essay on man wikipedia

An Essay on Man

"The Essay on Man in modern editions is a single poem, arranged in four “Epistles.” But in the beginning, each epistle was published separately, the first on February 20 [1733], the second on March 29, the third on May 17, and the fourth in the next year, on January 24, 1734. In May of 1733 the first three epistles were issued as a stitched together pamphlet, but the pamphlet was made up of separately issued copies of the three epistles. It was not until May 2, 1734, that all four parts were printed together as a single poem.", Alexander Pope; a bibliography , by Reginald Harvey Griffith (1922), Volume I, part I, p .211.

This transcription is of an edition published in 1751.

IN FOUR EPISTLES,

Alexander Pope , Esq

EDINBURGH ,

Printed for, and sold by James Reid Bookseller in Leith , MDCCLI.

• The Contents
• Epistle II.
• Epistle III.
• Epistle IV.
• The Universal Prayer
• Notes on the Essay on Man

This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.

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An Essay on Man

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• The Victorian Web - Alexander Pope's Essay on Man: An Introduction

An Essay on Man , philosophical essay written in heroic couplets of iambic pentameter by Alexander Pope , published in 1733–34. It was conceived as part of a larger work that Pope never completed.

The poem consists of four epistles. The first epistle surveys relations between humans and the universe; the second discusses humans as individuals. The third addresses the relationship between the individual and society, and the fourth questions the potential of the individual for happiness. An Essay on Man describes the order of the universe in terms of a hierarchy , or chain, of being. By virtue of their ability to reason, humans are placed above animals and plants in this hierarchy.

British Literature Wiki

An Essay on Man

“Is the great chain, that draws all to agree, And drawn supports, upheld by God, or Thee?” – Alexander Pope (From “An Essay on Man”)

“Then say not Man’s imperfect, Heav’n in fault; Say rather, Man’s as perfect as he ought.” – Alexander Pope (From “An Essay on Man”)

“All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body Nature is, and God the soul.” – Alexander Pope (From “An Essay on Man”)

Awake, my St. John! leave all meaner things

To low ambition, and the pride of kings., let us (since life can little more supply, than just to look about us and die), expatiate free o’er all this scene of man;, a mighty maze but not without a plan;, a wild, where weed and flow’rs promiscuous shoot;, or garden, tempting with forbidden fruit., together let us beat this ample field,, try what the open, what the covert yield;, the latent tracts, the giddy heights explore, of all who blindly creep, or sightless soar;, eye nature’s walks, shoot folly as it flies,, and catch the manners living as they rise;, laugh where we must, be candid where we can;, but vindicate the ways of god to man. (pope 1-16), background on alexander pope.

Alexander Pope is a British poet who was born in London, England in 1688 (World Biography 1). Growing up during the Augustan Age, his poetry is heavily influenced by common literary qualities of that time, which include classical influence, the importance of human reason and the rules of nature. These qualities are widely represented in Pope’s poetry. Some of Pope’s most notable works are “The Rape of the Lock,” “An Essay on Criticism,” and “An Essay on Man.”

Overview of “An Essay on Man”

“An Essay on Man” was published in 1734 and contained very deep and well thought out philosophical ideas. It is said that these ideas were partially influenced by his friend, Henry St. John Bolingbroke, who Pope addresses in the first line of Epistle I when he says, “Awake, my St. John!”(Pope 1)(World Biography 1) The purpose of the poem is to address the role of humans as part of the “Great Chain of Being.” In other words, it speaks of man as just one small part of an unfathomably complex universe. Pope urges us to learn from what is around us, what we can observe ourselves in nature, and to not pry into God’s business or question his ways; For everything that happens, both good and bad, happens for a reason. This idea is summed up in the very last lines of the poem when he says, “And, Spite of pride in erring reason’s spite, / One truth is clear, Whatever IS, is RIGHT.”(Pope 293-294) The poem is broken up into four epistles each of which is labeled as its own subcategory of the overall work. They are as follows:

• Epistle I – Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to the Universe
• Epistle II – Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to Himself, as an Individual
• Epistle III – Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to Society
• Epistle IV – Of the Nature and State of Man with Respect to Happiness

Epistle 1 Intro In the introduction to Pope’s first Epistle, he summarizes the central thesis of his essay in the last line. The purpose of “An Essay on Man” is then to shift or enhance the reader’s perception of what is natural or correct. By doing this, one would justify the happenings of life, and the workings of God, for there is a reason behind all things that is beyond human understanding. Pope’s endeavor to highlight the infallibility of nature is a key aspect of the Augustan period in literature; a poet’s goal was to convey truth by creating a mirror image of nature. This is envisaged in line 13 when, keeping with the hunting motif, Pope advises his reader to study the behaviors of Nature (as hunter would watch his prey), and to rid of all follies, which we can assume includes all that is unnatural. He also encourages the exploration of one’s surroundings, which provides for a gateway to new discoveries and understandings of our purpose here on Earth. Furthermore, in line 12, Pope hints towards vital middle ground on which we are above beats and below a higher power(s). Those who “blindly creep” are consumed by laziness and a willful ignorance, and just as bad are those who “sightless soar” and believe that they understand more than they can possibly know. Thus, it is imperative that we can strive to gain knowledge while maintaining an acceptance of our mental limits.

1. Pope writes the first section to put the reader into the perspective that he believes to yield the correct view of the universe. He stresses the fact that we can only understand things based on what is around us, embodying the relationship with empiricism that characterizes the Augustan era. He encourages the discovery of new things while remaining within the bounds one has been given. These bounds, or the Chain of Being, designate each living thing’s place in the universe, and only God can see the system in full. Pope is adamant in God’s omniscience, and uses that as a sure sign that we can never reach a level of knowledge comparable to His. In the last line however, he questions whether God or man plays a bigger role in maintaining the chain once it is established.

