The Rise of European Liberalism (Works of Harold J. Laski): An Essay in Interpretation by Harold J. Laski

Author:Harold J. Laski [Laski, Harold J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Communism; Post-Communism & Socialism, Democracy, Political Ideologies, Political Science, History, Politics, General
ISBN: 9781317586647
Google: BxMhBQAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 23530763
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 1936-06-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER III

The Age of Enlightenment

I

THE creative centre of liberal thought in the eighteenth century is in France. There, the problems to be solved demanded a greater effort, the need for change was more profound. In England, no small part of the mental climate necessary to a liberal evolution had already been achieved. A framework of constitutional government had been erected which, if its basis was more narrow than its admirers were willing to admit, yet offered opportunities far greater than those of any continental people. English political thought, in the seventy years before the French Revolution, did little more than work out the implications of Locke’s philosophy. Even Adam Smith may not unfairly be said to have developed with magistral emphasis a doctrine of which the postulates were already in existence before his time. There is novelty in Burke; but the true emphasis of his doctrine was in a conservative direction. His concern was to persuade his epoch to accept the finality of the Revolution settlement; and it was rather to the protection than to the enlargement of its implications that he devoted his superb powers. Price and Priestley1 did little more than demand formal recognition for a status for the Nonconformists which was already largely implicit in the practice of the English state. They made their obeisances both to the American and the French Revolutions; but their effort was a rhetorical gesture rather than an index to novelty. It won no wide response from those to whom it was addressed. The average Englishman of the eighteenth century was, if I may use a paradox, at peace even when he was at war. He felt that he had made his bargain with fate. It was with the details rather than with the principles of the system under which he lived that he concerned himself. The whig compromise had made room for the bourgeoisie within its confines. It was not necessary to disturb it until after the Napoleonic wars.

But eighteenth century France is a society in ferment, and the pressure of new ideas is inexhaustible. The ancien régime was challenged in the name of new ideas. All the genius of the period was on the side of the novelties; its outlook permeated even those who had most to lose by its victory. The system could not meet the challenge. To the new ideas it opposed an outworn discipline the sanctions of which were destroyed by its association with bankruptcy at home and defeat abroad. The monarchy was, at long last, compelled to take counsel with the middle class; and when it refused to accept the terms which the latter proffered, the result was its overthrow. As in the England of the Puritan rebellion, it was discovered that traditional institutions cannot be uprooted without a conflagration. Just as Hampden and Pym begat Lilburne and Winstanley, so Mirabeau and Mounier, in their turn, begat Babeuf and the Enragés. As Cromwell made possible the new equilibrium of the Restoration, so Napoleon made effective the compromise of the Charter.

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