The Crisis of the European Mind 1680-1715

by Paul Hazard

  A lawyer; Freeport, the merchant; Sentry, the captain; Will Honeycomb, the man-about-town; a clergyman; such are the sort of people that make up Mr. Spectator’s little group. They are all middle-class folk except Sir Roger de Coverley, the Baronet. But Sir Roger is so simple-hearted, so sensible and level-headed, so different in every way from his brethren of the nobility, and, withal, so contradictory and paradoxical, so sensitive and so benevolent that he bore not the slightest resemblance to those rascally specimens of the gentleman class that had flourished so plentifully in the literature of the previous generation. Mr. Spectator is the most unassuming of men. His property consists solely of one modest country estate, which was just as it had been for six hundred years; he is a man of considerable knowledge, which, however, he exhibits no anxiety to display. He has travelled a great deal about the world, but he makes no fuss about it. Sober-minded, a man of few words, with a taste for solitude, with but few intimates, seeing little of his relations, he suffered no one to get a hold on him, not even his landlady. People who saw him doing the round of the London theatres, coffee-houses and other places of public resort, studying the manners and customs of his contemporaries, did not know what to make of him. Some took him for a Jesuit, some for a spy, some for a conspirator and some for a madman. What consoled him for all his little set-backs was that he had the satisfaction of observing how men lived and behaved, with a serene and untroubled eye, quite without prejudice. Being quite free from the passions and ambitions by which they were enslaved, he was the better able to discern their talents and their vices. The simplicity of his character, his imperturbable good-sense themselves set us an example of a good and happy life, without any special exhortations on his part. He tells us, however, that because of their mistaken ideas about honour, which lead them to insist on fighting duels; because, too, they fail to understand what the word justice stands for; because they get playing with professional gamesters who are only waiting to fleece them of everything they’ve got, the aristocracy seems to be on the high road to ruin. He laughs at the sort of people who pride themselves tremendously on their titles, titles which are theirs by an accident of birth, not because they have done anything to deserve them. He stresses the importance of polite and refined behaviour, disapproves of people who make a noise in the theatre, and is very down on women who drink over much and go in for taking snuff. At the same time, he was careful to point out that mere outward politeness is not the only thing that matters in life. He would much rather a man should emphasize his individuality than obliterate all marks of character: fine speeches, grimaces, affected manners make him feel sick. A man’s worth is gauged by his spontaneous nature, not by his artificial acquirements. It is a mistake to think that man’s supreme virtue, and almost his only one, is valour, and that woman’s is chastity: a prejudice which explains in either sex the anxiety to please the other, women esteeming courage in men above everything else, and man hating women who are faithless. As if morality, a kindly nature were not as estimable as the so-called social qualities which are those customarily held in honour. Similarly, the useful should take precedence over the agreeable; coquettes, whose only aim is to shine; loungers whose only aim is to please; clever folk who, refining upon everything, become indifferent to good and evil, are a pernicious species. The jests, the witty sayings, the pointed sallies which the world in general likes so much are often pure spitefulness. And what, after all, is this fashionable life? Is it man’s business to cut a figure in public assemblies, at social gatherings? Is it in things like that that he finds real happiness? Happiness is the foe of pomp and noise; it seeks peace and seclusion; it comes from the enjoyment of its own resources, or from the society of a few chosen friends; it loves shade and solitude, it frequents woods and streams and meadows, and, finding within itself all that it needs, it dispenses with audiences and onlookers. In contrast with all this, spurious happiness likes to attract attention; it seeks only to excite admiration; it lives in palaces, in theatres, in assemblies and dies as soon as there are no longer eyes to behold it. As regards happiness, we should not ask too much of it. The quest of happiness is less necessary and less beneficial to the human race than the art of bearing up firmly in the midst of afflictions. Contentment is the utmost we can look for here below; as soon as our ambitions begin to grow, they encounter obstacles and vexations. Let us do all we can, let us use all our endeavours to secure for ourselves tranquillity on earth, and happiness in the world to come. We see how Mr. Spectator indulges in some variations on ancient themes; but we also see how, quite classical as he remains, he evidently dissociates himself from the type of the Gentleman, and how he passes, essaying to construct a loftier civilization, from the aristocracy to the bourgeoisie, from the external to the inward, from social pleasure to social welfare, from art to morals.

  The merchant, says the Tatler, has a better right to be called a gentleman than the courtier, whose only coin is words, and the savant who jeers at the ignorant. The Spectator is of the same opinion. To the merchant all honour is due. Not only does he confer upon England power, wealth and renown; not only has he set the Bank of England, that temple of the New Age, on a glorious throne, but by his commerce he lays the foundation for all countries to work together and enables them to contribute to the general welfare; he is the friend of the human race. The hero is content with what he vaguely calls fame; the merchant has need of a more delicate, more sensitive and, in a way, more subtle reputation, which is summed up in the word credit. A casual word, a passing allusion, an unfounded rumour getting about will undermine a merchant’s credit and bring about his ruin. A gentleman was remarking the other day that he spoke freely enough about other gentlemen, but that he was particularly careful not to say anything unflattering about merchants. That would have meant putting them on trial, or rather bringing them in guilty without a hearing. So here, in full pride of place, is a new brand of honour, the honour of the Business Man.

