kelly rousseau, kant, and history

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Rousseau, Kant, and HistoryAuthor(s): George Armstrong KellyReviewed work(s):Source: Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 29, No. 3 (Jul. - Sep., 1968), pp. 347-364Published by: University of Pennsylvania Press

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ROUSSEAU,KANT, AND HISTORY

BY GEORGEARMSTRONGKELLY

The intellectuallink betweenRousseau and Kant has been a sub-

ject of steady fascinationto XXth-century intellectualhistorians.In

this regardthe works of Ernst Cassirerand Robert Derathe, woven

arounda generaltheme of Rousseau'srationalism,have proved espe-cially influential.' As philosophical scholars turned their scrutinyupon the worksof Rousseauit becameclear that many of the trap-

pings of Romanticismand the cult of feeling allegedby earlier iter-

arycriticshad to be discardedor at least seriouslyreassessed.

Kant, like virtually all German ntellectualsof his time, receivedthe ambiguousmessage of Rousseau with serious attention and en-thusiasm.2However,unlike certainAufkldrerwho leaped uponRous-

seau'sidea of perfectibilitewithout regardfor its ironiccontent, andthe disciplesof Sturmund Drangwho saw in the Genevan's ife and

worksa beaugeste againstauthorityand order,Kant was well awarethat Rousseau'smajor message centeredupon the contradictionbe-tween nature andcivilization,civilizationand morality.

Substantial Rousseauian building blocks, including that cle de

voute, the liberty which is self-enacted law rather than mere willfulresistance to arbitrarycoercion (now expanded into a concept of

"transcendental freedom"), span Kant's architectonic rampartagainst "dogmatismand fatalism."3

Moreover, he "dialectic"of the

Critique of Practical Reason seems almost to be a philosophicalgroundingof the Savoyardvicar'srejectionof metaphysicaltheology,and his postulation of God, freedom,and immortality as the idees

forcesof the morallife, the "Whatmay I hope?"of the humanspirit.41 Cf. Ernst Cassirer,The Questionof Jean-JacquesRousseau,trans. Peter Gay

(Bloomington,1963) and his Rousseau, Kant, Goethe (Princeton, 1947); Robert

Derathe,Le rationalismede

Jean-JacquesRousseau

(Paris, 1948).For other treat-

ments of the Rousseau-Kantconnection,see esp. Arturo Deregibus,II problemamorale n Jean-JacquesRousseaue la validita dell'interpretazione antiana(Turin,1957), wherea gooddeal of the previous iterature s summarized.

2 Cf. RichardFester, Rousseau und die deutsche GeschichtsphilosophieStutt-gart, 1890); I. Benrubi,"Rousseauet le mouvementphilosophique t pedagogiqueen Allemagne,"Annales de la SocieteJean-JacquesRousseau,VIII (1912), 99-130.

3 "Preface o the SecondEdition,"Critiqueof PureReason, rans.NormanKempSmith (New York, 1963), 32-33.

4 Cf. J. J. Rousseau,Emile, ou de V'Education,d. Frangoisand PierreRichard

(Paris,1961) IV, 343-345, 385.347







348 GEORGE A. KELLY

It is also possibleto detect fundamental connectionsbetween Rous-seau's ideal model of political legitimacy and the societas sociorumof Kant in which individual wills would be made reciprocallyco-restrictiveby the "lawsof freedom"of a juridicalcommonwealthor

republic.5Finally, we have the record of Kant's own pre-Critical

preoccupationwith Rousseau in the notebook he

keptin

prepara-tion for his workon the Essay on the Sublime and the Beautiful.This is not the place to review Cassirer's treatment of the

Rousseau-Kant connection. Generally one may say that Cassirerfinds a similarityof moral,political, and historicalinterpretation n

the men, despite their opposed temperaments,and assimilatesthemto his general notion of the Enlightenment.Essentially, Cassirer'sKant codifies he philosophicallynchoateinsightsof Cassirer'sRous-

seau. Robert Derathe, while attaching Rousseau's philosophico-moral position to Cartesianand Malebranchianantecedents,never-theless warnsthat "to wishto makeof his doctrinea kindof Kantian-ism before the letter . .. results in distortion or mutilation. Cassirer

is not completelysafe from this reproach."Despite my appreciationof Cassirer'sbrilliantinterpretationand

my conviction that an out-and-out Sturm und Drang Rousseau is

preposterous, think that Derathe'sbarb finds the mark. However,

I believe that Cassirer'sessential failure in analyzingthe Rousseau-Kant relationshipis a consequenceof his misreadingof Rousseau's

perceptionsof history.It is no doubtappropriatehat within the fieldof the historyof ideas a crucialcontrolfor understandingwhat sepa-rates RousseauandKant should be the notion of historyitself and itsconnectionwith moralityand institutions.

Rousseau's own attitude towardhistory is of coursequite insep-arablefrom his feeling of himself in the world. Thus it is possible

that Cassirer shies away too far from psychologicalbiography informing his impressions,as Peter Gay has already acutely noted.7

Alreadythe psychologicalmethod appliedto Rousseauhas born richfruit in the brilliantworksby StarobinskiandPoulet andin somefinerecentessays by Judith Shklar.8This context seemsindispensable.

5Kant, The Metaphysical Elements of Justice (i.e. the "Rechtslehre" of the Meta-

physik der Sitten), trans. John Ladd (New York, 1965), 45-47.