2. The overarching message in section two is envisaged in one of the last couplets: “Then say not Man’s imperfect, Heav’n in fault; Say rather, Man’s as perfect as he ought.” Pope utilizes this section to explain the folly of “Presumptuous Man,” for the fact that we tend to dwell on our limitations rather than capitalize on our abilities. He emphasizes the rightness of our place in the chain of being, for just as we steer the lives of lesser creatures, God has the ability to pilot our fate. Furthermore, he asserts that because we can only analyze what is around us, we cannot be sure that there is not a greater being or sphere beyond our level of comprehension; it is most logical to perceive the universe as functioning through a hierarchal system.

3. Pope utilizes the beginning of section three to elaborate on the functions of the chain of being. He claims that each creatures’ ignorance, including our own, allows for a full and happy life without the possible burden of understanding our fates. Instead of consuming ourselves with what we cannot know, we instead should place hope in a peaceful “life to come.” Pope connects this after-life to the soul, and colors it with a new focus on a more primitive people, “the Indian,” whose souls have not been distracted by power or greed. As humble and level headed beings, Indian’s, and those who have similar beliefs, see life as the ultimate gift and have no vain desires of becoming greater than Man ought to be.

4. In the fourth stanza, Pope warns against the negative effects of excessive pride. He places his primary examples in those who audaciously judge the work of God and declare one person to be too fortunate and another not fortunate enough. He also satirizes Man’s selfish content in destroying other creatures for his own benefit, while complaining when they believe God to be unjust to Man. Pope capitalizes on his point with the final and resonating couplet: “who but wishes to invert the laws of order, sins against th’ Eternal Cause.” This connects to the previous stanza in which the soul is explored; those who wrestle with their place in the universe will disturb the chain of being and warrant punishment instead of gain rewards in the after-life.

5. In the beginning of the fifth stanza, Pope personifies Pride and provides selfish answers to questions regarding the state of the universe. He depicts Pride as a hoarder of all gifts that Nature yields. The image of Nature as a benefactor and Man as her avaricious recipient is countered in the next set of lines: Pope instead entertains the possible faults of Nature in natural disasters such as earthquakes and storms. However, he denies this possibility on the grounds that there is a larger purpose behind all happenings and that God acts by “general laws.” Finally, Pope considers the emergence of evil in human nature and concludes that we are not in a place that allows us to explain such things–blaming God for human misdeeds is again an act of pride.

6. Stanza six connects the different inhabitants of the earth to their rightful place and shows why things are the way they should be. After highlighting the happiness in which most creatures live, Pope facetiously questions if God is unkind to man alone. He asks this because man consistently yearns for the abilities specific to those outside of his sphere, and in that way can never be content in his existence. Pope counters the notorious greed of Man by illustrating the pointless emptiness that would accompany a world in which Man was omnipotent. Furthermore, he describes a blissful lifestyle as one centered around one’s own sphere, without the distraction of seeking unattainable heights.

7. The seventh stanza explores the vastness of the sensory and cognitive spectrums in relation to all earthly creatures. Pope uses an example related to each of the five senses to conjure an image that emphasizes the intricacies with which all things are tailored. For instance, he references a bee’s sensitivity, which allows it to collect only that which is beneficial amid dangerous substances. Pope then moves to the differences in mental abilities along the chain of being. These mental functions are broken down into instinct, reflection, memory, and reason. Pope believes reason to trump all, which of course is the one function specific to Man. Reason thus allows man to synthesize the means to function in ways that are unnatural to himself.

8. In section 8 Pope emphasizes the depths to which the universe extends in all aspects of life. This includes the literal depths of the ocean and the reversed extent of the sky, as well as the vastness that lies between God and Man and Man and the simpler creatures of the earth. Regardless of one’s place in the chain of being however, the removal of one link creates just as much of an impact as any other. Pope stresses the maintenance of order so as to prevent the breaking down of the universe.

9. In the ninth stanza, Pope once again puts the pride and greed of man into perspective. He compares man’s complaints of being subordinate to God to an eye or an ear rejecting its service to the mind. This image drives home the point that all things are specifically designed to ensure that the universe functions properly. Pope ends this stanza with the Augustan belief that Nature permeates all things, and thus constitutes the body of the world, where God characterizes the soul.

10. In the tenth stanza, Pope secures the end of Epistle 1 by advising the reader on how to secure as many blessings as possible, whether that be on earth or in the after life. He highlights the impudence in viewing God’s order as imperfect and emphasizes the fact that true bliss can only be experienced through an acceptance of one’s necessary weaknesses. Pope exemplifies this acceptance of weakness in the last lines of Epistle 1 in which he considers the incomprehensible, whether seemingly miraculous or disastrous, to at least be correct, if nothing else.

1. Epistle II is broken up into six smaller sections, each of which has a specific focus. The first section explains that man must not look to God for answers to the great questions of life, for he will never find the answers. As was explained in the first epistle, man is incapable of truly knowing anything about the things that are higher than he is on the “Great Chain of Being.” For this reason, the way to achieve the greatest knowledge possible is to study man, the greatest thing we have the ability to comprehend. Pope emphasizes the complexity of man in an effort to show that understanding of anything greater than that would simply be too much for any person to fully comprehend. He explains this complexity with lines such as, “Created half to rise, and half to fall; / Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all / Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl’d: / The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!”(15-18) These lines say that we are created for two purposes, to live and die. We are the most intellectual creatures on Earth, and while we have control over most things, we are still set up to die in some way by the end. We are a great gift of God to the Earth with enormous capabilities, yet in the end we really amount to nothing. Pope describes this contrast between our intellectual capabilities and our inevitable fate as a “riddle” of the world. The first section of Epistle II closes by saying that man is to go out and study what is around him. He is to study science to understand all that he can about his existence and the universe in which he lives, but to fully achieve this knowledge he must rid himself of all vices that may slow down this process.

