Encyclopedic Liberty: Political Articles in the Dictionary of Diderot and D’Alembert
- Denis Diderot (author)
- Jean Le Rond d’ Alembert (author)
- Henry C. Clark (editor)
- Christine Dunn Henderson (translator)
This anthology unites the most significant political writing from the compendium known as The Encyclopedia. It includes eighty-one of the most original, controversial and representative articles on political ideas, practices, and institutions. It covers such topics as the foundations of political order, the relationship between natural and civil liberty, the different types of constitutional regimes, the role of the state in economic and religious affairs, and manners, morals, and laws.
Key Quotes
Politics & Liberty
No man has received from nature the right to command others. Liberty is a gift from heaven, and each individual of the same species has the right to enjoy it as soon as he enjoys the use of reason. If nature has established any authority, it is paternal control; but paternal control has its limits,…
Natural Rights
If you therefore meditate carefully on the foregoing, you will remain convinced: (i) that the man who listens only to his particular will is the enemy of the human race; (ii) that the general will in each individual is a pure act of understanding that reasons in the silence of the passions about…