6 Derathe, Rationalisme, 188.7 Peter Gay, Introduction to Cassirer, Question, 24.

8 Jean Starobinski, Jean-Jacques Rousseau: la transparence et l'obstacle (Paris,

1958); Georges Poulet, Etudes sur le temps humain (Paris, 1949), 158-193, and

Les metamorphoses du cercle (Paris, 1961), 102-132; Judith N. Shklar, "Rousseau's

Images of Authority," American Political Science Review (December 1964), 919-932,and "Rousseau's Two Models: Sparta and the Age of Gold," Political Science Quar-

terly (March 1966), 25-51.








ROUSSEAU, KANT, AND HISTORY 349

Let us summarilyput Rousseauin his historicalplace. I do not,for one, think that his war on progresswas forced or stagy. At atime when the philosophes-here I must generalize-were com-

mencingto visualizehistory as the growthof reason,hence as some-

thing reasonable n itself, Rousseausaw it as a deplorablespectacleof raisonneursand raisonnements. And instead of

associatingthe

march of human achievement with conquestsof will, as thinkersinthe XIXth century would often do, he called upon the will to re-nounce its expansivenessand smite history. He connected historical

process with the vitiating consequencesof amour-propreand with"la prevoyance .. . which bears us ceaselessly beyond ourselves ...

the true source of all our wretchedness."9 The motto is obtained

fromMontaigneand othermoralists,but its extension into the realm

of historical phenomenology s of Rousseau's own doing.l0He con-fronted the human social experiencewith a model of existence inwhich "desire"and "power" hould seek a modest balance to guardagainst social injury."

Not only is Rousseau impatient with the "ce qui se fait" that

engagedthe talents of many contemporaries,l2 ut he seems to de-clarewar on the very dispositionto think historically."If ever menbecome wise," he wrote, "their history will scarcely entertain

them."' His cherishedSpartanshad no written history, and wouldhave hooted out of their councilsany man rash enoughto seek thelaurelsof posterity.That was the gameof the philosophes;and "whatwould they not give for that fatal Spartanever to have existed?" 4

They may not shine among the annals of the nations, he told the

Corsicans,but they will win a greater prize: they will be happy.lThe moralizingRousseau found it almost impossible to grasp anyconnectionbetween history and virtue, change and well-being.Ex-

istentially heightened, his anti-historicismin turn lies behind hisradicalseparationof wisdom and intellect, sagesse and science, andhis definitionof justice as simply the "loveof order."Still, man is a

history-makinganimal,somehowendowedwith the fateful faculty of

perfectibilite,willing himself above and beyondthe coherentnaturalorder "where everything is renewed and nothing degenerates."6

9Emile,II, 67.

10Cf. Michelde Montaigne,"OurFeelingsContinueBeyondthis Life," n Essays,trans.E. J. Trechmann(New York, 1946), 9. 1 Emile, II, 64.

12 Cf. Lettreau princede Wurttemberg,Nov. 10, 1763,CorrespondanceeneraledeJean-JacquesRousseau, d.Dufour(21Vols.,Paris,1924-32),X, 205-217. ["C.G."

hereafter.]18Lettre a Grimm, n Oeuvrescompletes,ed. B. Gagnebinand M. Raymond (3

Vols.,Paris,1959-1964),III, 69. ["O.C."hereafter.]14Dernierereponse,O.C.,III, 83.5Projet pour la constitutionde la Corse,O.C., III, 947.

16 Lettrea M. de Franquieres. an. 15. 1769.C.G., XIX. 56.








350 GEORGE A. KELLY

Moreover, he mysteryinherentin the observation hat "man s goodbut men are wicked" 7 Rousseauregardsexceptionallyas an histori-

cal, not a theological, problem. ". .. I concluded," Rousseau wrote,

defendingEmile against the Archbishopof Paris, "that it was notnecessaryto imagine man wicked becauseof his nature, when one

could assign the origin and progress of his wickedness."8 ThusRousseauis neither a theologicalmoralist nor a historical optimist.He is a moralfatalistwholeavesone loophole-free will.

Since, according o Rousseau,man is free becausehe commandshis own will, exclusive of his intelligenceor station in life, and sinceeach child born into the world or each act must be regardedas a

perpetualbeginning,19he possibilityof salvation-in the act, in the

individual,or in the community-cannot be cosmicallyforeclosed.If

history is woeful, it is not absolutelyauthoritative."Man,"exhortsthe Savoyardvicar, "lookno furtherfor the author of evil; that au-thoris you. No evil exists but that whichyou make orsuffer;both are

your works."20Selectedpassagesof this kind have createda power-ful current n Rousseau nterpretation.The literaryhistorian GustaveLansonwrites: "Theidea of progress, he great idea of the century,inspiresall the work of Jean-Jacques:he seems to deny its realityonly so as to announce its possibility the more loudly, its necessitythe more demandingly."21And Cassirerargues that, accordingtoRousseau, "man is to return to his original condition and originalnature;not only to remainthere,but in order romthis startingpointto rebuildhis socialexistenceall overagain." 2 These analysesare atbest dubious with regardto a man who wrote, in the first instance,about the "misunderstood rogressof societies,"and, in the second,declared that "la nature humaine ne retrogradepas."23 Our judg-ment of Rousseau's

mpacton his time shouldbe

distinguishedrom

that of his own perceptions.Witnessthe followingtone of pessimism."I like to flattermyself,"

he jotted amonghis papers,"thatsomeday therewill be a statesmanwho [regards himself as] a citizen . . . that by some lucky chance he

17DiscourssurI'lnegalite,note ix, O.C.,III, 202; Rousseau ugede Jean-Jacques,I, O.C.,I, 687.