2. The second section of Epistle II tells of the two principles of human nature and how they are to perfectly balance each other out in order for man to achieve all that he is capable of achieving. These two principles are self-love and reason. He explains that all good things can be attributed to the proper use of these two principles and that all bad things stem from their improper use. Pope further discusses the two principles by claiming that self-love is what causes man to do what he desires, but reason is what allows him to know how to stay in line. He follows that with an interesting comparison of man to a flower by saying man is “Fix’d like a plant on his peculiar spot, / To draw nutrition, propagate and rot,” (Pope 62-63) and also of man to a meteor by saying, “Or, meteor-like, flame lawless thro’ the void, / Destroying others, by himself destroy’d.” (Pope 64-65) These comparisons show that man, according to Pope, is born, takes his toll on the Earth, and then dies, and it is all part of a larger plan. The rest of section two continues to talk about the relationship between self-love and reason and closes with a strong argument. Humans all seek pleasure, but only with a good sense of reason can they restrain themselves from becoming greedy. His final remarks are strong, stating that, “Pleasure, or wrong or rightly understood, / Our greatest evil, or our greatest good,”(Pope 90-91) which means that pleasure in moderation can be a great thing for man, but without the balance that reason produces, a pursuit of pleasure can have terrible consequences.

3. Part III of Epistle II also pertains to the idea of self-love and reason working together. It starts out talking about passions and how they are inherently selfish, but if the means to which these passions are sought out are fair, then there has been a proper balance of self-love and reason. Pope describes love, hope and joy as being “Fair treasure’s smiling train,”(Pope 117) while hate, fear and grief are “The family of pain.”(Pope 118) Too much of any of these things, whether they be from the negative or positive side, is a bad thing. There is a ratio of good to bad that man must reach to have a well balanced mind. We learn, grow, and gain character and perspective through the elements of this “Family of pain,”(Pope 118) while we get great rewards from love, hope and joy. While our goal as humans is to seek our pleasure and follow certain desires, there is always one overall passion that lives deep within us that guides us throughout life. The main points to take away from Section III of this Epistle is that there are many aspects to the life of man, and these aspects, both positive and negative, need to coexist harmoniously to achieve that balance for which man should strive.

4. The fourth section of Epistle II is very short. It starts off by asking what allows us to determine the difference between good and bad. The next line answers this question by saying that it is the God within our minds that allows us to make such judgements. This section finishes up by discussing virtue and vice. The relationship between these two qualities are interesting, for they can exist on their own but most often mix, and there is a fine line between something being a virtue and becoming a vice.

5. Section V is even shorter than section IV with just fourteen lines. It speaks only of the quality of vice. Vices are temptations that man must face on a consistent basis. A line that stands out from this says that when it comes to vices, “We first endure, then pity, then embrace.”(Pope 218) This means that vices start off as something we know is wrong, but over time they become an instinctive part of us if reason is not there to push them away.

6. Section VI, the final section of Epistle II, relates many of the ideas from Sections I-V back to ideas from Epistle I. It works as a conclusion that ties in the main theme of Epistle II, which mainly speaks of the different components of man that balance each other out to form an infinitely complex creature, into the idea from Epistle I that man is created as part of a larger plan with all of his qualities given to him for a specific purpose. It is a way of looking at both negative and positive aspects of life and being content with them both, for they are all part of God’s purpose of creating the universe. This idea is well concluded in the third to last line of this Epistle when Pope says, “Ev’n mean self-love becomes, by force divine.”(Pope 288) This shows that even a negative quality in a man, such as excessive self-love without the stability of reason, is technically divine, for it is what God intended as part of the balance of the universe.

Contributors

• Dan Connolly
• Nicole Petrone

“Alexander Pope.” : The Poetry Foundation . N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2013. < http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/alexander-pope >.

“Alexander Pope Photos.” Rugu RSS . N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2013. < http://www.rugusavay.com/alexander-pope-photos/ >.

“An Essay on Man: Epistle 1 by Alexander Pope • 81 Poems by Alexander PopeEdit.” An Essay on Man: Epistle 1 by Alexander Pope Classic Famous Poet . N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2013. < http://allpoetry.com/poem/8448567-An_Essay_on_Man_Epistle_1-by-Alexander_Pope >.

“An Essay on Man: Epistle II.” By Alexander Pope : The Poetry Foundation. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2013. < http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/174166 >.

“Benjamin Franklin’s Mastodon Tooth.” About.com Archaeology . N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2013. < http://archaeology.about.com/od/artandartifacts/ss/franklin_4.htm >.

“First Edition of An Essay on Man by Alexander Pope Offered by The Manhattan Rare Book Company.” First Edition of An Essay on Man by Alexander Pope Offered by The Manhattan Rare Book Company. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 May 2013. < http://www.manhattanrarebooks- literature.com/pope_essay.htm>.

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Ernst Cassirer

Ernst Cassirer occupies a unique place in twentieth-century philosophy. His work pays equal attention to foundational and epistemological issues in the philosophy of mathematics and natural science and to aesthetics, the philosophy of history, and other issues in the “cultural sciences” broadly conceived. More than any other German philosopher since Kant, Cassirer thus aims to devote equal philosophical attention both to the (mathematical and) natural sciences ( Naturwissenschaften ) and to the more humanistic disciplines ( Geisteswissenschaften ). In this way, Cassirer, more than any other twentieth-century philosopher, plays a fundamental mediating role between C. P. Snow’s famous “two cultures.” He also plays a similarly mediating role between the two major traditions in twentieth-century academic philosophy – the “analytic” and “continental” traditions – whose radically different (and often mutually uncomprehending) perspectives on the relationship between scientific and humanistic elements in their subject gave rise to a fundamental split or gulf between philosophy as it came to be practiced in the Anglo-American world, on the one side, and as it was practiced in most of the rest of the world, on the other. Cassirer, by contrast, had fruitful philosophical relations with leading members of both traditions – with Moritz Schlick, the founder and guiding spirit of the Vienna Circle of logical empiricists, whose work in logic and the philosophy of science had a decisive influence on the development of philosophy in the United States, and with Martin Heidegger, the creator of a radical “existential-hermeneutical” version of Husserlian phenomenology which quickly became dominant in continental Europe.

