Chapter 14 Appendix (2)-2

Ⅴ It may be thought that the first steps in the direction of going out of the state of nature were taken by violence.Even if "natural" people do not have any intercourse with each other, they sometimes cannot help being in contact with each other.When the strong meet the weak by chance, he can make the weak obey him, thus laying the first foundation stone of the building of society in which there are classes of oppressors and oppressed, of rulers and ruled.We all know that in many theories of philosophy of history, violence acts as a key, and holding this key can open the doors of almost all theories.Rousseau, however, had a keen eye and, as we have seen, could not be content with invoking violence.He analyzes the concept of violence very carefully, and concludes that many theorists invoke violence because they want to explain the emergence of certain social relations, but that violence itself arises only when these relations already exist.Physical and mental differences among men undoubtedly exist in a state of nature.But to use Rousseau's words, these differences are far less so than in civilized ways of life.He said: "It is easy to understand that among the various differences that distinguish people from each other, many are regarded as natural differences, but these differences are actually entirely custom and the various differences adopted by people in society. The product of the way of life. Therefore, the strength of a person's constitution and the size of the physical strength dependent on his constitution often depend on whether he grows up in a difficult environment or in a pampered environment, rather than on his innate Physical constitution. Mental strength, too. Education not only makes a difference between the educated and the uneducated, but also increases the difference that exists between the former according to the degree of education received. For a giant and a dwarf are walking on the same road, and the distance between the two must increase with each step. If we take the education and mode of life prevailing in the various classes of civilized society Compare the inconceivable diversity with the simple unity of the lives of animals and savages who eat the same food, live the same life, and act exactly the same, and you will see how much the difference between man and man in the state of nature should be less than that of the savage. differences in the state of society, and at the same time to understand how natural inequalities are deepened among men by artificial inequalities." The oppression of the weak by the strong occurs in the state of nature, and in the way of life of society. Much more.The word oppression signifies that some men rule by violence, while others wretchedly think themselves compelled to submit to all their eccentricities.Rousseau said: "Some use violence to rule over others, the latter moaning under the slavery of the former, which is what I observe among us; but I do not see how it can be deduced from this So also, for it is difficult even to make them understand what slavery and dominion are. It is possible for a man to take the fruit that another has plucked, or the beast he has killed, or the cave that another has used for shelter from the wind and rain; but how can he do What about forcing others to obey him? How is the chain of subordination between men who have nothing? If someone wants to drive me from a tree, I can leave the tree and go to another tree. ;If someone disturbs me in one place, who will stop me from going elsewhere? Is there such a person, because he is not only stronger than me, but also corrupt, lazy, and vicious, so much that he forces me to find it for him? food, while he himself has nothing to do? Then the man must make up his mind to keep an eye on me at all times, and tie me up very carefully when he is going to sleep, lest I should escape, or put him Killing, that is, he must be willing to impose a burden on himself that is far greater than what he himself wants to avoid and what he has given me. Besides, will his guard A little relaxation? Would an unexpected sound make him turn his head? I walked twenty paces into the wood, and my bonds were released, and he would never see me again in his life."

When Rousseau enumerates the reasons why it is difficult for one man to enslave another in the state of nature, he forgets the most important thing: the productive capacity of human labor in the lower stage of barbarism is very small, and this alone makes the human slavery would be economically meaningless and therefore impossible.Man exploiting man is only possible when man has a certain level of productivity.Therefore, there is no slavery relationship among the so-called low-level hunters.For example, when they enslave a prisoner of war, it means forcing the prisoner to join the blood alliance with which he is fighting.As soon as the prisoner joins (though forcedly) into the new, formerly hostile blood confederacy, he becomes an equal member of that confederacy.Therefore, at that stage, it is not possible to speak of a relationship of slavery, but of a relationship of forced cooperation.But in any case, Rousseau showed a surprisingly clear vision. He proved that the enslavement of the strong to the weak presupposes the existence of certain social relations, or, And the state of life makes it impossible to enslave this person."Here, his vision has a profound insight into the secret of one social class exploiting another social class.But the more deeply Rousseau's eyes penetrated into this mystery, the more clearly did he understand the groundlessness of the prevailing theory of violence, the more difficult it became for him to account for the origin of the original social union.True, he cites the social contract in order to get to the crux of the theoretical difficulties that have so often obscured the problem.But, first, this citation itself violates the very method our author wishes to use to analyze the problem of the origin of human inequality.It assumes that primitive man behaves consciously, and thus repeats the error of the "Enlightenment," which Rousseau so cogently pointed out and so bitterly ridiculed, namely, that it is not necessary to convert the savage into the past. There is and cannot be a "philosopher".Secondly, in our author's case the social contract only accounts for the emergence of political alliances which, according to his theory, presuppose the presence of the family.But where does family come from?

