nce had
inspired the foundation of the Royal Society, so now his name
was invoked by the founders of the Encyclopaedia. [Footnote: See
d'Alembert's tribute to him in the Discours preliminaire.]

Beneath all philosophical speculation there is an undercurrent of
emotion, and in the French philosophers of the eighteenth century this
emotional force was strong and even violent. They aimed at practical
results. Their work was a calculated campaign to transform the
principles and the spirit of governments and to destroy sacerdotalism.
The problem for the human race being to reach a state of felicity by its
own powers, these thinkers believed that it was soluble by the gradual
triumph of reason over prejudice and knowledge over ignorance. Violent
revolution was far from their thoughts; by the diffusion of knowledge
they hoped to create a public opinion which would compel governments to
change the tenor of their laws and administration and make the happiness
of the people their guiding principle. The optimistic confidence that
man is perfectible, which means capable of indefinite improvement,
inspired the movement as a whole, however greatly particular thinkers
might differ in their views.

Belief in Progress was their sustaining faith, although, occupied by
the immediate problems of amelioration, they left it rather vague and
ill-defined. The word itself is seldom pronounced in their writings. The
idea is treated as subordinate to the other ideas in the midst of which
it had grown up: Reason, Nature, Humanity, Illumination (lumieres). It
has not yet entered upon an independent life of its own and received a
distinct label, though it is already a vital force.

In reviewing the influences which were forming a new public opinion
during the forty years before the Revolution, it is convenient for the
present purpose to group together the thinkers (including Voltaire)
associated with the Encyclopaedia, who represented a critical and
consciously aggressive force against traditional theories and existing
institutions. The constructive thinker Rousseau was not less
aggressive, but he stands apart and opposed, by his hostility to modern
civilisation. Thirdly, we must distinguish the school of Economists,
also reformers and optimists, but of more conservative temper than the
typical Encyclopaedists.

2.

The Encyclopaedia (1751-1765) has rightly been pronounced the central
work of the rationalistic movement which made the France of