1. Biography

2. early historical writings, 3. philosophy of mathematics and natural science, 4. the philosophy of symbolic forms, 5. cassirer, hegel and the cultural sciences, 6. the myth of the state, selected works by cassirer, secondary and other relevant literature, other internet resources, related entries.

Cassirer was born on July 28, 1874 to a wealthy and cosmopolitan Jewish family,in the German city of Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland). Part of the family lived in Berlin, including Cassirer’s cousin Bruno Cassirer, the distinguished publisher, who later published most of Cassirer’s writings. Cassirer entered the University of Berlin in 1892. In 1894 he took a course on Kant with Georg Simmel, who recommended Hermann Cohen’s writings on Kant in particular. Cohen, the first Jew to hold a professorship in Germany, was the founder of the so-called Marburg School of neo-Kantianism, famous for interpreting Kant’s transcendental method as beginning with the “fact of science” and then arguing regressively to the presuppositions or conditions of possibility of this “fact.” Kant was thus read as an “epistemologist [ Erkenntniskritiker ]” or methodologist of science rather than as a “metaphysician” in the tradition of post-Kantian German idealism. After learning of Cohen’s writings from Simmel, Cassirer (then nineteen years old) proceeded to devour them, whereupon he immediately resolved to study with Cohen at Marburg. He studied at Marburg from 1896 to 1899, when he completed his doctoral work with a dissertation on Descartes’s analysis of mathematical and natural scientific knowledge. This appeared, in turn, as the Introduction to Cassirer’s first published work, a treatment of Leibniz’s philosophy and its scientific basis [Cassirer 1902]. Upon returning to Berlin in 1903, Cassirer further developed these themes while working out his monumental interpretation of the development of modern philosophy and science from the Renaissance through Kant [Cassirer 1906, 1907a]. The first volume of this work served as his habilitation at the University of Berlin, where he taught as an instructor or Privatdozent from 1906 to 1919.

In 1919 Cassirer was finally offered professorships at two newly founded universities at Frankfurt and Hamburg under the auspices of the Weimar Republic. He taught at Hamburg from 1919 until emigrating from Germany in 1933. During these years Cassirer completed his three-volume Philosophy of Symbolic Forms [Cassirer 1923, 1925, 1929b], which broke fundamental new ground beyond the neo-Kantianism of the Marburg School and articulated his own original attempt to unite scientific and non-scientific modes of thought (“symbolic forms”) within a single philosophical vision. In 1928 Cassirer offered a defense of Weimar [Cassirer 1929a] at the University’s celebration of the tenth anniversary of the Republic, and in 1929–30 he served as the rector of the University, as the first Jew to hold such a position in Germany. In the Spring of 1929 Cassirer took part in a famous disputation with Martin Heidegger in Davos, Switzerland, where Heidegger explicitly took Cohen’s neo-Kantianism as a philosophical target and defended his radical new conception of an “existential analytic of Dasein” in the guise of a parallel interpretation of the philosophy of Kant [Heidegger 1929]. Cassirer, for his part, defended his own new understanding of Kant in the philosophy of symbolic forms – against Heidegger’s insistence on the ineluctability of human finitude – by appealing to genuinely objectively valid, necessary and eternal truths arising in both moral experience and mathematical natural science (see [Friedman 2000] [Gordon 2010]).

After his emigration Cassirer spent two years lecturing at Oxford and then six years at the University of Göteborg in Sweden. During this time he developed his most sustained discussion of morality and the philosophy of law as a study of the Swedish legal philosopher Axel Hägerström [Cassirer 1939a] (see [Krois 1987, chap. 4]). He also articulated his major statement on the relationship between the natural sciences and the “cultural sciences” [Cassirer 1942], which contained, among other things, an explicit rejection of Rudolf Carnap’s “physicalism” (see [Friedman 2000, chap. 7]). Cassirer, like so many German émigrés during this period (including Carnap) then finally settled in the United States. He taught at Yale from 1941 to 1944 and at Columbia in 1944–45. During these years he produced two books in English [Cassirer 1944, 1946], where the first, An Essay on Man , serves as a concise introduction to the philosophy of symbolic forms (and thus Cassirer’s distinctive philosophical perspective) as a whole and the second, The Myth of the State , offers an explanation of the rise of fascism on the basis of Cassirer’s conception of mythical thought. Two important American philosophers were substantially influenced by Cassirer during these years: Arthur Pap, whose work on the “functional a priori” in physical theory [Pap 1946] took shape under Cassirer’s guidance at Yale, and Susanne Langer, who promulgated Cassirer’s philosophy of symbolic forms in aesthetic and literary circles (see, e.g., [Langer 1942]). Cassirer’s American influence thus embraced both sides of his philosophical personality. One can only speculate on what this influence might have been if his life had not been cut short suddenly by a heart attack while walking on the streets of New York City on April 13, 1945.

