BLOCK II Check Your Progress Exercise 1

Jean Jacques
Rousseau Note: i) Use the space given below for your answer.
ii) Check your progress with the model answer given at the end of
the unit.
1. Discuss the life and times of Rousseau.
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2.3 ROUSSEAU’S CRITIQUE OF

ENLIGHTENMENT
“Man is born free but everywhere he is in chains.”

These contradictory lines of Rousseau in his seminal work The Social Contract
reflect his love for freedom and happiness and sadness over the loss of it in
modern society. Rousseau has attacked enlightenment as it enchains and enslaves
the individual to the unnecessary needs and demands in life. Modernity has
brought along with itself extravagant demands and needs which is contrary to his
real self and he pursues those things just to fit in a society. He aggressively
nurtures ambitions and goals and many a time, even marginalizing his fellow
being. This has taken a toll of compassion, empathy, love and warmth. Man has
become selfish in modern society. He looks at others as his competitors and not a
part of society. He learns to rule and exclude rather than cooperate, enjoy and
becoming a part in a society. Man forgets his real nature and starts conforming to
the vanity of civil society. This makes him isolated from his real self and he
becomes morally void. Modernity, according to Rousseau, has made man morally
corrupt. It has deprived him of his sentiments, feelings, love and happiness and
made them more self centered, competitive and aggressive towards others and
himself. And this cunning behavior of man has been institutionalized by the
creation of the modern state. Rousseau believes that the formation of the modern
state has furthered the vices of modernity. The modern state has been created for
the purpose of self-preservation. The purpose of the modern state is not to look
after the well-being and happiness of the individual, but rather to preserve the
distinction between the rich and the poor. Since, the superfluous wants of the
modern man cannot be satisfied in a modern society, so it becomes important for
him to oppress the other. The reason for his non-fulfillment of demands is that he
is not in his real self where he will be satisfied with minimal resources required
for survival. But in modern society, he seeks comfort in luxury and wastes or
exploits resources for his cheap thrills. Man turns into a pleasure-seeker in
30 modern society. The sustenance of his pleasures can only happen when he
deprives the other being of his rightful resources. Therefore, he marginalizes the
weak and does not allow them to emancipate. The mechanism of the modern state State of Nature and
and its laws are designed in such a way that it allows each man to pursue his the ‘Noble Savage’
selfish gains. He concentrates wealth and power to aggrandize himself and
oppresses the poor and the weak. Therefore, modern state sows the seeds of
hierarchy and derives benefits in sustaining divisions in society. The relationships
are then based on money and private interests rather than on trust, sociability and
welfare. Therefore, the civil society which was built for mutual interdependence
and mutual aid has now become an arena where men pursues their self–interest
and work only for their own advantage. Modern state and civil society have,
therefore, sowed the seeds of conflict and discontentment in society. For this
reason, Rousseau despises modernity and enlightenment. He says modernity is not
the indicator of progress and prosperity; rather, it is a sign of depravity and an
impoverished mind. It has resulted in the destruction of good life.

Rousseau also attacks arts and sciences. In his first major Discourse on the Arts
and Sciences in 1750 that won the prize in an annual essay competition organized
by the Academy of Dijon. The question asked in the competition was ‘Whether
the progress of the Arts and Sciences has contributed to the purifying of the
morals?’. And Rousseau answers it negatively. He was not in favor of the idea
that Arts and sciences are an indicator of progress and human civilization. He
articulates “Our minds have been corrupted in proportion as the arts and sciences
have improved”. He rather says that Arts and sciences have become a cause of
moral corruption. The nourishment and sustenance of arts and sciences requires
an ambience of luxury and comfort. It is required to feed the idle curiosity of men.
Only the rich and the upper class can derive the pleasure from the Arts and
sciences as the poor and the weak have no idle time and luxury to rejoice in it.
Arts and sciences have further perpetuated the distinction between the rich and the
poor. Lot of money is spent to preserve those arts and sciences whereas the
marginalized have to guard those very same commodities that have caused their
impoverishment. The modern society is, thus, characterized by inequality and
injustice.

Rousseau says “The arts, literature and the sciences, less despotic though perhaps
more powerful, fling garlands of flowers over the chains which weigh them down.
They stifle in men’s breasts that sense of original liberty, and cause them to love
their own slavery.”

Rousseau’s infamous essay Discourse on the Arts and Sciences led to a lot of
criticisms in which it was argued that he has simply underestimated the cruelty of
the barbarians in ancient society. To which Rousseau replied that private property,
wealth and inequality are the prime motivators of injustice and immorality in
modern society.

Check Your Progress Exercise 2

Note: i) Use the space given below for your answer.
ii) Check your progress with the model answer given at the end of
31
the unit.