the second city of England; spent fourteen of the best years of his life in
conducting the impeachment of Warren Hastings, Governor-General of India; and,
greatest of all, delivered his famous speeches on Taxation and Conciliation, in
behalf of the American colonists.

Notwithstanding the distinctly modern tone of Burke's ideas, it would be wrong
to think of him as a thoroughgoing reformer. He has been called the Great
Conservative, and the title is appropriate. He would have shrunk from a purely
republican form of government, such as our own, and it is, perhaps, a fact that
he was suspicious of a government by the people. The trouble, as he saw it, lay
with the representatives of the people. Upon them, as guardians of a trust,
rested the responsibility of protecting those whom they were chosen to serve.
While he bitterly opposed any measures involving radical change in the
Constitution, he was no less ardent in denouncing political corruptions of all
kinds whatsoever. In his Economical Reform he sought to curtail the enormous
extravagance of the royal household, and to withdraw the means of wholesale
bribery, which offices at the disposal of the king created. He did not believe
that a more effective means than this lay in the proposed plan for a
redistribution of seats in the House of Commons. In one place, he declared it
might be well to lessen the number of voters, in order to add to their weight
and independence; at another, he asks that the people be stimulated to a more
careful scrutiny of the conduct of their representatives; and on every occasion
he demands that the legislators give their support to those measures only which
have for their object the good of the whole people.

It is obvious, however, that Burke's policy had grievous faults. His reverence
for the past, and his respect for existing institutions as the heritage of the
past, made him timid and overcautious in dealing with abuses. Although he stood
with Pitt in defending the American colonies, he had no confidence in the
thoroughgoing reforms which the great Commoner proposed. When the Stamp Act was