The Period of the
Enlightenment in France

The Philosophy of Jean Jacques Rousseau

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I.
French Illuminism and the "Encyclopedie"

II.
The Sensationalism of Abbe de Condillac

III.
Jean Jacques Rousseau

The
vast intellectual movement which made its appearance at the close of the
"Glorious Revolution" in England (1688) and continued until the
French Revolution (1789) is called Illuminism, or the
Enlightenment. The new culture, advancing under the aegis of
"reason," launched itself in bitter opposition to all the past in general, and in particular to the Middle Ages. According to
the Illuminati -- the exponents of the Enlightenment -- the Middle
Ages, victim of philosophical and religious prejudices, had not made use of
"reason," and hence they called it the age of obscurantism, or the
Dark Ages. The new philosophy, on the other hand, was to introduce an age of
enlightenment; it was to dispel the darkness of the past.

I. French Illuminism
and the "Encyclopedie"

France borrowed Illuminism
from England, the land of its birth. This
adoption of Illuminism was brought about by the great
admiration which the French world of culture felt toward all things English.
French thinkers preferred Locke to Descartes because the former traced philosophical
problems back to their original basis, sensation. They admired Newton's mechanism and the English
Constitution. In a word, the cultured French created for themselves the English
myth. Letters, ties of friendship, and frequent trips across the Channel by
noted Frenchmen of the times, such as Voltaire, are manifest proof of this
lofty esteem for things English.

However,
French thinkers did not receive Illuminism passively.
France was always the land of clear
and distinct ideas (Descartes); and as soon as Illuminism
made its appearance there, French philosophers were able and quick to elicit
the extreme consequences hidden beneath the surface of Illuminist thought.
Promptly divining the far-reaching conclusions that could be drawn from Illuminism, the French adopted it as an efficacious and
speedy means of relieving France from all the evils that had
befallen her after the demise of the Sun King, Louis XIV. Thus if England was the birthplace of the new
philosophy of the Enlightenment, France was to become the classic home
of Illuminism.

The
French Illuminists placed full confidence in "reason," which they
understood to mean common sense, a factor equally distributed among men.
Neglect of the use of common sense has produced in the world class
distinctions, differences in knowledge and language; it has fomented hatred and
wars. Reason must undertake the task of abolishing or reducing these
differences to a minimum; it must assume the office of formulating a universal
knowledge and establishing a universal organization of peaceful peoples
governed by universal laws.

Nature
should be the starting point in the process of effecting this new organization.
But "nature" for French Illuminism meant
human nature devoid of all moral and religious restraint. French Illuminism was hence eminently anti-historical and
naturalistic, and consequently tended to give rise to countless problems of
both a doctrinal and practical nature, the solutions to which are most contrary
to historical tradition and the teachings of Christian philosophy.

In the
doctrinal field, Descartes, a Rationalist and spiritualist, was replaced by
John Locke, whose empiricism was rapidly reduced to simple sensism
by the French philosophers. Newton's physical mechanism took the
place of traditional metaphysics. Not only is the world a self-made machine,
but man himself is a self-moving machine with no dependence whatsoever upon any
principle superior to matter. Julien Offroy de
La Mettrie (1709-1751), author of L'homme machine; and more important
still, Paul Heinrich Holbach
(1723-1789), German by birth but French by education and author of Le Systeme de la nature; and Claude
Adrien Helvetius
(1715-1771), author of De l'esprit and De
l'homme, were the most outstanding protagonists
of this atheistic materialism.

Of
course not all French Illuminists were atheists as were La Mettrie
and Holbach. Many of them, notably Diderot, Rousseau, Voltaire, proposed Deism in place of
atheism, if not for speculative reasons, at least as a support and foundation
for moral activity. Belief in God, in the immortality of the soul, and in a retribution in the life to come were affirmed in
opposition to atheism. Voltaire, who fought as ardently against atheism as he
did against the Church, wrote: "If God did not exist, it would be necessary
to invent Him. But all nature proclaims that He exists."

In the
field of religion, French Illuminism battled against
the Catholic Church, its dogmas, its discipline, its hierarchy. The Church was
judged responsible for all the errors of the past. In this bitter struggle
against the Church, atheists like La Mettrie and
Deists like Voltaire made common cause and cried out: "Crush the
infamous!"

