Starts Here:
1. William Cobbett
· Text: Rural Rides
Primary Sources:
· Hampshire and Surrey: (http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/text/chap_page.jsp;jsessionid=1CB171FA2F9909CA1657496FC9D8D779?t_id=Cobbett&c_id=13)
· Winchester to Burghclere: (http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/text/chap_page.jsp;jsessionid=1CB171FA2F9909CA1657496FC9D8D779?t_id=Cobbett&c_id=18)
Secondary Sources:
Biography
Ø Born in Farnham in March 1763 and worked as a farm labourer and as a corporal in the army. He was later seen as a ‘troublemaker’ due to trying to expose theft of money by another solider.
Ø A writer for the Political Register, Cobbett was initially a Conservative but eventually became radical with his beliefs. Cobbett faced imprisonment for subversion and continued to challenge the government over its newspaper taxes.
Ø After the newspaper became a pamphlet, he was able to dodge the taxes and became somewhat of a hero for radicals with a working class agenda and free speech also.
Ø In 1821 Cobbett started a tour of Britain on horseback and published in serials in the Political Register. Later in 1830 this was realised as Rural Rides.
Ø Still publishing damaging material, Cobbett was again charged and through his own miraculous self-defence in court, the jury did not convict him.
Ø Becoming an MP for Oldham in 1832, after the Reform Act, Cobbett concentrated his attacks on the corruption on matters such as the 1834 Corn Laws. He died in 1835.
Like Rousseau, Cobbett would have probably wished to have seen a fairer system without the transition to a “state of nature”. |
Examples
“They may take in kind, but that will answer them no purpose at all. They will be less people than they have been, and will continue to grow less and less, until the day when the whole of the tithes and other church property, as it is called, shall be applied to public purposes.”
From: Botley, Hampshire
Ø In describing his tale of the unfortunate parson, Cobbett approaches the point of revenues and funding of the independent churches. His condemnation of the state support of churches, which are of no benefit to any farm labourer at all, is very apparent in this extract.
“I have the pleasure to know that there is one labouring family, at any rate, who are living well through my means. It is I, who, without knowing them, without ever having seen them, without even now knowing their names, have given the means of good living to a family who were before half-starved.”
From: Easton, Hampshire
Ø This particular description affirms Cobbett willingness to support the working classes and those who do not have a voice when they are earning so little. This story here was manufacture bonnets and only earned seven shillings a week. Starvation and lack of means to support the old systems which people lived by are also clear from this as well.
“As things now are, however, these countries have one great draw-back: the poor day-labourers suffer from the want of fuel, and they have nothing but their bare pay”
From: Burghclere
Ø In the area of Winchester, it is apparent that many people suffered in regards to having a lack of necessities in supporting their daily lives. It can be assumed as well that Cobbett is an atheist in this particular entry as he disregards God’s influence as unhelpful.
5 Points:
1. The movement, to a certain degree political, was associated more with a cultural and social feeling than that of general philosophy.
2. Rousseau is said to largely have been the founder of the movement, but originated from la sensibilité (emotion to sympathy) had established the feeling of remorse and sympathy to the peasant who lived in a certain circumstance.
- Romantics did not feel sorry for those who moved into industrial areas who wished to improve their circumstances.
3. Romantics saw money as the ‘immoral soul’ and lived life passionately and vigorously.
4. Had a regard for science, in the form of its medieval kind and not the enlightenment period.
5. The world and natural environment were well admired by these figures and are quoted as saying that “Truth is beauty and beauty is truth”
Points to Discuss
· “Prudence was regarded as the supreme virtue; intellect was valued as the most effective weapon against subversive fanatics; polished manners were praised against barbarism…By the time of Rousseau, many people had grown tired of safety, and had begun to desire excitement.” (Pg. 616/17)
As discussed by Russell, there was an opposition from the French Revolution against the aristocracy and monarchy at that time. As said, the solution to this was nationalism and romantics had begun to favour it at that time.
