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The free governments are dependent on constitutional arrangements that establish checks and balances. Montesquieu devotes one chapter of The Spirit of Law to a discussion of how the England's constitution sustained liberty (XI, 6), and another to the realities of English politics (XIX, 27). As for France, the intermediate powers (including the ...
The Spirit of Law (French: De l'esprit des lois, originally spelled De l'esprit des loix [1]), also known in English as The Spirit of [the] Laws, is a treatise on political theory, as well as a pioneering work in comparative law by Montesquieu, published in 1748. [2]
Proponents of the doux commerce theory argued that the spread of trade and commerce will decrease violence, including open warfare. [6] [7] Montesquieu wrote, for example, that "wherever the ways of man are gentle, there is commerce; and wherever there is commerce, there the ways of men are gentle" [8] and "The natural effect of commerce is to lead to peace". [1]
Rationalist humanism tradition includes Tocqueville and Montesquieu, and in the 19th century, Élie Halévy. [3] [4] Other strands of the Enlightenment included scientific naturalism. [2] In the mid 20th century, rational humanism represented also an alternative for those that did not embrace Sartre's existentialism. [5]
Thomas Jefferson, through his friendship with Marquis de Lafayette, was heavily influenced by French philosophers of the Age of Enlightenment, such as Voltaire, Rousseau and Montesquieu. In their often censored writings, those philosophers advocated that men were born free and equal.
Frontispiece and title page of 1748 edition. Initially, Montesquieu only intended on writing a few pages on the topic. [1] However, the size of his topic overwhelmed him, so he chose to expand the scope of his writing from the beginnings of the Roman Republic to the decay of the late Roman Empire. [1]
By far the most important French sources to the American Enlightenment were Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws and Emer de Vattel's Law of Nations. Both informed early American ideas of government and were major influences on the U.S. Constitution. Voltaire's histories were widely read but seldom cited.
Absurdism – Academic skepticism – Achintya Bheda Abheda – Action, philosophy of – Actual idealism – Actualism – Advaita Vedanta – Aesthetic Realism – Aesthetics – African philosophy – Afrocentrism – Agential realism – Agnosticism – Agnostic theism – Ajātivāda – Ājīvika – Ajñana – Alexandrian school – Alexandrists – Ambedkarism – American philosophy ...