This stance derived in part from his suspicion of general principles and aversion to
extremism. Setting out his personal intellectual ethic, he called for ‘less faith & more ad
hoc empiricism’, which meant that ‘one must judge each situation, so far as possible, on its
own merits & not commit oneself to campaigns for general principles: only for liberation
from specific wrongs & then for liberation from the defects of the remedy, & so on’. There
could be no general solution, no unvarying right position to take. Steering a decent course
meant making constant adjustments and distinctions, and avoiding excess:
‘One must vote for minorities which wd be fatal if they became majorities … one must
avoid the thin end of the wedge argument: which … only means that you refuse to do
what is right because you fear that you (or others) will not, when it is pushed too far, have
enough moral courage (or strength) to stop it then. The great weakness & vanity is search
for general principles of permanent reliability: even pragmatists do: whereas one shd
have the courage, I suppose, to die for undemonstrated & unself-evident positions, not
bolstered up by absolute faith.
Ever wary of final positions, ever resistant to coming to rest, Berlin immediately added –
giving voice both to the perennial doubts about moderation, and to the essence of the
moderate outlook itself – ‘I wonder if this is too cosy a way out’.
80
Berlin to Myron Gilmore 26 December 1949.
35
Convention