considered essential to full being. But now the source we
have to connect with is deep within us. This fact is part of the
massive subjective turn of modern culture, a new form of inwardness,
in which we come to think of ourselves as beings
with inner depths. At first, this idea that the source is within
doesn’t exclude our being related to God or the Ideas; it can
be considered our proper way of relating to them. In a sense,
it can be seen as just a continuation and intensification of
the development inaugurated by Saint Augustine, who saw
the road to God as passing through our own self-awareness.
The first variants of this new view were theistic, or at least
pantheistic.
The most important philosophical writer who helped to
bring about this change was Jean-Jacques Rousseau. I think
Rousseau is important not because he inaugurated the
change; rather, I would argue that his great popularity
comes in part from his articulating something that was in a
sense already occurring in the culture. Rousseau frequently
presents the issue of morality as that of our following a voice
of nature within us. This voice is often drowned out by the
passions that are induced by our dependence on others, the
main one being amour propre, or pride. Our moral salvation
comes from recovering authentic moral contact with ourselves.
Rousseau even gives a name to the intimate contact
with oneself, more fundamental than any moral view, that
is a source of such joy and contentment: “le sentiment de
considered essential to full being. But now the source we
have to connect with is deep within us. This fact is part of the
massive subjective turn of modern culture, a new form of inwardness,
in which we come to think of ourselves as beings
with inner depths. At first, this idea that the source is within
doesn’t exclude our being related to God or the Ideas; it can
be considered our proper way of relating to them. In a sense,
it can be seen as just a continuation and intensification of
the development inaugurated by Saint Augustine, who saw
the road to God as passing through our own self-awareness.
The first variants of this new view were theistic, or at least
pantheistic.
The most important philosophical writer who helped to
bring about this change was Jean-Jacques Rousseau. I think
Rousseau is important not because he inaugurated the
change; rather, I would argue that his great popularity
comes in part from his articulating something that was in a
sense already occurring in the culture. Rousseau frequently
presents the issue of morality as that of our following a voice
of nature within us. This voice is often drowned out by the
passions that are induced by our dependence on others, the
main one being amour propre, or pride. Our moral salvation
comes from recovering authentic moral contact with ourselves.
Rousseau even gives a name to the intimate contact
with oneself, more fundamental than any moral view, that
is a source of such joy and contentment: “le sentiment de
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