18 Lettrea M. de Beaumont,Oeuvresde Jean-JacquesRousseau,ed. Didier (17Vols.,Paris,1834), IV, 393-394.

19Cf. Inegalite,O.C.,III, 135-136; Emile et Sophiein Didier,IV, 286.20Emile, IV, 342.21 G. Lanson,Histoirede la litteraturefrancaise (Paris, 1895), 770.22E. Cassirer,The Philosophyof the Enlightenment,rans. F. C. A. Koelln and

J. P. Pettegrove (Boston, 1964), 272.23Rousseau uge de Jean-Jacques, , O.C.,I, 687andIII, 935; Emile,V,.605.









will cast his eyes on this book [the Social Contract], that my looseideaswill inspire n him moreuseful ones, that he will devotehimselfto makingmen better or happier.... My writinghas been guided bythis fantasy."24No one will deny that Rousseau proposedradicalideals. The problemwas how to get there; one knowsthat there is a

huge gap between a model and a method.Rousseau himself declaredin his most blazingworkthat "the vices that make our socialinstitu-tions necessaryare the same ones that make their abuses inevita-ble."25His prescription or the rococoFrance he knew was the main-tenance of the polite palliatives of culture: "Offera bit of food tothese tigers, lest they devourour children."6 His advice for strife-torn Geneva amounted to moderate stabilization of a bourgeoisraison de Republique n orderto stop the drift into faction and law-

lessness.27Rousseau hated history precisely because of its implaca-ble momentum and unreasonablepower.

Moreover,whatever redemptionRousseau held out for the in-

dividual, the domestic unit, or the society of sovereignequality hehemmedin with insuperableprovisosor felt atavistically compelledto dynamite. Julie's contradictionbetween love and social moralitysurvivesher death despite the therapy of Clarens.Emile, that deli-cate hothouse plant cultivated by a "gouverneur"of Godlike andnaturelikeproportions,pleads at the end for his mentor to remain,and in the unfinishedsequel,Emile et Sophie, is pitifully crushedbythe social order.In the Social Contractthe just society and its foun-dationsare described,but purely as a model by which existingformsof order can be judged.28Moreover, all optimism concerning itsrealization is swiftly sabotaged by the remarkableset of conditionsthat must presideat the establishmentof a civil community.As iswell

known,Rousseau

declareswithout blinkingthat Corsicaalone isfit for legislation.29These illustrations could be multiplied. Taken together, they

effectivelyshow that Rousseau saw little possibilityfor a "new"his-

tory but regardedall history as the inevitable carrierof perniciousvalues. "I have seen the evil and tried to finds its causes,"he wrote

resignedly."Othersbolder and more recklesscan seek out the rem-

edy."30Even though, as he claimedagainst the philosophes,he was

the only writer who had built solidly,38his hopes did not extend24Fragments politiques,O.C.,III, 474. 25 Inegalite,O.C.,III, 187.26Observations,O.C.,III, 56; cf. Preface a Narcisse, O.C.,II, 972.27Lettres ecrites de la Montagne,VII, O.C., III, 813. 28Emile, V, 422.29Contratsocial (Premiereversion), II, iii, O.C., III, 318-326; Contratsocial,

II, x, ibid.,389-391. 30Dernierereponse,O.C.,III, 95.31 Rousseau uge de Jean-Jacques, , O.C.,I, 728; "Lettrea M. Moultou,"Apr.

25, 1762,C.G.,VII, 191.








354 GEORGE A. KELLY

saken the "errorless"order of nature, and conscience "speaks the

languageof naturewhicheverythinghas causedus to forget."46

Rousseau'sclaimsto judge and condemnhistory may try the pa-tience of the soberobserver.But they enclose the seriousproblemof

how one gets outsideof historyin order o give it meaning."I feel my

heart and I know men," is his assertion.47This extraordinary ech-nique may not be that of the providentialists,the bourgeoishis-

torians,or the Marxists,but he is wrestlingwith the same ultimatehistorical dilemma.To do this, he imposes his special criterionof

sincerity upon a frameworkof conjecturallyhistoricizedempiricism.By this I mean that he acceptsthe Lockean-Condillaciannalysisofthe impingementof sense data on latent facultiesand the awakeningof the human psychologicalmechanism to these external bombard-

ments. Locke and Condillac,however, were not overly preoccupiedwith the questionof historicalgenesis,but rather with how and howfar we can know.48Rousseau, whose interests were different, very

properly asked the question: what happens if, because of literal

humanisolation,the complexideas of reasonare very long in form-

ing? How have they come to be transformed nto vicious "raison-

nements"infected with amour-propre? need not recapitulatehere

howthe SecondDiscoursedeals with this question.

