Burke argued that the French Revolution was fundamentally different from the Glorious Revolution of 1688, which he defended as a conservative restoration of ancient liberties. The French revolutionaries, he claimed, were attempting to rebuild society from first principles, rejecting all inherited institutions and traditions . He predicted this abstract rationalism would lead to the destruction of civil society's moral fabric and ultimately to terror. He was proven prescient when the revolution descended into the Reign of Terror and Napoleonic dictatorship .

While Locke's social contract was a historical or hypothetical agreement among individuals to form government, Burke reconceived it as a partnership between the living, the dead, and the unborn . This partnership is not a voluntary contract that can be dissolved at will, but a sacred trust that must be preserved across generations. For Burke, the state is a perpetual enterprise of civilization that no generation has the right to break, making his view fundamentally incompatible with the liberal and revolutionary idea of radical renewal .

Burke was a 'classical conservative' in that he opposed ideology itself, arguing that political problems must be addressed with prudence and practical wisdom rather than abstract doctrines . This distinguished him from later ideological conservatives who developed coherent programmatic agendas. He also accepted limits on the British Crown and defended the American colonists' grievances, showing a willingness to reform institutions from within. His thought emphasizes organic change over radical reform, a position that remains distinct from the ideological conservatism of the modern era.

Burke argued that political order depends on moral order, which in turn depends on religious belief. He saw Christianity as 'the great principle of social cohesion' and condemned the French revolutionaries' attack on the Church as an attack on the very foundations of civil society . For Burke, religion provides the 'eternal allegiance' that makes citizens willing to subordinate private interests to public good. His conservatism is thus intimately tied to a defense of established religion, rejecting the secular rationalism of Enlightenment thinkers who sought to base politics on human reason alone.

A common misconception is that Burke was simply a traditionalist who rejected all change. In fact, he explicitly stated that 'a state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation' . He distinguished between reform and revolution, arguing that institutions must adapt to changing circumstances through gradual, organic change. His opposition was not to change itself but to revolutionary change that breaks continuity and destroys the accumulated wisdom embodied in existing institutions and customs .