# A Vindication of Natural Society

A Vindication of Natural Society: or, a View of the Miseries and Evils arising to Mankind from every Species of Artificial Society is a work by Edmund Burke published in 1756. Although the Vindication is a satire aimed at the deism of Lord Bolingbroke, Burke confronted Bolingbroke not in the sphere of religion but in that of civil society and government, countering that his arguments against revealed religion could apply to all institutions. So close to Bolingbroke's style was the work that Burke's ironic intention was missed by some readers, leading Burke in his preface to the second edition (1757) to make plain that it was a satire; this is the consensus view among most Burkean scholars and followers.
The Vindication was recognized as satire by William Godwin, often regarded as the first modern proponent of philosophical anarchism, who supported part of Burke's arguments critical of the existing political institutions despite the irony inherent in its satire. Conversely, some modern right-wing libertarian commentators, such as Murray Rothbard and Joseph Sobran, interpreted Burke's satire as a serious philosophical anarchist argument against the state.

## Satire

Most historians and Burke's biographers, scholars, and followers believe the Vindication was intended as satire; some political commentators disagree. For example, American anarcho-capitalist economist and political theorist Murray Rothbard described the work as "perhaps the first modern expression of rationalistic and individualistic anarchism", and argued that Burke wrote the Vindication in earnest but later wished to disavow it for political reasons, while American paleoconservative writer Joseph Sobran stated that Burke's anti-statist argument was too persuasive to be a joke.
Rothbard's argument was based on a misunderstanding. He believed it took nine years (until 1765) for Burke to divulge that he was the author of the work, and only claimed it to be a satire to save his then spawning political career. In reality, Burke revealed both his authorship and claims the book as a satire in the preface to its second edition published in 1757, long before he would embark upon a political career.
British political philosopher William Godwin, often considered the first modern proponent of anarchism, appreciated its critique of political institutions but recognized the satire, and observed that the intent of Burke was to show that the existing political institutions, for all their flaws, were still preferable to anarchy. Passages that included Jonathan Swift-style irony, where Burke acted as though he was Bolingbroke and those who supported him in many ways in the Vindication, and as a theoretical realization of the danger such controversial opinions may have upon a career are the following:
   "In such a Discussion, far am I from proposing in the least to reflect on our most wise Form of Government; no more than I would in the freer Parts of my philosophical Writings, mean to object to the Piety, Truth, and Perfection of our most excellent Church. [...] These and many more Points I am far from spreading to their full Extent. You are sensible that I do not put forth half my Strength; and you cannot be at a loss for the Eeason. A Man is allowed sufficient Freedom of Thought, provided he knows how to chuse his Subject properly. You may criticise freely upon the Chinese Constitution, and observe with as much Severity as you please upon the Absurd Tricks, or destructive Bigotry of the Bonzees. But the Scene is changed as you come homeward, and Atheism or Treason may be the Names given in Britain, to what would be Reason and Truth if asserted of China."

## Content

The preface presents the occasion of the essay as a riposte to the philosophy of Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke (died 1751), whose Collected Works and Letters had been published by David Mallet in 5 volumes in 1754. A new preface was written by Burke after his authorship was discovered, and after a significant number of his contemporaries who read his work had not caught the irony. In this apologetic preface, he wrote that Vindication was inspired by "seeing every Mode of Religion attacked in a lively Manner, and the Foundation of every Virtue, and of all Government, sapped with great Art and much Ingenuity" in Lord Bolingbroke's collected works. About his design, Burke wrote:
   "The Design was, to shew that, without the Exertion of any considerable Forces, the same Engines which were employed for the Destruction of Religion, might be employed with equal Success for the Subversion of Government; and that specious Arguments might be used against those Things which they, who doubt of every thing else, will never permit to be questioned."
Burke contrasts natural society with political society, beginning with a distrust of the Mind, which "every day invents some new artificial Rule to guide that Nature which if left to itself were the best and surest Guide". He proposes to set out to identify those "unalterable Relations which Providence has ordained that every thing should bear to every other. These Relations, which are Truth itself, the Foundation of Virtue, and consequently, the only Measures of Happiness, should be likewise the only Measures by which we should direct our Reasoning." Burke's attack on the rationalists of his day is not because they are rationalists but because they engage in artificial rather than natural reason. In the spirit of the Age of Enlightenment, Burke expresses every confidence in the cumulative progress of the human condition. He writes:
   "The Fabrick of Superstition has in this our Age and Nation received much ruder Shocks than it had ever felt before; and through the Chinks and Breaches of our Prison, we see such Glimmerings of Light, and feel such refreshing Airs of Liberty, as daily raise our Ardor for more. The Miseries derived to Mankind from Superstition, under the Name of Religion, and of ecclesiastical Tyranny under the Name of Church Government, have been clearly and usefully exposed."
In a swift survey of history, Burke finds nothing but "Tumults, Rebellions, Massacres, Assassinations, Proscriptions, and a Series of Horror", and remarks that "All Empires have been cemented in Blood" as the casualties mount in the millions, with cruelties perfected by technology. Contrasted with natural liberty and natural religion, Burke sets the Aristotelian general forms of government, which he describes with the same emphatic detail as used in the Satires of Juvenal: starting from despotism, the simplest and most universal, where "unbounded Power proceeds Step by Step, until it has eradicated every laudable Principle"; then republics, which "have many Things in the Spirit of absolute Monarchy, but none more than this; a shining Merit is ever hated or suspected in a popular Assembly, as well as in a Court"; followed by aristocracy, which is scarcely better, as "a Genoese, or a Venetian Republick, is a concealed Despotism"; and finally giddy democracy, where the common people are "intoxicated with the Flatteries of their Orators". Despite being a law student, Burke also denounced lawyers and legal procedures.
Having employed fulminating rhetoric to dispense with the artificial political societies after "so fair an Examen, wherein nothing has been exaggerated; no Fact produced which cannot be proved", Burke is expected to turn to his idea of natural society for contrast. Instead, he turns his critical eye upon the mixed government, which combines monarchy, aristocracy, and a tempered democracy, the form of politics this essay's British readers would immediately identify as their own (Westminster system). His satirist's view takes it all in, painting once again in broad strokes the dilemmas of the law courts or the dissatisfactions of wealth, and closes—without actually having vindicated natural society at all. Embedded in the whirl of extravagant invective, Burke is able, like all writers of Menippean satire, to express some subversive criticism thusly: "You may criticise freely upon the Chinese Constitution, and observe with as much Severity as you please upon the Absurd Tricks, or destructive Bigotry of the Bonzees. But the Scene is changed as you come homeward, and Atheism or Treason may be the Names given in Britain, to what would be Reason and Truth if asserted of China."