Vindiciae Gallicae: Defence of the French Revolution and its English admirers, against the accusations of the Right Hon. Edmund Burke, including some strictures on the late production of Mons. de Calonne
Contributions
- James Mackintosh
- author
- G.G.J. & J. Robinson (George Robinson)
- publisher
Related resources
- has translation
- Apologie de la Révolution française et de ses admirateurs anglais, en réponse aux attaques d'Edmund Burke, avec quelques remarques sur le dernier ouvrage de M. de Calonne translation
Notes
Mackintosh wrote 'Vindiciae Gallicae' at the age of 25 in response to Edmund Burke’s 'Reflections on the French Revolution'. The youngest of Burke's critics, he was possibly also the most profound, writing for a studied, elite audience rather than in the popular, journalistic manner of a Thomas Paine.
Published in April 1791, Mackintosh's response provided moderate supporters of the revolution with an eloquent statement on the need for reform in Britain, as well as France. While not condemning the methods used in France, Mackintosh did not believe them suitable or necessary for effecting change in Britain, "We desire to avert revolution by reform; subversion by correction". Mackintosh's intention was not to rival but to undermine Burke's 'Reflections' by exposing the weakness of his argument and evidence behind his flamboyant and showy prose. Conor Cruise O'Brien has called Mackintosh "the most acute of Burke's early critics" (See O'Brien's introduction to 'Reflections', 1969, p.50).
However, the gradual escalation of revolutionary violence caused a change of heart, and after the 1792 September Massacres he gradually started to distance himself from his earlier stance. In December 1796, he met Burke to apologize for his earlier criticism, having told him in a letter that, “From the earliest moments of reflection your writings were my chief study and delight... The enthusiasm with which I then embraced them is now ripened into solid Conviction by the experience and meditation of more mature age. For a time indeed seduced by the love of what I thought liberty, I ventured to oppose your Opinions without ever ceasing to venerate your character... I cannot say... that I can even now assent to all your opinions on the present politics of Europe. But I can with truth affirm that I subscribe to your general Principles; that I consider them as the only solid foundation both of political Science and of political prudence” (22 December).
Mackintosh later described the French Revolution as a “shameless thing", in a series of published pro-Burke lectures given between February and June 1799, in which he also attacked the spread of the [Godwin's] "new philosophy". Despite this recantation of his early support for the Revolution, which has somewhat distorted Mackintosh's reputation, he never abandoned his long-standing support for parliamentary and legal reform, press freedom, and Catholic rights.
See P. O'Leary, 'Sir James Mackintosh: the whig Cicero' (1989) and Christopher Finlay's entry on Mackintosh for the ONDB.