Introduction
Goal of this work is to understand what Rousseau meant by consecrating one’s life to the truth.
Provisionally, the answer seems to be 1. Taking responsibility for what one publishes & 2. Publishing only things of public benefit.
What’s notable about Rousseau’s life is:
His notorious sincerity
His devotion to philosophic inquiry
The risks that come with speaking truth to power
Rousseau was bold and didn’t use pseudonyms
Rousseau was also self-restrained because he thought a lot about circumstances when truth is morally useful and when it is not.
Why people were surprised with Rousseau’s success as an author
It came so late after so many failures
Rousseau used great literary skill to attack literature (first discourse).
He pioneered a new mode of life that was threatening to other authors who just wanted to be right. He wanted to live according to his principles and values.
He was very different from other “public intellectuals” out there. He was very critical of the republic of letters.
Rousseau wrote so many genres and his ambition really can’t be overstated.
He carefully planned every aspect of his works down to the font and arguing with the publication house.
He wrote his private letters intending them to be published.
Chapter 1 Responsible and irresponsible authors
This chapter is about the culture of anonymous publishing and the arguments for and against attaching one’s name to a work.
Rousseau’s feuds with his contemporaries were petty and vindictive.
Voltaire would pin his own controversial works on Rousseau, making up fake stories to attack his character.
Rousseau would expose voltaire as the true author of works
Culture of Censorship
There were many censors who decided what can get published.
Sometimes the censors would decline publication but hinted they won’t persecute so you would publish anonymously or in a different jurisdiction.
Authorities were quite lax about anonymous publishing because without a name these books quickly faded in and out of culture. This is one of the key reasons why Rousseau would add his name, because it gave a gravitas.
Most of the books were published anonymously Spirit of the laws, some works by Hume, etc.
Rousseau and voltaire all were addressing the same issue (spreading enlightenment, avoiding censorship) and they all adhered to their own principles but they had directly opposing principles.
They all cared greatly about the effectiveness of their work in advancing enlightenment.
They were both upset by how noble birth was more important than raw talent. Arbitrary inequality.
Voltaire prioritized safety
Argument that not having one’s name was noble because you weren’t after literary fame.
Argument that it allowed one to speak his own mind. Whereas Rousseau had to make concessions (e.g. SD).
He believed the author needed to protect himself to achieve his end of increasing enlightenment.
Rousseau prioritized responsibility
His actions
In his earlier writings sometimes he did not use his own name.
Like voltaire who gave himself an aristocratic sounding name, Rousseau also created a fake identity when he was young.
He did not dedicate his books to wealthy patrons.
Everyone agreed that Rousseau had an innovative and bold style. People attributed it to different drives: recklessness, celebrity, devotion to truth.
Rousseau did practice caution: removing bold passages, having his characters voice his own opinions. He would be the citizen of one country (Geneva), live in a second (France), and publish in a third (holland).
His “why”
On one hand for rational argumentation you want to say that rank does not matter … but the person does matter. That’s why adding name was important.
Rousseau’s main argument for including one’s name is that it is honorable, one must take responsibility. Whereas the culture of anonymous publishing created a culture of lack of responsibility 1. Because it was easy to claim a work as an open secret without suffering persecution people didn’t have to really believe what they wrote. It became much more of a tool for them to disavow or avow when profitable. Montesquieu and his election to the French Academy is an example. 2. It also made the government censors irresponsible. They would separate the book from the author and “punish” (ie. Censor) the book. It was quite easy to do so and (my reading) made them more trigger happy … they stopped caring as much of the actual content of the book. When Rousseau’s second discourse was burned, they argued they didn’t have to question rousseau in advance.
IMPORTANT: it’s a world in which books were detached from their authors.
Prosecutors will be even more harsh on authors who put their name on books in such a culture. Two types of authors thrive 1. Those who suck up to people who are powerful 2. Those who publish anonymously.
Another issue with anonymous publishing is what voltaire did to Rousseau. It enables you to say whatever you want. It might give you incentives to be more polarizing because you are still awarded from that prestiege.
Rousseau believed his name tied together disparate works.
He later would use his name even adding it to the title of the work. Turning point was first discourse when he became a celebrity. Because he felt he needed to be an exemplar.
question: isn’t there something self-congratulatory about that?
