The Age of European Romanticism

[Conrad_Jalowski]

(Jean-Jacques Rousseau)


The Romantic period was a critical reaction to the empiricism, determinism and automatism of the Age of Enlightenment. While the Enlightenment stressed reason and rationality, the Romantics favored creative expression, individual will and autonomy, an organic approach to the world as opposed to the artificial and barren views of the Enlightenment, a rejection of societal decadence and luxury for the pursuit of individual expression, and a passion for the natural world as opposed to the conformity and slothfulness of the plebeian masses of society. The Age of European Romanticism can be expressed as the triumph of individual will over the whim of the masses and the encroaching powers of the collective whole. The powers of the imagination were of greater significance than cold and barren rationality. While the Romantics displayed the vibrancy and effervescence of their imagination, the Enlightenment reliance on logic and empirical data attributed to an atrophied imagination. For the Enlightenment philosophes, man was an advanced machine or automaton capable of complex actions and elaborate thought; however, an autonomous will and true consciousness were deemed to be nonexistent. The Romantics vehemently opposed the determinism of the philosophes and favored individual autonomy over collective subservience. In my understanding of the Age of European Romanticism, the potency of empirical reason and objectivism were subordinated to the potency of trepidation, aesthetic sublimity, intuition, emotion and the subjective experience. In summary, the individual was an autonomous being with full sovereignty over their own person and that the powers of the imagination were deemed superior to the empirical reason of the philosophes as according to the Romantics. In addition, while the Romantics strongly favored the great spectacle of the individual imposing their will upon society as in the example of Napoleon who embodied the Romantic ideal as a revolutionary force that impinged itself upon the world and as a world historical figure, the Enlightenment philosophes favored the stagnant or ossified autocracies of the old order (The age of the absolutist monarchs). The two main variants in the political theory of the period of the Enlightenment were the liberal constitutionalism of Charles-Louis de Secondat Montesquieu and the benevolent despotism or enlightened absolutism as espoused by Voltaire in its moderate form and Baron d'Holbach in its extreme version.

During the Age of European Romanticism, the significant dichotomy between the civilized state and the natural world, the objective versus the subjective experience and the state of isolation as embodied in nature versus the collectivism of society was considered by the Romantic writers, poets, visionaries and philosophers. For the Romantics, civilized society represented an artificial construct that limited the sovereign rights of the individual by coercing the individual into conforming to the will of the collective or to the masses. In this sense, the state formed an artificial barrier between the individual and nature. Through the coercive actions of society, the individual's natural autonomy and full sovereignty over their own person were crushed by the leaden weight of the masses or the vulgar crowd. For the Romantics, the individual was the pillar of society and was of greater significance than society itself. For the Romantics, the archetypal figure of the Romantic movement was the Emperor of the French Napoleon. Napoleon gloriously ascended from obscurity in the Mediterranean island of Corsica to vertiginous heights or to the summit of power as the imperial successor to Charlemagne. From the uniform of a simple soldier, Napoleon adorned himself with imperial panoply. As Napoleon imposed his individual will upon the entire populations of Europe, so too does the Romantic hero represent the triumph of individual will over the common herd of man. While the people represent a mass of mediocrity, the Romantic hero embodies individual excellence, superiority of will and intellect, and the triumph of creative expression and the powers of the imagination over cold reason and calculation. With the spread of revolutionary fervor, the ascension of Napoleon to the imperial appellation and the disintegration of the old European order, the blind optimism and strict rationality of the Age of Enlightenment were irrevocably lost.

[King Solomon]

Personally I think the Age of Enlightenment was better. First, some philosophers preferred monarchs. Though without the ideas of the Enlightenment, would the founding fathers of America, created the type of country that they did? Would they have even started a revolution the way they did to begin with? Many ideas from the Enlightenment are found in the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. Then think about all of the ways the United States has shaped the world.

Romanticism was great and in a way, brought back the ideas of the Renaissance, but I feel that without the Enlightenment I feel America would be different today. Not to mention the many monarchs affected by the Enlightenment ideas, that then shaped Europe. I feel the Enlightenment had a greater impact in its time, and prefer it over romanticism.

[Conrad_Jalowski]

Personally, I am fascinated with the Age of Enlightenment within the realm of political philosophy as well as with the historical works that were completed during this period in the history of philosophy. In particular, I am attracted to the works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Charles-Louis de Secondat Montesquieu. I have read Rousseau's The Social Contract, Discourse on the Sciences and Arts, Discourse on Inequality, Confessions and Reveries of the Solitary Walker. As for Montesquieu, I have read his Considerations on the Causes of the Greatness of the Romans and Their Decline. However, I prefer the Age of European Romanticism as I place the individual human being over the collective whole or the dense mass of society. Simply expressed, I place greater value on the individual than society itself.

The American Republic is politically based on the philosophies of the Age of Enlightenment and the ancient republic of Rome. America gazes at the republic and the constitutional law of the Romans as opposed to the inherently unstable democracies of the Ancient Greeks (Athenians) which often degenerated into ochlocracies or rabble rule. The American Founding Fathers looked to Republican Rome for inspiration as opposed to the volatile, fissiparous and politically unstable Greek poleis. The American concept that the populace or citizenry possesses the right to overthrow or topple particular regimes that have become despotic was derived from John Locke's Second Treatise on Civil Government which in turn originated from the French monarchomachs. The monarchomachs were originally French Huguenots who opposed autocracies or absolute monarchies as well as the doctrine of ultramontanism and later came to include tyrannicides in which it was a sacred duty of the citizenry to completely overthrow and dissolve unjust, immoderate and despotic regimes. Also, the concept of inalienable, sovereign and inviolable rights or laws that were not provided or guaranteed by the rules of men but by the Divine Will or Nature was eloquently expressed by Marcus Tullius Cicero. The concept that all men are created equal and possess a divine spark is Ciceronian. Marcus Tullius Cicero once stated that there exists a single divine and perpetual law that unites all the world and that this divine and natural law transcends all local governments, whether originating from the cities of Rome or Athens. This universal, indissoluble and encompassing law was expounded by the greatest orator and statesman of Antiquity -- Marcus Tullius Cicero. The concept of a "brotherhood of man" was an incomplete classification of natural and sovereign rights that originated from the Pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus of Ephesus and the Stoic philosophers; however, the case for a universal law that transcended petty politics as well as national identities was compiled and eloquently expressed by Cicero. In particular, the Constitution of the United States is indebted to the Romans as it was infused with Ciceronian natural law and Roman representative government.

[King Solomon]

You prove a good point. Though what I am still saying is that because of the Age of Enlightenment these ideas from Ancient Rome were being looked at, which might not have been the case had the Enlightenment never have happened. I am for individualism, but I also like practicality, which I feel was part of the Enlightenment. That is part of the reason that I favor it over Romanticism.