As indicated above, Cassirer’s first writings were largely historical in character – including a discussion of Leibniz’s philosophy in its scientific context [Cassirer 1902] and a large-scale work on the history of modern thought from the Renaissance through Kant, Das Erkenntnisproblem in der Philosophie und Wissenschaft der neueren Zeit [Cassirer 1906, 1907a]. The latter, in particular, is a magisterial and deeply original contribution to both the history of philosophy and the history of science. It is the first work, in fact, to develop a detailed reading of the scientific revolution as a whole in terms of the “Platonic” idea that the thoroughgoing application of mathematics to nature (the so-called mathematization of nature) is the central and overarching achievement of this revolution. And Cassirer’s insight was explicitly acknowledged by such seminal intellectual historians as E. A. Burtt, E. J. Dijksterhuis, and Alexandre Koyré, who developed this theme later in the century in the course of establishing the discipline of history of science as we know it today (see, e.g., [Burtt 1925], [Koyré 1939], [Dijksterhuis 1959]). Cassirer, for his part, simultaneously articulates an interpretation of the history of modern philosophy as the development and eventual triumph of what he calls “modern philosophical idealism.” This tradition takes its inspiration, according to Cassirer, from idealism in the Platonic sense, from an appreciation for the “ideal” formal structures paradigmatically studied in mathematics, and it is distinctively modern in recognizing the fundamental importance of the systematic application of such structures to empirically given nature in modern mathematical physics – a progressive and synthetic process wherein mathematical models of nature are successively refined and corrected without limit. For Cassirer, it is Galileo, above all, in opposition to both sterile Aristotelian-Scholastic formal logic and sterile Aristotelian-Scholastic empirical induction, who first grasped the essential structure of this synthetic process; and the development of “modern philosophical idealism” by such thinkers as Descartes, Spinoza, Gassendi, Hobbes, Leibniz, and Kant then consists in its increasingly self-conscious philosophical articulation and elaboration.

In both the Leibniz book and Das Erkenntnisproblem , then, Cassirer interprets the development of modern thought as a whole from the perspective of the basic philosophical principles of Marburg neo-Kantianism: the idea that philosophy as epistemology ( Erkenntniskritik ) has the articulation and elaboration of the structure of modern mathematical natural science as its primary task; the conviction that, accordingly, philosophy must take the “fact of science” as its starting point and ultimately given datum; and, most especially, the so-called “genetic” conception of scientific knowledge as an ongoing, never completed synthetic process (see below). From a contemporary point of view, Cassirer’s history may therefore appear as both “Whiggish” and “triumphalist,” but it cannot be denied that his work is, nevertheless, extraordinarily rich, extraordinarily clear, and extraordinarily illuminating. Cassirer examines an astonishing variety of textual sources (including both major and minor figures) carefully and in detail, and, without at all neglecting contrary tendencies within the skeptical and empiricist traditions, he develops a compelling portrayal of the evolution of “modern philosophical idealism” through Kant which, even today, reads as extremely compelling and acute.

Cassirer must thus be ranked as one of the very greatest intellectual historians of the twentieth-century – and, indeed, as one of the founders of this discipline as it came to be practiced after 1900. He continued to contribute to intellectual history broadly conceived throughout his career (most notably, perhaps, in his fundamental studies of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment [Cassirer 1927a, 1932]), and he had a major influence on intellectual history throughout the century. Aside from the history of science (see above), Cassirer also decisively influenced intellectual historians more generally, including, notably, the eminent intellectual and cultural historian Peter Gay and the distinguished art historian Erwin Panofsky (see, e.g., [Gay 1977], [Panofsky 1939]). As we shall see below, intellectual (and later cultural) history is an integral part of Cassirer’s distinctive philosophical methodology, so that, in his case, the standard distinction between “historical” and “systematic” work in philosophy ends up looking quite artificial.

It was noted above that Cassirer’s early historical works interpret the development of modern thought as a whole (embracing both philosophy and the sciences) from the perspective of the philosophical principles of Marburg neo-Kantianism, as initially articulated in [Cohen 1871]. On the “genetic” conception of scientific knowledge, in particular, the a priori synthetic activity of thought – the activity Kant himself had called “productive synthesis” – is understood as a temporal and historical developmental process in which the object of science is gradually and successively constituted as a never completed “X” towards which the developmental process is converging. For Cohen, this process is modelled on the methods of the infinitesimal calculus (in this connection, especially, see [Cohen 1883]). Beginning with the idea of a continuous series or function, our problem is to see how such a series can be a priori generated step-by-step. The mathematical concept of a differential shows us how this can be done, for the differential at a point in the domain of a given function indicates how it is to be continued on succeeding points. The differential therefore infinitesimally captures the rule of the series as a whole, and thus expresses, at any given point or moment of time, the general form of the series valid for all times,

Cassirer’s first “systematic” work, Substance and Function [Cassirer 1910], takes an essential philosophical step beyond Cohen by explicitly engaging with the late nineteenth-century developments in the foundations of mathematics and mathematical logic that exerted a profound influence on twentieth-century philosophy of mathematics and natural science. Cassirer begins by discussing the problem of concept formation, and by criticizing, in particular, the “abstractionist” theory characteristic of philosophical empiricism, according to which general concepts are arrived at by ascending inductively from sensory particulars. This theory, for Cassirer, is an artifact of traditional Aristotelian logic; and his main idea, accordingly, is that developments in modern formal logic (the mathematical theory of relations) allows us definitively to reject such abstractionism (and thus philosophical empiricism) on behalf of the genetic conception of knowledge. In particular, the modern axiomatic conception of mathematics, as exemplified especially in Richard Dedekind’s work on the foundations of arithmetic and David Hilbert’s work on the foundations of geometry, has shown that mathematics itself has a purely formal and ideal, and thus entirely non-sensible meaning. Pure mathematics describes abstract “systems of order” – what we would now call relational structures – whose concepts can in no way be accommodated within abstractionist or inductivist philosophical empiricism. Cassirer then employs this “formalist” conception of mathematics characteristic of the late nineteenth century to craft a new, and more abstract, version of the genetic conception of knowledge. We conceive the developmental process in question as a series or sequence of abstract formal structures (“systems of order”), which is itself ordered by the abstract mathematical relation of approximate backwards-directed inclusion (as, for example, the new non-Euclidean geometries contain the older geometry of Euclid as a continuously approximated limiting case). In this way, we can conceive all the structures in our sequence as continuously converging, as it were, on a final or limit structure, such that all previous structures in the sequence are approximate special or limiting cases of this final structure. The idea of such an endpoint of the sequence is only a regulative ideal in the Kantian sense – it is only progressively approximated but never in fact actually realized. Nevertheless, it still constitutes the a priori “general serial form” of our properly empirical mathematical theorizing, and, at the same time, it bestows on this theorizing its characteristic form of objectivity.