Chapter 2 The Case For and Against Censorship
Rousseau’s critique of censorship in previous chapter should not be mistaken for condemnation of censorship altogether. This chapter is about the types of censorship that Rousseau advised and why he advised it.
Rousseau’s critique is …
Philosophy undermines the best part of society
Arts enhance the worst parts
It seems like he would much prefer total censorship but that is not possible so he presents a more moderate view in the following three categories
1. censorship in religion
1.1 Religious mores (be kind to one’s neighbor, ethical maxims etc.)
Mores are not grounded on reason but on sentiments (that’s why philosophy is harmful for them)
Mores are more important than laws, they are the “essence” of good society
Laws and mores support each other. Laws without mores have no effect, mores need support from laws.
Most perfect subordination of mores to laws is in Sparta where the laws were all about the education of the young
But the most perfect balance between mores and laws is in Rome where good mores authored good law. In other words Rousseau doesn’t think having legislation protect mores is desirable for two reasons:
While Rome subordinated private life to public life … it kept open a sphere of private life whereas Sparta did not.
People with bad mores are incapable of accepting good laws. This is why he views degeneration of best communities as necessary.
Rousseau thinks that these are not grounded on reason but good for community to keep intact. For him attacks on mores should be censored.
The atheists who tried to subject these under reason under the guise of tolerance and fairness are actually deeply intolerant, because they try to attack these religious mores on reason. That’s sectarian because it brings in the assumption that reason must be the ultimate arbiter. It’s intolerant because reason claims to be this totalizing arbiter and yet religion does not proclaim that it is. So religious societies are relatively tolerant because in so far as you don’t threaten the religion it’s fine. (Kind of like Tocqueville’s argument for the tolerance of aristocracies vs. the intolerance of democracies) IMPORTANT. This is such an important insight that free speech, free debate is dogmatic because it carries the dogmatic and intolerant assumption that things need to be decided on reason.
But philosophy is a private activity. So you can do that in your own private space.
We can censor religious ceremonies in this view because he takes ceremonies not to be constitutive for a religion (jews and muslims disagree of course) so nothing is lost. But he thinks we must censor attacks on religious mores because that is critical. Almost opposite reasons.
1.2 Religious dogmas (e.g. freedom of the will, existence of god, and other metaphysical questions)
On one hand believing in divine punishment is important for justice
On the other hand kings have no authority over souls
I think where he lands is that public skepticism is ok, private denial is ok, but public denial is not.
The general policy is “don’t ask, don’t tell.”
Example
Rousseau praises Cato and Cicero for condemning Caesar when he publicly proclaimed the mortality of the soul even if Cicero expressed similar private opinions.
The key thing is that you don’t ever have to say anything you don’t think is right. This is what Rousseau meant by you have to withhold the truth know when to share. Question: what if you are asked?
This doesn’t make you a hypocrite because you are motivated by something more important than truth which is the sake of the community.
His view on religion is not to compel belief but for non-believers to shut-up / be censored.
2. Censorship in laws and policies
Rousseau himself wrote public letters to change laws instead of trying to change them privately.
This is because debating policies is different than debating mores. In fact, Rousseau would appeal to his readers existing sentiments.
He thought that even SC and SD (dedication to Geneva) are not threats to society they appeal to the same principles.
Question: under what circumstances should the principles of a society be challenged?
Question: in our global world, mores will be challenged. That presents a new dimension of the challenge?
A way around this is if you write at a sufficient generality you should not be censored because your work is not an outright attack.
Rousseau thinks he is obliged to refrain from particular criticism.
This is why it’s ok to critique general political principles but not general religious dogmas publicly.
Government policies should be grounded on reasons whereas religious mores are not
Governments can only be stable if founded on right principles (so does that mean it’s right to upheave governments that aren’t built on this?)
Question: but if this is true, then, why can’t you attack particular governments?
But the right principles are compatible with many types of governments
So, the answer seems to be government policies are ok to criticize, government principles are OK to criticize in the abstract. This is different from the religious case where both should not be criticized because they are not grounded on reason.
3. Philosophy (speculative opinions other than government principles and religious dogmas)
Here the answer is that they should be done in private but not in public
Philosophers tend to be
Antisocial
Bad citizens
Look down on non-philosophers
Even worse, philosophers produce “pseudo-intellectuals” who try to imitate intellectuals.
