Six concepts of liberty
Shirley Robin Letwin
PHILOSOPHERS AND PAMPHLETEERS: POLITICAL THEORISTS OF THE ENLIGHTENMENT by Maurice Cranston OUP, £12.95 • The Enlightenment that preceded the French Revolution has an uncertain repu- tation. Whether, as the name suggests, it marks the triumph of the forces of light over superstition and tyranny or a preten- tious and dangerous promotion of enlight- ened despotism continues to be debated. Professor Maurice Cranston is eminently qualified for this debate. He has published the first volume of a biography of Rous- seau that promises to be as distinguished as his earlier study of Locke, as well as numerous essays on other French philo- sophers. Nevertheless, instead of general- ising, he has chosen to give an account of six political theorists, not only of their ideas but also of their personal and social circumstances. It is done with immense grace and wit and the result is a provoca- tive as well as highly readable interpreta- tion of the Enlightenment which can serve also as an excellent introduction to it.
The diversity among the writers appears in origins and style as well as opinion. Whereas Rousseau and Diderot came from modest circumstances in the provinces to make their fortune in Paris, Montesquieu, Voltaire, Holbach and Condorcet could contemplate the world from châteaux. But Voltaire was proud of being bourgeois; Holbach inherited his title and fortune from an uncle who had been a tradesman; Montesquieu belonged to the legal aristo- cracy and Condorcet to the ancient landed one. Though they all contributed to politic- al theory, Montesquieu and Voltaire were satirical and urbane literary men, Diderot edited the great systematising monument of the Enlightenment, the Encyclopedie whose 17 volumes included 11 containing plates to show the instruments and techni- ques of industry; Rousseau's works have become classics of philosophy, while Hol- bach and Condorcet inhabit that dimly lit world between philosophy and science fashioned by positivism and the social sciences.
The differences in their political atti- tudes were at least as great. Holbach described England as a 'mirror of anarchy'; for Montesquieu and Voltaire it was a model of liberty. But Montesquieu attri- buted English liberty to a divided sovereignty and Voltaire to the power of the House of Commons. When Voltaire was sent Rousseau's attack on inequality, which made him a hero of the salons, Voltaire replied: 'I have received, Mon- sieur, your new book against the human race . . . No one has employed so much intelligence to turn men into beasts.' For Montesquieu and Voltaire the right to property was inviolate, but Condorcet helped to draft a constitution for the Revolution and supported it until he fell victim to the Terror and was betrayed when in hiding by his aristocratic table manners.
In spite of their disagreements, his sub- jects shared, Cranston believes, a dissatis- faction with the lack of liberty in France. He rejects the usual view that they were advocates of enlightened despotism. But he also points out that each interpreted liberty differently, and allows us to see the inconsistencies that arise from advocating both liberty and managerial government dedicated to promoting technological prog- ress. The only exception is Montesquieu. Though in his early years he dreamed of a republic where virtue reigned, when he failed to find it as he expected in Venice and Holland, he came to admire a very different mode of governing, which he called 'monarchy' and found most nearly achieved in England. There the object is not to impose a common project on all but to provide a framework of laws that leaves everyone free to pursue projects of his own choice.
The others could not resist the Baconian offer of salvation through science. And not even Voltaire could recognise that social order might be achieved without pervasive direction from the centre. He mistook Mandeville's Fable of the Bees, which was a profound attack on the belief in centralised direction, for a defence of vice, thereby introducing a fallacy that has since become endemic. Nor was he any less eager than the others for the victory of 'reason' and `progress' over the products of custom and tradition even though he did not share Condorcet's enthusiasm for social arith- metic.
For Diderot, Holbach, and Condorcet the model was Sparta rather than England. Although they agreed with Rousseau about the desirability of participation in government, they carefully excluded the representative body from decision-making. Its proper role, they held, was to serve as a safety valve allowing the expression of discontent because truth was bound to be defeated by ignorance if popular opinion were permitted to influence public policy.
Because of his attention to detail, Pro- fessor Cranston provides in passing impor- tant insights into England as well as France. The connection between Bacon's faith in science and dirigisme, which only Oakeshott has fully appreciated, appears very clearly here. We learn as well that his admiration for England did not prevent Montesquieu from lamenting the wide- spread interest there in making money and the aristocracy's readiness to engage in trade. Disciples of Corelli Barnett, please note.
A great virtue of Cranston's approach is that he leaves the reader room to reach his own conclusions about the Enlightenment. And some may be more impressed by the ambiguities in his subjects' devotion to liberty than by their contribution to its achievement. For it is here, as he says, that we find the beginning of the line that stretches to Marx and the Webbs, thus illuminating not only a remarkable episode of the past but also some of the more outrageous follies of the present.
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