Romanticism

Thesis: Romantics argued that the rationalism of the thinkers of the Enlightenment made humans souless thinking machines and reduced nature to a lifeless system of cogs and pulleys. They believed the Enlightenment's mechanistic view of the world and human nature chained the human spirit and creativity.
-William Wordsworth's "Tables Turned" expressed a desire to put away books and let nature be your teacher of wisdom and morality.
-William Blake's "Milton" saw Reason as a scab on the immortal soul and the source of doubting Christianity and mocking eternal life.
-Philosophes approaced the world in a scientific and analytical way, while romantics asserted the value of emotions and imagination.
-Philosophes thought emotion obstructed clear thinking, but romantics saw feeling and imagination as the human essence, source of creativity, and the path to true understanding.
-They held that artists, musicians, and writers must not be held by textbook rules
-They urged individuality and freedom of expression in the arts
-Artist and poet succeeded the scientist in the age of Romanticism as the arbiters of Western Civilization.

John Stuart Mill: On Liberty

Thesis: John Stuart Mill is a fierce defender of Liberalism, and believes in the inviolable right of all adults to do as they please, as long as they accept the rights of others.

-Toleration is essential to behaving rationally, morally and civilly.

-Mill believes in a "harm policy" , that is, if one is not physically harming another, or their livelihood their actions are legal.

-Mill is a defender of the individual and his ability to govern himself.

-Government can only serve to hinder the growth of an individual, who know better what their needs are and how to best fulfill them.

-Government should never seek to silence the voice of the people, nor should it be affected by public opinion alone.

Joseph de Maistre

Rob Edwards

Joseph de Maistre: “Essay on the Generative Principle f Political Constitutions”

Thesis: Joseph de Maistre critiqued the phiposophes, the French Revolution, and manufactured constitutions by claiming that constitutional law can only be the development or sanction of a pre-existing and unwritten law.

• It was erroneous to believe that a political constitution could be created and written where reason and experience unite in proving that a constitution is a divine work and that precisely the most fundamental and essentially constitutional of a nation's laws could not possibly be written

• The fundamental principles of political constitutions exist prior to all written law

• constitutional law can only be the development or sanction of a pre-existing law

• it is foolish to think that law can be created just with a pen and paper

• Without Christianity, people become brutalized, and civilization degenerates into anarchy

• Religion alone civilizes nations. No other known force can influence the savage

• Science will brutalize humanity

• Man cannot create a constitution, and no legitimate constitution can be written

Perry J. S. Mill on Classical Liberalism

MEHAP Andrew Fortugno

Perry J. S. Mill on Classical Liberalism

Thesis: J.S. Mill, in his defense of intellectual freedom in On Liberty, argue that everyman is entitled to his own opinion on all subject matters no matter what the majority favors.

1. John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), prominent British philosopher

a. No individual or Government has no monopoly over truth

b. Toleration of opposing and unpopular viewpoints is a necessary trait in order for a person to become rational, moral, and civilized.

2. Essay asserts one very simple principle, “That principle is that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number is self protection”.

a. Only power that can be exercised over any civilized member of society, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.

b. “Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign”

3. Appropriate region of human liberty comprises

a. Inward domain of consciousness

b. Thought and feeling

c. Absolute freedom of opinion and sentiment on all subjects

i. Practical

ii. Speculative

iii. Scientific

iv. Moral

v. Theological

4. Mankind are greater gainers by suffering each other to live as seems good to themselves than by compelling each to live as seems good to the rest

5. The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is that it is robbing the human race, posterity, as the existing generation, those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it.

"Essay on the Generative Principle of Political Constitutions" Maistre

“Essay on the Generative Principle of Political Constitutions”

By J. de Maistre

Thesis: Maistre writes this criticism concerning the philosophes, French Revolution, and manufactured constitutions

• The greatest error – to believe that a political constitution could be created and written a priori
• Common belief - that a constitution was the work of the intellect
• 18^th century didn’t produce any talent who did not make three things when he left school: an educational system, a constitution, and a world
• Believes that fundamental principles of political constitutions exist prior to all written laws; therefore, constitutional law is and can only be the development or sanction of a pre-existing and unwritten law
• He is a great fool, who believes himself to be able to establish a clear and lasting doctrine
• Whoever writes the laws or civil constitutions in the belief that he can give them adequate conviction and stability because he has written them, he disgraces himself, whether or no other people say so
• Showing an ignorance of nature of inspiration and delirium, right and wrong, good and evil
• Ignorance is shameful
• Man cannot create a constitution, and no legitimate constitution can be written
• Religion alone civilizes a nation
• If guidance of education is not returned to the priests, and if science is not uniformly relegated to a subordinate rank, evils await us
• Impiety became a true force in first half of eighteenth century
• It manifests itself everywhere