Rousseau refuted Locke's opinion in detail, in Locke's view, children cannot live without their parents, which makes it necessary for men and women to live together for a long time, thus laying the foundation of the family.In the opinion of our author, man in a state of nature is not at all concerned with the fate of his offspring, nor can he be, because he thinks nothing of the future.Also, where there is no marriage, it is impossible to decide who is the father of the child.So men don't want to live with a woman for a long time, and women don't want to live with a man for a long time.Rousseau says that the whole of Locke's dialectics did not enable him to avoid the errors of Hobbes and some other researchers.What they should be stating is a well-known fact of the "state of nature" in which men live alone without any reason for striving to live together.But they observe this fact from the point of view of the modern age, which is characterized by people living together and having every reason to do so.Here, of course, much of Rousseau's statement is true.His predecessors and contemporaries actually viewed the life of the savage from the point of view of the social relations of a civilized society.But since Rousseau conceives of the primitive savage as an extreme individualist, he gives an entirely incorrect account of savage life.And the main thing is that he himself could not have found the sufficient cause of the family.He said that after people learned how to make stone axes, they began to build huts for themselves with sticks and clay, and thus countries were born.But this is very incomprehensible.It is not clear, for example, why huts should be more conducive to the establishment of other relations between men and women than the caves in which people lived before Rousseau thought they had learned to build huts.Finally, Rousseau, speaking of the origin of the family, repeats (in his impartial opinion) the error of Locke, Hobbes, and many other writers: he views family relations in primitive society with the eyes of civilized man , in other words, he thought that once a long-term bond between a man and a woman was established, a monogamous family would immediately form.He makes the same mistake again when he speaks of property: with him property arises at once as private property.

All the difficulties which at present seemed to Rousseau insurmountable have long been excluded by the science of man.Today we know, according to Ludwig Nouare, that "language and rational life arise from a common activity for a common purpose, from the primitive work of our ancestors"; we know, in the words of the same author, that Human activities have given content to the original roots of language.But in order that common work might be possible for our distant ancestors, they should not have lived in solitude, as Rousseau postulated, but in a common, more or less extensive collective life.Ethnography proves that they did live such a collective life.The care of children who cannot sustain themselves by themselves falls to the members of these groups.Undoubtedly, the development of the family was and is most closely causally connected with the development of ownership, which in turn is determined by the growth of productive forces.But the primitive family is quite different from the monogamous family which, for Rousseau, was the first foundation of social life.In the same way, the wealth relationship existing in primitive society is fundamentally different from the wealth relationship produced and developed in the civilized age.The savages of primitive times were not individualists but communists.The reader may know the story of a certain Vedic in Ceylon, who, having received a coin from a European traveler, attempted to split it into as many parts as there were members of his kinship union.In the "natural man" as Rousseau describes it, no such intention can arise, because "natural man" lives a life of solitude, not of communal life.It is not consciousness that determines existence, but existence that determines consciousness.In so far as Rousseau guided his speculations about the general course of cultural development to this indisputable principle, he showed himself to be a man of true genius.But he knew very little about the human "living conditions" in the earliest stages of cultural development.His conception of these conditions of life was therefore entirely incorrect, and he caused himself many difficulties in applying his correct method to thinking about the first progress of man in the field of culture.

