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66-746: Scholars differ on who is to be included among the major figures of the Counter-Enlightenment. In Italy, Giambattista Vico criticised the spread of reductionism and the Cartesian method , which he saw as castrating the arts and humanities of the Renaissance . Decades later, Joseph de Maistre in Sardinia and Edmund Burke in Britain both criticised the anti-religious ideas of the Enlightenment for leading to

132-561: A philosophe (albeit an erratic one) who shared the basic beliefs of his Enlightenment contemporaries. But similar to McMahon, Garrard traces the beginning of Counter-Enlightenment thought back to France and prior to the German Sturm und Drang movement of the 1770s. Garrard's book Counter-Enlightenments (2006) broadens the term even further, arguing against Berlin that there was no single "movement" called "The Counter-Enlightenment". Rather, there have been many Counter-Enlightenments, from

198-422: A political philosophy is the diversity within a political body, which is seen to permit the peaceful coexistence of different interests, convictions, and lifestyles. While not all political pluralists advocate for a pluralist democracy , this is the most common stance, because democracy is often viewed as the most fair and effective way to moderate between discrete values. Political theorist Isaiah Berlin ,

264-498: A childhood friend, and accepted a chair in rhetoric at the University of Naples, which he held until ill-health retirement, in 1741. Throughout his academic career, Vico would aspire to, but never attain, the more respectable chair of jurisprudence ; however, in 1734, he was appointed historiographer royal , by Charles III , King of Naples, at a salary greater than he had earned as a university professor. Vico's version of rhetoric

330-524: A freer and brighter style of expression, so he can learn to draw on those arguments which are most probable and have the greatest degree of verisimilitude "; yet, in Scienza Nuova , Vico denounced defending both sides in controversies as false eloquence . As Royal Professor of Latin Eloquence, Vico prepared students for higher studies in the fields of Law and of Jurisprudence ; thus, his lessons were about

396-493: A maieutic oratory art against the grain of the modern privilege of the dogmatic form of reason, in what he called the "geometrical method" of René Descartes and the logicians at the Port-Royal-des-Champs abbey. As he relates in his autobiography, Vico returned to Naples from Vatolla to find "the physics of Descartes at the height of its renown among the established men of letters." Developments in both metaphysics and

462-591: A piece of drawing chalk. Even the rational critic is inspired by irrational dream-content under the gaze of the sharp-eyed lynx. Marshall Brown makes much the same argument as Barzun in Romanticism and Enlightenment , questioning the stark opposition between these two periods. By the middle of the 19th century, the memory of the French Revolution was fading and so was the influence of Romanticism. In this optimistic age of science and industry, there were few critics of

528-436: A plurality or realistic harmony of interests. Pluralism recognizes that certain conditions may make good-faith negotiation impossible, and therefore also focuses on what institutional structures can best modify or prevent such a situation. Pluralism advocates institutional design in keeping with a form of pragmatic realism here, with the preliminary adoption of suitable existing socio-historical structures where necessary. One of

594-469: A political speech according to the precepts of geometrical method is equivalent to stripping it of any acute remarks and to uttering nothing but pedestrian lines of argument. Vico's position here and in later works is not that the Cartesian method is irrelevant, but that its application cannot be extended to the civic sphere. Instead of confining reason to a string of verifiable axioms, Vico suggests (along with

660-514: A strong supporter of pluralism, wrote: "let us have the courage of our admitted ignorance, of our doubts and uncertainties. At least we can try to discover what others ... require, by ... making it possible for ourselves to know men as they truly are, by listening to them carefully and sympathetically, and understanding them and their lives and their needs... ." Pluralism thus tries to encourage members of society to accommodate their differences by avoiding extremism (adhering solely to one value, or at

726-487: A tradition of relativist , anti-rationalist , vitalist , and organic thinkers stemming largely from Hamann and subsequent German Romantics. While Berlin is largely credited with having refined and promoted the concept, the first known use of the term in English occurred in 1949 and there were several earlier uses of it across other European languages, including by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche . Despite criticism of

