Chapter 13 Appendix (2)-1

Appendix (2) Jean Jacques Rousseau and his doctrine of the origin of human inequality Plekhanov I Jean-Jacques Rousseau is one of the most outstanding representatives of French literature in the eighteenth century.He is a gifted writer.This is acknowledged and repeated in various ways on the occasion of the bicentenary of his birth.But where was his genius?It is difficult to find a somewhat satisfactory answer to this quite natural question among the many books, pamphlets, essays and short reviews written for the commemoration and celebration of this June.Most who have written and spoken about Rousseau agree that we cannot now agree with his ideas, but that we should commemorate him because they are so well stated.This is very similar to what someone said: We respect Pushkin as a brilliant poet.But to say that a certain writer is a brilliant poet is not the same as saying that he is a great poet.Similarly, acknowledging that a particular political commentator of a particular era is an excellent writer is not the same as acknowledging that he is a great writer.The greatness of a writer is not measured by the beauty of their style.He who expresses great thoughts well with his pen is a great writer, just as he who expresses great thoughts well with his mouth is a great orator.And the best style quickly becomes affectation, that is, bad, when it ceases to be a form of expressing something of great significance.This is true not only in literature, but also in art, as we all know, works of art also have their own style.Why did Michelangelo's students create extremely mediocre works, whether in painting or sculpture?The reason is simple: having mastered the style of their gifted teacher, they cannot rise to the level of those deep visceral feelings which gave rise to that style.So the style in them soon became a ludicrous thing, though, no doubt, it was radiant in Michelangelo himself.This talented Florentine presumably foresaw the fate that awaited his brilliant style.He said to contemporaries who were amazed at his skill with his material: "My knowledge has created a multitude of ignorant men." These words, at first eccentric, reveal a deep understanding of things.

But let us return to Rousseau.As we will see below, most of the critics and political commentators who refute Rousseau's thought today take a negative attitude towards Rousseau, not out of theoretical considerations, but out of practical concerns.We are therefore convinced that the reason why these critics and political commentators refute these ideas is not the content of the ideas, but the social sympathy of the critics and political commentators themselves.This belief does not, of course, prevent us from admitting that, so far as purely theoretical considerations are concerned, many of Rousseau's ideas cannot be considered satisfactory in our time.They are outdated in many ways.This is a fact.But it is very strange to only respect Rousseau as a brilliant writer.You know, for example, the ideas developed by Aristotle in his "Politics" are also very outdated.But would it have been tempting, on account of this indubitable circumstance, to suppose that the significance of Aristotle's Tractatus now lies for us only in its style? ...

Everything is flowing, everything is changing.As the social relations of a given country change, so do the ideas that embody those relations.The idea of ​​expressing relations that no longer exist cannot but be outdated.Yet obsolete ideas, in their sense of the word, are not all the same.There are great thoughts, ordinary thoughts, and small thoughts; deep thoughts, mediocre thoughts, and utterly superficial thoughts.In addition, there are ideas that were not correct even at the time, in other words, outdated as soon as they were born.From this it can be concluded that even if we find the thought of a particular writer in a past historical epoch to be outdated, we cannot yet determine its relative importance.In order to give these ideas a proper appreciation, we must ascertain what the ideas of the writer who interested us were outdated for his time.At that time, you may find that these ideas were not only new at the time, but also very profound, and even genius.Then we should admit that the man who uttered these ideas was a genius, even without regard to his style.In literature, style is of course a very important thing.But if the writer utters a genius thought, even if he uses a bad style, he still has to be admitted as a genius.Such was the case with Rousseau.Needless to say, his preconceived readers were amazed and even conquered to a certain extent by the extraordinary flair with which he articulated his thoughts.This is of course a great advantage.But even if there is no such merit at all, even if Rousseau's treatises and books are not at all brilliantly described, so long as the ideas expressed in them are excellent, the matter remains the same.If we have to answer the question "These ideas were genius for their time," then we have to admit that Rousseau was a genius writer, if not genius in his narrative.

