10.2 The French Enlightenment

                By far the most ambitious work of the French Enlightenment was the great Encyclopédie (Encyclopedia), edited by Denis Diderot.  Diderot (1713 - 1784) believed that knowledge was key to the emancipation of the human mind from ignorance and intolerance.  Knowledge, however, had to be both understandable and available if indeed the mind were to be freed.  To this end he embarked on a twenty-year project of collecting information on all subject matter to be published in a massive encyclopedia.  He sought articles from the greatest minds of the time and over 200 experts contributed to the work.  Not content to have the encyclopedia be a mere collection of facts, Diderot and his contributors used it to promote the philosophes' belief that human progress was possible only if faith were replaced by reason.  Both the Catholic Church and royal government saw the work as heretical and subversive and suppressed its publication.  In spite of authoritarian resistance and the financial difficulties inherent in such a project, Diderot persisted.  Fortunately, the crown's chief censor was a sympathetic friend of Diderot, and the restrictions on publication were not rigidly enforced.  He received financial contributions from numerous benefactors including Madame Geoffrin.  Both Frederick II of Prussia and Catherine the Great of Russia offered the hospitality of their countries should he need to move his project from France.  When faced with bankruptcy, Diderot put his personal library up for sale.  The Russian empress, hearing of his plight, bought it and gave it back to him.

              The first of the Encyclopédie’s 17 volumes was published in 1751; the last in 1772.  Some 25,000 sets were sold (half of them purchased abroad) by 1789.  With its readable text and detailed illustrations, the Encyclopédie proved an epic and pioneering contribution to both education and understanding.  Presenting the challenge of reason to the traditional concepts of authority, it caused its readers to view their rulers and institutions with a more critical eye.

Montesquieu and The Spirit of Laws

Born into the French nobility, Charles Louis de Secondat, le Baron de Montesquieu (1689 - 1755), was trained as a lawyer and served as a judge in the parlement   (law court) of the city of Bordeaux.  While distinguishing himself as a jurist, Montesquieu was also a philosophe busying himself with studies of science and history and writing social criticism.  In his lifetime his most famous work was his Persian Letters (1721), a satirical novel that gently ridiculed aspects of French society and government through the observations of two imaginary Persian visitors to France. Through their letters home as well as through those received from their fictional correspondents in Persia, Montesquieu compared life in France with that of the Orient.  The book was a great success, going through eight editions in its first year of publication. The French reading public loved satire, especially if "hidden" in exotic and mysterious cultures. All who read the book knew that the injustices and absurdities of Montesquieu's Persia were those of their own society.  Fortunately for Montesquieu, Persian Letters was published during the Regency of the young King Louis XV and royal censorship had been relaxed, another factor contributing to the book's success as a best seller.  It is in the area of political theory, however, that Montesquieu made his greatest contribution to modern thought.  In 1748 he published The Spirit of Laws, a book on government.  Knowing that it would not pass French censors, he published it first in Switzerland. The book was openly published in France in 1755 when a new royal censor removed the ban.

               Montesquieu's thesis was that the "spirit" of laws - their origin and nature - was determined by the unique conditions of geography, climate, economy, government, and values of different societies. Looking for the universal truths underlying law in all of its manifestations, he divided the book into four areas: natural law (human reason and natural rights), international law (relations between states), political law (the relationship of the state to the individual), and civil law (relations between individuals).

               The Spirit of Laws is a lengthy and rambling work that laboriously covers the whole spectrum of human existence from marriage customs to religious beliefs.  Montesquieu maintained that governments differ because their underlying "spirits" differ.  His observations led him to conclude that the spirit underlying monarchy was honor; that of a republic, virtue; and fear underlay despotism.  Should the identifying "spirit" weaken, the government will weaken.  He also believed environment was a factor explaining different kinds of societies and forms of government.  The warm, sunny conditions of the Mediterranean explain those regions' leanings to autocracy and Catholicism.  The colder, harsh conditions of northern Europe lend themselves to moderate governments and Protestantism.  These generalizations may seem to modern minds to be ignorant and even silly, but they do represent a "scientific" approach to understanding human institutions and customs.

              The book's most significant conclusion, however, related to the question, what was the ideal form of government?  Montesquieu saw the philosophical goal of government to be freedom.  By freedom he did not mean that state of human anarchy wherein each individual was free of any restraints whatsoever (the "state of nature") but individual freedom within a society of laws guaranteeing each person's natural rights.  Montesquieu's studies led him to conclude that Britain came closest to this ideal.  The government of Britain was one wherein the executive and legislative powers seemed to him to be separated. 