However,these are some seriousphilosophicaldifficulties,relatedto Rousseau'scurious mixture of empiricismand rationalism.Vic-timizedby "funesteshasards,"man is, nevertheless,responsible:vic-timized as a child, imputable as a corruptedadult. Evil may be

broughton by externalmodificationswroughtupon the amour de soi

and the subsequent growth of cancerouspassions,49but "it is the

abuse of our faculties which makes us unhappy and wicked. ...Moral evil is incontestablyof our doing,and physicalevil [i.e., pain]wouldbe nothingwithout ourvices, whichhave made us sensitive toit." 50 Thus there is a static analysisof the rationalmoralequipment,emphasizingresponsibility, ogetherwith a dynamicstatementof the

progressof historicalcorruption,emphasizingvictimized innocence.This is not unlike Kant's separationbetween the timelessnessof the

"good will" and "radicalevil" and the temporality of phenomena,with the significantexceptionthat Rousseau,unlike Kant, places the

originof evil-and

consequentlyof

morality-withinthe socio-

historicalprocess.At any rate, once Rousseauhas broughthis his-torical phenomenologyto completion, to the point where "all our

46Emile,IV, 355; "Lettresmorales,"VI, C.G., III, 369.47

Confessions, , O.C.,I, 5.48See Starobinski'sntroduction o Inegalite,O.C.,III, liii, lv.49Emile, IV, 247. 50Ibid., IV, 341.









faculties [are] developed,memoryand imaginationset in play, van-

ity stimulated,reason made active, and mind evolved practicallyto

the limit of its possible perfection,"51man has somehowbecomeman

in the rational-imputableenseand the severer echniquesof XVIIth-

century moralism, minus, of course, its visionary theologies, are

pressedinto service.This is also the point in the child'slife whenheis readyfor the doctrinesof the Savoyardvicar.

But it is now conscience, hat "voixde la nature,"and not reason,that sustainstruth-seekingaction.52 Takeaway the sentimentinter-

ieur," Rousseau declared,"and I defy all the modern philosophers

together to prove to Berkley [sic] the existence of physical bod-

ies."58 In a thoroughly"rationalist"manner,the inner certitudees-

tablishes the outer event; but the judgment is now moral (what

Rousseauoften calls "useful"),not moregeometricoand theoretical.The je qui pense is no longer the philosophicalconstructionof an

impersonaland universalreason,but the sensitive moi qui est, the

man in whom nature still speaks, in the instance Rousseauhimself,

by extensionthe Romantic artist. Truthremainsexternallygroundedbut the subject must "love"it, which is preciselywhat the philoso-

phers,with their furor systemicus,do not do: they aspireto instruct

others, not themselves.54Even one's own mistake, sincerely arrived

at, is worth morethan the truth of another'sauthority.55Thus, thepersonalhistoryof a man of unspoiledfeeling, fusing with his sensi-

bility honest observationsand the impeccabledisclosuresof men of

the stripeof Plutarchand Fenelon,becomes, n someprofoundsense,a revelation of the millenial shocks of the human condition.Imagi-

natively, suchmenrerunthe tortuousrace of the genrehumain.

A fragmentfrom the time of the Second Discoursediscloses: "I

studiedman in himself, and saw or thought I saw finally within his

constitution [Rousseau'scustomarywordfor the "changeable" spectof humanity]56 the true system of nature, which people have not

failed to call my own, even though to establishit I simply removed

from man what, according o my demonstration,he had acquired or

himself."57Finally, at about the time of the writing of Emile, the

citizen of Geneva becomes moreexplicit: "I conceiveof a new kind

of serviceto man: to offer the faithful image of one of them so that

they maylearn to know themselves." 8 To

ignorethe

subjectivist51Inggalite,O.C., III, 174.52Cf. Emile, IV, 348.53Lettre a M. de Franquieres,C.G.,XIX, 54.54Emile, IV, 285. 55Ibid., IV, 323.56See Starobinski's otes to Inegalite, O.C., III, 1294.57 "Fragmentbiographique,"O.C.,I, 1115.58 "Monportrait,"O.C., I, 1220.








.

foundation-and incentive-of Rousseau's researchand to attributeto him any "scientific" xperimentalism bviouslypasseswide of themark.But thereis alsoan oppositeerror o be avoided:that of takinghis positions as simply "meta-historical."9 Accordingto this view,"history"becomesa metaphorfor moral judgment,a figurativeem-bellishmentlightly gowninga diatribeagainst the gatheredevils of

contemporaryman. Not all aspects of this problemcan be treatedhere,but I think there are compellingreasonsagainstthe notion thatthe "facts" of the Second Discourse are simply ecartes.To be sure,"onemust not take [these] inquiries .. forhistorical ruths,but onlyfor hypotheticaland conditional lines of reasoning." 0Conjecture s

conjecture,and the reachof the Church s long. However,Rousseau'sintellectualmilieu had two conflictingtendencies with regardto his-

tory,nowheremore

sharplydefined than in his own

writings.In the

firstplace,"nature"was often absolutelyopposedto "history" or the

purpose of establishing civil liberties based on "naturalright" as

against prescriptive yrannies.But, in the secondplace, "history"wasthrownagainst "revelation"or religiousauthority in orderto loosenthe chains of ecclesiasticalobedience.61 The PelagianizingRousseauwas no less concernedwith the latter than with the formerproblemand neededhistory as a tool to deal with it. History, not primordial

guilt, was the clue to corruption.It was the immense continuumstretching between man's anthropological nnocence and his social

misery.Seen in this light, it is improbable hat Rousseau intended a

relinquishmentof fact to fancy. His materials are characteristicofthe literarysocial science of the epoch.Even today (cf. LewisMum-

ford), where artifacts are lacking, the interpreterscruplesto imag-ine, or resortsto the evidence of myth and poetry. Kant, a distin-

guished anthropo-moralisthimself and a tendentious examiner of

Rousseau's arguments,was not incorrectin writing: "The experi-mental moralistwill be fair-mindedenoughnot to classifyM. Rous-seau'spropositionsas merely fine fancies beforehaving tested themout." 62

Rousseau saw historical process both as a deformation which

man, firstvictimizedby excessivecontact and competitionfor scarce

goods ("aidez-moi")and reciprocal approval ("aimez-moi") gradu-ally imposed on himself, and as a nexus of socio-political growth