One more point should be added here.In analyzing any theoretical work—and we are here dealing with Rousseau’s theoretical writings—it is not enough to consider the ideas contained therein and the manner in which they are stated.Here, too, something third is absolutely necessary to take into account, and that is the method of research.method, which is the tool used to discover the truth.The reason why it is important is not in itself, but in the use of it to draw some conclusions, just as in the field of material production, the reason why tools are important is not in the tools themselves, but in the use of tools to obtain some necessary items.Moreover, in the field of material production, the benefits brought by a specific tool are determined by the sum of those items that can be obtained by actually using the tool, not by any one of the items that is taken out separately.Likewise, in the field of mental labor, the merit of a particular method depends on the sum of all those correct conclusions drawn by the investigator who applies it, not on any one of them.So we can quite conceive of a situation in which the writer manifests his genius with special force precisely at the moment when he draws erroneous conclusions.This can be found, for example, in the history of Russian social thought.Belinsky showed himself to be a particularly profound thinker when he came to incorrect conclusions in a treatise on Borodin's jubilee.Things of this kind are nothing to be surprised about, any more than a marksman, even with a good gun, does not always hit the mark.If, however, a good gun is likely to miss, but a bow is likely to hit the mark, it should not at all follow from this that shooting with anything: either with a perfect gun or with a bow of ancient the same.After all, a gun is far more powerful than a bow.The same reasoning: Although it is possible to make mistakes by mastering more modern methods of studying truth, and it is possible to reach correct conclusions by using relatively backward methods, this still does not prove that the significance of methods is very small.After all, more modern methods are more effective than less backward methods.If the writer who discovers the more modern method has not always been adept at actually applying it without error, this does not take away the importance of the discovery of it.Those who came after him will not only correct his errors by his new methods, but will generally do far more good for science than they have done by old, less effective methods.Hence the merits of the man who discovers a more perfect method are after all great, in spite of his individual errors.That is why I say that in analyzing a theoretical work it is not enough to evaluate the ideas contained in them and the way in which they are described, but also to take into account the method by which the author arrived at his ideas.Correctness of method more than compensates for errors in individual conclusions and blandness of narrative.

As for Rousseau, as has already been said above, his brilliant narrative talent by no means aroused any controversy.It is utterly useless to dwell on this at length.Not so the method by which Rousseau arrived at his own, though outdated, ideas.There was and is little talk about this method—almost nothing at all.And yet it deserves the utmost attention. The task of this article is also to evaluate Rousseau's achievements from a methodological point of view. II Certain materials are necessary to solve any task.Where can I find materials?I first and mainly start with Rousseau's theory of the origin of human inequality.This doctrine is mainly set forth in the work written by our author in response to the question posed by the Academy of Dijon in 1753: What is the origin of human inequality?Is human inequality sanctioned by natural law? (Quelle est line alite par mile sho

-mmesetsielleestautoriseseeparlaloinaturelle? ) Rousseau explained in his own how he thought about this work.He had been to Saint-Germain for a week, where he had spent the whole time in the forest. "I have explored there, I have discovered the scene of the primitive age, I have boldly drawn the outline of the history of that age; I have exposed the boring lies in the world; Natural time and the course of things, and comparing man-made man ('L'hommedel'homme' by Rousseau) with natural man, pointing to the so-called perfection of man is to point out the real source of human disaster. My soul is captured by these Inspirited by sublime meditation, I ascended to the realm of God. In that state, I saw that my kind was led astray by prejudice, heading in the direction of error, misfortune, and evil. So I used a kind of A feeble voice cried out to them: 'You are unreasonable people, you go on complaining about nature, and know that all your misery comes from yourselves!'"

It is quite obvious that primitive man cannot be studied while wandering in the forest of Saint-Germain and raising the soul to the realm of the gods.To understand the spectacle of human culture in primitive times, the enthusiasm of a sensitive soul is not enough; at least some knowledge of the conditions of life of savage tribes is required.Nothing is easier, therefore, than to laugh at Rousseau and to declare that the conclusions he has drawn are the purest fictions.In fact, many people have been doing this since the time of Voltaire.Voltaire said such a witty remark: Rousseau gave him the desire to run into the forest on all fours.However, in fact, "" (Discours surl' origine et les fondements de line galite parmiles hommes) has both ridiculous things and more ingenious ideas.It goes without saying, of course, that the total amount of knowledge possessed by our authors concerning the life of savage tribes is insignificant.Generally speaking, people in the eighteenth century knew very little about these tribes.But there was already something known about these tribes at that time.The great geographical discoveries in modern times have produced very rich travel books, and writers draw materials from these books when explaining primitive cultures.However, when most of these writers are completely satisfied with historical idealism in their discourses, Rousseau is one of the few outstanding figures who feel that historical idealism is unsatisfactory.

