Diderot as a disciple of English thought

Front matter

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STUDIES IN ROMANCE PHILOLOGY AND LITERATURE

DIDEROT AS A DISCIPLE OF ENGLISH THOUGHT

CHAPTER I Diderot's Life and General Relationship to

England 19

Diderot's early years. — New importance of modern languages. — Which are most necessary in the eighteenth century? — Impression created by Voltaire's Lettres philosophiques. — Diderot's needy years. — He learns English. — His dislike for traveling. — Marriage.

Diderot's literary career. — Translations from the English for the booksellers. — The Encyclopedie. — Diderot's early writings. — His imprisonment. — Posthumous works.

Second-hand knowledge of England. — English spleen. — The English Parliament, and other topics. — The question of patriotism. — A recantation. — Holbach's impressions of England.— " 0 Paris, when shall I isee thee again ¥ " — Diderot's unfavorable reflections on England. — Blots in the scutcheon. — England's true greatness. — Protestantism and education.

Diderot's enthusiasm for the American Insurgents: an unpublished letter to Wilkes.

viii DIDEEOT AND ENGLISH THOUGHT

— His wishes for the United States. — Conclusion.

Chapter II

An enemy: Horace Walpole. — Many Englishmen in Paris after 1763. — An anecdote by Goldsmith. — Incomplete state of Diderot's Correspondence. — A great friend: "Hoop," or Hope; his life and character. — Tales of savages; Baron Dieskau; anthropology and philosophy. — Curiosities of literature: Hoop and Sterne; Smollett's "Roman dinner." — Sterne; did he know Diderot personally? — Gibbon. — Obscurer visitors to Paris.

Three famous friends of Diderot: Garrick; Hume; Wilkes. — Franklin in Paris.

English reaction against French free-thinking: Burke, Romilly. — The divorce between the French and English intellects.

Chapter III

Diderot "le Philosophe" essentially a moralist.— Shaftesbury's popularity in England^' and France. — His Inquiry concerning merit or virtue. — Why Diderot found it especially interesting. — Rhetorical precautions. — English "boldness" tempered in the translation. — Shaftesbury's influence on Diderot. — Sceptical doubts.

CONTENTS ix

Diderot's Pensees philosophiques, partly made up of extracts from the Characteristics.— Reminiscences from Shaftesbury in some subsequent works of Diderot.

The Lettre sur les aveugles and the u problem of Molyneux." — Nicholas Saunderson. —The fictitious "William Inchliff."— The "elephant and tortoise" illustration. — First outline of a transformistic theory. — Passage from metaphysical to scientific activity.

CHAPTER IV The Scientist 174

General contempt for "systematic" philosophy about 1750, — Locke's sensationalism almost universally accepted in France. — Hume's phenomenism. — Reaction against hypotheses.— Diderot's reserve in judging metaphysical systems.

His work in mathematics and acoustics. — Controversy concerning vaccination. — Variety of Diderot's scientific studies.

Diderot's Pensees sur V interpretation de la nature and Bacon's Thoughts on the interpretation of nature. — Some scientific anticipations by Diderot. — Question of patent rights in science.

Diderot as a forerunner of Transf ormism : his ideas on this subject in 1749, 1754, and 1769. — General principles on matter and motion, life and consciousness. — Diderot, Lamarck, Darwin.

x DLDEEOT AND ENGLISH THOUGHT

Chapter V

Bacon quoted, on the necessity of " Circle- Learning." — Elements for compiling encyclopedias, provided by the seventeenth century: learned periodicals, special reviews, historical and technical dictionaries. — An age of dictionaries.

John Harris's Lexicum Technicum. — E. Chambers's Cyclopcedia. — Their deficiencies. — Italian and German compilations ; Brucker.

Outline of the history of the Encyclopedie. — Its originality. — The charge of plagiarism. — Influence of Bacon : classification of sciences ; dignity of the mechanical arts.

Diderot's contributions to the Encyclopedie :

Articles on the arts and crafts : some articles taken from Chambers. — Mistakes and inaccuracies.— His original share: technical descriptions.

Articles on philosophy, often taken from Brucker. — His articles on English philosophy. — The Annual Eegister and the Zend Avesta.

Conclusion: what is of lasting interest in the Encyclopedie is not borrowed.

Chapter VI

Diderot's early taste for the stage. — His reaction against the French dramatic tradi-

CONTENTS xi

tion. — The importance of action, or "pantomime."— Diderot was writing a play in 1753.

Diderot's dramatic theories combine the French and English movements in reaction against French classicism. — Difference between these two movements. — English examples adduced by Diderot as confirmations of his theories.

Lillo's London Merchant. — Enthusiastically praised by Diderot/ — Moore's Gamester. — Translated and "improved" by Diderot; English " boldness " again corrected.

Diderot's view of the work of his predesessors in France and England. — His own discovery, the "genre serieux." — His progeny, the drama.

The art of acting. — Romantic and realistic definition of artistic genius. — Influence of Garrick and the Par ado xe sur le comedien. — Genius and sensibility.

Chapter VII

Connection between Diderot's dramatic theories and his ideas concerning the novel. His ideal, Richardson. — What Diderot admired in his works. — The Eloge de Richardson.—Traces of Richardson's influence in La Beligieuse. — " Eclaircissements sur les obscenites."

xii DIDEROT AND ENGLISH THOUGHT

Sterne. — Vogue of " Shandyism n in France. — Tristram Shandy and Jacques le Fataliste. — Why Diderot copied some pages from Tristram. — Relation of both works to Candide. — A philosophic tale on Fatalism.

Diderot's fondness for the "conte philosophique." — Consideration of the Supplement au Voyage de Bougainville in this light.

Chapter VIII

" Fixed faith and constant axioms " in criticism.— The passage from literary criticism to general esthetic criticism before Diderot, in France and England.

Diderot's predecessors in esthetics. — His theory of the Beautiful. — Shaftesbury; morality and art. — Hogarth's peinture morale.

English books on art: Hogarth, Spence, Webb. — Diderot upbraids Hogarth. — His quarrel with Webb: are Christian subjects fit for artistic treatment? — Esthetic value of " the reigning superstition." — Gothic architecture.

The process of the imitation of nature by great artists. — Hogarth's " line of beauty." — An illustration borrowed from him by Diderot.— The transcendental model; influence of Garrick.

Romantic themes for poetry. — Philosophy adverse to poetry. — Diderot and Shakespeare.

CONTENTS xiii

— Scottish poems; Ossian. — Young. — Diderot and Dr Johnson.

Diderot essentially French. — Variety of the forms of English " influence " that acted upon him. — His gradual emancipation. — How he transformed what he received. — Diderot in many ways a thinker of the nineteenth century.— Devious ways of his influence in Europe. — Why French critics have often dealt severely with him. — Multum incola fuit anima mea.

Appendices 463

I

A. A letter from Voltaire to G. Keate.

B. Letters from Diderot to David Hume (Reprinted).

C. An unpublished letter from Diderot to Bret.

D. Letters from Diderot to John Wilkes (three unpublished).

II A Chronological Table of Diderot's main works

Ill

Bibliographical Note.

Diderot as a Disciple of English Thought