59Cf. Henri Gouhier, "Nature et histoire dans la pensee de Jean-Jacques

Rousseau,"Annales,XXIII (1953-55), 11.60Inegalite,O.C., III, 133.61See especially,Rene Hubert,Les sciences socialesdans l'Encyclopedie(Paris,

1923), 23-26.62"Note on the WandererJan Kommarnicki,"n GesammelteSchriften (Akad-

emieausgabe,24 Vols., Berlin, 1902-1964), II, 489. [G.S., hereafter.]









cycles analogousto the human experienceof youth, maturity, and

decrepitude. There is at least some ambiguity about these two

interpretations, encouraging the hesitation between cosmopolitanand particularisticvalues so pronounced n his works.It is perhapsconvenient to see the first image (forcefully expressed n the SecondDiscourseand in texts like the "Lettrea Philopolis")as a refutationof the most optimistic and "progressivist"trains of the Enlighten-ment-ideas found especially in the writings of St.-Pierre, Grimm,Turgot, and, somewhat more guardedly,d'Alembert.Unlike these

men, Rousseau feared the future. He inveighed often against the

sacrificeof the present for uncertain gains.63"In the long run allmen becomesimilar,but the orderof their progress s different,"he

writes; 64 this is not meant as an encouragement.Perhapsthe Rus-sians will overrunEurope, to be followed by the Tartars.65Above

all, he is concerned o show that science is destructiveof sagesse.In

his Reply to the King of Poland, he argues thus at considerable

length over the field of post-classical European history.66The

polemicis aimedchieflyat the Church,but Rousseaumakesit amply

clear that the free-thinking philosophers come under the samerubric.Indeed,he regarded he two campsas "mad wolves ready to

tear each other to piecesin their rage"or even capableof unitingin a

single fanaticism,as had happenedin China.67t is difficultto com-

prehendwhy certain historians still persist in claimingRousseauas

"progressivist." erfectibilite s a bitterirony,and"progress"s surelywhat historyis not-or, better,historyis an expressionof the human

conditionrun amok.

Each historicalpeople, Rousseaubelieved, had its cycle of vigorand decline,akin to the seasonsor the agesof man, fromwhich therewas no appeal. The "robust"age of youth was associatedwith the

launchingof political society; thereupon,gradualdecrepitudeover-took the nation until its civic ligaturesfinallydissolved n anarchy.68This "naturalorder"of politicallife, analogousto but not to be con-fused "organistically"with the biological ife of the individual,couldbe deliberatelyregulatedby a good diet-wise legislation,"sublime"

institutions,and

resistanceto demoralizing nequality bred bylux-

ury, specialization,and sophistication-but only to the extent thatthe originalmaterial allowed. The Social Contract,from II, vii for-

ward,is repletewith these observations.Rousseau's"tinkering"withGeneva and Polandis basedon the suppositionthat certainremedial

63Cf. Emile et Sophie,Didier, IV, 289.64Essai sur l'originedes langues,Didier, II, 362.65 Contratsocial,II, viii, O.C., III, 386.66 Observations,O.C.,III, 43-56.

67Confessions, X, O.C.,I, 435; XI, ibid., 567.68In6galite,O.C.,III, 191.







358 GEORGE A. KELLY

operations are appropriateto particularphases of a unique socio-

political cycle: this is one of the meanings of Rousseau's alleged

conservatism.The image of circularity,with emphasis on politicalfactors, is essentially what history is for Rousseau. One will detect

without great difficultythe influence of Polybius, Plutarch,Machia-

velli, and Montesquieuin the conception.It is a broad portrait offatalism incorporatingcertain limited features of correction.

However,Rousseau had severelyquestionedthe legitimacyof all

political relationships,and he had remarked hat peopleswere occa-

sionally granted a recommencement or seconde naissance: Sparta

and Rome amongthem. France was one of the last countriesRous-seau would have imaginedin this connection; he saw all the greatstates of WesternEurope as one flavorless"bourgeois"paste. How-

ever, by late 1792,his is the mythology by which the most fervent

Montagnardideologists understood the Revolution that they were

making.Although,as Robespierrewrote,"despotismcorrupts .. themost intimate feelings of the oppressed . . . and a people is criticallysituated when it passes suddenly from slavery to freedom, when

there is contradictionbetween its customs and habits and the prin-ciples of its new government,"nevertheless,"the peuple, that large,industriousclass ... is untouchedby the causes of deprivationwhichhas doomed . . . those of a superior condition. ... It is closer to

nature." 9 "Freedom,"declaredSaint-Just, "has found new, uncul-

tured, violent souls. .. ."70 In Montagnard rhetoric the legendaryvirtues Rousseau assigned to Corsica were simply transplantedto

Picardyand the Ile de France.

Grantingthis link with Jacobin and sans-culotte lyricism, thereis definitelysomethingabout Rousseau'sconcatenationof moods that

evades the equation. In the end, he stands alone. There is a vast

distance,not to be measuredby decades or kilometers,between theIsle of Poplarsand the Pantheon,betweenArcadiaand the Hotel deVille. That somethingis pathos,passivity, and regret.It is a matterof non-expectation.Rousseau'sadieu to his centurywas not in favorof the next, but in favor of a temps mort or a nulle part, a place of

childhood deniedby history,

deniedby

the fate ofgrowing

old.