  In the theatre, the tones are heightened, as we all know. Writers are obliged to intensify them a little so as to bring them into the necessary relief. It was not enough for Steele to draw out the contrast between the Gentleman and the Merchant in print; he depicted it on the stage. The play in which he did so, one of his best, was The Conscious Lovers. The aristocratic Sir John Bevil has given his consent to the marriage of his daughter with the son of a Mr. Sealand, a well-to-do merchant who has made a fortune in trading with the East Indies. They stand up and confront one another. The merchant has a dig or two at the gentleman; he, Sealand, has a splendid genealogy, Godfrey, father of Edward, father of Ptolemy, father of Crassus, father of Count Richard, father of Henry the Marquis, father of Duke John—all of them first-rate fighting-cocks.

  In case Sir John Bevil is not sufficiently impressed, Mr. Sealand proceeds to give a precise account of the revolution that has taken place in England:

  “I know the town and the world—and give me leave to say that we merchants are a species of gentry, that have grown into the world this last century, and are as honourable, and almost as useful, as you landed folks, that have always thought yourselves so much above us; for your trading, forsooth! is extended no farther than a load of hay, or a fat ox—You are pleasant people, indeed, because you are generally bred to be lazy.” Then he goes on to say still more proudly that an accomplished merchant is the best example of the gentleman in the country; and that in knowledge, good manners and judgment the merchant is superior to many of the nobility.

  In short, a revolution has taken place, a revolution which literature records and propagates:

  ’Tis the misfortune of many other gentlemen to turn out of the seats of their ancestors, to make way for such new Masters as have been more exact in their Accompts than themselves; and certainly he deserves the Estate a great deal better who has got it by his industry, than he who has lost it by his negligence.[4]

  The new English pattern-man which now took shape made a profound impression throughout Europe. Journals, travel-books, the sta
ge, novels—all brought him in, and the smart set tried to copy him. A plain exterior, no adornments, ordinary broadcloth, no silks, and a walking-stick instead of a sword. Plain without and plain within. Open-hearted, frank and free, he scorns a lie, and lets you know it bluntly; plenty of sound common sense, with a practical turn of mind. “Ought a man”, to quote Mr. Spectator again, “ought a man to be always thinking about polite letters and the fine-arts? Good honest work, business, trade, saving, those useful arts that tend to make life easier—things like that should occupy us as much and more.” In 1695, when Pierre Coste brought out his translation of Locke’s Thoughts on Education, he had an explanation to make. The author, he said, had designed his book to apply to young gentlemen; but Coste warned his readers that they must not misinterpret that word; it did not refer to the nobility but to the class immediately below the rank of baron, that is to say, to the sort of people who in France would be called de bons bourgeois, the upper middle-class. “Therefore, we may take it that this work, intended for gentlemen, in the English sense of that word, is in fact of general application.” Through the good offices of Pierre Coste, the English bourgeoisie holds out a friendly hand to all the bourgeoisies in Europe.

  But the delineation of the type universal ceased to be the prerogative of any one nation. That meant it would be something more composite; less simple, less clearly-defined in form and outline. Never again would any model present the purity of outline with which Classic art had endowed the concrete embodiment of its spirit. France set to work on her own account. What she wanted, what her temperament and her aims demanded, was someone to guide her steps towards reason, towards intellectual emancipation. At last she brought forward as her chosen type someone to whom the intellectuals of the eighteenth century were to give their unqualified approval. He was a sort of amalgam of French and English, an abstract thinker, yet a practical guide: he was, in fact, the Philosopher.

  What does he look like in the early days, when he was struggling into being? We will turn him up in the Academy’s Dictionary for 1694: “Philosopher: one who devotes himself to research-work in connexion with the various sciences and who seeks from their effects to trace their causes and principles. A name applied to one who lives a quiet and secluded life remote from the stir and troubles of the world. It is occasionally used to denote someone of undisciplined mind who regards himself as above the responsibilities and duties of civil life.”