They are mostly interested in being “contrarian” and standing out for attention.
Rousseau is different because Rousseau 1. Tells the truth 2. Tells only truths that are helpful to a society 3. Wants to cure people of philosophy.
Therefore philosophy should be something you do privately and not in society.
General principles
Protect sentiments of sociability (mores).
Use truth to correct bad prejudices while not questioning the good ones.
Redirect the root passions of the bad prejudices.
But you shouldn’t persecute someone using truth to correct a good prejudice because they are innocent after all.
Other philosophers are...
Cautious when they should be bold. They do not claim authorship and take no responsibility.
Bold when they should be cautious. Critiquing everything with reason when they should’ve kept the good prejudices intact.
Chapter 3 The Case Against (and For) the Arts
The chapter here is to understand the relationship between art and morality
Rousseau’s own contribution to the arts before and after FD, seems to betray his principles of austere republicanism. People charged him for inconsistency.
Rousseau’s view on art
Rousseau is part of the tradition that sees art as imitative of nature/ of the world. And Rousseau certainly thinks some music is like this, that it imitates physical sounds (e.g. strings and the human voice) but there is a second type of music that is imitative not of things but of emotions ie. They stir up one’s passions directly.
Rousseau flips the tradition on its head, art should be judged not by how well it imitates things out there but things “in here.”
This understanding of arts as inciting emotion is going to be key to understanding his view on the arts.
Rousseau’s critique of Art
Art represents a society that has fallen into decadence (Rousseau thinks this is more symptom than cause)
Artists are motivated by praise and adapt their delivery for specific tastes.
Even those who produce for wholesome tastes are depraved in the sense they are not praised for their morality (goodness of their work) but talent (ability to cater to tastes).
Develops polished/polite manners. This is bad because 1. It hides the relationship of servitude amongst unequals 2. Festers resentment among equals whereas disputes could be resolved if people aired it out.
The arts makes us anti-social (Political Case)
It’s very rare to have moral plays. Because moral lessons are boring. Voltaire and the French dramatists do a good job of this he concedes.
IMPORTANT:but even when you have moral plays theatrical identification (someone suffering in play) is stronger than identification in real life (someone dying on the street). Kelly calls the emotion “pure” because it is just the emotions tied to no obligation. What this does is that it allows you to discharge these prosocial motivations in the theatre without having to do anything.
The arts makes us too social or, more accurately, social in the wrong way (Natural Case)
Natural man (SD) cannot extend his pity to Macbeth’s ambition or Oedipus’ regret but only physical pain. So theatre requires man to be highly socialized.
In Emile, his education with fine arts is seen as dangerous because he might try to do things that are “unique.” The worry here is that art provides too strong imitative models that make us lose ourselves and our own values.
QUESTION:well which one is it, is life imitative of art or is it a substitutive relationship? If the former then the political case seems to be wrong, if the latter than the natural case seems to be wrong.
The Political Case for the Arts
The legislator is the lone person who properly directs art in Rousseau’s positive proposals.
Knowing what justice is and having a “reason” to pursue justice are entirely different. Only a few philosophers make decision based off of reason. Even that is rare and dependent on anti-social circumstances.
This leaves open room for the arts to play a crucial role in political life.
Rousseau gives examples of legislators like Moses and Mohammad who use religion as their grounds.
They do not ground their proclamations on miracles because 1. It’s cheap 2. It will keep people uneducated.
What he relies on is his moral character, that people want to imitate him.
IMPORTANT Fascinating discussion about how languages have degenerated
Rousseau traces a spectrum between persuasion and reason and how the very first language was essentially music that tried not to capture reason or depict the world (imitate external) but tried to convey emotion (imitate what’s “in here”). As language develops and becomes more and more rational and depicting things, it loses its persuasive force. The most extreme end of the reason spectrum is mathematical symbols (this is why I think I dislike analytical philosophy so much, at least in form).
European languages are great for philosophy but bad for persuasion. Classical languages are persuasive and poetic but not specific.
In the absence of persuasion/rhetoric at the heart of social life we don’t get a world grounded on reason but rather a world grounded on low-minded self-interest or physical force.
