Review
In this expostulatory essay on the European and American philosophes of the 18th century, a dean of American historiography contrasts the European profession of the Enlightenment with down-to-earth American accomplishments. English intellectualism, according to Commager, was an aristocratic exercise exemplified by Royal Society director Joseph Banks' belief that science should supersede politics; Americans, of course, believed in plebian democracy, freedom of speech, and the abandonment of Greek and Latin for botany and husbandry: they were euphorically venturing westward while Europe looked toward ancient, stagnant civilizations like China's. True, the Old World had Goethe, Priestley, Kant - but the reality was that "cities are put to the torch, nobles ride heedless over the fields of peasants, the Irish cotters starve to death. . . ." Americans, with "no King, no Court, no aristocracy, no body of laws, no professional army, no Established Church, no history, no tradition, no usable past" created a nationalism from the bottom up. Thomas Jefferson is exalted as the native philosophe embodying this development, while less is made of Franklin's collaboration with his European counterparts. It is easy to challenge Commager's hyperboles about direct democracy in the early Republic and his notion that America lacked tradition; his contrast between European decadence and American practicality is more nuanced but fundamentally adds little to our knowledge of either. (Kirkus Reviews) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Product Description
The foremost American historian of his generation delves into the nation's European origins, illuminating how the new country embodied the principles of the Enlightenment--ideals that Europe, trapped by tradition and privilege, could not itself realize. "...crystalline clarity of...writing [causes] explosions in the reader's mind...history to be pondered and cherished."--The New York Times. "Learning and reason are at the service of a mind whose understanding of democracy gains brilliance and power from a passion for...freedom."--Arthur Schlesinger Jr.

"Porter's [book] has been long in the making and has been worth waiting for."—Peter Gay, Times Literary Supplement From the author of The Greatest Benefit to Mankind (winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Award) comes a "sumptuous and spicy volume" ( Washington Post Book World ) that highlights Britain's long-underestimated and pivotal role in disseminating the ideas and culture of the Enlightenment. In response to numerous histories centered on France and Germany, Roy Porter explains how the monumental transformation of thinking in Britain influenced worldwide developments. This "splendidly imaginative" work "propels the debate forward...and makes a valuable point" ( New York Times Book Review ). 16 pages of black and white illustrations

In this magisterial history, Richard B. Sher breaks new ground for our understanding of the Enlightenment and the forgotten role of publishing during that period. "The Enlightenment and the Book" seeks to remedy the common misperception that such classics as "The Wealth of Nations" and "The Life of Samuel Johnson" were made by their authors alone. To the contrary, Sher shows how the process of bookmaking during the late eighteenth century involved complex partnerships between authors and their publishers. Similarly, Sher demonstrates that publishers were involved in the project of bookmaking for a variety of reasons, ranging from accumulating profits to advancing human knowledge.

In the wake of the Scientific Revolution, the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries saw the complete demolition of traditional structures of authority, scientific thought, and belief by the new philosophy and the philosophers, including Voltaire, Diderot, and Rousseau. The Radical Enlightenment played a part in this revolutionary process, which effectively overthrew all justification for monarchy, aristocracy, and ecclesiastical power, as well as man's dominance over woman, theological dominance of education, and slavery. Despite the present day interest in the revolutions of the eighteenth century, the origins and rise of the Radical Enlightenment have received limited scholarly attention. The greatest obstacle to the movement finding its proper place in modern historical writing is its international scope: the Radical Enlightenment was not French, British, German, Italian, Jewish or Dutch, but all of these at the same time.

In this wide-ranging volume, Jonathan Israel offers a novel interpretation of the Radical Enlightenment down to La Mettie and Diderot, two of its key exponents. Particular emphasis is placed on the pivotal role of Spinoza and the widespread underground international philosophical movement known before 1750 as Spinozism.