              Freedom is best guaranteed when the powers of government are separated.  Government, he wrote, had three powers: legislative, executive, and judicial.  The legislative power made the law.  The executive power administered and enforced the law.  The judicial power interpreted the law. These powers must be separated and not exercised by the same body. They should also be kept in relatively equal strength through a system of checks and balances.  In France the crown, through its divine right absolutism, exercised all three powers of government and there was no freedom.  In Britain, however, the Parliament made the law and the crown administered the law, and, as compared to France, there was freedom (the Bill of Rights).  The ideal legislature, he wrote, should have two representative bodies: one representing the upper classes, the other the commoners. Both bodies should also be in a check and balance relationship for the laws they make should be those of compromise and consensus acceptable to the interests of both groups.

              Montesquieu's understanding of the British political system was not fully correct.  For example, the British Prime Minister and Cabinet officers (those who performed the executive function for the crown) were at the same time members of Parliament, and not separate from it.  Nonetheless, his message was to the France of the Bourbon monarchy, not to the British.  The universal truth of government was the separation of powers in which both the nobility and commoners have a legislative role, a political message not lost to the French aristocracy and bourgeoisie.  Although it did not attract a reading audience during Montesquieu's lifetime, The Spirit of Laws would later be widely read throughout France and elsewhere.  In British colonial America its premises were well known and understood by some extraordinary men whom experience would someday bring together.  Among them were Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay, Edmund Randolph, and George Washington. They would be the principals among the framers of the Constitution of the United States of America.

The Political Philosophy of Jean Jacques Rousseau

              Of all the philosophes, the one with the most immediate impact on the thinking of his times was Jean-Jacques Rousseau.  Between 1789 and 1799 Europe was shaken by the momentous upheaval known as the French Revolution.  The Old Regime of absolute monarchy, privileged estates of nobility and clergy, and centuries of human injustice based on feudal custom and tradition was shattered in a revolutionary movement based on such principles as liberty, equality, and fraternity and the sovereignty of the general will of the people.  These revolutionary ideals were first given voice by Rousseau.

            Rousseau was born in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1712, the son of a poor watchmaker.  Emotional and moody, Rousseau had a troubled childhood.   At age sixteen he left home and went to France.  Unable to hold a job and unwilling to settle into a meaningful livelihood, Rousseau considered himself an outsider unjustly treated by a cruel and inhuman world.  Financially irresponsible, he became dependent upon friends, whom he never really trusted, for monetary support.  He lived largely through the generosity of wealthy women whom he charmed through his wit and intellect. Although he did settle down with a young woman of modest means, he never married her and abandoned their five children at an orphanage.  It was not until the age of forty that he turned to writing.  Throughout his life, even when celebrated by Parisian society as a cult figure, Rousseau remained severely maladjusted and possibly paranoiac.  "He talked endlessly of his own virtue and innocence, and complained bitterly that he was misunderstood" (Palmer et al., 304). He died in 1778, his writings and reputation as a philosopher making him, along with Voltaire, one of the most famous figures of his time.              As a writer, Rousseau touched the thought and hearts of both the bourgeoisie and nobility, and his books had widespread popular following.  Unlike other philosophes, Rousseau saw emotion as a valid guide to human thought and action.  Reason alone, he argued, was impersonal and dehumanizing.  His writings appealed to humanitarian sentiments.  He rejoiced in the beauty, power, and wonder of nature.  He saw the common man as having dignity and being worthy of respect.  Even the poorest peasant, in the simplicity of his life, was a "good" human being, innocent and virtuous, happy and free of the confusing complexities and artificiality of modern society.  All men, regardless of their social rank and privilege (or lack of privilege), are joined in a universal brotherhood and should be responsible for the well-being of each other.  So effective were his writings that many in the upper classes were shaken out of their insensitivity.  His appeal to the virtue of emotions and human simplicity had some surprising – and sometimes shallow – results. Men were not ashamed of tears.  Women returned to nursing their own babies.  Even Queen Marie Antoinette had a farm village constructed at Versailles so she could experience the "life" of a simple milkmaid!  By appealing to humanitarianism, Rousseau inspired a new sense of human equality.  This in itself was a revolutionary concept.

             Throughout Rousseau's writings, there are basic themes.  He sees man as inherently good.  All human beings are born with goodness in them.  Evil is the result of environment.  Bad people are so because of the conditions in which they live.  In looking at his own society, Rousseau saw it as evil and unjust.  The injustices resulted from the unequal distribution of wealth.  Too many people were poor.  Too few people were rich.  This inequality was reflected in the artificiality of social status and privilege.  Because society was based on artificial distinctions of wealth and privilege, society was corrupt.