At that time there was a very popular formula for expressing the basic views of historical idealism in an extremely condensed form: c'est lopinion quigou vernelmonde (opinion rules the world).What is an opinion?Hual replied: "What I mean by opinion is the result of all the truths and falsehoods prevailing in the nation; this result determines the judgment of the nation, the praise and blame of the nation, the likes and dislikes of the nation, the customs and habits of the nation, the advantages and disadvantages of the nation, In a word, the character of the nation is determined. It is this opinion which governs the world." This means that the opinion which governs the world is based on a definite sum of truths and falsehoods prevailing "within the nation", i.e. Perspectives are the final cause of everything that happens in human society.Those who hold this point of view, if they want to conceive and understand the history of primitive culture, they should first figure out what the point of view of "natural person" is.And Rousseau understood that, if the opinions of men are considered to be the deepest cause of social development, the origin of these opinions themselves is quite impossible to explain.He says that people turn savages into philosophers before they can be seen as human beings, and he points out with particular pertinence the logical error inherent in this method of investigation.If primitive people, because they have such social ideals and no other social ideals, agree to these relations and not to others, then, in Rousseau's words, this means that primitive people use themselves only gradually and only gradually. The kind of education that comes about because of social organization to organize your own society.Rousseau found that the writers who had dealt with the problems of man's state of nature did not at all trace back to this state from the point of view that it should be. "Those who do not hesitate to suppose that man in a state of nature has ideas of justice and injustice do not show why he has such ideas, or even explain them. What use is it to him. Others speak of natural right, the right of every man to preserve what is his own, but do not clarify what they understand by belonging. Still others give first to the strong power over the weak, and therefore think that government arises from it, but they do not realize how long it takes before the meaning of such terms as power and government can exist in the human mind. In short, all these people are constantly When they talk about human needs, greed, oppression, desires, and pride, they actually transfer some ideas from society to the state of nature; they describe savages and describe civilized people. "

We shall soon see that this civilized man (l'ho), who was so important to Rousseau, -mmecivil) and the savage (l'hommesauvage) have in him a special, and in itself a very important, though far from always correct, meaning.But first I invite the reader to study with me those accusations made against the "philosophers" which characterize Rousseau's method in no better way. Some philosophers postulate that in the state of nature each individual has a right to keep what is his.But what, our author asks, is that which belongs to man in the state of nature?Certain things belong to certain persons, which presupposes the institution of private property.Have we the right to assume that there is private property in the state of nature?If so, where did it come from?Those who believe that private property arose because primitive man found it beneficial, arbitrarily and wrongly imagine primitive man as a thinker who builds his life according to his theoretical convictions.At the same time, they forget to ask themselves, how can people believe that private ownership can bring benefits before private ownership exists.The same error is committed by those philosophers who assert, when discussing natural persons, that they have notions of justice and injustice.What is justice?Roman jurists said: Justice is giving back to everyone what belongs to everyone.But this brings us back to the question of what it is that belongs to man in the state of nature.Rousseau justly pointed out: "To return everyone's things to everyone is based on the premise that everyone can have something." ①Finally, the superiority of the physically strong over the weak is one thing, but the power of rulers over those they rule is another.In a state of nature, one man can certainly have greater physical strength than another.Rousseau does not want to deny that this is the case.But, first, he found that when researchers tried to understand the consequences of physical inequality among people, they described the situation, that is to say, they still confuse the civilized man with the natural man.Second, he also saw here that it is groundless for the idealist view of history to use the development process of social political concepts to explain the development process of social political relations.He pointed out that it takes a lot of time before people have the concept of government and power.Where do these concepts come from?It is clear that this relationship must exist among people in order to produce the above two concepts, and the origin of this relationship cannot be explained by these two concepts.

