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How Did Jean Jacques Rousseau Influence The Enlightenment

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Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a great philosopher, writer, and composer during the 18th century. Rousseau’s civic philosophy influenced the Enlightenment and changed the general way of thinking. Rousseau’s first major piece of work when the academy he attended, the Academy of Dijon, conducted an essay contest and Rousseau was chosen as the winner with his essay called: A Discourse on the Sciences and Arts. Rousseau argued that Science and the Arts have corrupted the morals and virtue of people. Rousseau’s essay instantly won fame and recognition and it laid the building blocks for his next piece of work, The Discourse on the Origin of Inequality. The second piece of work didn’t win a prize, but it was read by many and further reinforced Rousseau
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Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Hobbes, two titans of the Enlightenment, work within similar intellectual frameworks in their seminal writings. Hobbes, in Leviathan, postulates a “state of nature” before society developed, using it as a tool to analyze the emergence of governing institutions. Rousseau borrows this conceit in Discourse on Inequality, tracing the development of man from a primitive state to modern society. Hobbes contends that man is equal in conflict during the state of nature and then remains equal under government due to the ruler’s monopoly on authority. Rousseau, meanwhile, believes that man is equal in harmony in the state of nature and then unequal in developed society.

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The autobiography, The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, provides a vivid insight into the complicated, yet exhilarating, life of Rousseau. The beginning of his life was filled with misfortunes, such as the death of his mother which was quickly followed by a distraught and self-sabotaging attitude which his father adopted. This led to his father’s involvement in illegal behaviors and the subsequent abandonment of Rousseau. His mother’s death was the catalyst for his journey to meet multiple women who would later affect his life greatly. The Influence of Miss Lamberciers, Madame Basile, Countess de Vercellis, and Madam de Warens on the impressionable adolescent mind of Rousseau led to the positive cultivation of self-discovery and the creation of new experiences, as well as the development of inappropriate sexual desires and attachments towards women.

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Rousseau is one of the most important ecological thinkers in the 18th century. The ecological thought of Rousseau marks a new stage in the development of ecological thought, it is systematic and comprehensive which influencing many ecological philosophies in the western country. He admits that the desire is a natural tendency of personality and a useful tool which to maintain surviving, therefore, it is futile to destroy it, if did, it can be seen to control the nature and change the work of God. However, the desire in Rousseau’s recognition is limited, and it is not the infinite desire of luxury in the consumer society; he points out that our natural desire is very limited which is a tool being used to reach the freedom, it enables us to achieve the purpose of keeping survival, all of those desires, which enslaved and destructed us, come from elsewhere, they do not belong to nature, it is us who regard it as our desire, violating the real desire meaning.(Rousseau,1991;288-289), then he analyzes the original reason of desire which was imposed by civilization,firstly, human being obtains the essential needs, secondly, they turn to pursue other things, such as the sensual pleasure, the endless wealth,subjects and slaves, they struggle for all of these

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The French Revolution was undoubtedly influenced by the political theorists of the Enlightenment. The ideas of two French political theorists in particular are easily seen throughout the French Revolution, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Baron Montesquieu. Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s thoughts and texts, such as the Social Contract, instilled the entitlement of basic human rights to all men. Rousseau’s concepts on rights combined with Baron Montesquieu’s ideas on government provided the backbone of a radical movement in the French Revolution known as the Terror. When one delves into the beginnings of the French Revolution, the motives and actions of the National Assembly, and the Terror of the French Revolution, one can obviously see the influence of two Enlightenment political theorists, Rousseau and Montesquieu.

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