BURKE, EDMUND (1729-1797).--Statesman, orator, and political philosopher, was the _s._ of an attorney in Dublin, where he was _b._ His _f._ was a Protestant, but his mother, whose maiden name was Nagle, was a Roman Catholic. He received his early _ed._ at a Quaker school at Ballitore, and in 1743 proceeded to Trinity Coll., Dublin, where he graduated in 1748. His _f._ wished him to study for the law, and with this object he, in 1750, went to London and entered the Middle Temple. He, however, disliked law and spent more time in literary pursuits than in legal study. In 1756 his first _pub._ work appeared, _A Vindication of Natural Society_, a satire on the views of Bolingbroke, but so close was the imitation of that writer's style, and so grave the irony, that its point as a satire was largely missed. In the same year he _pub._ his famous treatise _On the Sublime and Beautiful_, which attracted universal attention, and three years later (1759) he projected with Dodsley the publisher _The Annual Register_, for which he continued to write the yearly Survey of Events until 1788. About the same time he was introduced to W.G. Hamilton (known as Single-speech H.) then about to go to Ireland as Chief Sec., and accompanied him in the capacity of private sec., in which he remained for three years. In 1765 he became private sec. to the Marquis of Rockingham, the Whig statesman, then Prime Minister, who became his fast friend until his death. At the same time he entered Parliament as member for Wendover, and began his brilliant career as an orator and philosophic statesman. The first great subject in which he interested himself was the controversy with the American colonies, which soon developed into war and ultimate separation, and in 1769 he _pub._, in reply to G. Grenville, his pamphlet on _The Present State of the Nation_. In the same year he purchased the small estate of Gregories near Beaconsfield. His speeches and writings had now made him famous, and among other effects had brought about the suggestion that he was the author of the _Letters of Junius_. It was also about this time that he became one of the circle which, including Goldsmith, Garrick, etc., had Johnson for its central luminary. In 1770 appeared _Thoughts on the Causes of the Present Discontent_, directed against the growth of the Royal power on the one hand, and of faction on the other. In 1774 he was elected member for Bristol, and continued so until 1780, when differences with his constituency on the questions of Irish trade and Catholic emancipation led to his resignation, after which he sat for Malton until his final retirement from public life. Under the administration of Lord North (1770-1782) the American war went on from bad to worse, and it was in part owing to the splendid oratorical efforts of B. that it was at last brought to an end. To this period belong two of his most brilliant performances, his speech on _Conciliation with America_ (1775), and his