Edmund Burke, from Reflections on the French Revolution para 87:
Are all the taxes to be voted grievances, and the revenue reduced to a patriotic contribution or patriotic presents? Are silver shoe-buckles to be substituted in the place of the land tax and the malt tax, for the support of the naval strength of this kingdom?
When science is irrelevant
3 hours ago
3 comments:
And while we're on the subject of Burke, here's a link to a nice little editorial written while he was just nineteen showing that, among other things, he knew that rent was the major cause of poverty.
D, Splendid. Do you think the example in the penultimate para is allegorical or real life?
Difficult to say. Clues in the para imply that EB is talking about an Irish landlord who was 10 or more years older than himself. He could certainly have met such a person through his mother's family or through his father's business contacts. And enlightened landlords who charge less than the maximum may be in the minority but they do exist. So the "gentleman of fortune" may well have been taken from real life. It's nice to think so anyway.
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