"Will,"writes the philosopherLouis Lavelle, "convertsthe future

into a sensuouspresent,while memoryconvertsthe past into a spir-itual present." Further, "will is, in a certain sense, the reverse of

memory; it makes a perceptionout of the image, just as memorymakes an image out of the perception." 1Despite his defense of the

69Maximilien Robespierre, D6fenseur de la Constitution, No. 4, in Oeuvres com-

pletes (10 Vols., Nancy 1910-1967), IV, 113-115; cf. Lettres a ses commentans,

2eme serie, No. 4, O.C., V, 20.

70 Louis Antoine Leon de Saint-Just, Oeuvres, ed. J. Gratien (Paris, 1946), 92.71 Louis Lavelle, Du temps et de l'eternite (Paris, 1945), 283.








will, Rousseau is fundamentallyan apostle of the memory: his per-ceptions becomeimages. Still, he is at a point of tension, trying to

resolve the contradictorytriads of past-memory-regretand future-will-desire nto a perfect present,where,as he puts it, "eachmomentis a perpetual beginning." Sociologically,this attitude has a gooddeal of resemblance o what GeorgesGurvitch has labelled the senseof "erratic time": ". .. a time of uncertainty par excellence where

contingency is accentuated . . .the present appears to prevail over

the past and the future, with which it sometimes finds it difficulttoenter into relations." 2 Rousseau's political disciples of the Mon-

tagne will take the decisive step of transforming"memory" nto"will"across the atemporalkairosof the "recommencement"whoseaptest symbol is the Revolutionarycalendar). And this will mean,once the deed is accomplished,a future; with that future a past;and with the past a history, a new "nuit des temps,"new heroes, anew cite. With the passageof time that historycan join the "old"his-

tory whichhas neverceased.Progresscan achieve a double boon.ButRousseau himself did not cut this Gordianknot; he did much to callattention

to it.I cannot doubt that Emile is the wishfulanalogueto those unfor-tunate and nameless victims of the Second Discourse who had no

"gouverneur"o wardoffthe "funesteshasards"of history."We must

generalizeour views," Rousseau commences,"and consider in our

pupil the abstract man, the man exposed to all the accidents ofhumanlife."7 In this procedure, hereis both a paralleland an anti-

parallel. The parallel is that Rousseau (from his Lockean epis-

temologicalbase)invites us to

comparethe maturation of a child

with the historicity of human social development.74Clearly theidealization of childhoodin Emile is a clue to Rousseau's feelingsabout the siecle d'or and the potential of the Corsicans: "If youwould extend the effect of a fortunate educationover a whole life-

time, prolongthe habitsof childhood nto earlymanhood;whenyourpupil is what he ought to be, keep him the same from then on."75

"Noble people,"he apostrophizes he Corsicans,"I have no wish to

give you artificial and systematic laws of man's invention, but to

bring you back to live under the laws of nature and order whichalone command the heart and do not tyrannize the will."76Emile,

72 GeorgesGurvitch,TheSpectrumof SocialTime (Dordrecht,1964), 31f.73Emile,I, 12.74 Lockeused the illustrationof the childto disprove he existenceof innateprac-

tical ideas, implying, nter alia,of coursethe idea of originalsin. Cf. An Essay Con-

cerningHuman Understanding, d. A. CampbellFraser,2 Vols. (New York, 1959),I, Bk. I, iii, paragraphs1-5, 92-94.

75Emile, V, 550; cf. IV, 398. 76 Corse,O.C.,III, 950.







360 GEORGE A. KELLY

then, is Rousseau's vision of how nature might be projected into

society without the awful wrenchthat most men suffer.But, seen inthe light of the SecondDiscourse,Emile is also passionatelyantihis-

torical: it sets "good"educationagainst "bad"development.Humanhistory is not the education of man writ large, as the teleologiesof

Lessing, Kant, and their successors n part suggest.It is, so far as wecan judge, the horribleopposite of that experiment,properly con-ceived. And this means, in effect, taking educationout of history,divorcingman fromhis works. In this sense,Rousseau'smessagewas

ignoredordeeplymisunderstood y his Germanadmirers.Rousseau'smaterials are of great importanceto successorsdesir-

ing to retainhis moralemphasisand yet find a historicalroute "fromworseto better";

77 his fatalism, however,neededto be overcomeandhis subjectivity more plausibly universalized.This was a part ofKant's mission. But Kant tended to see civilization as a mediatingterm between the ideas of nature and morality, which Rousseau,againstthe generalthrust of the Enlightenment,had set apart.WhatI mean is that Rousseauregardednature as pre-moral, tronglyheldthat society, having createdmorality, had heavily tipped the scales

againstvirtue. Thus he wishedfor a subsumptionof nature and vir-tue at a level that resistedthe march of civilization.Kant, of course,had no unilateraloptimismconcerningthe achievements of man in

society; as he wrote in a well-knownpassage: "To a high degreewe

are, throughart and science,cultured.We are civilized-perhaps toomuch for our own good-in all sorts of social graces and decorum.But to consider ourselves as having reached morality-for that,much is lacking." 8 Nevertheless,Kant set himself the task both of

takingRousseauseriouslyand of workinga way out of the historicalblockadejust described.

