"0 great philosophers!" cried Rousseau, "How much God is
obliged to you for your easy methods and for sparing Him work." And
again Rousseau warns us to "flee from those [Voltaire and his like]
who, under the pretense of explaining nature, sow desolating doctrines
in the hearts of men, and whose apparent skepticism is a hundred times
more ... dogmatic" than the teachings of priests. Rousseau was not an
orthodox Christian, nor a calmly rational Deist; he simply felt that
"to love God above all things, and your neighbor as yourself, is the
sum of the law."
This he reproached the philosophers with not doing. Rousseau had seen
and felt the bitter suffering of the poor, and he had perceived the
cynical indifference with which educated men often regarded it. Science
and learning seemed to have made men only more selfish. Indeed, the
ignorant peasant seemed to him humbler and more virtuous than the
pompous pedant. In a passionate protest--his _Discourse on Arts and
Sciences_ (1749)--Rousseau denounced learning as the badge of
selfishness and corruption, for it was used to gratify the pride and
childish curiosity of the rich, rather than to right the wrongs of the
poor.
Pages:
877
878
879
880
881
882
883
884
885
886
887
888
889
890
891
892
893
894
895
896
897
898
899
900
901