· “…but most of the strongest passions are destructive. Hence the type of man encouraged by romanticism, especially of the Byronic variety, is violent and anti-social, an anarchic rebel or a conquering tyrant.” (Pg. 620)
Could emotions ranging from anti-Semitism and other forms draw back to the beginning of this movement? Would have figures such as Hitler been inspired by this ideology? Despite the ideas of liberalism and decency, the ‘ego’ and anarchy suggests that there is much to criticise about this idea.
· “The romantic movement, in its essence, aimed at liberating human personality from the fetters of social convention and social morality.” (Pg. 622)
Like Rousseau’s ideas political theories of the General Will and self-interest within society, However, there is much to question about this theory in regards to the hierarchy within society and conflicts within an entity of governance. As seen under the despotism under Napoleon, the once revered figure of Romanticism, the social anarchy does not seem to have worked without a class system. Marx had similar ideas, though they are in complete conflict to the classes Romantics supported.
3. Rousseau
5 Points:
1. Founding father of Romanticism and the figure to begin the counter-Enlightenment.
2. Had lived by his own virtues and ‘sensibility’, as he referred it as, and was said to have steeled, feeling sorry for the victim due to hi action. Hume once said “He has only felt during the whole course of his life, and in this respect his sensibility rises to a pitch beyond what I have seen any example of…”
3. Works involved Emile and Discourses on the Origin of Inequality. Both were controversial due to Rousseau’s ideas on religion and government at that time.
4. “Man is everywhere and in chains” and the General Will composed Rousseau’s social liberation. People would live under a metaphysical ‘sovereign’ and governed by three wills (personal, government and general).
5. Believed in pseudo-autocratic dictatorships and believed that equality was better than freedom itself.
Points to Discuss
· At the present time, Hitler is an outcome of Rousseau…” (Pg. 623)
It is possible that Rousseau, through his feelings on Sovereignty being able to override on a group of individuals’ emotions and the leader doing what is best for his people, may have influenced the nationalist ideology to become extreme. Rousseau was a democrat though and believed that people who were simple and free from greed were the best sorts of citizens according to him.
· “I believe in God as strongly as I believe any other truth.” (Pg. 629)
Perhaps an ardent Christian Catholic/Calvinist for a time, it is more likely Rousseau was a believer in the ‘natural law’ and the beauty which surrounded him. The Social Contract was pure and would have been unfettered by state appendices such as the church.
· “His conception of the Social Contract seems, at first, analogous to Locke’s, but soon shows itself more akin to that of Hobbes.” (Pg. 632)
Rather like Hobbes, Rousseau seems to have a liking for the aggressive and passionate perspective of a “brutish” state of nature. Whereas Hobbes’ sentiments were based on that of the monarchy, Rousseau believed that the stripping of property and money would later lead to conflict would be a better alternative rather than individuals to control them.
4. Kant
5 Points:
1. The most crucial texts of his time were The Critique of Pure Reason and The Foundations of Metaphysics of Morals. He was said to be the founder of German Idealism.
2. He was critical of both empiricists and rationalists for both the ‘blank slate’ for the former and ‘a priori’ for the latter. He instead preferred transcendental realism and asserted that matters such as ‘space and time’ itself were subjective matters. Our experience of what is present in our mental constitution is not applicable to what is actually there. By having thoughts outside the physical world is mentally impossible, despite people sharing an intersubjective conceptual understanding of objects. The other is sensibility of receiving information.
3. In his Ethics, Kant suggests there is an innate understanding of what we do in terms of right or wrong. This is called the hypothetical imperative which we can achieve a certain end by obeying a temporal law. The other is a categorical imperative which a point of law must be followed constantly and it is no good following an action because it is what feels right, but because the motive of that action is for the sake of morals.
4. Our mental perception in space in time suggests a sensation of what we see and feel does not necessarily correlate to the physical precepts of something being present.