Kant's total philosophical achievement consists of an epochal"criticism"and reorderingof the possibilities and proceduresof

knowledge, supplemented by a more problematic "future meta-

physics" constructed on this base. It is therefore not surprisingthat he credited Rousseau with the elaborationof a kind of pre-philosophical"criticism"and "metaphysics"of his own:

In his On the Influenceof the Sciences and his On the Inequality of Man

[Rousseau] howsquitecorrectlyhat there is an inevitableconflictbe-tween cultureand the humanspecies,considereds a naturalspeciesofwhicheverymember ughtwhollyto attainhis naturalend. But in hisEmile,his SocialContract, ndotherwritingshe triesto solvethis muchharderproblem: owculturewasto moveforward,n order o bringabout

77

"ConjecturalBeginningof HumanHistory,"Kant on History,ed. L. W. Beck(New York, 1963), 68.78"Ideafor a UniversalHistory from a CosmopolitanPoint of View," bid., 21.








sucha developmentf the disposition f mankind, onsidereds a moral

species,as to end the conflictbetweenhe naturalandmoralspecies.79

Kant and his follower Ernst Cassirerto the contrary, this is not

preciselywhat Rousseaumeant.In his ethicalandlegal philosophyKant takesRousseau'santihis-

torical ideals, such as the notion of the social contract,and regardsthem-in somewhatalteredform-as "Ideasof reason," .e., "rational

concepts,for which there can be foundno adequateobject in experi-ence." 0 Thus, according o Kant, "withRousseau'sEmile, the edu-

cation to be given Emile is a true Idea of reason." 1 Rousseau's cri-

teria for judging,affirmedby the guaranteed"sincerity"of the con-

science, are, however, placed in a quasi-historical,quasi-legendary

past, akinto the traditionalmoralist'snotionof Utopia.Againstthese

standardsRousseaudescribedand indeed succumbed o an historical

phenomenologyof despair.He expectedlittle good to issue from the

future.

By the same token, Kant's epistemological ransformationof the

ideal-what Rousseau sometimes called a "chimera"-into an Idea

bearsambiguously uturized mplications.Kant stroveto see how the

"chimera"might be plausible.In the early notes to On the Sublimeand the Beautiful, wherehis first appreciationsof Rousseau are re-

corded,he noted enthusiastically:"The educationof Rousseauis the

only way to make society flourish again. . . . Thanks to it govern-ments will be better orderedand wars will become rarer."2 The

philosophicaldevice which will eventually describethe hope for this

passageis the "ethico-teleology"of the final paragraphsof the Cri-

tique of Judgment, backstoppedby the explanation of the use of

"practical deas"in the first Critique,the primacyof the moral lawand its derivationsestablishedin the second Critique,and the phe-nomenal dialectic of "unsocial sociability" described with almost

Hobbesianflavor in the "Idea for a Universal History." Obviously,the complexrelationshipof these elements cannot be fully exploredin the present essay.

We can say in the guiseof explanationthat the Kantian Idea83is

a bridgeof indefinitespan to the problematic uture.Historyitself is

79"ConjecturalBeginning,"60-61; cf. Anthropologie,G.S., VII, 326-327.80Anthropologie,G.S.,VII, 199.81Vorlesungeniber die philosophischeReligionslehre, d. K. H. L. Politz (Leip-

zig, 1832),3. Quotedby Deregibus, I problemamorale n Jean-JacquesRousseau,77.

82"Bemerkungen,"G.S., XX, 175. Rousseauhimself had, however,told a cor-

respondent:"You are quite right that it is impossible o make an Emile; but can

you believe that this was my purpose and that the book . . . is really a treatise on

education?"Lettre a M. Philibert Cramer,Oct. 13, 1764, C.G., XV, 339. In the

Prefaceto Emile (2-3), he indicated hat his subjectwas "le bonheurou le malheur

dugenrehumain."83For Kant's full epistemologicalexplanationof Ideas, see Critique of Pure

Reason,308-326.







362 GEORGE A. KELLY

riven decisively at the moment of "now"-the moment when the

subject chooses either freely or "heteronomously." The Kantian past,insofar as it may be historically understood, is a causal determinism:

. . . the real things of past time . . . are objects for me and real in pasttime only insofar as I representto myself (either by the light of historyor by the guiding chain of causes and effects) that a regressiveseries of

possible perceptionsin accordancewith empirical laws, in a word, thatthe course of the world conductsus to a past-time series as a conditionof the present time .. .84

Thus the past is to be judged by the "understanding," not by a Rous-

seauian conscience. Conscience judges the act, not the fact. Past timeis the record of what "humanity," taken as a part of the order of

nature, has done. Such a perspective defers our moral concern. The

past, however, brings us inexorably to the "now" and confronts us

with a future that is open, a sphere of freedom. This sphere is not

only the timeless and impalpable "whenever" of noumenal causation;

it is also the impending "from now on." As Havet felicitously puts it:

"the whole sense of the Kantian ethic is that evil is done, while the

good is to be done."85

Of course, Kant did not mean that suddenlyand splendidly the good will would assert itself in history, even

though he assigned it a potency for doing so. In fact, history is a slow

and painful process of improvement. But that there is such a "guid-

ing thread" ought not to be doubted.

Kant's philosophy of history will then be seen to depend on what

he calls "ethico-teleology." This is a projection of the moral law via

the forms of the categorical imperative into the content of "practical

Ideas" (e.g.,the

perfectcivil

constitution, peace)in an

impendingfuture. The firm though scarcely complacent faith that Kant held

with regard to the ultimate invasion of history by morality dependedon no facile determinism but on his conviction that evil is "character-

less," that it has "the indiscerptible property of being opposed to and

destructive of its own purposes . . . thus it gives place to the moral

principle of the good, though only through a slow progress," and that

the phenomenal world of the past, teleologically viewed, can be in-

terpretedas

providingfor the advent of

morality upona base of law

and culture.86 The teleological judgment, moreover, is a scheme

which man uses to put reason into nature: "We bring in a teleologi-cal ground where we attribute causality in respect of an object to the

concept of an object, as if it were to be found in nature (not in

ourselves)." 87 Man's ethical motive for doing this is a practical proof

84Ibid., A495=B523, 442.85 JacquesHavet, Kant et le problemedu temps (Paris,1947), 198.

