The Enlightenment: An Interpretation 1. [antikvár]

Preface This essay is the first of two related but independent volumes which together will offer a comprehensive interpretation of the Enlightenment. For the last half century or more, intellectual historians, sradents of literature, and political theorists have worked to restore the Enlightenment to its true stature, to rescue it from its admirers nearly as much as from its detractors. They have published authoritative editions of major texts, discovered new documents, and compiled exhaustive, accurate, often supremely revealing collections of the philosophes' correspondence. And they have not rested content with this essential but technical labor; they have been angry. Ever since the fulminations of Burke and the denunciations of the German Romantics, the Enlightenment has been held responsible for the evils of the modern age, and much scorn has been directed at its supposed superficial rationalism, foolish optimism, and irresponsible Utopianism. Compared to these distortions, more superficial, foolish, and irresponsible than the failings they claim to castigate, the amiable caricature drawn by liberal and radical admirers of the Enlightenment has been innocuous: the naiveté of the Left has been far outweighed by the malice of the Right. Still, like the conservative view, the liberal view of the Enlightenment remains unsatisfactory and calls for revision. And so scholars have turned to polemics. I have had my share in these polemics, especially against the Right, and I must confess that I have enjoyed them. But the time is ready and the demand urgent to move from polemics to synthesis.