This is why music is central to legislation (because it is the peak of persuasion).
Most ancient traditions saw music as having a legislative role whether thats communicating the mores through epic poems or forming character with the right harmonies. Even laws that were force-based (Brutus killing his sons) were about what that force signified rather than the fear it inspired in citizens. It inspired awe not fear.
This is even stronger than Plato’s discussion of music and good citizenship. For Plato, music is being subordinated to reason/speech, but that’s not the case for Rousseau that sees music and art as grounding political life.
This is how we reconcile the political case and the natural case against art: it’s too imitative that it threatens our naturalness… but it’s not imitative enough / in the proper way to support citizenship. The surprising conclusion is that Rousseau, despite what he says in FD, thinks art needs to be more embedded into cultures, namely:
Making the theatre participatory
e.g. horsemanship competitions
Making the theatre never end
You need to imitate these practices in your daily life. Today there is a separation between walking out of the cinema and living life. But not in Sparta where life was theatrical in some sense that it was always public, that the myths you were told penetrated your life (e.g. you are in the universe of the gods).
Right values and support for cultivating citizenship
He praises the athenian theatre because it was public and not motivated out of profit
because all the citizens went there.
Because the role models they got were of exemplary citizens.
Rousseau’s Art Project
The goal he sets for artists are not servants of patrons but founders of communities.
Rousseau felt like there was little hope in modernity because how much language deteriorated, how much things were driven out of self-interest or physical force.
His self-conception is that of a good but weak man and not a hero.
Chapter 4 Heroic and Anti-Heroic Citizens
This chapter is to describe the nature of the heroic citizen, his uses and abuses, and what are the alternatives to such a citizen
The heroic citizen
Liberal democrats / egalitarians are suspicious of hero worship, they always want to equalize everything. Rousseau, being a defender of equality, is all the more interesting in his views on heroism.
What are heroes?
In Rousseau’s treatise on heroes he gives three kinds conquerors (Alexander), legislators (Lycurgus), and people who make great sacrifices (regulus)
Rousseau does not identify a single list of virtues which he considers to be heroic. Except strength of soul. Virtu over Fortuna, the ability to overcome obstacles and to be effective.
Even stronger, the wiseman has all the virtues, more than a hero. But the hero is clearly more important for the community. However the hero treats the community always as a means to an end, specifically, an end to his own glory. That’s why he’s dangerous, if there were another anti-social way to win glory, he would do that.
Rousseau believes a feeling of existence (will to power?) is what we are after and treats the other virtues as good because of that. e.g. discipline is good because it enables us to exert ourselves.
Strength of soul does not always create virtue but weakness of soul always causes wickedness, hate/resentiment/etc.
Why do people have heroes?
Rationally people ought to be suspicious of heroes. But people seem to worship them naturally without reservation even if they rationally disagree with all the values they represent.
Example: the Netflix documentary “Alexander is my hero” it was unreserved admiration.
Heroes imbue us with strength we exist outside of ourselves and “become” them.
Young Rousseau felt an acute loss of self, he felt what it meant to be Brutus before he knew what it meant to be Rousseau.
They not only borrow their attributes but they also borrow their strength of soul.
People are not naturally social so communities only form around identification of common heroes.
He calls a community that has a shared identity a fatherland. And a mere collection of people without shared identity a country/nation.
Pluralists see debate as a sign of healthy community. But Rousseau does not think so. What he is much more concerned with is defending the community from the top (government).
So legislators really have to be heroes that shine through with their personality. Heroes of course are very dangerous. So the solution seems to be “the heroic legislator must not be a part of the community he founds.”
Emile - The Unheroic Citizen
Emile’s education is pretty anti-imitation in general. E.g. he learns to draw things but not to imitate artists. This is obviously the exact opposite education that Rousseau received. It’s about delaying amour-propre as much as possible.
Emile is given a hero to imitate, Robinson Crusoe, but this hero is not the classical hero for two reasons:
Firstly, he is a model of independence.
This is one of the most important points in the book that sociality is so imbedded in us that even if we want to be independent we need to look for role models of independence.
"Such people need an imaginative support for a life of independence. They must be able to imagine themselves to be someone like Emile in order to keep from imagining themselves to be someone who is less independent"
Secondly, Emile is asked to be critical of this hero, he is taught to ask what would he do if he were in his shoes.