It is interesting that Helvetius does not regard primitive man as an individualist, although in his view of cultural history he is closer to Rousseau than to any other materialist of the eighteenth century.He said that as a weak animal, man should strive to unite with other humans, either to defend himself from the imitation of powerful animals, or to attack animals for his own food."From this," he says, "follow all the rules concerning hunting and fishing." It may be added that the above ideas are not clearly expressed in Helvetius.He develops this idea in terms which might lead one to think that primitive peoples did not unite into societies until the population in a particular area had reached a certain density.It was easier for eighteenth-century writers to get a correct guess about the causes that drove culture than to paint a satisfactory picture of the "state of nature."

Ⅵ Rousseau has a very vivid saying: "Those roads that once led mankind from the state of nature to the state of civilization have been forgotten and lost."It is quite sufficient that these roads cannot be forgotten or lost: for just as the state in which the savage lived in complete solitude did not exist, so did these roads never exist.It is not surprising that Rousseau, for all his brilliant talents, was unable to rediscover these paths and to illustrate them with his own formula of cultural development.He only avoids, and can only avoid, rather than overcome, the difficulties which this assumption creates for him, assuming that primitive man lives in complete solitude.For this hypothesis presented him with tasks which, generally speaking, could not be solved by any means.In order to avoid these difficulties he had to be content with very simple and unclear views.In this case, in fact, he can only show that he is a very good writer.But as soon as he ceased to search in vain for the paths which would lead man from a state of utter solitude which did not exist to a state of social life, as soon as he returned to the causes which determined the development of social relations, he showed great Profound thought, and far surpassed most of his contemporaries.

Most writers of the eighteenth century firmly believed in the omnipotence of the rule of law.They said: "C'estla legislation quifaittout" (Everything is transferred by the legal system).The legal system they refer to first refers to the political legal system of the state system.This belief in the omnipotence of the law is closely related to the belief in the dominion of opinion in the world: for the activity of the political legislator, though not always smooth, is always conscious, because it always pursues a definite end, and My conscious activities are based on opinions.Belief in the omnipotence of the legal system is one of the many manifestations of the idealist view of history.This view was deeply shaken by the earth-shattering events of the Great Revolution.The French historians of the Restoration had understood that the course of social thought was determined by the course of social relations.Therefore, they no longer believe in the omnipotence of the rule of law.The political institutions of any given country, says Guizot, are effects before they are causes; these institutions themselves arise from the state of a particular society, and they themselves depend on "the civilized way of life of men."This is the point of view directly opposed to that of the eighteenth century: instead of explaining the civilized way of life of a given society in terms of its political institutions, the political institutions of a given society are themselves explained in terms of their civilized way of life .And this is a far more correct view.In the eighteenth century only a few eminent writers came close to this point of view.Rousseau was one of them.Although he sometimes does not hesitate to repeat that everything is based on the legal system (he restates this view mainly in ), in his "" he appears to be a forerunner of the French historians of the Restoration era.He believes that the generation of private ownership precedes the generation of the state, or in other words, the political relationship between people is explained by the relationship between citizens and wealth.He said: "The various forms of government have been produced by the greater or lesser differences in the state in which the people are when the government is established." The more the state approaches a democracy; conversely, the more unequal it is in this state, the more the state system approaches a monarchy through an aristocracy.

The origin of the state should be attributed to the inequality among people caused by the development of productive forces.And once the state has been created, it in turn becomes the cause of inequality.The political system is the result of specific ownership relations, but it also affects these relations and is the cause of further changes in these relations, widening the distance between rich and poor.Rousseau said so.From this it can be seen that he was well aware of the reaction of "politics" to the "economics" on which it was based.It might also be said that he deliberately exaggerated the reaction.He writes in vivid terms about the growth of inequality in civilized societies, which he seems to think has more to do with political privilege than with economic relations.This writer in pre-revolutionary France thinks this was the case, because in France at the top of the social hierarchy it was always only the politically privileged.However, this small deviation did not prevent Rousseau from having a good understanding of the internal logic of the political life of a society divided into classes.No wonder Engels called him an outstanding dialectician in his "Anti-Dühring".