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792-539: Is a product of his humanistic and pedagogic concerns. In the 1708 commencement speech De Nostri Temporis Studiorum Ratione ( On the Order of the Scholarly Disciplines of Our Times ), Vico said that whoever "intends a career in public life, whether in the courts, the senate, or the pulpit" should be taught to "master the art of topics and [to] defend both sides of a controversy, be it on Nature, Man, or politics, in

858-454: Is epitomized by the Marquis de Sade . However, there were philosophers rejecting Adorno and Horkheimer's claim that Sade's moral skepticism is actually coherent, or that it reflects Enlightenment thought. [REDACTED] Category Giambattista Vico Giambattista Vico (born Giovan Battista Vico / ˈ v iː k oʊ / ; Italian: [ˈviko] ; 23 June 1668 – 23 January 1744)

924-447: Is recognised as one of the first Counter-Enlightenment figures in history. The Latin aphorism Verum esse ipsum factum ("truth is itself something made") coined by Vico is an early instance of constructivist epistemology . He inaugurated the modern field of the philosophy of history , and, although the term philosophy of history is not in his writings, Vico spoke of a "history of philosophy narrated philosophically." Although he

990-527: Is required in equal measure in both spheres. One of the clearest and earliest forms of this argument is available in the De Italorum Sapientia , where Vico argues that to introduce geometrical method into practical life is "like trying to go mad with the rules of reason", attempting to proceed by a straight line among the tortuosities of life, as though human affairs were not ruled by capriciousness, temerity, opportunity, and chance. Similarly, to arrange

1056-410: Is the notion that a single vision or ideological schema, whether Marxism or unbridled neoliberalism , is likely too simplistic and rigid to advocate human beings' natural plurality of values. Pluralists likewise reject historicism and utopian thinking. While some, like John N. Gray , repudiate historical progress altogether, others, like Edmund Burke , indicate that human progress has occurred, as

1122-416: The encyclopédistes and fought to prevent the dissemination of Enlightenment ideas in the second half of the century. Many people from earlier times attacked the Enlightenment for undermining religion and the social and political order. It later became a major theme of conservative criticism of the Enlightenment. After the French Revolution, it appeared to vindicate the warnings of the anti-philosophes in

1188-510: The Reign of Terror and an Orwellian police state following the French Revolution . The ideas of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Johann Georg Hamann were also significant to the rise of the Counter-Enlightenment with French and German Romanticism respectively. In the late 20th century, the concept of the Counter-Enlightenment was popularised by pro-Enlightenment historian Isaiah Berlin as

1254-423: The orator (rhetorician) as the transmitter of the oratio , a speech with ratio (reason) at the centre. What is essential to the oratorical art (Gr. ῥητορική, rhētorikē ) is the orderly link between common sense and an end commensurate with oratory; an end that is not imposed upon the imagination from above (in the manner of the moderns and dogmatic Christianity), but that is drawn from common sense, itself. In

1320-608: The philosophes to the instability in France in the 1790s. His Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790) identifies the Enlightenment as the principal cause of the French revolution. In Burke's opinion, the philosophes provided the revolutionary leaders with the theories on which their political schemes were based. Augustin Barruel 's Counter-Enlightenment ideas were well developed before

1386-476: The rationalism , universalism and empiricism that are commonly associated with the Enlightenment. Berlin's essay "The Counter-Enlightenment" was first published in 1973, and later reprinted in a collection of his works, Against the Current , in 1981. The term has been more widely used since. Berlin argues that, while there were opponents of the Enlightenment outside of Germany (e.g. Joseph de Maistre ) and before

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1452-659: The "sleeping partner" of the Age of Enlightenment . Despite having been relatively unknown in his 18th-century time, and read only in his native Naples, the ideas of Vico are predecessors to the ideas of the intellectuals of the Enlightenment. Moreover, recognition of Vico's intellectual influence began in the 19th century, when the French Romantic historians used his works as methodological models and guides. In Capital: Critique of Political Economy (1867), Karl Marx 's mention of Vico indicates their parallel perspectives about history,

1518-531: The 1770s (e.g. Giambattista Vico ), Counter-Enlightenment thought did not take hold until the Germans "rebelled against the dead hand of France in the realms of culture, art and philosophy, and avenged themselves by launching the great counter-attack against the Enlightenment." This German reaction to the imperialistic universalism of the French Enlightenment and Revolution, which had been forced on them first by

