The Essential Writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Author:Jean-Jacques Rousseau [Rousseau, Jean-Jacques]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Vintage Classics
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

THE SAVOYARD VICAR’S PROFESSION OF FAITH

My child, do not expect from me learned speech or profound reasoning. I am not a great philosopher, nor do I desire to be one. But I have a certain amount of common sense and a profound love of truth.

[…]

If the soul is immaterial, it can survive the body, and if it survives the body, providence is justified. If my only proof of the immateriality of the soul was the triumph of everything that is wicked in this world and the oppression of all that is just, that alone would prevent me from doubt. So shocking a dissonance in the universal harmony would have led me to attempt to resolve it, and to tell myself: “Everything does not end for us with life’s end—with death everything returns to order.” But I would, in truth, find it difficult to ask myself what becomes of man when all his senses are destroyed. This question no longer presents any difficulty to me when I have acknowledged the two states. It is easy enough to understand that, as during my physical life I can perceive only through my senses, whatever is imperceptible to these senses will escape me. Once the union of soul and body is destroyed, I conceive that the former may be dissolved and the latter preserved. But why should destruction of the one involve destruction of the other? On the contrary, being of such different natures they exist during their union in a violent condition, but when this union comes to an end, they both return to their natural state. The active and living substance regains all the force it used in setting the passive dead substance in motion. Alas! My vices make me feel too keenly that during this life man is only half alive, and that the life of the soul begins only with the death of the body.

But what is this life, and is the soul immortal by its nature? My limited understanding can conceive of nothing without limits; everything that is called infinite escapes me. What can I deny or affirm, what judgment can I make about matters I cannot conceive? I believe that the soul survives the body long enough to maintain order, but who knows if this is enough to last forever? I can comprehend how the body uses and destroys itself by the division of its parts, but I cannot conceive a similar destruction of the thinking being, and as I cannot imagine how this being can die, I presume that it will not. Since this assumption consoles me and is not unreasonable, why should I be afraid of accepting it?

I am aware of my soul. I know it through feeling and through thought; I know that it exists, but without knowing what its essence is; I cannot reason about knowledge I do not have. What I do know is that the identity of the self is prolonged only by memory, and that to be the same in reality, I must remember that I have existed.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.