In explicitly embracing late nineteenth-century work on the foundations of mathematics, Cassirer comes into very close proximity with early twentieth-century analytic philosophy. Indeed, Cassirer takes the modern mathematical logic implicit in the work of Dedekind and Hilbert, and explicit in the work of Gottlob Frege and the early Bertrand Russell, as providing us with our primary tool for moving beyond the empiricist abstractionism due ultimately to Aristotelian syllogistic. The modern “theory of the concept,” accordingly, is based on the fundamental notions of function, series, and order (relational structure) – where these notions, from the point of view of pure mathematics and pure logic, are entirely formal and abstract, having no intuitive relation, in particular, to either space or time. Nevertheless, and here is where Cassirer diverges from most of the analytic tradition, this modern theory of the concept only provides us with a genuine and complete alternative to Aristotelian abstractionism and philosophical empiricism when it is embedded within the genetic conception of knowledge. What is primary is the generative historical process by which modern mathematical natural science successively develops or evolves, and pure mathematics and pure logic only have philosophical significance as elements of or abstractions from this more fundamental developmental process of “productive synthesis” aimed at the application of such pure formal structures in empirical knowledge (see especially [Cassirer 1907b]).

Cassirer’s next important contribution to scientific epistemology [Cassirer 1921] explores the relationship between Einstein’s general theory of relativity and the “critical” (Marburg neo-Kantian) conception of knowledge. Cassirer argues that Einstein’s theory in fact stands as a brilliant confirmation of this conception. On the one hand, the increasing use of abstract mathematical representations in Einstein’s theory entirely supports the attack on Aristotelian abstractionism and philosophical empiricism. On the other hand, however, Einstein’s use of non-Euclidean geometry presents no obstacle at all to our purified and generalized form of (neo-)Kantianism. For we no longer require that any particular mathematical structure be fixed for all time, but only that the historical-developmental sequence of such structures continuously converge. Einstein’s theory satisfies this requirement perfectly well, since the Euclidean geometry fundamental to Newtonian physics is indeed contained in the more general geometry (of variable curvature) employed by Einstein as an approximate special case (as the regions considered become infinitely small, for example). Moritz Schlick published a review of Cassirer’s book immediately after its first appearance [Schlick 1921], taking the occasion to argue (what later became a prominent theme in the philosophy of logical empiricism) that Einstein’s theory of relativity provides us with a decisive refutation of Kantianism in all of its forms. This review marked the beginnings of a respectful philosophical exchange between the two, as noted above, and it was continued, in the context of Cassirer’s later work on the philosophy of symbolic forms, in [Cassirer 1927b] (see [Friedman 2000, chap. 7]).

Cassirer’s assimilation of Einstein’s general theory of relativity marked a watershed in the development of his thought. It not only gave him an opportunity, as we have just seen, to reinterpret the Kantian theory of the a priori conditions of objective experience (especially as involving space and time) in terms of Cassirer’s own version of the genetic conception of knowledge, but it also provided him with an impetus to generalize and extend the original Marburg view in such a way that modern mathematical scientific knowledge in general is now seen as just one possible “symbolic form” among other equally valid and legitimate such forms. Indeed, [Cassirer 1921] first officially announces the project of a general “philosophy of symbolic forms,” conceived, in this context, as a philosophical extension of “the general postulate of relativity.” Just as, according to the general postulate of relativity, all possible reference frames and coordinate systems are viewed as equally good representations of physical reality, and, as a totality, are together interrelated and embraced by precisely this postulate, similarly the totality of “symbolic forms” – aesthetic, ethical, religious, scientific – are here envisioned by Cassirer as standing in a closely analogous relationship. So it is no wonder that, subsequent to taking up the professorship at Hamburg in 1919, Cassirer devotes the rest of his career to this new philosophy of symbolic forms. (Cassirer’s work in the philosophy of natural science in particular also continued, notably in [Cassirer 1936].)

At Hamburg Cassirer found a tremendous resource for the next stage in his philosophical development – the Library of the Cultural Sciences founded by Aby Warburg. Warburg was an eminent art historian with a particular interest in ancient cult, ritual, myth, and magic as sources of archetypal forms of emotional expression later manifested in Renaissance art, and the Library therefore contained abundant materials both on artistic and cultural history and on ancient myth and ritual. Cassirer’s earliest works on the philosophy of symbolic forms appeared as studies and lectures of the Warburg Library in the years 1922–1925, and the three-volume Philosophy of Symbolic Forms itself appeared, as noted above, in 1923, 1925, and 1929 respectively. Just as the genetic conception of knowledge is primarily oriented towards the “fact of science” and, accordingly, takes the historical development of scientific knowledge as its ultimate given datum, the philosophy of symbolic forms is oriented towards the much more general “fact of culture” and thus takes the history of human culture as a whole as its ultimate given datum. The conception of human beings as most fundamentally “symbolic animals,” interposing systems of signs or systems of expression between themselves and the world, then becomes the guiding philosophical motif for elucidating the corresponding conditions of possibility for the “fact of culture” in all of its richness and diversity.

Characteristic of the philosophy of symbolic forms is a concern for the more “primitive” forms of world-presentation underlying the “higher” and more sophisticated cultural forms – a concern for the ordinary perceptual awareness of the world expressed primarily in natural language, and, above all, for the mythical view of the world lying at the most primitive level of all. For Cassirer, these more primitive manifestations of “symbolic meaning” now have an independent status and foundational role that is quite incompatible with both Marburg neo-Kantianism and Kant’s original philosophical conception. In particular, they lie at a deeper, autonomous level of spiritual life which then gives rise to the more sophisticated forms by a dialectical developmental process. From mythical thought, religion and art develop; from natural language, theoretical science develops. It is precisely here that Cassirer appeals to “romantic” philosophical tendencies lying outside the Kantian and neo-Kantian tradition, deploys an historical dialectic self-consciously derived from Hegel, and comes to terms with the contemporary Lebensphilosophie of Wilhelm Dilthey, Henri Bergson, Max Scheler, and Georg Simmel – as well as with the closely related philosophy of Martin Heidegger.