Same thing when he reads Plutarch.
Emile has the strength of soul of a hero but not the desire for glory. He will lead people if he needs to but he does not seek to lead or that is not his telos.
Emile is made for the current world where we only have countries and not fatherlands.
I think the idea is that If you were educating a child in Sparta in a genuine fatherland you would want to inflame social desires. But today once you inflame those desires what do you end up becoming, influencers? Reality TV contestants? Sociality itself is improper in modernity because of the bad structure of modernity.
But then Rousseau seems to suggest that the culture of heroism produces fanatics as well. And he much prefers a culture that produces neither.
The unheroic citizen is motivated by “self-interest” properly understood. He sees how is close family and friends interests are tied to the nation at large.
Question: interesting, so in neither case is helping the community the actual goal! The heroic citizen does it for glory, the unheroic citizen does it for private interests.
Julie, the beautiful soul
The novel: this is somewhat of a tangent but its to setup why Rousseau chose to write Julie in novel form.
When Rousseau first moved to Paris he wrote discourses and got into vicious fights because of the vices “in the air” in the city. What he failed to realize is precisely because he was right of the corrupting influence of society people were not open to his arguments from reason.
Due to his conclusion that most people are not creatures of reason or, more accurately, the role of reason is quite weak compared to the social passions so reason can only affect us when we are far from society he realized he had to switch genres.
He already had success with the theatre genre. But he moved to the novel because the novel was more solitary. His ranking is athenian theatre (genuine civic theatre) > novel > modern theatre.
Same thing with romantic love. He thinks it’s not as good as general community sentiment and can threaten it but much better than what we have now which are base sentiments.
Novels are suitable for teaching and domestic life.
Should not expect them to bring about total transformation of society.
Issues with novels:
Novels and books are, for Rousseau, either useless because they validate existing morals or are useless because people don’t agree with them. They are more useful in the countryside.
Making a certain type of life seem too nice as to trick people into yearning for a life that does not exist.
Death of Lucretia: important play that Rousseau abandoned from which we can see the outlines of Julie.
Issue with Lucretia is that it was about republicanism against monarch and against adultery — two things that did not appeal to the French audience at the time.
Julie is weak! But what makes her a heroine is she has ability to influence people within her domain because her soul is just, virtuous and beautiful.
It’s actually because of her weakness that she can pull people in.
She’s the least capable of being a citizen.
Chapter 5 A Hermit Makes a Very Peculiar Citizen
This chapter is to explain why Rousseau considered himself while being in exile a form of citizenship and why his writing is a form of civic participation.
He clearly isn’t a form of heroic citizenship, the issue with the heroic citizen ideal is that it doesn’t leave room for dissent. This mode of civic participation creates room for dissent.
Critics critique Rousseau’s idea of unity as being coercive. There is a sense which that is true.
The importance of consent in the general will
States need to form citizens into people who can think about the greater good from a young age and obviously this is not consented into.
Rousseau actually is not in favor of unanimity without qualification. He traces out a path of degeneration:
First you have total unanimity, this is Sparta of great health
Then you have debate, this is beginning of the decline but can be manageable this is Rome can still be maintained
Lastly you have total unanimity because people are coerced/buying votes etc.
Even though he praised Sparta, it is Rome that is the exemplar for Rousseau of the model free society.
Sparta
Model of patriotism. Would sacrifice their lives for the fatherland.
Sparta worshipped its laws. It wanted its good laws to produce good morals. Its laws had the prestige of antiquity/divinity almost.
Plus side is that their lows never changed. Downside is they were inattentive to how the government applied laws, there was no place to critique it.
Sparta is the first state of total unanimity basically denied degeneration for a long time.
Rome
Model of freedom, they didn’t think Rome itself (because all of the turmoils) could outlive freedom/glory. Ie. These things will continue even when Rome fails. Rome always had the idea that freedom would die out so it had freedom front and center.
Rome worshipped its morals: freedom and glory. It wanted good morals to legislate good laws.
The emphasis on morals made its laws more fragile but it gave an independent criterion by which people can evaluate and judge the laws.
Rome is the second state of debate where there was no unanimity over laws but it was still healthy. They were still able to deny degeneration for a long time.