1584-539: The 18th-century Age of Reason for both 18th and 20th-century totalitarianism also resurged. The locus classicus of this view is Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno 's Dialectic of Enlightenment (1947), which traces the degeneration of the general concept of enlightenment from ancient Greece (epitomized by the cunning "bourgeois" hero Odysseus ) to 20th-century fascism . The authors take "enlightenment" as their target including its 18th-century form – which we now call "The Enlightenment". They claim it

1650-587: The Counter-Revolutionary antipathy towards the philosophes . All three directly blamed the philosophes in France and the Aufklärer in Germany for devaluing beauty, spirit and history in favour of a view of man as a soulless machine and a view of the universe as a meaningless, disenchanted void lacking richness and beauty. One particular concern to early Romantic writers was the allegedly anti-religious nature of

1716-493: The Enlightenment (2001), historian Darrin McMahon extends the Counter-Enlightenment back to pre-Revolutionary France and down to the level of " Grub Street ". McMahon focuses on the early opponents to the Enlightenment in France, unearthing a long-forgotten " Grub Street " literature in the late 18th and early 19th centuries aimed at the philosophes . He delves into the obscure world of the "low Counter-Enlightenment" that attacked

1782-431: The Enlightenment and the Revolution. They blamed the Enlightenment for undermining traditional beliefs that sustained the ancien regime . As the Revolution became increasingly bloody, the idea of "Enlightenment" was discredited, too. Hence, the French Revolution and its aftermath have contributed to the development of Counter-Enlightenment thought. Edmund Burke was among the first of the Revolution's opponents to relate

1848-532: The Enlightenment being a widely discussed topic in twentieth- and twenty-first century thought, the term "Counter-Enlightenment" was slow to enter general usage. It was first mentioned briefly in English in William Barrett 's 1949 article "Art, Aristocracy and Reason" in Partisan Review . He used the term again in his 1958 book on existentialism, Irrational Man; however, his comment on Enlightenment criticism

1914-428: The Enlightenment might not actually be a creation of its opponents, but the other way round. The fact that the term "Enlightenment" was first used in 1894 in English to refer to a historical period supports the argument that it was a late construction projected back onto the 18th century. By the mid-1790s, the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution fueled a major reaction against the Enlightenment. Many leaders of

1980-462: The Enlightenment since the philosophes and Aufklärer were generally deists , opposed to revealed religion . Some historians, such as Hamann , nevertheless contend that this view of the Enlightenment as an age hostile to religion is common ground between these Romantic writers and many of their conservative Counter-Revolutionary predecessors. However, not many have commented on the Enlightenment, except for Chateaubriand, Novalis, and Coleridge, since

2046-447: The Enlightenment, and few explicit defenders. Friedrich Nietzsche is a notable and highly influential exception. After an initial defence of the Enlightenment in his so-called "middle period" (late 1870s to early 1880s), Nietzsche turned vehemently against it. After World War II , the Enlightenment re-emerged as a key organizing concept in social and political thought and the history of ideas. The Counter-Enlightenment literature blaming

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2112-528: The Enlightenment. According to him, "the revolutionary storm is an overwhelming force of nature unleashed on Europe by God that mocked human pretensions." In the 1770s, the " Sturm und Drang " movement started in Germany. It questioned some key assumptions and implications of the Aufklärung and the term " Romanticism " was first coined. Many early Romantic writers such as Chateaubriand , Friedrich von Hardenberg (Novalis) and Samuel Taylor Coleridge inherited

2178-451: The French Revolution and their supporters made Voltaire and Rousseau , as well as Marquis de Condorcet 's ideas of reason, progress , anti-clericalism, and emancipation, central themes to their movement. It led to an unavoidable backlash to the Enlightenment as there were people opposed to the revolution. Many counter-revolutionary writers, such as Edmund Burke , Joseph de Maistre and Augustin Barruel , asserted an intrinsic link between

