Prussian Idealism

Prussian Idealism 

Political discussion in the modern west never extends beyond bipartisan shouting match to something more philosophical. The kind of thinkers discussed today are normally limited to a few liberal political philosophers like Hobbes, Locke, Voltaire, or Rousseau. What all these thinkers have in common is that they have an individualistic outlook and anarchistic ontology that places the individual above society. Thus, it always conceives society as a contractual creation between free individuals. But there is another tradition in the West, a more illiberal philosophical tradition, perhaps best exemplified by Prussian philosophers such as Hegel, Kant, Frederick the Great, and Spengler. It may be important to look back to them as they offer an alternate view and allows Americans to reflect on whether their ideas apply to all parts of the world.   

There is no other country revered for its constant sloganeering about freedom and liberty than France. Nothing could be more explicit about the importance of individualism in Rousseau’s thought than when he makes a dichotomy between the individual experience in early civilization versus that of modern civilization. In his work “Discourse on Inequality”, Rousseau writes, “The savage and the civilized man differ so much in the bottom of their hearts and inclinations, that what constitutes the supreme happiness of one would reduce the other to despair. The former breathes only peace and liberty … Civilized man is always moving, sweating, toiling and racking his brains to find still more laborious occupations (Rousseau, 39).” Rousseau holds the savage man’s individual experience in high regard compared to civilized man’s life, especially in the context of 18th century Europe which is undergoing significant economic, political and cultural transformation. The Prussian king Frederick II would have disliked Rousseau’s individualist idea of the savage man, who idles and doesn’t work. In his work “Political Testament”, Frederick II condemns laziness when he writes “Laziness, hedonism, and imbecility, these are the causes which restrain princes in working at the noble task of bringing happiness to their subject (Frederick II, 110).” In this quote, Frederick II implies that rulers have a duty to serve their subjects, and blames laziness as cause of bad events to happen. As a response to this, Rousseau disagrees with Frederick II, and questions that selfless sense of virtue that princes and despots would possess. According to Rousseau, aristocrats don’t have a sincere sense of duty to serve their subjects, as their existence by itself is a result of inequality. Rousseau writes, “The different forms of government owe their origin to the differing degrees of inequality which existed between individuals at the time of their institution … If several, nearly equal in point of eminence, stood above the rest, they were elected jointly, and formed an aristocracy (36).” Rousseau believes that in an earlier age, people that lived in a state of equality took advantage of their position, and monopolized all of the power which enabled them to become rulers and despots. Therefore, Rousseau condemns all forms of government as he believes that they are a monopoly of power over people rather than anything particularly helpful. Rousseau also attributes the existence of abstract ideas as contrary to the state of freedom. Rousseau writes, “Nascent government did not have a constant and regular form. The lack of philosophy and experience allowed only present inconveniences to be perceived, and one thought of remedying others only as they presented themselves (97).” In this quote, Rousseau elaborates that the lack of knowledge and science in the past only allowed present inconveniences to be the object of focus for the savage man, not abstractions commonly found in science and philosophy. The French philosopher Voltaire, questions the validity of metaphysics, which are abstract ideas in philosophy. In Voltaire’s work, “Letters on England”, Voltaire writes, “Human reason is so little able, merely by its own strength, to demonstrate the immortality of the soul, that it was absolutely necessary religion should reveal it to us (Voltaire, 46).” Voltaire expresses his disdain for metaphysics, going even so far as to call it a tool for a religious government to justify its paradigmatic order and authority. Rousseau would’ve agreed with Voltaire about the inadequacy of metaphysics, since the savage man’s interest only concerns the present experiences not elaborate ideas such as science and philosophy. In "The Social Contract,” Rousseau expresses similar dislike for metaphysics, “But what, when we come down to it, is a law? As long as we settle for attaching only metaphysical ideas to the word, we’ll go on arguing without understanding one another (Rousseau, 18).” In this passage, it’s revealed that Rousseau dislikes metaphysics, as well. Because of the correlation between metaphysics and modern civilization, it can be said that it’s preferable to be like the savage man and possess no knowledge of such abstractions. Voltaire would agree, as it’s simply a tool of their oppressors to remain in power. However, in the article “Kant’s Theory of Rights”, Gunnar Beck elaborates on why the Prussian philosopher Immanuel Kant would disagree with both Rousseau and Voltaire, and postulate that there is indeed a universal metaphysical law. According to Beck, 

Kant’s theory of rights is generally characterized in exactly those terms: as a strict logical deduction of the principle of justice from the moral law, and since the moral law is essentially universal and timeless, so is the principle of justice as the set of necessary and fixed human rights that any empirical government must respect and enforce as the guarantees that every individual needs in order to attain individual autonomy (Beck, 2). 