5. He was said to be an empirical realist, despite his profound disagreements with people like Hume and Berkley. Contending that all synthetic reasoning was a priori, it was suggested that it would only be possible to presuppose we exist to distinguish our own judgement. Thus the mind possesses judgements but not necessarily a priori judgements. Geometry is concerned with this particular form of knowledge.
Points to Discuss
· “…there can be nothing more dreadful than the actions of a man should be subject to the will of another.” (Pg. 640)
Kant suggests the idea that without freedom, we cannot express ourselves with reason and freely with the judgement of the first person. It is the idea of causation and the mind seeking to develop its understanding beyond normal constraints. He was also a political liberal.
· “God, freedom, and immortality, he says, are the three ‘ideas of reason’. Therefore there is a God and a future life; and there must be freedom, since otherwise there would be no such thing as a virtue.” (Pg. 644)
Perhaps somewhat like Hume, Kant says there are only forms, but not a strong evidential reason as to why God exists. Whilst Kant is a strong believer in the aesthetic judgements of beauty and happiness, he also maintains ‘the moral law within’ which may suggest Kant is more secular rather than like a Leibniz.
· “We have, on this view, two spaces, one subjective and one objective, one known in experience and the other merely inferred. But there is no difference in this respect between space and other aspects of perception, such as colours and sounds.” (Pg. 650)
This is perhaps in relation to Kant’s transcendental idealism, to which he sets out the idea of objects having a sensation but not actually being there at all, it is suggested that Russell seems to follow a Locke perspective to which colours are secondary qualities which are there to be perceived. Space itself is a priori intuition, according to Kant, but he maintains that that it is possible to imagine no space at all, but Kant does not entirely explain this.
5. Currents of Thought in the Nineteenth Century
Figures and Ideas
Ø Helvetuis: An atheist utilitarian, his thoughts centred on the beliefs that pleasure was good and religion as being counter-productive. Men were also apparently made stupid by education. He was later burnt to death.
Ø Condorcet: A follower of Rousseau and a contemporary of Malthus, Condorcet believed that all men were generally equal and could not be divided into rulers and subjects. He believed that the French Revolution would spread and cure the world of its ‘social ills’ one day. He was later imprisoned and his death is unknown.
Ø Bentham: Called democracy the ‘greatest happiness of all happiness’. He was widely criticised and his followers opposed to trade unions as well as being critical when it came to Malthus’s ideas of ‘checks’ on the world’s population.
Ø Darwin: The Galileo and Newton of the nineteenth century, Newton’s On the Origin of Species made clear for the first time of the distinction of evolution and the “survival of the fittest” when it had not been considered in science before. Men were said to be evolving at the rate of evolution becoming the cosmic purpose of the universe.
Ø Malthus: His work, the Essay Concerning the Human Population was a pessimistic outlook which explained that man’s constant population growth was exponential and could not keep up with adequately with the world’s food sources. He favoured tariffs and ‘checks’ (such as famines and natural catastrophes) to intercede with the growth of the population. He was therefore opposite in his views to people like Cobbett, Ricardo and Adam Smith.
Ø Ricardo: Published Principles of Economy and Taxation, inspired by Adam Smith’s work, and implied that substances such as air and water had their utilities but were not valued as a commodity. Gold, on the other hand, was rarer and was useless, thus having value. It is the theory of ‘supply and demand’, which objects, if they are mass produced, will be cheaper than those that are manufactured slower. He was a believer in free trade and his economics were to affect the course of opinion in the 19th century.
o Difficulties such as the class divide between capitalists and socialists, and God and the truth limiting man’s course of knowledge.
o However, the world had advanced to a degree that science, new civilisations and industry had begun to mark advancement in the ways which people thought also.
Final Word…
Russell: ““It will be essential to recognise the necessary limitations of men's power over the non-human environment, and the desirable limitations of power over each-other.” (Pg. 660)
No comments:
Post a Comment