Rousseau was equally distant from most of his contemporaries in his view of human nature.They regard human nature as a constant, and believe that the more the "legislator" complies with the requirements of human nature, the more "perfect" the "rule of law" will become.The utopian socialists of the nineteenth century saw it in exactly the same way.Each of them took as the basis of his system some thought or another about human nature.Each of them built his utopia along these lines.Only the founders of scientific socialism cleared up this erroneous view, pointing out that human nature changes with the development of human society.Rousseau also understood the fickleness of human nature.In his words, man's mind, the result of gradual changes in his passions, finally acquires another nature.Human beings in this age are different from humans in another age.If Diogenes found no one, it was only because he looked among his contemporaries for a man from another period of history. "The depths of the heart and disposition of the savage and the civilized man are so different that that which leads to the highest happiness of the civilized man will lead the savage to despair." Rousseau does not believe in the attitude of solving moral problems by abstract methods. The inevitable consequence of this belief in the fickleness of human nature.He said that "the countless ethical and political problems that philosophers cannot solve" can only be answered when we look at them from the perspective of "lentesuccessiondeschoses".This is already a familiar way of using existence to explain consciousness.

It should also be said that Rousseau's genius is particularly evident in his assertions about social psychology.It is impossible to say on this matter that his views are outdated.These assertions of his will hitherto be very, very instructive to those who have not fully grasped the materialist view of social life and who have not been completely bewildered by idealist prejudices.And the names of these people are too numerous to count.Anyone who is willing to understand Rousseau's views on the various geniuses of social psychology, or more precisely, anyone who is willing to understand Rousseau's views on the various geniuses of class social psychology, must read the book "" Read his essay on Political Economy, originally published in Volume V of Diderot and D'Alembert's famous Encyclopedia.The content of this article bears little direct relation to questions of political economy; but it is important from the point of view of sociology, and mainly from the point of view of social psychology.Rousseau mainly studies the dialectics of social concepts and social customs.The happiness of society is the sole purpose of the supreme power of the state.The happiness of this society is the end pursued by the common will.For each member of the nation, the common will, the will of the people, is the criterion of justice and injustice.But in a society where the inhabitants are divided into classes with different interests, it is not so easy for the individual individuals to recognize a common will.Such a society would seem to consist of many small societies, each with its own special interests, and therefore its own will determined by these interests.The will of each small society is the common will of all its members; at the same time, it is a partial will of the larger society: for it does not reflect the common will of the larger society. interests, but partial interests of a small society.Therefore, what is perfectly just from the point of view of the small society may be completely unjust from the point of view of the larger society, and what is considered good by one class may be considered bad by the whole people.A priest who prays to God, or a heroic soldier, may, in Rousseau's phrase, be essentially a bad citizen.Rousseau was convinced that all contradictions in the behavior of the members of a class society could be explained very easily by means of these simple and clear principles.If a man acts perfectly just in one respect, and wrong in another; It means that he regards the partial happiness of his own small society as the common happiness of a larger society.The author adds: "It is unreasonable to expect those who can influence the situation to value the interests of anyone else more than their own interests. Therefore, the influencers (les maitres) may within the confines of their own small society He is altruistic, but he will show himself to be an egoist in his attitude towards the people. After this explanation, it is self-evident that the interests of the people will be destroyed by those who are keen to destroy the interests of the people But the people themselves can also be the destroyers of their own interests. This phenomenon will appear as soon as the people mistakenly regard the partial interests of a particular small society as the common interests of a larger society, that is, as their own interests. "Rousseau's incisive insights reveal very clearly the psychology of the lower class under the influence of the upper class.As long as the lower classes are not yet free from this influence, their will will as usual be directed towards the common happiness, and its actions directed by the interests of "the man in charge" in defense of these interests, i.e. in direct violation of the representative The common happiness of its own happiness.This contradiction can only be eliminated by raising the consciousness of the lower classes.As soon as the lower classes are convinced that the interests of the "persons in charge" lie in the destruction of the common happiness, it ceases to support them, that is to say, it ceases to undermine its own interests.Here we therefore draw a conclusion: the more the class consciousness of the lower class grows, the more its actions correspond to the common well-being.The same cannot be said for the upper classes.The more clearly they are aware of their own class interests, the more they act against the interests of the whole, and the more egoistic they become.