Kant believes in a timeless and universal standard for everyone to follow, which is metaphysical in nature. This is different from Rousseau’s stance as he believes that laws are formed from common agreement based on sensual experience, not abstract metaphysical reasoning. In “The Social Contract”, Rousseau elaborates on how societies were first formed when he writes, “It’s the common element in these different interests that forms the social tie; and if there were there nothing that they all had in common, no society could exist. It is solely by this common interest that every society should be governed (17).” According to Rousseau, a good society can only exist if everybody was equal, treated equally, and could come to an agreement. However, in “Discourse on Inequality”, Rousseau believes that a general will can only be achieved if these people have a common selfish desire, which is contingent within the same experienced environment and not an abstract universal law. Rousseau writes, “I could show that it is to this desire of being talked about, and this unremitting rage of distinguishing ourselves, that we owe the best and the worst things we possess, both our virtues and our vices, our science and our errors, our conquerors and our philosopher (37).” According to Rousseau, our vices and the selfish desire to be recognized is the cause behind progress and achievements, not because of a universal and timeless sense of duty. Because of the unreliability of structured rules and institutions, Rousseau finally admits that man would be better off if he sacrifices his comfort under law and order by fighting against the dominance of despots. Rousseau expresses what he deems to be the highest experience for the human individual when he writes, 

I know that the former does nothing but boast incessantly of the peace and quiet they enjoy in their chains. But when I see the others sacrifice pleasures ... when I see multitudes of entirely naked savages' scorn European voluptuousness and brave hunger, fire, the sword, and death to preserve only their independence I sense that it is not for slaves to reason about liberty (98).  

Rousseau doesn’t believe in the validity of conforming to the law, as he believes that social institutions are simply the despots’ monopoly of power to exploit people. Therefore, Rousseau believes that people are happier committing anarchism. However, Kant would have disliked Rousseau’s call for violent revolution. Kant stresses the need for obedience for progress to even be conceived of in the first place; philosophers and wise kings did not come about exclusively through selfishness, but they did it because they believed it to be morally right.  Kant writes, “To overthrow a ruler, therefore, is not only illegitimate but will also fail to achieve its end. For political revolution does not produce 'a true reform in ways of thinking,' and the new rulers will be as likely to abuse their power as their predecessors (2).” Kant believes that a lack of self-discipline and sense of morality is the cause of bad tyrants. Kant believes that a good society can only come into existence if everybody was able to conceive of a metaphysical universal law. In contrast, Rousseau believes that vices, immorality, and toppling kings are natural expressions of the human will, so it is inherently good. Both Rousseau and Voltaire don’t believe in universal abstractions, and believe that human nature is inherently compulsive and desires to liberate himself from others. Kant justifies the existence of governments because it protects our freedom and our self-development. Beck paraphrases Kant in his article, “Man’s moral title to external freedom thus carries with it a correlative duty to respect the same right in others. And since men cannot be relied upon to observe this duty voluntarily, it must be enforced. (Beck, 5).” Kant refutes Rousseau by saying that good rulers could only exist if there was an existing government that protected the rights of people, which allowed their minds to flourish and develop in the first place. Furthermore, Rousseau’s belief that rulers are selfish by nature is only an indication of his French bias. In the article, “The Age of Louis XIV: Frederick the Great and French Ways of War”, Adam Storring writes, “Louis XIV rarely led his armies from the front, Frederick’s assumption of personal military command reflected the new Enlightenment idea of the ‘great man’ (grand homme), whose greatness should be earned by personal merit (Storring, 3).” Storring states the difference between the French King Louis XIV and the Prussian King Frederick the Great, by illustrating how Louis XIV forced others to fight for his will while Frederick the Great fulfills his correlative duty to fight alongside his own subjects. Louis XIV influenced Rousseau’s conception of rulers in general, and this is faulty logic as it doesn’t pertain to rulers outside of his own culture. The French political tension between the subjects and their rulers would, perhaps, be relevant to Revolutionary France but the ideas would be inconceivable in Prussia. In the book “Prussianism and Socialism”, Oswald Spengler attempts to shed further light onto this when he writes, “We must repeat again the magnificent words of Frederick the Great: ‘I am the first servant of my state.’ As soon as every individual makes this attitude his own, socialism becomes a fact. There is no sharper contrast to this idea than Louis XIV with his factual statement, ‘I am the state’ (Spengler, 207).” Spengler discovers that the attitudes of these two rulers are representative of the nations they rule by quoting the two rulers themselves. Louis XIV semantically maintains his individual personality with his phrase ‘I am the state.’ Frederick the Great’s statement shows that he submits to the state before his personal needs and individuality when he says ‘I am the first servant of my state.’ In this scenario, one could see that even the king of Prussia becomes subject to his own despotism while the king of France’s individual needs is the despotism that his subjects must become subject to. Louis XIV possesses a more ego-centric attitude, which Rousseau has no problem with as it allows the liberation of one’s inner barbarism. The Prussians believe that duty is important, not individual impulses. 