The most basic and primitive type of symbolic meaning is expressive meaning, the product of what Cassirer calls the expressive function ( Ausdrucksfunktion ) of thought, which is concerned with the experience of events in the world around us as charged with affective and emotional significance, as desirable or hateful, comforting or threatening. It is this type of meaning that underlies mythical consciousness, for Cassirer, and which explains its most distinctive feature, namely, its total disregard for the distinction between appearance and reality. Since the mythical world does not consist of stable and enduring substances that manifest themselves from various points of view and on various occasions, but rather in a fleeting complex of events bound together by their affective and emotional “physiognomic” characters, it also exemplifies its own particular type of causality whereby each part literally contains the whole of which it is a part and can thereby exert all the causal efficacy of the whole. Similarly, there is no essential difference in efficacy between the living and the dead, between waking experiences and dreams, between the name of an object and the object itself, and so on. The fundamental Kantian “categories” of space, time, substance (or object), and causality thereby take on a distinctive configuration representing the formal a priori structure, as it were, of mythical thought.

What Cassirer calls representative symbolic meaning, a product of the representative function ( Darstellungsfunktion ) of thought, then has the task of precipitating out of the original mythical flux of “physiognomic” characters a world of stable and enduring substances, distinguishable and reidentifiable as such. Working together with the fundamentally pragmatic orientation towards the world exhibited in the technical and instrumental use of tools and artifacts, it is in natural language, according to Cassirer, that the representative function of thought is then most clearly visible. For it is primarily through the medium of natural language that we construct the “intuitive world” of ordinary sense perception on the basis of what Cassirer calls intuitive space and intuitive time. The demonstrative particles (later articles) and tenses of natural language specify the locations of perceived objects in relation to the changing spatio-temporal position of the speaker (relative to a “here-and-now”), and a unified spatio-temporal order thus arises in which each designated object has a determinate relation to the speaker, his/her point of view, and his/her potential range of pragmatic activities. We are now able to distinguish the enduring thing-substance, on the one side, from its variable manifestations from different points of view and on different occasions, on the other, and we thereby arrive at a new fundamental distinction between appearance and reality. This distinction is then expressed in its most developed form, for Cassirer, in the linguistic notion of propositional truth and thus in the propositional copula. Here the Kantian “categories” of space, time, substance, and causality take on a distinctively intuitive or “presentational” configuration.

The distinction between appearance and reality, as expressed in the propositional copula, then leads dialectically to a new task of thought, the task of theoretical science, of systematic inquiry into the realm of truths. Here we encounter the third and final function of symbolic meaning, the significative function ( Bedeutungsfunktion ), which is exhibited most clearly, according to Cassirer, in the “pure category of relation.” For it is precisely here, in the scientific view of the world, that the pure relational concepts characteristic of modern mathematics, logic, and mathematical physics are finally freed from the bounds of sensible intuition. For example, mathematical space and time arise from intuitive space and time when we abstract from all demonstrative relation to a “here-and-now” and consider instead the single system of relations in which all possible “here-and-now”-points are embedded; the mathematical system of the natural numbers arises when we abstract from all concrete applications of counting and consider instead the single potentially infinite progression wherein all possible applications of counting are comprehended; and so on. The eventual result is the world of modern mathematical physics described in Cassirer’s earlier scientific works – a pure system of formal relations where, in particular, the intuitive concept of substantial thing has finally been replaced by the relational-functional concept of universal law. So it is here, and only here, that the generalized and purified form of (neo-)Kantianism distinctive of the Marburg School gives an accurate characterization of human thought. This characterization is now seen as a one-sided abstraction from a much more comprehensive dialectical process which can no longer be adequately understood without paying equal attention to its more concrete and intuitive symbolic manifestations; and it is in precisely this way, in the end, that the Marburg “fact of science” is now firmly embedded within the much more general “fact of culture” as a whole.

Cassirer emphasizes the kinship between his Philosophy of Symbolic Forms and Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit in the Prefaces to both the second (1925) and third (1929) volumes. Recent commentators ([Skidelsky 2008] [Moss 2015]) have illuminatingly built on this circumstance in further articulating the relationship between Cassirer and Hegel. Considerable light is shed on this relationship by Cassirer’s treatment of the problem of the Naturwissenschaften and Geisteswissenschaften in The Logic of the Cultural Sciences (1942). We shall return to this situation in the next section.

Hegel had conceived nature ( Natur ) and spirit ( Geist ) as two different expressions of a single divine infinite Reason, which manifests itself temporally from two different points of view. His project of an encyclopedia of philosophical sciences had three parts, the logic, the philosophy of nature, and the philosophy of spirit, where the logic had the task of depicting the dialectical conceptual structure of infinite divine Reason itself. But this Hegelian project for securing the ultimate logico-metaphysical identity of nature and spirit found ever fewer followers as the century progressed, as the rising tide of neo-Kantianism – aided by further developments within the natural sciences instigated by Hermann von Helmholtz – undermined the appeal of the original Naturphilosophie of Schelling and Hegel together with their Absolute Reason. The result was the problem of the Naturwissenschaften and Geisteswissenschaften as it presented itself to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. [Cassirer 1942] develops a characteristically methodological perspective on this problem by treating both disciplines as empirical rather than “speculative” sciences (in the sense of Schelling and Hegel) and elucidating their methodological relationship within the philosophy of symbolic forms.

