ABSTRACT
In relating the political order of civil society to the created order of the world, Burke's theory of prescription of government plays an important role. Paul Lucas has described Burke's theory of prescription as his 'idea about the way in which an adverse possession of property and authority may be legitimated by virtue of use and enjoyment during a long passage of time'. Burke's doctrine of prescription of government, as Fennessy remarks, "is by no means an anti-rational defence of existing institutions, based on feelings of reverence for antiquity. It is a theoretical answer to a problem of political theory". Universal moral imperatives are, as such, abstractions and become actual only in the concrete and particular. The derivation of the bond of civil society from the necessities of man's nature shifts the emphasis, not only from consent to obligation, but also from rights to purposes. The constitution of civil society is determined by human needs, not by original rights.
