Post by Nathan on Nov 22, 2005 22:25:29 GMT -6
"A Discourse Upon The Origin and The Foundation of The Inequality among Mankind"
'Tis of man I am to speak; and the very question, in answer to which I am to speak of him, sufficiently informs me that I am going to speak to men; for to those alone, who are not afraid of honouring truth, it belongs to propose discussions of this kind. I shall therefore maintain with confidence the cause of mankind before the sages, who invite me to stand up in its defence; and I shall think myself happy, if I can but behave in a manner not unworthy of my subject and of my judges. ...
www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1782rousseau-inequal.html
"A Second Discourse Upon The Origin and The Foundation of The Inequality among Mankind"
The first man who, having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought himself of saying "This is mine," and found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society. Humanity would have been spared infinite crimes, wars, homicides, murders, if only someone had ripped up the fences or filled in the ditches and said, "Do not listen to this pretender! You are eternally lost if you do not remember that the fruits of the earth are everyone's property and that the land is no-one's property!" But by that point things had changed so drastically that there was no turning back, for this idea of "property," which develops out of prior ideas, did not form spontaneously in the human mind. Men had to progress, acquiring knowledge and arts, transmitting and increasing these from generation to generation, before they reached the last stage in the natural human state. I shall endeavor, then, to explain the progress of events and discoveries from the perspective of their natural order. ...
www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/Rousseau-inequality2.html
'Tis of man I am to speak; and the very question, in answer to which I am to speak of him, sufficiently informs me that I am going to speak to men; for to those alone, who are not afraid of honouring truth, it belongs to propose discussions of this kind. I shall therefore maintain with confidence the cause of mankind before the sages, who invite me to stand up in its defence; and I shall think myself happy, if I can but behave in a manner not unworthy of my subject and of my judges. ...
www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1782rousseau-inequal.html
"A Second Discourse Upon The Origin and The Foundation of The Inequality among Mankind"
The first man who, having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought himself of saying "This is mine," and found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society. Humanity would have been spared infinite crimes, wars, homicides, murders, if only someone had ripped up the fences or filled in the ditches and said, "Do not listen to this pretender! You are eternally lost if you do not remember that the fruits of the earth are everyone's property and that the land is no-one's property!" But by that point things had changed so drastically that there was no turning back, for this idea of "property," which develops out of prior ideas, did not form spontaneously in the human mind. Men had to progress, acquiring knowledge and arts, transmitting and increasing these from generation to generation, before they reached the last stage in the natural human state. I shall endeavor, then, to explain the progress of events and discoveries from the perspective of their natural order. ...
www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/Rousseau-inequality2.html