VII What conditions are required so that the actions of individual social classes, strata, and groups do not conflict with the interests of society as a whole?It's easy to understand!The contradiction between the partial interests of these classes, strata and groups and the common interests of the whole must be eliminated.Rousseau expressed this meaning in another way. He said: "If you are willing to execute the common will, try to make all the partial wills agree with it." In Rousseau's view, all social virtues lie in the partial will and the common will Unity of will.He therefore expresses the necessary condition for the execution of the common will in these words: "Act thus: make virtue popular." It is not enough to say to the citizens: "You will be good"; If they are good men, they cannot be placed in a situation in which their partial interests continue to be at odds with each other and with the common happiness.It can be seen that Rousseau's "virtue" is first of all socio-political in nature.In this case, our author does not differ at all from the "Holbachians" and, generally speaking, from the most advanced French writers of the eighteenth century.All these writers approached the question of virtue in terms of social relations, and all of them firmly believed that the improvement of social institutions was necessary in order to transform man.So Marx later said that the conclusions of French materialism were the basis of the theories of nineteenth-century socialists.And from this one can also judge how deep the minds of those gentlemen who are now doing everything possible to spread the ridiculous fantasy that Rousseau's views and those of Le Tolstoy citizens are the same.Rousseau's and the eighteenth-century French materialists' doctrines of "virtue" are fully in line with the principle that not consciousness determines existence but existence determines consciousness.On the contrary, the whole of Tolstoy's teaching is based on the belief that not being determines consciousness but consciousness determines being.Just the following excerpt from Tolstoy's (November 18, 1904) telegram to the editorial office of "The North American" in response to the newspaper's inquiries about the Russian liberation movement makes it clear: See: "True social improvement can only be achieved by the religious and moral perfection of all individuals. The kind of political propaganda that creates very pernicious illusions about social improvement in individuals by changing their external forms." , usually brings true progress to a standstill--this can be seen in all constitutional countries, France, England, America." Only those who understand neither Rousseau's nor Tolstoy's views People confuse these views.Almost as absurd are beliefs such as: "George Sand was undoubtedly Rousseau's most direct and gifted schoolgirl," or: "These two minds of intellect came from the same source," or, in other words, that George Sand · Sang's thoughts and Rousseau's thoughts are completely "consistent".George Sand only approves of some of Rousseau's sentiments and certain individual propositions, but in terms of the nature of her own thinking, she may not be closer to Rousseau