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2 results

  • vii - Defense of The Spirit of Law (1750)

  • Edited and translated by David W. Carrithers, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga, Philip Stewart, Duke University, North Carolina
  • Book:
    Montesquieu
    Published online:
    02 November 2020
    Print publication:
    19 November 2020, pp 224-263

  • Summary

    Although The Spirit of Law (1748) was greeted very favorably in many quarters, a Jansenist writer in the Nouvelles Ecclésiastiques charged Montesquieu with lack of respect for Christianity and with being a follower of natural religion. Montesquieu’s response was that his critic had failed to understand that he was writing, not as a theologian, but as a “jurisconsult” (legal scholar) exploring what laws are most suitable for a given people considering their character and situation. Montesquieu acknowledges that although he had discussed many non-Christian customs, he was “not justifying the customs but giving the reasons for them.” He also stressed that he had rebutted the views of both Bayle and Spinoza. He notes that he had called out Bayle for his error in believing that “a society of true Christians could not survive” and had refuted Spinoza’s fatalism by asserting that “those who have said that a blind fate has produced all the effects that we see in the world have uttered a great absurdity.”

Montesquieu
  • Discourses, Dissertations, and Dialogues on Politics, Science, and Religion
  • Edited and translated by David W. Carrithers, Philip Stewart
  • Published online:
    02 November 2020
    Print publication:
    19 November 2020
  • A number of Montesquieu's lesser-known discourses, dissertations and dialogues are made available to a wider audience, for the first time fully translated and annotated in English. The views they incorporate on politics, economics, science, and religion shed light on the overall development of his political and moral thought. They enable us better to understand not just Montesquieu's importance as a political philosopher studying forms of government, but also his stature as a moral philosopher, seeking to remind us of our duties while injecting deeper moral concerns into politics and international relations. They reveal that Montesquieu's vision for the future was remarkably clear: more science and less superstition; greater understanding of our moral duties; enhanced concern for justice, increased emphasis on moral principles in the conduct of domestic and international politics; toleration of conflicting religious viewpoints; commerce over war, and liberty over despotism as the proper goals for mankind.