2244-624: The New Religion of Sincerity", in the American Political Science Review (Vol. 90, No. 2), Arthur M. Melzer corroborates Everdell's view in placing the origin of the Counter-Enlightenment in the religious writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau , further showing Rousseau as the man who fired the first shot in the war between the Enlightenment and its opponents. Graeme Garrard follows Melzer in his "Rousseau's Counter-Enlightenment" (2003). This contradicts Berlin's depiction of Rousseau as

2310-735: The United States, President Dwight Eisenhower 's "middle way" was arguably motivated by a belief in political pluralism. While advocated by many pluralists, pluralism need not embrace social democracy given it does not a priori assume a desirable political system. Rather, pluralists advocate one based on the pre-existing traditions and cognizable interests of a given society, and the political structure most likely to harmonize these factors. Thus, pluralists have also included Michael Oakeshott and John Kekes , proponents of something close to liberal conservatism (although will often reject such political labels). What pluralists certainly do have in common

2376-497: The ancients) that appeals to phronēsis (φρόνησις or practical wisdom ) must also be made, and likewise appeals to the various components of persuasion that comprise rhetoric. Vico would reproduce this argument consistently throughout his works, and would use it as a central tenet of the Scienza Nuova . Vico is best known for his verum factum principle, first formulated in 1710 as part of his De antiquissima Italorum sapientia, ex linguae latinae originibus eruenda (1710) ("Of

2442-434: The body of his work, Vico's rhetoric begins from a central argument ( medius terminus ), which is to be clarified by following the order of things as they arise in our experience. Probability and circumstance retain their proportionate importance, and discovery —reliant upon topics ( loci )—supersedes axioms derived through reflective, abstract thought. In the tradition of classical Roman rhetoric, Vico sets out to educate

2508-515: The boy was seven years old. Giovan Battista's formal education was at the University of Naples from which he graduated in 1694, as Doctor of Civil and Canon Law. In 1686, after surviving a bout of typhus , he accepted a job as a tutor, in Vatolla, south of Salerno , which became a nine-year professional engagement that lasted till 1695. Four years later, in 1699, Vico married Teresa Caterina Destito,

2574-482: The consequent collapse of society. In that vein, Vico proposed a social need for religion, for a supernatural divine providence to keep order in human society. In Orientalism (1978), Edward Said acknowledged his scholar's debt to Vico, whose "ideas anticipate and later infiltrate the line of German thinkers I am about to cite. They belong to the era of Herder and Wolff , later to be followed by Goethe , Humboldt , Dilthey , Nietzsche , Gadamer , and finally

2640-478: The contemporary political philosophy of such a view include Isaiah Berlin , Stuart Hampshire and Bernard Williams . An earlier version of political pluralism was a strong current in the formation of modern social democracy (to balance socialist and capitalist ideals), with theorists such as the early Harold Laski and G. D. H. Cole , as well as other leading members of the British Fabian Society . In

2706-524: The decades prior to 1789. Cardiff University professor Graeme Garrard claims that historian William R. Everdell was the first to situate Rousseau as the "founder of the Counter-Enlightenment" in his 1971 dissertation and in his 1987 book, Christian Apologetics in France, 1730–1790: The Roots of Romantic Religion . In his 1996 article, "the Origin of the Counter-Enlightenment: Rousseau and

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2772-487: The emergence of new interests, identities, values, and differences raising claims to representation not currently legible within the existing pluralist imaginary. Pluralism is connected with the hope that this process of conflict and dialogue will result in a quasi- common good . This common good is not an abstract value or set in stone, however, but an attempt at balancing competing social interests and will thus constantly shift given present social conditions. Proponents in

2838-471: The following years. The historian James Schmidt questioned the idea of "Enlightenment" and therefore of the existence of a movement opposing it. As the conception of "Enlightenment" has become more complex and difficult to maintain, so has the idea of the "Counter-Enlightenment". Advances in Enlightenment scholarship in the last quarter-century have challenged the stereotypical view of the 18th century as an " Age of Reason ", leading Schmidt to speculate on whether

2904-493: The formal aspects of the canon of rhetoric, including the arrangement and the delivery of an argument. Yet he chose to emphasize the Aristotelian connection of rhetoric with logic and dialectic , thereby placing ends (rhetoric) at their center. Vico's objection to modern rhetoric is that it is disconnected from common sense ( sensus communis ), defined as the "worldly sense" that is common to all men. In lectures and throughout