In
politics, a new organization, English in pattern, was called forth to effect
the reforms demanded by reason. This rational state was outlined by Charles Louis de Secondat,
Baron de Montesquieu (1689-1775) (picture) in his book L'esprit de lois
(The Spirit of Laws), which was widely read and made a great impression on the
thinkers of the times.

To
spread and popularize these ideas, French Illuminism
made use of a very powerful medium, the Dictionnaire
Raisonne des sciences, des arts et
des metiers, or Encyclopedie,
as it came to be called. This work, which can be considered fundamental and
which spread throughout France and the rest of Europe, was published between 1751 and
1780 in thirty-five volumes, including supplements, illustrations and indexes.
The directors of the Encyclopedie were Jean Le Rond d'Alembert (1717?-1783), who wrote the famous Discours preliminaire
as a preface, and Denis Diderot
(1713-1784) (picture).
However, many other Illuminists also contributed to the Encyclopedie,
and for this reason this group of writers came to be known as the Encyclopedists. The most famous of the Encyclopedists were Voltaire and Rousseau.

The
most prominent figure of French Illuminism and of
European contemporary culture is Francois Marie Arouet,
who took the name Voltaire
(1694-1778) (picture). He
was the author of many works, the most interesting from the point of view of
philosophy being the following: Lettres anglaises ou philosophiques,
Metaphysique de Newton, Elements de la philosophie de Newton, and Dictionnaire
philosophique.

II. The
Sensationalism of Abbe de Condillac

A
typical philosopher of French Illuminism was Etienne Bonnot de Condillac (1715-1780),
a member of a distinguished legal family of Grenoble. Although ordained a Catholic
priest, Condillac never exercised the priestly
powers. For about ten years he was tutor t the ducal court of the Infant
Ferdinand de Bourbon at Parma. His most significant philosophical work is the Traite des sensations.

Locke
had distinguished two sources of our ideas, sensation and reflection. Condillac accepted only the former, and considered
reflection as an activity following upon and connected with sensation.
Moreover, Locke presupposed certain faculties of the soul, such as thinking,
remembering, reasoning, to be innate and did not investigate their origin. The
task of Condillac was to show how these activities
originate in sensation alone.

To
this end he took as an example a statue, endowed like man with a soul, but
deprived of any sensation ("tabula rasa") because the soul is enclosed in marble. The
statue is first given the use of the sense of smell, the least important of the
five senses. A rose is presented to the statue. The statue has the
"sensation" of odor; indeed, it is entirely identified with the odor
of rose. From this simple olfactory sensation, Condillac
believed he could derive all the so-called spiritual faculties. Indeed, when
the statue turns its entire capacity for feeling upon the impression of the
rose, attention is achieved.

A
faint sensation (produced when the rose is withdrawn) gives rise to memory;
a vivid memory produces imagination. Through memory the statue
can compare an actual sensation with a past one, and from this comparison arises judgment. The practical development of the
spirit proceeds in parallel fashion with its theoretical unfolding.

From a
pleasant or painful sensation the sentiment of pleasure or pain arises.
The remembrance of a pleasant sensation gives rise to desire; a vivid
desire produces passion; a stable desire is transformed into will.
The statue acquires all these faculties with the use of one sense only. By
granting to the statue the use of the other senses, the number of objects
is extended, the quantity of the ideas is
increased, but not the forms of activity by which it apprehends.

According
to Condillac, neither olfactory nor gustatory nor
auditory nor even visual sensations give to the statue the idea of spatial
extent upon which our knowledge of the corporeal world is founded. Only touch
is capable of giving the spirit an idea of the external world, of one's own
body and the bodies of others, because of the resistance which our
physical efforts meet in the exterior world.

It is
to be noted, however, that this is not a proof of the reality of the
external world; the statue still remains in the world of sensations, which are subjective
modifications. The external world is dogmatically presupposed; we are face
to face with metaphysical Skepticism.

III. Jean Jacques Rousseau

Life and Works

Born
in Geneva in 1712, Rousseau (
picture) led an errant and
tormented life. At sixteen, while apprenticed to an engraver, he ran away and
wandered to Savoy. He found shelter, first, with
the pastor at Confignon and later, in Annecy, with Madame de Warens, who remained his patroness for many years. In 1741
he went to Paris, where he was obliged to earn
his living as a copyist of music, as a tutor, and a secretary. In 1750 he took
part in an open contest sponsored by the Academy of Dijon, succeeded in winning the
prize, and rose to fame in Europe.