Demands for Economic Justice -Babeuf

• The reformers of 1789 sought to make a constitutional government that limited the monarch's power, protected individual rights, ended the special privileges of the aristocracy, etc.
• However, alleviating the hardships of the poor was not of concern
• Sans-culottes demanded that the government increase wages, set price controls, and punish food speculators and profiteers
• 1795 a new constitution that established a five-member directory was established
• Still the discontent of the poor was not answered
• Babeuf's conspiracy of the equals
• Conspired the reestablish the constitution of 1793 and the overthrow of the directory
• Attack on the mistreatment of the poor and call for the abolition of private property
• The organization of a secret society attempting to overthrow the government heralds revolutionary movements in the 19th and 20th centuries
• Only such a radical move would end the tyranny of the rich over the poor
• "A man only becomes rich through the spoliation of others"

Society of the Friends of Blacks

• The society derives its mission from the humanity that induced it to defend the lacks
• The assembly had declared that all men are born and remain free and equal in rights
• Restored these rights to the French people after despotism had spoiled these rights for them
• The society says they're not asking for the restoration of the political rights or even freedom of the blacks
• Say that this would actually be detrimental to the operation of the colonies
• Slavery and the colonies' prosperity are inseparable
• Immediate emancipation of the blacks would be a deadly gift
• Not yet time to demand liberty, only that the butchering of thousands of blacks to take hundreds of captives cease
• Ceasing of the use of the French name to authorize these thefts and atrocious murders
• Demand the abolition of the slave trade
• Say that other countries (like England) are not far off from doing the same

Jefferson, DOI

Wow, sorry this is so late I've totally forgotten to post my Perry's on the blog...

Declaration of Independence

• Written to justify the American's break with the British motherland

• embodied principles that were familiar to English statesmen and intellectuals

• Articulated clearly Locke's philosophy of natural rights (life, liberty, and property as essential individual rights)

• "pursuit of happiness" substituted for property

• Locke's view of human nature and the origin and true purpose of political authority, along with the people's right of rebellion

The Levy in Mass

Thesis: When fighting against foreign invaders, the Jacobin regime’s ideals of universal male suffrage and rights formed the basis of a system of conscription that went on to characterize modern warfare.

-No exemption from the army, all men and women are required to serve the state army

-Increased power of the state- Ministry of Public Safety given the power to take over industries for the state’s armed services requirements

-State tasked a system of dividing those who are conscripted and placing them in service relative to their respective region

-Required uniform standards such as the bearing of the phrase “The French people risen against tyrants:

-Tax levied on all individuals with no exemptions in order to pay for the state army

Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Women

Thesis: In her piece "Vindicatino of the Rights of Women", Wollstonecraft attacks the restrictions set up by men as immoral and against the Reason that the new France is to be founded upon.

I. Neglected Education
A. Conduct and manners of women prove that they are not in a healthy state. Likely from lack of education.
B. False system of education based from books written by men.
II. Women viewed physically inferior to men (by men)
III. Strength/Mind - Importance of improvement/Restriction by men
A. The strengthening of these aspects for women is surrendered to the libertine pursuit of beauty.
B. Women hindered by marriage being the only way for them to rise in the world.
C. Wollstonecraft's belief: If women are not prepared by education, they will stop the progress of knowledge and virtue.
D. Without education, women can not be true patriots, and thus can not pass that trait down to their children.
E. Women unable to improve mind and physical strength as a result of man's "crushing" of reason.
F. Attack of the New Constitution - If the French plan to be truly Democratic, then they can not restrict women, or they will always be in that way tyrannical.
G. Men only treat women as trust servants and only love a woman on account of her sex.
H. Women are restricted to menial professions, and thus are kept from learning about them.
IV. Final idea: If men were to cut their restrictive "chains," then women will be more observant, affectionate, and faithful. The women deserve their rights, and it is the fact that they are not receiving them that causes their extreme dissatisfaction.