Sparta is not the model of the general will its too totalitarian.
How the debate that Rousseau permits (praises even in Rome) is different from current discourse
You are supposed to argue from a disinterested place from the perspective of the community’s vantage point.
Rousseau is opposed to interest group politics of any sort. No factions.
General will is “discovered” not “constructed,” I think what he means to say here is this debate is not a compromise, its not I want 100 chickens you want a 100 ducks we settle for 50-50. But in my learning that you want 100 ducks I take you as earnestly suggesting what the community needs and thus I correct my original desire for only 100 chickens. We arrive at 50-50 not constructing two personal, agonistic desires but through “discovering” what the group really needs.
Rousseau’s surprising claim is that his own literary work abides by these three characteristics. That he participated in citizenship despite renouncing his citizenship, despite not being in Geneva. Kelly gives two examples. Rousseau’s letter to discuss whether Geneva should have a theatre and a group of people trying to get him un-cancelled after his book burning by the government.
“If one wants to dedicate books to the true good of the fatherland, one must not compose them in its bosom" Such an interesting claim and the reason he gives is because 1. He has more freedom in France. 2. He might create factional intrigues if you are too deeply embedded in a community.
IMPORTANT by renouncing his citizenship Rousseau conceives that to be an act of citizenship.Because it makes himself disinterested, it prevents the charge of self-interest.
In the case of the theatre, he argues against his own interests as an avid theatre-goer.
In both cases Rousseau is simply describing the situation and the consequences of their choices he is not giving advice, he is simply drawing out what each choice would mean.
Rousseau’s voice is one among many in the formation of the general will he is 1. Speaking from community’s vantage point 2. Opposed to the forming of factions 3. Helping the community discover the general will.
Rousseau thinks that this model of public authorship is available to citizens as well. In fact citizens were doing it when they tried to get him to un-cancel his book.
Chapter 6
This chapter is about examining the philosopher: 1. Rousseau’s self-conception of being a philosopher (or not) as well as 2. The nature of writing to other philosophers instead of the general public.
Rousseau does address himself to philosophers in some of the works like SD but even then he is imagining himself addressing his works to philosophers under the view of mankind. This is because authorship always has a public dimension to it.
Ultimately whether we ought publish a work depends on whether we think it will do good or bad.
Esotericism
All of Rousseau’s contemporaries were aware of esotericism.
Argument for esotericism (championed by Diderot)
The general claim was that the origin of this was good even if it is prone to degeneration / it is possible for degeneration.
Diderot claims that those who don’t publicize aren’t interested enough in fame.
Most convincing one is that we can’t tell if something is positive or negative influence. This is a great point: Deng claims we still can’t even know if the French Revolution is good or bad after the fact. How could Rousseau possibly know before the fact (two layers of additional issues, you need to predict the event, you need to judge the moral valence).
Diderot proposes that censors only censor public works but leave freedom in scholarly language.
Rousseau’s attack on esotericism
He makes two surprising claims: 1. Esotericism is the only thing that is unifying about philosophy / a philosophical culture 2. Esotericism is motivated by pride.
The argument is this:
Because the philosopher is prideful, he has contempt for everyone else.
They seek contrarian opinions from other people to differentiate themselves and overestimate/exaggerate the “truth” that they hold.
Because they did this contrarian move, they are against the mores of the community and must conceal their opinions. They reach overly dogmatic opinions to satisfy their vanity even if they wouldn’t satisfy an impartial reason.
They also build a coalition of yes-sayers around them to flatter themselves.
What esotericism does is they create a coalition of intellectuals that are harmful to society.
Traditional esotericism only wanted to cultivate a small community of followers. Today, new esotericism wants to convert the masses (it’s even worse). They write two books: one book (named) where they pay lip service to societal mores and another book (anonymous) where they give really poor defenses for societal mores to undermine it.
Keep in mind here that Rousseau’s main rebuttal of esotericism is that it is motivated by pride. That is what creates the contrarian character. Theoretically, then, there could be a healthy esotericism … which is what we will explore next.
Rousseau’s philosophic dream
Rousseau wrote an allegory written for philosophers: TLDR
First philosopher is troubled by materialist vs. teleological accounts of universe. He realizes it’s unsolvable and gives up the prideful desire to settle every metaphysical question. When he let go revelation hits and he is pulled into he teleological view. He decides to spread this insight (to reduce philosophical pride of wanting to know everything).