Leaving
Paris in 1756, he retired to
Montmorency, where he wrote his two masterpieces, the Social Contract
and Emile. Instead of bringing him the fame he expected, these
two works evoked the opposition of civil and ecclesiastical authorities, and
Rousseau was forced to go into exile.

He
went first to Switzerland, and then to England, where he was a guest of David
Hume. Estranged from Hume by suspicions and petty quarrels, he returned to Paris in 1770; he died of apoplexy in
Ermenonville in 1778. A Calvinist, Rousseau was early
in life converted to Catholicism, only to abandon it and to return to
Protestantism.

Doctrine

Rousseau
is truly the most original figure of French Illuminism,
of which he was not only a protagonist but also a severe critic. He possessed
the characteristics common to the Illuminati; namely, a great faith in reason,
and a deep-rooted desire to bring history, tradition, and society to trial.

On the
other hand, he was suspicious of the arts and sciences, of those very things
which were believed to be the greatest achievements of Illuminism
and considered the paramount factors of civilization and happiness.

As far
as Rousseau is concerned, the growth of culture produces an increase of
indigence and corruption. The source of true human values is not the intellect
but sentiment, which is possessed equally by all. Hence his continuous
refrain was: "Let us return to nature." But what does Rousseau mean
by nature?

In his
earlier writings Rousseau identified nature with the primitive state of savage
man. Later, especially under the criticism of Voltaire, Rousseau took nature to
mean the spontaneity of the process by which man builds his personality
and his world. Nature thus signifies interiority, integrity, spiritual freedom,
as opposed to that imprisonment and enslavement which society imposes in the
name of civilization.

Hence,
to go back to nature means to restore to man the forces of this natural
process, to place him outside every oppressing bond of society and the
prejudices of civilization. Rousseau developed these concepts in his two
masterpieces, the Social Contract and Emile.

The "Social Contract"

This
work contains Rousseau's political thought. The problem which he proposes to
solve is this: Society implies distinction between sovereign and subjects, with
the submission of the latter to the former. How is it possible, in a society so
composed, to preserve equality and liberty in the subjects? Liberty comes to
man from nature, and belongs to every associate of society as an inalienable
right.

Rousseau
resolved the question by distinguishing between "the general will"
and "the will of all," giving to this latter a meaning opposite the
former. "The general will" is the expression of the humanity immanent
in every man, and for this reason such a will is inalienable, universal and
uniform in every man. "The will of all," on the contrary, is the expression
of particular interests, of egoism; it is the font of all inequalities.
According to Rousseau, liberty consists in the spontaneous coordination of the
"general will" and the "will of all."

Primitive
man was free because, without being forced, he submitted his individualistic
interests to the exigencies of his humanity. The social contract has not
changed this condition, for men, making such a contract, intended to fuse the
general of all associated persons by a "pactum unionis" (and not by a "pactum
subjectionis," as Hobbes maintained), in such a
manner that their liberty might be conserved even in society. It is this
"general will," and not any particular group or person, which is
invested with sovereignty.

Laws
are just in so far as they express this general will. Thus every associated
person, by obeying the general will and the laws that flow from it, does
nothing more than obey himself. Hence hi is still free and feels his entire
dignity as a free man, even in the society of which he forms a part.

"Emile"

In
this work Rousseau offers an example of what he thinks education, in accordance
with the spontaneity of nature, should be. He says that nature is good, and
hence an education in keeping with the properties of nature will also be good,
unless this process is destroyed by outside prejudices. The pupil has to feel
himself free in developing his activities. The educator may never impose his
will upon the pupil by precepts. His work should consist in preparing the
fittest external conditions for the free unfolding of the activities of his
pupil.

In
keeping with his principle that culture and the sciences are causes of evil and
corruption, Rousseau wants Emile, the hero of his work by that name, to learn
only those notions that will be necessary to his practical life. Thus he will
learn a trade, that of carpenter. Moral education must start with the
burgeoning of reason, and its norms will be learned, not from the precepts of
the educator but from the reflections of the pupil himself. Emile's religion
will be a natural one, that is, belief in God as He reveals Himself in His
works. Only when his education is completed can Emile enter society, for only
then will he be able to avoid its dangers and enjoy its benefits.