than to the Russian historian Karazin. This Karamzin, as you know, I also only agree with some of Rousseau's individual propositions and certain emotions: love of nature, love of "joke-telling gatekeepers" and so on.Ontoua Guyot established his view that Rousseau and George Sand came from the same source on the grounds that "both Rousseau and George Sand believed that the love and affection for nature was the source of the deepest inspiration". Thought.Rousseau was indeed a lover of nature, and knew how to appreciate it, but it is very strange to think that his attitude towards nature constituted the main feature of his thinking.Engels characterizes his thought much better when he points out that both Rousseau and Diderot belonged to the few dialectics of the eighteenth century. "" is a brilliant attempt to use dialectics to analyze the reasons for the movement of human history. The kingdom of "virtue" is also the kingdom of equality.Rousseau did not believe that a full restoration of equality was possible.He was prepared to be content with only a little closer to equality.He hoped that, for every member of society, "work will always be necessary, and never redundant."In his view, one of the most important tasks of the government is to "prevent the emergence of extreme inequality of wealth".Those who regarded Rousseau as the enemy of private property were no less mistaken than those who now bring Rousseau closer to Tolstoy or George Sand.Rousseau categorically declared: "Indeed, the right of property is the most sacred of all rights of citizens, and in some respects it is even more important than liberty." Key is quite right when he says that Rousseau's theory "is by no means a theory of communism, even though it may seem so to the superficial critic."Likewise, those who participated in the French Revolution who claimed to be Rousseau's successors were not Communists.Saint-Just and Robespierre declared more than once that private property is sacred.It is true that they advocated the confiscation of property belonging to the "conspirators", that is, to the royalists fighting against the republic.Saint-Just said that the property of the "conspirator" belongs to all the unfortunate.However, in his view, the confiscation of these properties is only a punishment for certain (political) crimes, or it can also be said to be a preventive measure for certain (political) crimes. Not only was Rousseau not a communist, but he did not necessarily conceive of any minimal communist society.We now know that the starting point for the development of human culture is the communism of the original blood-kin alliance.But Rousseau, as we have seen, considered the primitive savage to be the most extreme individualist.He did not think that some ancient Greek countries like Sparta were communist countries.He called them oppressive aristocracy.He imagined the future fate of the middle and lower classes in European society at that time with sufficiently sad eyes.He believes that the development of civilization will inevitably lead to the expansion of social inequality.And the expansion of social inequality will inevitably worsen the situation of the people's middle