86Anthropologie,GS., VII, 329; "PerpetualPeace," Kant on History, 127;

Critiqueof Judgment,trans. J. H. Bernard (London, 1931), paras.83-84, 355ff.87Judgment ("Teleological"), ara.61, 261; cf. "PerpetualPeace,"106-107.








of his rational potential to liberate history progressivelyfrom vio-lence and injustice. The operative agency through which the "goodwill"fuseswith temporalevent is the executive will or Willkiir,effec-

tively the "now,"wherehumanity is subject to both "impure"and"pure"practicalreason;88 the primary nstrumentsof this liaison are

culture,the state, and the school.

That, in brief,is the Kantian reallocationof Rousseau'smaterials.Of the many things that might be said about this transfer,severalseem of crowning importance.The first, as I have suggested, con-cerns Kant's indefinite prolongation of Rousseau's anti-historical"chimeras"by way of the epistemologicaluse of Ideas, constitutingan "opening" o the future. This pronouncedcontrast is missed byinterpreters who hold that Kant "explained"Rousseau, when itwouldbe more accurateto say that he "used"him, somewhatin thesame sense that he used Plato. A secondfactor is Kant's agile recon-ciliation of Rousseau's"judgment-as-conscience"ith the traditionalview of "judgment-as-reason,"hus allowing for an understandingof historicalprocessthat would be both moral and, in Kant's word,"objective"-i.e., categorical and universal. The third and fourth

points are intimately connectedbecause they involve the historicalstrategies of pedagogy and culture. Though an admirer of Emile,Kant was no subscriber o the maxim: "Rentronsen nous-memes";89

he describedan education intended to "givehumanity its whole de-

ployment and make it possible for us to reach our destination."90

Rousseau'semphasiswas on "negativeeducation,"designedto pre-serveEmile from the "gouffre" f civilization; Kant, believing firmlythat "manis an animal who needs a master" and "needsan educa-

tion," placedhis emphasison "discipline." 1"The lack of discipline,"he writes, "is a worseevil than the failing of culture,for the lattercan still be remedied ater, while one will then no longerbe able toroot out savagery. .. ." 92 The state, we may say, performs an anal-

ogous discipliningand civilizing function. In these respectswe find

the positions of our two thinkersgreatly at odds, a fact related totheir competingvisions of the dialecticof history and morality.It isthus finally importantto note that despiteKant's fundamentalsepa-

ration of theoreticaland practicalreason,he goes far to restoringthecomplementarityof science and sagesse, set in oppositionby Rous-

seau. "Science,"Kant writes, "is the narrowgate that leads to thedoctrineof wisdom." 3 Further: "Man owes it to himself (as a ra-

88 For a superiordiscussion,LewisW. Beck,A Commentary n Kant'sCritiqueofPracticalReason(Chicago,1963),37-42; idem,"Deuxconceptskantiensduvouloir,"Archivesdephilosophie olitique, V (1962), 119-137.

89Cf.Emile,II, 64-69. 90Introduction o Pddagogik,G.S.,IX, 444.91"Ideafor a Universal

History,"17;"Reflexionenur

Anthropologie,"o.

1423,G.S.,XV, 621. 92Pddagogik,G.S.,IX, 445.93 Critiqueof PracticalReason,trans. L. W. Beck (New York, 1956), 167-168.







364 GEORGE A. KELLY

tional being) not to leave idle and, as it were, rusting away thenaturaldispositionsandpowersthat his reasoncan in any way use";and "theoreticalphilosophy can help to promote the ends of wis-

dom." 4 In fact, the philosopherof Koenigsbergnever drewan anti-intellectualbreath.

Kant's moral preoccupationundoubtedlyowes much to the im-

pact of Rousseau, although, as has often been pointed out, he at-

tempted a philosophicalresolution of the ambiguitiesof hedonismand intentionalismin Rousseau's work. But Kant's historicalvisiondiffersby almost a half-circlefrom Rousseau's,even if similar mate-rials are deployed. Rousseau's undoubted political radicalism was

muted and frustratedby his historicalexpectations.Kant's versionofliberal progressivism-somewhat authoritarianor at least pedagogi-cal in tone-was nurturedby a subtle optimism. The difference, f

not, as the caricaturesoften have it, between the forgetfulnessofArcadiaand the imminence of Utopia, was still between nostalgicand anticipatorynorms.As such,it is one illustrationof a sea-changein the Europeanperceptionof time.

Kant did not rigorizeRousseau;he attemptedto solve his explicit

dilemmaby usingthe individual'sa priorimoralawarenessas a con-tinuous wedge against the history of "darkshades" (or, as Voltaire

put it, "crimes")whichthe FrenchEnlightenmentwas seekingto rollback throughits primaryemphasison science,or theoreticalreason.In this sense,Kant stoodRousseau on his head and remarriedhim toan Enlightenment of which the Genevan had been, in his uniquemanner,not only the most boisterous critic but one of the subtlest.

That, I would argue, is the most plausible connectionbetween the

two thinkers.HarvardUniversity.94 The Doctrine of Virtue (i.e., "Tugendlehre" from the Metaphysik der Sitten),

trans. Mary J. Gregor (New York, 1964), 111.

kelly rousseau, kant, and history

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