Burke’s political thought, while lacking a complete metaphysics, tracks the Aristotelian-Thomist tradition even though he is fundamentally an English empiricist. His foremost contribution is a theory of change within a hierarchic, teleological universe: ‘By preserving the method of nature in the conduct of the state, in what we improve, we are never wholly new; in what we retain, we are never wholly obsolete’, he wrote in Reflections. The best synthesis is in Thoughts on Our Present Discontents: ‘It is the business of the speculative philosopher to mark the proper ends of government. It is the business of the politician, who is the philosopher in action, to find out the proper means towards those ends, and to employ them with effect’. Pappin begins by dismissing claims of Burke’s utilitarianism as language for rhetorical effect; elsewhere, he denies Burke is an existentialist or a reactionary, for his views are neither a ‘swirl of abstraction’ nor premised on defending an unchanging order. The balance of the book sketches the metaphysical principles of Aristotle, Aquinas, and to a lesser degree Jacques Maritain (i.e., Collingwood’s absolute presuppositions). Action follows nature; action and existence require structure and essence; growth is essential for the subject to reach its teleological ends; wisdom perfects the intellect as virtue the will. For Burke as for Aquinas, social (secondary) nature is shaped by habits and customs that naturally emerge from man’s primary nature. In Economical Reform, ‘It would be wise to attend upon the order of things, and not to attempt to outrun the slow, but smooth and even course of nature’. In a volume of his writings, ‘Man is made for speculation and action, and when he pursues his nature he succeeds best at both’. Where contemporary philosophers posit the rejection of metaphysical essence liberates man, Burke unites change and constancy, possibility and structure. Thus man’s place is within the social community, not bound but prudentially circumscribed in his behavior. Ultimately, Burke distinguishes between abstraction and universal / absolute and so contends that society’s proper ends are realized according to unique characteristics of the epoch. Pappin asserts Burke should have given more thought to metaphysics but concedes his primary purpose was political. The work is carefully organized and helpfully illustrates metaphysical concepts, but the prose is choppy. While the natural law view of Burke is often referenced, where is Harvey Mansfield? Coda: another Burke quote: ‘All men have equal rights but not to equal things’.