  In these days, these various ideas of the Philosopher got mixed up, superimposed one upon another. In the first place the Philosopher was not now the sort of pedant who swore by Plato and Aristotle and no one else; he was not the expert, the specialist, the professor. You could be completely innocent of metaphysics and still be a philosopher. Or, again, he is a man of learning who relies not on his memory, but on his reasoning powers. He may be a student of astronomy and hold forth about the plurality of worlds, explaining, if not why, at all events how, we know that the earth goes round the sun. Or, he is just a wise, sensible man whose wisdom tells him how to live a snug, cosy life, with his friends—including his lady-friends—around him, never aiming at being anything higher than keeper of the ducks in St. James’s. He will indulge himself, but within reasonable limits, for he is a prudent voluptuary. Freedom to think what you like—that, of course, was essential. He looked at everything with a perfectly free and unbiased mind, and, as Mme. de Lambert was later to remark, he restored Reason to its pride of place. Where the gentlemen of the Academy went wrong was in saying in their dictionary that the philosopher placed himself above the responsibilities and obligations of civil life. On the contrary, what he wanted was to reform them. No philosophizing without a touch of preaching. Finally, he was to have a glowing heart; but that came later. We must wait half a century longer before we see him with all his fires ablaze.

  From the outset, the philosopher is the foe of revealed religions. When you say that in China the Emperor’s counsellors and favourites are all philosophers, what you mean is that all of them, like Confucius their master, are sage laymen. If you hear a philosopher discoursing about morals, or about learning, you may be quite sure that his morality has no connection with religion, nor his learning with the things that are God’s. Very much the reverse. When you hear that a man has lived and died like a philosopher, you may be equally certain that he has died an unbeliever. The champions of tradition saw all that plainly enough. In 1696, Père Lejay wrote a play for his college theatre, which he called Damocles sive philosophus regnans. The gist of it was, “Be foolish enough to put a philosopher in power and he’ll turn the world upside down for you in no time”.

  A philosophy which abandons metaphysics; a philosophy which purposely restricts itself to what can be directly apprehended in the human mind. An idea of nature which hesitates to recognize it as wholly good, but which regards it as powerful, regulated and consonant with reason: whence a natural religion, natural law, natural freedom and natural equality. A morality subdivided into a number of constituent moralities; recourse to social usefulness in order to know which one to choose. The right to happiness, to earthly happiness. A frontal attack on those foes to man’s happiness in this world, namely, absolutism, superstition and war. Science, which will ensure the boundless progress of man, and therefore his happiness. Philosophy, the guide of life. Such, it would seem, are the changes which have been taking place before our eyes; such were the ideas and aims which, before the seventeenth century had come to an end, had become conscious of themselves and had combined to form the doctrine of the relative and the human. All is now ready. The stage is set for—Voltaire!

  [1]Hamilton, Mémoires de la vie du Comte de Grammont, 1713; chap. III.

  [2]With whatever proud title your heroes may be invested, let us take Reason for Judge, and find out what their virtues really are. All I can find in them is extravagance, weakness, injustice, arrogance, treasons, furious anger, cruelties; a strange virtue which is often made up of an enormous assemblage of the most detested vices.

  [3]What! Shall Rome and Italy in ashes make me honour Sylla? Am I to admire in Alexander the very things I abhor in Attila? Am I to call warlike courage a murderous valour that soaks its hands in my blood, and force my lips to sing the praises of a savage Hero born to bring disaster on the human race!

  [4]Spectator, No. 174.

  PART FOUR

  The Feelings and the Imagination

  I

  THE MUSES ARE SILENT

  THE rationalist movement may be traced, via the Encyclopédie, and the Essai sur les Moeurs, via the Declaration of the Rights of Man, down to our own times.

  But Richardson, and Jean Jacques, and the Sturm und Drang, where do they come from? How are we to account for them Even now there must have been some hidden springs somewhere for such floods of passion to have gushed forth later on. Up to this point we have allowed it to be inferred that the only actors to be seen on the World’s Stage were the Rationalists, and, indeed, these were the times when they advanced to the footlights, played all the big parts, and were all very self-important, very declamatory. Well; that is true, but it is not true that they were the only ones; there were others, and it now behoves us to take a glance at them. However, we may as well admit at the outset that the task is none too easy. Appearances can be deceptive, and we must confess that the results of our first line of enquiry were disappointing.

  It was in the sphere of poetry that we decided to begin our investigations. Poetry, we thought, would surely prove to be the home of those imaginative and emotional qualities of whose source we were in search. However, it was essentially an age of prose. Where shall we find a prose style more rich, more firm and in every respect more admirable than Swift’s? More sinuous than Saint-Évremond’s? More subtle than Fontenelle’s? More vehement than Bayle’s? Bayle, that master of logic and dialectic, who, as Leibniz put it, cared only for incrimination and discrimination. Bayle is never cold. He grows indignant, he waxes wroth, and his pages still glow with the fires that first inspi
red them. When words in current use failed him, he coined new ones. He grips and squeezes his ideas till he has forced them to yield their last drop of meaning. There is none like him, none, and you would instantly recognize anything he had written, even if he had not put his name to it.