All these perfectly correct observations compel our author to use his thoughts in another way.He emphatically denies that natural persons are intelligent beings who use their own opinions to guide their actions.Indeed, he also admits in "" that "due to the development of human ability and the progress of human wisdom" (development denos faculteset des progres del'esprithumain), inequality grows and consolidates.But the problem is precisely that the progress of wisdom and the development of abilities are not the most important reasons for social development in his mind, that is, they are not more profound reasons than all other reasons.He considered the purpose of his research to determine the conditions which gave rise to the advancement of human intellect and the development of human faculties.This is where his great merit in methodology lies.In this respect he is a rare exception among eighteenth-century writers.For the writers of the eighteenth century were always completely content with the superficial idea that opinion rules the world, that is, human development.

In this respect Rousseau resembles Helvetius more than anyone else.Helvetius also felt the groundlessness of historical idealism.He said: "It is possible that the progress of science and art is not so much the work of genius as of age and necessity. This seems to be confirmed by the same process of scientific development in all countries. In fact, if, as Hume puts it, If I have pointed out that all peoples can only learn to write prose after they have acquired the ability to write poetry, then I think that the same process of human rational development is something common and hidden (that is, what Helvetius calls "ambiguity"). '[sourde]) cause." Helvetius himself attempted to determine the causes which gave rise to the progress of human knowledge, at least in the first stages of cultural development.This attempt is an interesting episode in the history of eighteenth-century French materialism.We will spend a little space below to make some comparisons between this attempt and Rousseau's similar attempt. III As we have just seen, Helvetia considers the meaning of necessity in the development of education.Rousseau called the cause of the development of knowledge accidental.And by chance, he only means that these causes are not inside the person, but outside the person.So Rousseau's view on this question is actually very close to that of Helvetius. Like Helvetius, Rousseau believed that the progress of knowledge is everywhere caused by human needs.For example, the origin and spread of science and art in Egypt should be attributed to the flooding of the Nile; in Greece, the sandy soil of Attica is more favorable to science and art than the fertile soil of Sparta.Rousseau said: "The peoples of the North are generally wiser than those of the South, because they would not be able to live otherwise. Nature seems willing to adjust things in such a way as to make them equal, where it refuses to give the land its bounty. , and gave abundance to the spirit." In the state of nature, people can satisfy their own needs by using the gifts that are readily available in nature.But as humans multiplied, these gifts became relatively rarer.Poverty forces people to find new ways to sustain life.Inventions of all kinds appeared one after another.On both sides of the coast and rivers, people invented fishing equipment and became fishermen.In the forest, they devise bows and arrows and become hunters and warriors.In colder regions they wear the skins of wild animals they have killed.Lightning, or a volcanic eruption, or some other lucky chance introduced them to fire, and they were given a new weapon against the cold of winter.At first they preserve fire, then acquire fire, and finally use fire to cook food.This attitude of man towards things which are not like himself and are not like each other gradually produces in his mind the idea of ​​the mutual relation of things.Then man has something like thinking.With this kind of thing, the superiority of man over animals will gradually increase.Although some animals have greater physical strength and others run faster, man is at the same time the master of some animals and the scourge of others.These first advances lead man to a position in which it becomes increasingly easier for