and lower classes, if not absolute, it is relative.Yes, he is a staunch plea to the government to curb the growth of wealth inequality.But he cannot expect these governments to readily comply with such requests.He understands that the government's actions are to protect the interests of the rich.He asked: "Don't the rich and powerful get all the benefits of social wealth? Probably he never studied economics in the original sense. But he not only looked at the most advanced countries of the time The economic hardship of the people, and, as stated above, he also understood the nature of the economic exploitation of one social class by another. He uses the following "Four sentences" summarize the social contract (lepactesocial) between the rich and the poor: "You need me because I am rich and you are poor; therefore we agree with each other: I allow you the honor to serve me, and you will give me the honor of serving me." Give me what little you have left, as a reward for my directing labor to you." This statement is not entirely clear; but if the phrase "what little you have left" is understood to mean that the poor Such a part of the product created by human labor: it is left over from satisfying the simple needs of the poor, then we will get the theory of "surplus product".The social contract between rich and poor thus boils down to the right of the rich to a surplus product as a result of "commanding labor" over the poor.Our author is so far-sighted that we do not so much risk violating the truth when we ascribe this meaning to his brief formula of a contract between two social classes.And if this formula actually has such a meaning, then this is a new point of contact between Rousseau's viewpoint on the one hand and Marx and Engels' viewpoint on the other. VIII We are now fully acquainted with Rousseau's teachings on the origin of human inequality.The essence of this theory is that once human beings have taken a few giant steps forward on the road of their productive forces, the dominant equality relationship in the state of nature will be destroyed.And each new step along this road leads to a new increase in inequality.Metal smelting and farming created a class of rich on the one hand and a class of poor on the other.The antagonism of the interests of these two classes gave rise to the State.The state is in the hands of the rich, who receive all the benefits of state life.The state is thus a new source of widening human inequality.The greater the inequality, the more corrupted are the customs, the more prostitution, and the more crime.The progress of science and art increases inequality, and thereby increases the corruption of customs.Therefore, Rousseau stated more than once in his debates with his critics that he fully respected science and art in themselves, but he was convinced that the spread of science and art would actually corrupt customs.This also explains the content of his famous, prize-winning essay on the question posed by the Academy of Dijon.Now it is impossible to return to the state of nature, and it is impossible to restore the equal relationship in the primitive era. In the end, we can only take measures that can delay the