2970-592: The francophile Frederick II of Prussia , then by the armies of Revolutionary France and finally by Napoleon , was crucial to the shift of consciousness that occurred in Europe at this time, leading eventually to Romanticism . The consequence of this revolt against the Enlightenment was pluralism . The opponents to the Enlightenment played a more crucial role than its proponents, some of whom were monists , whose political, intellectual and ideological offspring have been terreur and totalitarianism . In his book Enemies of

3036-535: The great twentieth century Romance philologists Erich Auerbach , Leo Spitzer , and Ernst Robert Curtius ." As a humanist and early philologist, Vico represented "a different, alternative model that has been extremely important to me in my work", which differed from mainstream Western prejudice against the Orient and the dominating "standardization" that came with modernity and culminated in National Socialism . That

3102-567: The historical cycles by which societies rise and fall. Born to a bookseller in Naples , Italy, Giovan Battista Vico attended several schools, but ill health and dissatisfaction with the scholasticism of the Jesuits led to his being educated at home by tutors. Evidence from his autobiographical work indicates that Vico likely was an autodidact educated under paternal influence, during a three-year absence from school, consequence of an accidental fall when

3168-459: The interdependence of human history and culture facilitates the scholars' task to "take seriously Vico's great observation that men make their own history, that what they can know is what they have made, and extend it to geography. As geographical and cultural entities—to say nothing of historical entities—such locales, regions, and geographical sectors as 'Orient' and 'Occident' are man-made." Pluralism (political philosophy) Pluralism as

3234-510: The micro and macro level. Essentially, he has shifted the theory from a conservative theory of order, to a progressive theory of democratic contestation and engagement. Connolly introduces the distinction between pluralism and pluralization . Pluralism, whether the interest-group pluralism of Robert A. Dahl or political liberalism's "reasonable" pluralism, is oriented towards existing diversity of groups, values, and identities competing for political representation. Pluralization, by contrast, names

3300-484: The middle of the 18th century to the 20th century among critical theorists, postmodernists and feminists. The Enlightenment has opponents on all points of its ideological compass, from the far left to the far right, and all points in between. Each of the Enlightenment's challengers depicted it as they saw it or wanted others to see it, resulting in a vast range of portraits, many of which are not only different but incompatible. The idea of Counter-Enlightenment has evolved in

3366-552: The mind perceives itself, it does not make itself." This criterion for truth would later shape the history of civilization in Vico's opus, the Scienza Nuova ( The New Science , 1725), because he would argue that civil life—like mathematics —is wholly constructed. The New Science (1725, Scienza Nuova ) is Vico's major work. It has been highly influential in the philosophy of history, and for historicists such as Isaiah Berlin and Hayden White. Samuel Beckett 's first published work, in

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3432-505: The most ancient wisdom of the Italians, unearthed from the origins of the Latin language"). The principle states that truth is verified through creation or invention and not, as per Descartes , through observation: "The criterion and rule of the true is to have made it. Accordingly, our clear and distinct idea of the mind cannot be a criterion of the mind itself, still less of other truths. For while

3498-483: The natural sciences abounded as the result of Cartesianism. Widely disseminated by the Port Royal Logic of Antoine Arnauld and Pierre Nicole , Descartes's method was rooted in verification: the only path to truth, and thus knowledge, was through axioms derived from observation. Descartes's insistence that the "sure and indubitable" (or, "clear and distinct") should form the basis of reasoning had an obvious impact on

3564-550: The new American republic and devotes this paper to questioning how best to avoid such an occurrence. He posits that to avoid factionalism, it is best to allow many competing factions (advocating different primary principles) to prevent any one from dominating the political system . This relies, to a degree, on a series of disturbances changing the influences of groups so as to avoid institutional dominance and ensure competition. Like Edmund Burke , this view concerns itself with balance, and subordinating any single abstract principle to

3630-459: The other hand, Johann Georg Hamann and his fellow philosophers believe that a more organic conception of social and political life, a more vitalistic view of nature, and an appreciation for beauty and the spiritual life of man have been neglected by the eighteenth century. Isaiah Berlin established this term's place in the history of ideas . He used it to refer to a movement that arose primarily in late 18th- and early 19th-century Germany against

