Edmund Burke: An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs

Abstract

Edmund Burke (1729–1797) was born in Dublin, and after attending Trinity College there, proceeded to London to study law. Yet his early pursuits were largely literary (his Inquiry into the Origin of our Ideas on the Sublime and the Beautiful was a major statement of aesthetic theory), and he became editor of the Annual Register at thirty. Six years later he entered the House of Commons and became secretary to the Marquis of Rockingham, leader of the Whig Party. In Parliament he served the Whig cause with eloquent writings and speeches against George III’s efforts to establish personal control, and in support of the American colonies, Roman Catholic emancipation, and abolition of the slave trade.