This book offers a detailed study of political argument in early eighteenth-century England, a time in which the politics of virtue were vigorously pursued - and just as vigorously challenged. In tracing the emergence of a privately orientated conception of civic virtue from the period's public discourse, this book not only challenges the received notions of the fortunes of virtue in the early modern era but provides a promising critical perspective on the question of what sort of politics of virtue is possible or desirable today.

"Shelley Burtt's exposition of these complex and nuanced themes is economical, shrewd and above all lucid...." J. P. Kenyon, Times Literary Supplement

"Shelley Burtt offers an intelligent, disciplined and felicitous discussion, and it is a pleasure to see a work as well grounded in history as it is in political theory." Times Higher Education Supplement

"...a scholarly, detailed, well-constructed book, its author's first, which gives assurance of many more good things to come." J. G. A. Pocock, American Historical Review

"...a book for those who like their histories interesting, riveting, and richly textured." Terence Ball, American Political Science Review

"This book is easy to admire because it is elegantly brief and lucidly written and, at the same time, it possesses a stimulating and rich complexity." Lawrence E. Klein, Albion