him to undertake new undertakings.Rousseau said: "The more wisdom develops, the more perfect the skill is." Man soon stopped sleeping under trees or in caves; he learned to make stone axes and build huts.According to Rousseau, this advance in technology brought about the first great revolution in the interrelationships of people: the birth of the family.And after this progress, other progress had to follow.What is not easy to solve now is how people know iron and how to use iron.It is difficult to assume that iron was known by some fortunate accident, since iron ore is usually found in barren areas where no vegetation exists.According to Rousseau, it seems that nature is trying to keep us from discovering the very unfortunate secret of the use of iron.Finally, our author considers volcanoes again: a sudden eruption of a volcano spews out molten metal substances, and it is for the first time that the human mind thinks that metal can be smelted.But even this hypothesis Rousseau thinks it is not very reliable, because the observation of volcanic eruptions can only arouse the above thoughts in people with advanced intelligence, and the minds of natural people may not have such advanced wisdom when they do not know metals. In any case, man learned to use metal, and this new great technological progress of man, together with farming, was the cause of a new great revolution in human interrelationships, that is to say, the State.Metal smelting and farming created civilization.The savages of America did not farm or smelt iron; they were still savages.Certain other peoples know one of these practical skills, but not the others; There were less interruptions in the course of development, and therefore a higher degree of civilization; perhaps one of the chief reasons for this was that Europe was not only the most fertile country of iron, but also of wheat." Farming inevitably gave rise to private ownership of land, and with it a succession of other legal institutions, up to the state.Rousseau repeats after Grotius that when the Greeks called the goddess Selys the lawgiver, they meant that the private ownership of the lands produced a new right, different from natural rights. From all these arguments, it can be well seen that the "accidental" cause of Rousseau's so-called progress in knowledge does not actually lie in human nature, but in human surroundings, first of all geographical environment.According to his theory, some tribes lived by hunting and others by fishing, which depended on the characteristics of the geographical environment.The same properties eventually gave rise to other technological advances: metal smelting, farming, and so on.If Europe is more highly civilized and more stable than all other continents, this is explained, as we have seen, by the natural conditions of the Continent.The nature of any particular geographical environment is to a certain extent accidental to the person who falls into it.He may fall into,—and in other cases does fall into,—geographical circumstances of entirely different character.But it is needless to say that the properties of the geographical environment are not themselves at all accidental—for they are the inevitable product of the geological history of a given area—and their influence on man clearly has all the hallmarks of necessity.Man cannot but fight for his own existence, and in the struggle for existence he cannot help making use of the means available to him in a given area.You know, nothing else, but the characteristics of the geographical environment determine that a person becomes a hunter in one place and a fisherman in another.Of course, this is by no means to say that geographical environment is omnipotent, but people are useless.The positive role does not belong to the geographical environment, but to the people.But at a given time, man can only use to a certain extent those means of existence which the natural conditions of the area in which he lives provide him.This range is determined by the level of human intelligence development.Rousseau understood this very well and explained it very clearly.Moreover, we have seen that every new progress on the road of human wisdom development is caused by a prior achievement or achievements in technology to a certain extent.According to Rousseau's theory, this means that