Rousseau’s point is that philosophy purged of pride leads to philanthropy because philosophy is about the fundamentally miserable conditions of man. The prideful seeks to distance, but the philanthropic seeks to help.
The philosopher encounters a dream.
Evil priests bring citizens blindfolded in a temple with statues of seven sins that are unveiled and a veiled middle statue that people worship. The statues look evil in every direct except one. The evil priests lead citizens to that place and take off their blindfold.
This is to describe bad prejudices and the question is how do we rid people of bad prejudices.
The first wise man (unclear who it is) does not rip off their blindfold but gives them sight before the citizens end up in that one spot. The citizens make a big fuss and the wiseman gets caught and killed.
The lesson here is that gradual enlightenment is dangerous because 1. Oppressors are vigilant and 2. You might be discreet but those you tell your esoteric truths may not be.
The second wise man (socrates) claims he is blind so he is allowed to approach the center statue (socratic ignorance, feigning he knows less) and pulls the veil of the center statue and gives a rational account of how they’ve been tricked. The citizens see the (ugly) statue as beautiful and the wiseman fails and gets killed.
The lesson here is that people are more attached to their passions than you would think. And reason does not work.
Third wiseman (represented by Jesus) smashes the statue and puts himself on the pedestal. And it works, people start worshipping him.
The lesson is people are motivated not by reason but passions and idols. The second wise man sets the stage for the third by unveiling the statue. The idea that reason can tear down but not build up.
This story is to tell philosophers to abandon philosophical pride, to understand the limits of reason, and learn how to speak to ordinary people.
Rousseau uses allegory even when communicating to other philosophers. Not so sure I understand the difference other than that it is shorter.
He uses allegory to teach the necessity of allegory.
Rousseau is the first philosopher.
They both received illumination on philosophical pride.
This maps to Rousseau’s life and letter to Voltaire where he thinks the materialist account that voltaire is spreading causes depressing worldview. He himself cannot rationally decide but goes with teleological because it is more consoling.
IMPORTANT QUESTION: is that really satisfying? Because surely it is more consoling because it is true. Find the quote about I have hope.
In the way Rousseau deals with philosophers like Voltaire he attacks their philosophical position first by rationally showing its ungrounded and then uses allegory and rhetoric to try to change their ethical position.
Misc
To satisfy citizenship Rousseau had to renounce his. To practice philosophy he had to denounce philosophy.
China
Reports of china through jesuit missionaries prompted huge re-evaluation in the 16th century European consciousness. To know that there was a non-christian, well-run, highly civilized culture was a huge shock to europeans. It was also a shock because many interpreted Chinese as atheist/materialists who merely paid exoteric lip-service to religious practices. This played into debates whether atheism could sustain civilization.
PostScript
One of the key theses of this book is that philosophy and authorship is incompatible. The main thing to be addressed in this postscript is Rousseau’s public communication with philosophers and his own participation in philosophy.
Some people try to claim that Rousseau did not have an overly negative view of philosophy just that he and plato were responding to very different times.
Plato was trying to give honor to philosophy when it was not respectable.
Rousseau was writing in an age where philosophy had become too respectable.
Rousseau objected to being called a philosopher.
He called himself a “friend of the truth” which meant what classically “philosopher” meant because the word “philosopher” had become too polluted.
Kelly thinks this is right, that there’s something bad about philosophy having so much prestige, but its philosophy itself taht is the problem.
There are three limited ways that philosophy is good for someone who already has started philosophy (presumably it would be better not have touched it, but if you are a philosophical mind, Rousseau thinks you are doomed to philosophize).
The first is that philosophy can cure you of the vanity associated with philosophy. This is so important, philosophy as a grounding force.
The second is to set you up to undertake good forms of contemplation like the reveries or writing novels.
Third is for artistic contemplation (rather than prideful philosophical, or practical self-interested).
Rousseau conceives of three reasons to know: out of pride, out of interest (you need to survive), and an aesthetic contemplation which he associates with botany/viewing art/poetry … its that discussion about how music seeks to imitate and ignite emotions directly.
Thankyou Sir 🤝🏻