growth of inequality, and only maintain a well-off state (lamediocrite). This doctrine itself contains everything that is most important in Rousseau's views.It forms the core of Rousseau's view; it illustrates both its strength and its weakness.Anyone who has not understood Rousseau's theory of inequality will not understand his point of view.And since there are many misunderstandings about this doctrine, it is not surprising that Rousseau's views have hitherto been poorly understood.People confuse these views with Tolstoy's or George Sand's because they have no idea of ​​their real theoretical basis.The extent to which things have become can be illustrated by the following example. 在其不久前出版的《革命的卢梭》（Ｊ．Ｊ．Ｒｏｕｓｓｅａｕｒeｖｏｌｕｔｉｏｎｎａｉｒｅ”）一书中，阿利贝尔·梅叶这样说明卢梭关于不平等起源的论断的性质。“论不平等是一部能够使读者惶惑和值得惋惜的著作（ｕｎｅｏｅｕｖｒｅｄeｃｏｎｃｅｒｔａｎｔｅｅｔｆａｃｈｅｕｓｅ）。它同卢梭整个的政治学说不大相符。在某些方面，它甚至还和这一学说矛盾。它是一个例外，仿佛是他那本身１８２包含这样多卓越思想的理论身上的庞物。”这完全等于说：马克思的经济学说，和他的其他的观点不大相符；这一学说是一个例外，仿佛是他那本身包含许多杰出的观点的理论身上的疣物。而最滑稽的是，这样一些批评马克思经济学说的话，竟在英国和意大利流传，英国著名的“费边社”（“Ｆａｂｉａｎｓｏｃｉｅｔｙ”）某些成员制造出这些评语，意大利某些工团主义理论家就鹦鹉学舌。人的天真是浩瀚无边的。 阿·梅叶在下面一段又说道：《论不平等》可以使人对卢梭政治思想的明白性产生怀疑，虽然一般说来，卢梭的政治思想是严谨的和确切的。事实上这些思想只有在根据卢梭的不平等学说加以考察的时候才会变得十分的明白易解。 作为《》的作者，卢梭的伟大的理论功绩就在于，他不满意十八世纪盛行的对文明发展过程的唯心主义观点，而企图从不是思维决定存在而是存在决定思维的那个唯物主义原理的观点来看这个过程。他任何时候也没有表述过这一原理。而且假使有某人把这一原理的唯物主义性质告诉我们的作者，他很可能，——甚至非常可能，——感到惶惑和生气，而摈斥这个原理。然而这一原理毕竟是他关于社会不平等的起源和发展的论断的基础。卢梭在自己的《》中得出的所有那些重要的理论上的结论，毕竟彻底浸透着这一原理的唯物主义精神。这些结论是极其重要的。卢梭作为思想家的光荣应当以这些结论为依据。不过这些极其重要的结论也给卢梭帮了倒忙，因为它们给他的实际方案带来了保守主义的和甚至是反动的因素。 他本人曾经说过，他绝没有想到要使现代文明民族回复到原始时代的朴直浑厚中去。他认为自己所能有的最大的希望，就是制止那些不大的国家的堕落，这些国家由于处在特殊幸运的环境下，还没有来得及在文明和同文明有联系的淫风败俗的道路上走得太远。怎样制止呢？卢梭向“立法者”呼吁。可是我们知道，按照他的学说，国家，从而还有立法权，是落在富有阶级的手上的。我们有什么根据可以指望立法机关会愿意延缓社会发展的进程呢？难道这符合富有阶级的利益吗？No.这些级阶的利益在于扩大他们和穷人的距离。卢梭自己就说，“能左右局势的人”绝不会违反自己的利益去行事。他能够指望的究竟是什么呢？他只有能够起来反抗可悲的必然性的人类自由的模糊的希望。换句话说，他只有在使他把必然和自由对立起来的那个哲学上的错误中，才能找到安慰。但是哲学上的错误并无助于实际方案的严谨性。而事实上我们看到，卢梭的实际方案常常是很不严谨的。在自己的《对波兰政府的考察》（“ＣｏｎｓｉｄeｒａｔｉｏｎｓｓｕｒｌｅｇｏｕｖｅｒｎｅｍｅｎｔｄｅＰｏｌｏｇｎｅ”）中，他还劝告波兰人注意农业和“使金钱变成可鄙的和尽可能无用的东西”（ｒｅｎｄｒｅｌ'ａｒｇｅｎｔｍeｐｒｉｓａｌｂｅｅｔ，ｓ'ｉｌｓｅｐｅｕｔ，ｉｎｕｔｉｌｅ）。这种劝告的实际意义当然等于零。卢梭自己也感到了这点。他赶紧申明：“我的意思不是要取消货币流通，而是要延缓货币流通，特别是要指明十分重要的一点：好的经济制度不是财政的和货币的制度。”为了说明和证实自己的思想，他引证李库尔，说他“为了在斯巴达根除贪婪心理，并没有消灭硬币，而是使它变成铁币。”也不用说，这类劝告和引证并未能在波兰人处境困难的时候帮助他们。而当忠于其小国理想的卢梭希望使波兰人相信，失去许多省份会给波兰共和国带来很大利益的时候，波兰人可能把他的话当作一种恶毒的嘲笑。最后，在自己的关于波兰农民解放运动的论断中，卢梭表现出是一个真正的保守派，在这个问题上，卡列林替卢梭辩护是枉费心机的。卢梭劝人逐步地解放波兰农民，而“没有显明的革命”（ｓａｎｓｒeｖｏｌｕｔｉｏｎｓｅｎｓｉｂｌｅ）。 天才的卢梭尝受了真正的智慧的悲哀。他不满意所谓ｌａｒａｉｓｏｎｆｉｎｉｔｔｏｕｉｏｕｒｓｐａｒａｖｏｉｒｒａｉｓｏｎ（理性最后总归有理）的流行的空谈。他需要有理性胜利的客观保证。没有这些保证，他就不能相信理性会胜利。他看到，生产力的发展是人类历史运动的主要原因。他也看到，历史的运动要引起和扩大社会的不平等，以及和社会不平等密切相关的人的利己主义行为。他的难能可贵的智慧帮助他发现了这些重要的理论上的真理。不过当时的甚至西欧最先进的国家的经济关系还不曾使人有任何理由可以指望：生产力的发展虽然引起和扩大社会的不平等，并且使风俗败坏，但这种发展本身会提出一个社会阶级，能够用根本改造社会制度的办法来恢复平等和淳化风俗。因此卢梭最后只有反对经济上的进步。他也就这样做了。而反对经济上的进步，并未能使他制定出一种严谨而彻底的世界观。他的观点中有许多对旧思想的让步。著名的《萨伏依神甫的信条》就应该认为是最主要的一个让步，这本书里反对唯物主义的意见，都是很天真的。 卢梭没有从不平等现象、利己主义和奢侈淫荡到处风行的那个社会制度中找到出路。这妨碍了他拟定出多少正确的切实可行的行动计划。不过这个人民的儿子是真正热爱平等的，他对富人压迫穷人的现象衷心感到愤怒。就其同情说，他是彻头彻尾的民主主义者。例如在他就种种政治理论问题所写的每一页纸上，都表露出他的热情奔放的民主主义的同情。他的社会契约说，除少数例外，乃是完全革命的学说。难怪罗伯斯庇尔和圣鞠斯特曾经自认为是他的学生，也难怪法国的无裤党人热爱过他。他说到平等时，声音里迸发出奔腾澎湃的革命热情。然而这种澎湃的热情，在现代法国资产阶级的温文尔雅的儿孙们的心灵中，不能得到同情的响应。现在社会里的统治阶级的思想家之不能同情这种热情，就象他们不能同情卢梭对人类文化发展进程的维物主义观点一样。对于这些思想家说来，这种热情“已经过时了”。而既然在他们看来，这种热情过时了，那么他们最好的确只有赞扬一番卢梭行文时素有的那种令人愉快的风格。 （王荫庭译）