it is not human consciousness that determines human existence, but human existence determines human consciousness.At the same time, this also means that the process of human development has a regular, that is, inevitable rather than accidental nature.All this taken together proves that our writer, dissatisfied with the idealist conception of history, has taken some great steps in the direction of historical materialism.In explaining the process of human cultural development, Rousseau appears to be one of the most outstanding predecessors of Marx and Engels, especially the American Morgan, the author of the famous "Ancient Society". Philosophically he is the irreconcilable enemy of materialism.One need only read his Profession de foid du vicaires savoyard to be fully convinced of this.He was undoubtedly an idealist in his philosophical point of view, but (as the same "Creed of the Priest of Savoy" shows) his philosophical idealism was not very rigorous and not fully considered. .There is much more materialist view of history in this idealist than in the materialist group "Holbachians" who are hostile to him.I draw the reader's attention to the fact that it is not at all my intention to assert that Rousseau is completely thorough in his materialist interpretation of history.He also often falls back to idealism at times.For example, it is difficult for him to get rid of the antithesis of freedom and necessity which plays a large part in the discourse of all idealists except the likes of Schelling or Hegel.Although his "boldly sketched" sketchy picture of human development speaks of human development as a necessary process, Rousseau is fond of repeating that this process may, if one chooses, partly redirect itself, or at least greatly slow down.He restates this view only on rare occasions with some half-hearted reservations about the impossibility under certain conditions of one wishing to act differently from what he has done.I think the following is the most salient of such reservations. Our analysis of the second part of Rousseau's "" begins with the well-known insight that the true founder of civilized society is the one who digs a field around and surrounds it, and says, "This is mine." .After this insight, Rousseau exclaimed in passionate tones: "If a man pulls up a stake or fills a ditch, and shouts to his fellows: 'Do not listen to this liar, if you forget that the fruits of the land belong to all , the land does not belong to anyone, then you will be seeded!' How many crimes, wars and killings, how much suffering and terror will be saved by this person!" Rousseau's tendency to oppose necessity to liberty is evident in his passionate statement that he must be an anarchist if he is not a socialist.We have seen that, according to his doctrine, private property arose as a necessary consequence of the development of man's productive forces (metal smelting and farming).We remember how, after Grotius, Rousseau repeated that the Greeks, not without reason, called the goddess Selys the lawgiver.And now it occurred to him that if some well-intentioned man wished to oppose private institutions, that is, if the forces of liberty rose against the forces of necessity, things would go in quite the other direction, and there would be no reason for the goddess Selys to enact her own laws. up.But then Rousseau immediately doubts the possibility of one power rising against another.He went on: "But then, presumably, everything had gone so far that it could no longer go on as before", etc.In other words, presumably, under the conditions of the time, no one would have thought to oppose private institution, and if anyone wanted to oppose it, or indeed anyone wanted to oppose it, he would not have enough strength to overcome its supporters.This point of view may also be expressed in another way: presumably under the conditions at the time, people would naturally want to establish private ownership, that is to say, presumably the tendency of people's will at that time just expressed the force of necessity at that time.This new expression of the same thought would have the great advantage of resolving the antinomy of freedom and necessity.This is how the great idealists Schelling and Hegel (and Leibniz) resolved the antinomy of freedom and necessity.But Rousseau does not resolve this