What about the philosophical differences of the British and the Prussians? The French emphasizes the importance of the individual. However, the comparison between the British and Prussians would be interesting, as both sides will be justifying the existence of sovereign rulers and governments. To start off, the most basic difference to point out between the two cultures would be their philosophical attitudes towards epistemology. In the book, “The Making of the West Vol. 2,” Lyn Hunt writes, “Ideas are shaped, Kant argued, not just by sensory information (a position central to empiricism, a philosophy based on John Locke’s writings), but also by the operation on that information of mental categories such as space and time (Hunt, 480).” Hunt maintains that the English philosopher John Locke believes in empiricism, the decree that knowledge is shaped by our sensory organs, and that all knowledge is derived from our sense-experience. This is in opposition to Kant as he believes in the operation of abstract mental concepts such as space and time. According to empiricism, it is one’s sensory experience that will determine the ideas and knowledge one receives. Operating from this logic, morality is relative to one’s experience and it isn’t universal.  Locke believes that a common consensus is key towards a successful community. In Locke’s work “Second Treatise of Government”, he writes, “First, there wants an established, settled, known law, received and allowed by common consent to be the standard of right and wrong, and the common measure to decide all controversies between them: for though the law of nature be plain and intelligible to all rational creatures (Locke, 70).” Locke believes that a coherent society can work, but only if everyone thinks similarly in an empirically similar environment. However, Locke only believes in the protection of property and rights, but not one's autonomy and will in the most abstract sense. Rather, Locke writes, “The great and chief end, therefore, of men's uniting into commonwealths, and putting themselves under government, is the preservation of their property to be protected (70). To conclude, Locke believes that the purpose of government is to protect people’s private property. Similar to Locke, English philosopher Thomas Hobbes elaborates on his ideas about the importance of collectivism in his work “Leviathan.” Hobbes elaborates on the importance of a unified community when he writes, “They that have already instituted a Commonwealth, being thereby bound by covenant to own the actions and judgments of one, cannot lawfully make a new covenant … they that are subjects to a monarch cannot without his leave cast off monarchy and return to the confusion of a disunited multitude (Hobbes, 66).” Hobbes maintains that it’s an absolute detriment that people will be obedient to a commonwealth. Similar to Locke, Hobbes supports his belief for an absolute government by describing nature as being in a state of constant change.  Hobbes writes, 

Hereby it is manifest that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every man against every man. For war consists not in battle only, or the act of fighting, but in a tract of time ... so the nature of war consists not in actual fighting, but in the known disposition thereto during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary.  (Hobbes, 64). 

In Hobbes’ idea of the natural state of man, man is in an anarchic condition of a war of all against all. Hobbes posits that the nature of war is everywhere, which includes the passage of time and man’s uncertainty of what’s to come. This is central to Locke and Hobbes’ disbelief in the possibility of universal morality, as it would be different for everyone because of the rate of constant change. Thus, a common power is needed in order to enforce its power and to humble men from revolting out of fear for one’s life. Hobbes details the risks of what happens when men do not band together to form a commonwealth when he writes, “In such condition there is no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently, no culture of the earth …  continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short (69).” In this anarchic state of nature, nothing can be considered just or unjust, and therefore every man must be considered to have a right to all things. However, without the metaphysics that constitutes an objective criterion of choice, then the natural will only constitutes arbitrariness not social progress. Such indeterminate arbitrary will can be considered as a paradigm of free will, like Rousseau's savage man. However, according to the Prussian philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel it’s a serious mistake. In the “Philosophy of the Right”, Hegel writes, “The choice which I have is grounded in the universality of the will, in the fact that I can make this or that mine. This thing that is mine is particular in content and therefore not adequate to me and so is separate from me; it is only potentially mine, while I am the potentiality of linking myself to it (Hegel, 258).” Hegel believes that by giving in to our natural impulses, we become enslaved to natural objects instead of using our free will. Thus, it’s not true freedom. Personal property is also an arbitrary concept because of this; thus, it couldn’t support the philosophy of Hobbes’ absolute government and Locke’s notion of private property. Hegel continues, “Thus, I am dependent on this content, and this is the contradiction lying in arbitrariness. The man in the street thinks he is free if it is open to him to act as he pleases, but his very arbitrariness implies that he is not free (259).” In other words, true freedom is ethical freedom and can only be achieved in an ethical community that has allowed the individual to conceive of Kant’s moral law. Because the arbitrary wills of men don’t coincide when they act capriciously, Hobbes’ ordinarily structured anarchic state of natural men isn’t possible.  However, according to Hegel arbitrary choice has a place in a rational normative order. Hegel writes, 