              The greatest evil, in Rousseau's thinking, was private property.   Nothing divided man against himself more than property.  In its simple, prehistoric "state of nature," humanity was free, innocent, and happy.  The fruits of the earth were shared by all.  As a "noble savage" man lived in primitive harmony with nature.  But once men began to say "This is mine and not yours," the innocence and happiness ended.  Laws were created by those with property to keep it from others.  From its very early origins, civilization denied equality and brotherhood.  The history of civilized humanity has been that of endless conditions of social injustice, intolerance, and economic, social, and political inequality.

              Organized religion claiming a monopoly of truth through an established church was evil.  Rousseau saw God as a divine force of love and beauty.  Although himself not religious, he did see himself as spiritual.  The wonder of God's presence was everywhere – in nature, in the virtue of simple living.  He called for freedom of religion, but felt there would be social value in a "civil religion."  That is, he thought a state religion that celebrated the virtue of the divine force that governed the universe would give humanity a common spiritual identity compatible with each individual's own personal religious beliefs.

              Rousseau was a philosophe, not a radical.  He did not advocate nor call for the revolutionary overthrow of existing society.  He did not call for the end of private property.  He did, however, want his readers to think about the world in which they lived in the hope that they might use their intellect, talent, and energy to benefit all humanity.

              Rousseau's most famous work on politics was The Social Contract, published in 1762.  In this book he explained what he thought was necessary to rid society of its evils and injustices and reconcile liberty with authority.  The social contract was just that - an agreement through which people established society, the community.  It was the means whereby individuals gave up their personal liberty to each other, fusing their individual wills into one "general will."  The general will became the collective desire of the people acting responsibly in the public interest.  Through the general will the welfare of the community and the welfare of the individual were the same.  Because they were the same, all individuals should accept the rulings of the general will as final.  Thus, the general will was sovereign.  Government, if it is to be just and fair to all, must reflect the sovereignty of the general will.  It was from the general will of the governed that government derived its power to rule.  "Kings, officials, elected representatives were only delegates of a sovereign people" (Palmer et al., 305).  The general will was not necessarily determined through vote of a majority, rather it was based on common interest, a consensus (general agreement) of opinion.

              Through a new social contract it would be possible to create a government responsive to the general will.  Such a government would by its nature be virtuous and create and maintain conditions wherein one's rights and liberties would be protected.  The result would be a society in which there would be equal justice for all and equal opportunity for all to share the benefits of society.  Rousseau offered no specifics about the structure of government best suited to reflect the general will.  Personally, he saw a small city-state as the best opportunity for the practical application of the sovereignty of the general will.  But the concept of responsible civic membership expressed in The Social Contract seemed applicable to the large state as well.  It is the philosophic forerunner of nationalism, that concept whereby one identifies with the state as a national community of citizens.  Today all modern states strive to encourage national identity in their peoples -the nation as the reflection of the general will.

              The philosophy of democracy finds Rousseau's concept of the general will among its foundations.  In democratic systems, the general will is identified with the sovereignty of the people.  Laws made through representative bodies such as the British Parliament or the American Congress can be said to reflect the general will.  It is the principle of government through consent of the governed.  Yet at the same time some of the world's most tyrannical dictatorships have based their policies on the sovereignty of the general will.  Rousseau never says how the general will should exercise its power. Is it not possible, therefore, for one individual or party to claim to represent popular consensus?   Hitler firmly believed that the policies and programs of the Nazi dictatorship were the expressed will of the German people.  The Communist Party of the Soviet Union saw itself as the inevitable outcome of the struggle for democracy through revolution against the capitalist exploiters of humanity.  Thus it is that the general will can only be interpreted, not specified. 

              The Social Contract was not widely read in Rousseau's lifetime.  It did not have the appeal or fascination of his other works such as his treatise on a "natural" education, Émile, or his romantic humanitarian novel, La Nouvelle Héloïse.  Rousseau's impact as a political theorist came more than a decade after his death as France was swept into revolution.

              The principles upon which the revolutionary leadership would attempt to restructure French society were stated in the "Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen" of August 1789, today regarded as one of the most significant documents in Western history.  "Men are born free, and remain free and equal in rights.  Social distinctions can only be based on the requirements of the common good," reads its first principle.  "Law is the expression of the general will," begins another.  Here is Rousseau.

              The national motto of France today is "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity."  In these principles Rousseau continues to live.

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    All images in this section are from Wikipedia sources.

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Sources for the French Enlightenment

Durant, Will and Ariel. The Age of Voltaire. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1965.

---. Rousseau and Revolution. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1967.

Gay, Peter.  The Age of Enlightenment.  New York: Time-Life, 1976. 

Palmer, Robert R. et al.  A History of the Modern World. Boston: McGraw Hill, 2002.