antinomy.He just had a hunch that it might be solved.And even this premonition, so clearly expressed in the reservation just mentioned, is rarely seen in him.In general, he not only retains the antinomy of freedom and necessity unresolved, but also builds on the basis of this antinomy his views on the desirable course of continued social development.In purely philosophical matters he could not rise above the superficial idealist.But when this superficial idealist contemplates the dynamics of cultural development, he reasones like a materialist despite his individual idealist biases, and in his reasoning often appears to be a Truly talented people.Of all the materialists of the eighteenth century, only Helvetius was equal to Rousseau in this respect, and inferior to Rousseau in power of thought. IV The idealist bias, in Rousseau's The Origin and Foundation of Human Inequality, certainly undermines the rigor of his materialist views.His inability to overcome the antinomy of freedom and necessity gives these insights an element of incompleteness.The above-quoted reservations concerning the origin of private property prove that he was not at times without a vague awareness of the existence of this factor, or a dim hope of at least weakening it, if not eliminating it.But the chief difficulty which troubles our author most in his false conception of "natural persons" does not lie here at all. His "natural man" is the most extreme individualist.He lived "alone" (Seul), and therefore he had no notion of any social association.Neither the family nor the state exists in a state of nature.Rousseau's view of the natural person was by no means the only one at the time.The writers of the eighteenth century, following the precedent of their seventeenth-century predecessors, often regarded extreme individualism as a point of departure in the development of culture.This may in no small measure account for the well-known fact that they are fond of invoking in their reasoning the natural state of man.Since in this state, according to their assumption, there is no social association of any kind, they think that they can easily ascertain the importance of social relations in human nature by comparing this state with the "civilized" way of life. The part played in the development of traits which arouses their intense interest.A well-known Charles Born wrote some critical comments on "The Origin and Basis of Human Inequality", and also said that social life is the inevitable result of human nature.卢梭在回答查理·波恩的时候说道：“我请您不要忘记，在我看来，生活在社会中对人类说是十分自然的，正象老年衰颓对个人说是自然的一样……不同的地方只在于，年老唯一的来源是人的本性，而社会生活方式则不是直接来自人类的本性，象您断定的那样，而只是由于某些可能如此也可能不如此的外部情况，如我所证明的。”这就再明显不过地表明一种信念：人完全不是一生下来就只过社会生活的，因为社会仅仅在人类的老年期才产生。然而正是这个信念使卢梭陷于种种不可克服的理论窘境中。下面就是其中的一种。 语言是人类理性进步虽不充分、但是必要的条件。然而正象卢梭告诉我们的，“自然人”过着孤独的生活，他和自己的同类没有任何往来。因此，他既没有语言的需要，也决不可能进而掌握分节语。然则他从哪里获得这种语言呢？语言的产生是由什么原因引起的呢？ 卢梭长期劳而无功地纠缠在这个问题上。最后他几乎想承认自己对付不了它，他宣称：“语言单凭人类的智能就可以产生并建立起来（ｎａｉｔｒｅｅｔＳeｔａｂｌｉｒｐａｒｄｅｓｍｏｙｅｎｓｐｕｒｅｍｅｎｔｈｕｍａｉｎｓ），这几乎已被证明是不可能的事”。这使人想起德·鲍纳利，他后来（在复辟时代）教导说，语言是神给予人的。如果说，我们的作者在暗示语言起源的某些非“纯粹”人类的原因时指的是和后来德·鲍纳利所作的那种解释相似的某种东西，那么，他由于有敏锐的智慧就不能不意识到，实质上这等于什么也没有解释。大概就是这种意识曾经迫使他让其他的研究者去解决哪一个更必要：是社会的存在对“语言的建立”（ｌ'ｉｎｓｔｉｔｕｔｉｏｎｄｅｓｌａｈｇｕｅｓ）更必要呢，还是语言的存在对社会的产生更必要。有某个时候根本不可能解决谁先谁后的问题：鸡在蛋先呢，还是蛋在鸡先。只有当生物学掌握了发展的观点以后，这个问题才是可以解决的，而且是非常容易解决的。但是，卢梭采取的“自然人”是极端个人主义者的假设，有时使他根本不能了解这个观点。如果我们记得，正是在发展问题上，即实质上是在决定人类社会发展过程的原因问题上，特别有力地说明了我们作者的天才，那么我们应当承认，上面这个假设给他造成了许多很大的不幸。 请注意他究竟得出什么结论。他以惊人的明确性论述社会发展的原因，却不预先说明这些原因怎么能发生作用。这似乎奇怪，但的确如此。他没有说明“自然人”怎么能够在文化领域内迈进任何最小的几步。而且只要认为自然人是象卢梭描绘出来的那种极端的个人主义者的话，也就不可能说明这个道理。 非常清楚，在沿海，人们会变成渔人，在森林里，人们会变成猎人。但是当我们现在谈到野蛮的猎人或渔人的时候，我们一定是以为他们过着社会生活。 在我们看来，问题可能只在于人们的原始社会结构是怎样的，以及作为人们固有的获得食物的方式的结果，这种社会结构是怎样出现的。而在卢梭的心目中，社会的产生是人类年老衰颓的一个特征。因此，只有在我们谈到人类老年期的时候，猎人和渔人的部落才能成为我们研究的对象，虽然他们的文化水平极其低下。这个意见尤其适用于卢梭那个完全正确的猜测：调节尼罗河定期泛滥的必要性引起了埃及科学技术的进步。事情很明显，尼罗河的泛滥不是由“自然人”调节的，因为按照卢梭的假设，自然人过着完全孤独的生活，他们同其他的人们没有任何往来，也不感到有任何必要进行这样的交往。这种泛滥是由“文明人”来调节的，尤其是由从事农耕的“文明人”来调节的。因此，无论卢梭关于推动文化进步的原因的见解多么富于天才，这些天才见解中任何一个见解都排除不掉最主要的困难，即解决不了在人独自过活的时候文化的进步一般说来究竟是如何开始的根本问题。卢梭本人说，即使这时有所发明，除了发明者以外仍然是没有人知道的，并且会随着发明者的死亡而消灭。“在这种状态中，既无所谓教育，也无所谓进步，一代一代毫无进益地繁衍下去，每一代都从同样的起点开始。许多世纪都在原始时代的极其粗野的状态中度过去；人类已经古老了，但人始终还是幼稚的。” 如果自然状态的确是如此，如果它的特征真是既无所谓“教育”，也无所谓“进步”，那么还是不明白，为什么这种状态中断了，换言之，即使是最缓慢的、勉强可以觉察得到的进步是如何开始的。按照卢梭的理论，技术的进步，——而且还是很大的技术进步，——乃是产生社会的必要前提。因之，如果不可能有技术进步，也就不可能有社会。人类只有在年代学的意义上才会衰老。在文化方面他应该永远是年轻的，这是因为正象我们刚才看到卢梭说的那样，每一代都是从同样的起点出发的。