The bond of duty can appear as a restriction only on indeterminate subjectivity or abstract freedom, and on the impulses either of the natural will or of the moral will which determines its indeterminate good arbitrarily. The truth is, however, that in duty the individual finds his liberation; first, liberation from dependence on mere natural impulse and from the depression which as a particular subject he cannot escape in his moral reflections on what ought to be and what might be; secondly, liberation from the indeterminate subjectivity which, never reaching reality or the objective determinacy of action, remains self-enclosed and devoid of actuality. In duty the individual acquires his substantive freedom (149). 

Hegel postulates that there is an evolution from the abstract concept of freedom, actualized in an individual will, to a concrete form of freedom, actualized in a community. This is paradoxical if we accept Rousseau’s view that moral duty binds us and restrict our freedom of movement, and Locke and Hobbes’ inability to conceive of a moral law. For Hegel and Kant, it’s only through Prussian discipline and devotion to one’s duty can there be no paradox. 

In conclusion, the excess of violent revolutions can be attributed to Locke, Hobbes, and Rousseau’s ideas of will, consent, and freedom into the reduction of the union of individuals and the state to a contract, and therefore to something based in an arbitrary will. When a man is so self-determined, but the only source of his determination are his impulses, appetites, and desires, he is enslaved to his passions and is not proof of true freedom. Such a will doesn’t act according to its rational nature, although it’s capable of utilitarian rationality such as Locke’s common consent and Hobbes’ absolutism. However, their political utopia can only be conceived as an abstraction, a state of nature, in which impulses and violence reign unchecked full of independent egocentric and impulse-driven individuals. It’s the only freedom in which the Jacobins and Louis XIV could possibly have when they find themselves in a shared physical space. Kant and Hegel believe that it’s only through duty, similar to Frederick the Great’s heroic actions, can true freedom be realized. 

Works Cited 

Beck, Gunnar. “Immanuel Kant’s Theory of Rights.” Ratio Juris, vol. 19, no. 4, Dec. 2006, pp. 371–401. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.ezproxy.bakersfieldcollege.edu/10.1111/j.1467-9337.2006.00336.x. 

Frederick the Great, “Political Testament.” Mary Dougherty, 1752, p. 110 https://www.amazon.com/Sources-Making-West-II-Cultures/dp/0312576129 

Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich. “Philosophy of Right.” 1820 

Hobbes, Thomas. “Leviathan.” Mary Dougherty, 1651, p. 68 https://www.amazon.com/Sources-Making-West-II-Cultures/dp/0312576129 

Hunt, Lynn. “The Making of the West: Peoples and Cultures Second Edition.” Bedford/St. Martin's, 2005 p. 480 

Kant, Immanuel. “What is Enlightenment?” 1784 https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/mod/kant-whatis.asp 

Locke, John. “Second Treatise of Government.” 1689 https://www.amazon.com/Sources-Making-West-II-Cultures/dp/0312576129 

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. “Discourse on Inequality.” 1753 https://aub.edu.lb/fas/cvsp/Documents/DiscourseonInequality.pdf879500092.pdf 

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. “The Social Contract.” 1762 https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/assets/pdfs/rousseau1762.pdf 

Spengler, Oswald. “Prussianism and Socialism.” 1919 

Storring, Adam L. “‘The Age of Louis XIV’: Frederick the Great and French Ways of War.” German History, vol. 38, no. 1, Mar. 2020, pp. 24–46. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.ezproxy.bakersfieldcollege.edu/10.1093/gerhis/ghz069. 

Voltaire. “Letters on England.” 1778 http://www.naturalthinker.net/trl/texts/Voltaire,Francois/Voltaire%20-%20Letters%20on%20England.pdf