How did Hippolyte Taine’s interpretation of the French Revolution resemble Edmund Burke’s view?

Hippolyte Taine’s interpretation of the French Revolution closely mirrored the hostile view held by Edmund Burke.1

In his monumental work, Les Origines de la France contemporaine (“The Origins of Contemporary France”), Taine argued that the Revolution did not promote liberty as commonly believed. Instead, he contended that it merely transferred absolute power into even more illiberal hands, a perspective that aligned with and further developed Burke’s critique.1

Burke, in his Reflections on the Revolution in France, had famously challenged the Revolution’s rationalist and idealist temper, arguing that its speculative schemes of political reconstruction caused a destructive devaluation of tradition and inherited social values. Similarly, Taine’s historical analysis sought to demonstrate that France’s primary fault lay in excessive centralization—a condition originating during the ancien régime and subsequently intensified by the revolutionary process. Both thinkers shared a deep skepticism toward the radical, abstract political changes that sought to dismantle established social orders.213