Note 834 — Chapter VII · (continued 2)

‘Politics ought to be adjusted, not to human reasonings, but to human nature; of which the reason is but a part, and by no means the greatest part.’ Observations on a late State of the Nation, in Burke's Works, vol. i. p. 113. Hence the distinction he had constantly in view between the generalizations of philosophy, which ought to be impregnable, and those of politics, which must be fluctuating; and hence in his noble work, Thoughts on the Cause of the present Discontents, he says (vol. i. p. 136), ‘No lines can be laid down for civil or political wisdom. They are a matter incapable of exact definition.’ See also p. 151, on which he grounds his defence of the spirit of party; it being evident that if truth were the prime object of the political art, the idea of party, as such, would be indefensible. Compare with this the difference between ‘la vérité en soi’ and ‘la vérité sociale,’ as expounded by M. Rey in his Science Sociale, vol. ii. p. 322, Paris, 1842.