Page 8 - GALIET LICENSES AND SILENCES: Burke IV

In Edmund Burke’s insufferable “Reflections on the Revolution in France,”1 we encounter spills of hot coffee on our laps: the astute opinions of an Irish-born English whig whose spastic ultra conservative imagination challenges “the most astonishing event in the world”: the French Revolution (92). His poignant views on Revolutionary France and the Revolution Society of England’s idealistic and transcendental tendencies are equally evident in his eloquent discourse. Burke indulges in castigating both: the French Revolution for its terrifying romantic idealism of “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” and the Revolution Society of England for its passionate endorsement of its non-conformist ideologues and “political theologians” for their blatant attempt to brainwash, influence and colonize conservative England towards imitating France’s emancipating pikes and Sans-Culottes2 3⁄4 encapsulating symbols of the French Revolution.
Moreover, Burke, as a grand inspecting counter-revolutionary, prepares his memorial in eternity by his uncanny predictions of the “Reign of Terror” and the “Raise of Napoleon” and partly his oblivion by nostalgically dwelling on the providential and primordial benefits bestowed by monarchy, tradition, inheritance
1 Burke, Edmund. Reflections on the Revolution in France. London, UK: The Penguin Group. 1986.
2 Urban workers and artisans who wore trousers down to the ankle rather than knee breeches to distinguish themselves from the nobility. Spark Notes: www.sparknotes.com/history/european/frenchrev/terms.html
•8•