, and of necessity can't be, any–
thing corresponding to some of his central doctrines such as Provi–
dence and the "divine tactic." However all this has come to be rather
overlooked under the influence of a synthetic image of Burke, tailored
to the specifications of our age: tough, cultivated, secular, sophisti–
cated, bored with the dogmas and ideologies of the marketplace, a
man for whom traditional wisdom consists in combining three poli–
cies-getting on with those one doesn't agree with, holding what one
has, and walking downstairs before one is kicked down. It is some–
times regarded as a sign of greatness in a thinker that he can be end–
lessly travestied:
if
this is so, then Burke is certainly in Elysium. A
few months ago the conservative writer mentioned above, T. E.
Utley, described Burke as "a house with many mansions": on recent
evidence it would have been both truer and newer to call him "a
front to many houses."
Thirdly, conservative skeptics may be divided according to what
it is in the doctrines of the Left that they are skeptical about. Of
course they are all skeptical about principles, but it is commonly as–
sumed on the Right that principles of two very different kinds enter
into, or are presupposed by, liberal or radical views. There are on the
one hand theoretical or technical principles, and on the other prac–
tical or moral principles: the former provide the 'scientific' basis of
reformism, the latter the 'utopian' basis. And both are equally ne–
cessary for a rational, full-fledged, self-contained radical program.
The radical, that is to say, needs certain practical principles concern–
ing what society ought to be, in order to know what to aim at, and
also certain theoretical principles concerning what society really is,
in order to realize his aim. I do not wish for the moment to quarrel
with these right-wing assumptions-though I certainly do think that
the role of principles and presupposition in left-wing thought has been
much exaggerated, even by thinkers ultimately well-disposed to the
Left, like Isaiah Berlin. Here I only want to point out what we might
reasonably expect to find in consequence of them: namely, that right–
wing thinkers would always make it quite clear which of these two
kinds of liberal assumptions they are attacking. Yet I do not know
that we always do.
Of generalized, or secular, skepticism, as we may call it, the
