GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

THE IDEALIST THEORY OF THE STATE 573
strike the English reader as unrealistic. It constitutes,
Indeed, a pre-eminent example of that a prim reasoning
whose validity in relation to political and ethical problems
is, as I suggested 1 in the last chapter, open to question.
In spite, however, of the abstract and remote character
of the theory, it is highly important, both because it
represents the logical development ofseveral lines ofthought which in earlier chapters I have been engaged in following,
and because of the philosophical sanction which it
would seem to bestow upon the policies of States in the
contemporary world. I will, first, say something of the
various lines of thought which may be regarded as the
ancestors of the theory; I will then briefly outline its main
features, and indicate some of the corollaries that follow
from it.
I. ANCESTORS OF THE THEORY
Common to* all those who have followed what, for the
sake of brevity, I propose to call idealist modes of political
thinking are a rejection of the Social Contract theory
(except in so far as Rousseau inherited and took over
the theory as part of the framework of his thought), a
refusal to entertain doctrines of natural rights, except in
the Ideological sense defined by T. H. Green, a disavowal
of popular sovereignty (Rousseau again excepted), and an
insistence upon the natural as opposed to the artificial
status and origin of society.
Views of Burke
(i)
Let us consider in the light of these denials and insist*
ences the views of Edmund Burke (1729-1797) as .set out
in his Speeches and Letters. At his criticisms of the Social
Contract theory and the doctrine of Natural Rights I have
already glanced. 1 They embody a number offeatures which
recur in the best conservative thought of every generation,
and which most readers will at once recognize as familiar
1 See Chapter XIV, p. 558-560.
f See Chapter XIV, pp. 546-549-