Rousseau and Revolution

Reverse Revolution 85
magnum opus. But did Rousseau really write the revolution as is suggested
by the title of Louis-Sébastien Mercier’s 1791 book, De J.-J. Rousseau considéré
comme l’un des premiers auteurs de la Révolution? Connecting Rousseau to
the events of 1789 was obviously not the philosophers’ choice and can only
be explained by the practical need of the revolutionaries to anchor their
ideological beliefs on a philosophical foundation. In this sense, choosing
Rousseau over other philosophers also meant preferring one current of the
Enlightenment over another. Unlike the materialism or the physical rationalism
of other contemporary philosophers, Rousseau’s philosophical focus
on the inner sentiment provided a spiritual energy and the eventuality of
a sacred aura to the measures taken under the revolution. In this sense,
linking Rousseau’s name to the events following 1789 up until Thermidor
was also a means of fi lling the spiritual vacuum left by the dethroned God
of the Catholic edifi ce. Placing the Declaration of the Rights of Man and
of the Citizen under the auspices of a supreme being was a deferential reference
to the author of the Profession de foi du vicaire savoyard and a way to
reorient the orphaned faith of the people into a divinized legislation. 2 As
its prophet, Rousseau stood as the fi gure who could grant it the legitimate
blessing to succeed.
As we shall see, the religious dimension given to the French Revolution
has a direct bearing on the anachronistic supposition that Rousseau
authored the event. In order for the effect to become the cause, the essential
nature of the supposition necessitated a retrocausal argument that went
against the rational thought we usually associate with the Enlightenment.
In Candide, for example, Voltaire criticizes Leibnitz’s theodicy for using an
a priori reasoning in which cause and effect are inversed, and mocks him
by having the Leibnizian Dr. Pangloss declare that
Since everything was designed for a purpose, everything is necessarily
meant to serve the best of all purposes. [ . . . ] noses are designed to hold
up eyeglasses, and therefore we have eyeglasses. Legs are obviously meant
for wearing shoes, and so we have shoes. Rocks having been designed to
be quarried and used for building purposes, the Baron has a singularly
beautiful mansion. (Voltaire, 2005, 2)
Likewise, La Mettrie’s diatribe against religious inspired essentialism in
L’Homme-machine also focuses on its illogical penchant to put effect before
cause,
Man is a machine so complicated that it is impossible at fi rst to form a
clear idea of it, and, consequently, to describe it. This is why all the