3696-402: The prevailing views of logic and discourse. Studies in rhetoric—indeed all studies concerned with civic discourse and the realm of probable truths—met with increasing disdain. Vico's humanism and professional concerns prompted an obvious response that he would develop throughout the course of his writings: the realms of verifiable truth and human concern share only a slight overlap, yet reasoning

3762-451: The problems plaguing any discussion of pluralism is that it is a multi-faceted concept. There are at least four distinct ways in which the term pluralism has been used. William E. Connolly challenges older theories of pluralism by arguing for pluralization as a goal rather than as a state of affairs. Connolly's argument for the "multiplication of factions" follows James Madison 's logic in engaging groups, constituencies, and voters at both

3828-451: The revolution. He worked as an editor for the anti- philosophes literary journal, L'Année Littéraire . Barruel argues in his Memoirs Illustrating the History of Jacobinism (1797) that the Revolution was the consequence of a conspiracy of philosophes and freemasons. In Considerations on France (1797), Joseph de Maistre interprets the Revolution as divine punishment for the sins of

3894-401: The role of historical actors, and an historical method of narrative. Marx and Vico saw social-class warfare as the means by which men achieve the end of equal rights ; Vico called that time the "Age of Men". Marx concluded that such a state of affairs is the optimal end of social change in a society, but Vico thought that such complete equality of rights would lead to socio-political chaos and

3960-597: The selection of critical essays on James Joyce entitled Our Exagmination Round His Factification for Incamination of Work in Progress , is "Dante... Bruno. Vico.. Joyce". In it, Beckett sees a profound influence of Vico's philosophy and poetics—as well the cyclical form of the Scienza Nuova —on the avant-garde compositions of Joyce, and especially the titular Work in Progress, viz. Finnegans Wake . In Knowledge and Social Structure (1974), Peter Hamilton identified Vico as

4026-484: The term itself did not exist at the time and most of their contemporaries ignored it. The historian Jacques Barzun argues that Romanticism has its roots in the Enlightenment. It was not anti-rational, but rather balanced rationality against the competing claims of intuition and the sense of justice. This view is expressed in Goya's Sleep of Reason , in which the nightmarish owl offers the dozing social critic of Los Caprichos

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4092-424: The tradition of Socrates and Cicero , Vico's true orator will be midwife to the birth of "the true" (as an idea) from "the certain", the ignorance in the mind of the student. Rediscovery of "the most ancient wisdom" of the senses, a wisdom that is humana stultitia ("human foolishness"), Vico's emphases on the importance of civic life and of professional obligations are in the humanist tradition. He would call for

4158-467: The very least refusing to recognize others as legitimate) and engaging in good faith dialogue. Pluralists also seek the construction or reform of social institutions in order to reflect and balance competing principles. One of the more famous arguments for institutional pluralism came from James Madison in The Federalist paper number 10 . Madison feared that factionalism would lead to in-fighting in

4224-518: Was an Italian philosopher , rhetorician , historian , and jurist during the Italian Enlightenment . He criticized the expansion and development of modern rationalism , finding Cartesian analysis and other types of reductionism impractical to human life, and he was an apologist for classical antiquity and the Renaissance humanities , in addition to being the first expositor of the fundamentals of social science and of semiotics . He

4290-442: Was not an historicist , contemporary interest in Vico usually has been motivated by historicists, such as Isaiah Berlin , a philosopher and historian of ideas , Edward Said , a literary critic , and Hayden White , a metahistorian. Vico's intellectual magnum opus is the book Scienza Nuova or New Science (1725), which attempts a systematic organization of the humanities as a single science that recorded and explained

4356-423: Was very limited. In Germany, the expression "Gegen-Aufklärung" has a longer history. It was probably coined by Friedrich Nietzsche in "Nachgelassene Fragmente" in 1877. Lewis White Beck used this term in his Early German Philosophy (1969), a book about Counter-Enlightenment in Germany. Beck claims that there is a counter-movement arising in Germany in reaction to Frederick II 's secular authoritarian state. On

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