[Cassirer 1942] argues that the empirical evidential basis for the cultural sciences starts from the same realm of perceived physical objects and processes distributed in space and time as do the natural sciences – in this case documents, artifacts, rituals, performances – but it goes on to imbue them with a symbolic “sense” or “meaning” that is not at issue in the natural sciences. We must distinguish, in particular, between the representative function ( Darstellungsfunktion ) and the expressive function ( Ausdrucksfunktion ) of thought, and only a prejudice privileging “thing perception [ Dingwahrnehmen ]” over “expressive perception [ Ausdruckswahrnehmen ]” can support the idea that the natural sciences have a more secure evidential basis than he cultural sciences. (It is precisely this prejudice which, according to Cassirer, lies behind Carnap’s “physicalism.”) For Cassirer, by contrast, both forms of perception are equally legitimate. While the natural sciences take their evidence from the sphere of thing perception, the cultural sciences take theirs from the sphere of expressive perception – and, in the first instance, from our lived experience in a human community sharing a common system of “cultural meanings.”

Yet we also have the capacity, in the cultural sciences , to extend such meanings beyond their originally local contexts. Whereas intersubjective validity in the natural sciences rests on universal laws of nature ranging over all (physical) places and times, an analogous type of intersubjective validity arises in the cultural sciences independently of such laws. Although every “cultural object” has its own individual place in (historical) time and (geographical-cultural) space, it can still continuously approach a universal cultural meaning (in history or ethnography) as it is continually interpreted and reinterpreted from the perspective of other times and places. Universal cultural meaning thereby emerges only asymptotically, in a way similar to the genetic conception of knowledge of the Marburg School (now seen as based on the significative function of thought). Rather than an abstract mathematical relation of backwards-directed inclusion, however, we are concerned, in the historical cultural sciences, with a hermeneutical relation of backwards-directed interpretation and reinterpretation – and, as a result, there is no possibility, in these sciences, of reliably predicting the future.

We can further illuminate Cassirer’s evolving attempt to situate himself between Kant and Hegel by considering his evolving relationship to Heidegger. In the 1929 Disputation at Davos Cassirer challenged Heidegger’s radical “finitism” by appealing to the presumed necessary and eternal validity found in both the mathematical sciences and morality. And after the Disputation Cassirer added five footnotes to Being and Time (1927) in The Phenomenology of Knowledge before its publication, where he suggested that his attempt to begin the Hegelian phenomenology with mythical thought rather than ordinary sense perception could also address Heidegger’s concerns. In 1931, however, Cassirer published a review of [Heidegger 1929], which took a different approach from his remarks at Davos. Instead of primarily emphasizing the “eternal” validity found in the mathematical sciences, Cassirer now placed his main emphasis on the ethical and aesthetic dimensions of Kant’s thought, as expressed in the Critique of Practical Reason (1788) and the Critique of the Power of Judgement (1790). His main point was that, whereas the Transcendental Analytic of the Critique of Pure Reason (1781/1787) may indeed be written from the perspective of human finitude, the rest of Kant’s system embeds this perspective within a wider conception of “the intelligible substrate of humanity.”

[Cassirer 1931] mirrors his just-completed attempt to embed the Marburg genetic conception of knowledge within a wider conception of the development of human culture as a whole. The way in which Cassirer situates his new philosophy of culture with respect to both Hegel and Heidegger then illuminates his fundamental divergence from Hegel – as it came to be expressed in Cassirer’s works on history and culture after he left Germany for good in 1933. By building the Marburg conception of knowledge, in his new philosophy of culture, on top of the more primitive forms of mythical thought [ Ausdruckswahrnehmen ] and ordinary language [ Dingwahrnehmen ], Cassirer takes himself to have done justice to the insights of both Hegel and Heidegger while avoiding both the infinite divine reason of the former and the radical human finitude of the latter. Yet he has now conceded to Heidegger that Kant’s theory of human cognition involves only the notion of potential rather than actual infinity. In particular, Kant’s treatment of the regulative use of the ideas of reason from a merely theoretical point of view leaves their actual content quite indeterminate. In the case of the idea of transcendental freedom, for example, we are only able to determine it negatively (from a theoretical point of view), as a species of causality that is not bound by the conditions of time-determination governing the phenomenal world.

In the Critique of Practical Reason , however, Kant asserts that transcendental freedom acquires a determinate content from pure practical reason, through our immediate awareness of the moral law as normatively binding on our will (as a fact of reason), and that the (practical) objective reality thereby conferred on this idea can then be transferred to the ideas of God and Immortality. This is because the moral law unconditionally commands us to seek the Highest Good – the realization of the Kingdom of Ends here on earth – which is an infinite task requiring infinite (practical) faith and hope. The resulting divergence from the indeterminate and merely potential infinity arising within theoretical reason is visible in the famous passage on the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me at the end of the Critique of Practical Reason , from which Cassirer quotes in his 1931 review of Heidegger. What the Critique of the Power of Judgement adds to this conception is then the further idea that rigorous mathematical scientific understanding of the phenomenal world (“mechanistic” understanding) runs out considerably before we arrive at the history of human culture, so that the future is in principle open to the possibility of our continuously approximating the Highest Good without limit. But Cassirer, as we have just seen, has now achieved a parallel result though his methodological distinction between the natural and the cultural sciences. He is thereby in a position to replace what he takes to be the oppressive (speculative) infinity of Hegel’s Absolute Reason with the liberating (practical) infinity of our human (practical) reason. It is in this way, for Cassirer, that our cultural future always lies open and is always up to us.

In the Preface to the third volume of The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms , the Phenomenology of Knowledge (1929), Cassirer explains that his concept of phenomenology is precisely the Hegelian one [Cassirer (1929, vi–vii)]: “When I speak of a ‘ Phenomenology of Knowledge ,’ I do not align myself with modern usage, but I go back to the fundamental meaning of ‘phenomenology’ as Hegel established and systematically grounded and justified it. For Hegel phenomenology becomes the fundamental presupposition of philosophical knowledge, because he requires of the latter that it comprehend the totality of spiritual forms, and because this totality, according to him, can only be made visible in the transition from one form to another. [There follows a quote from the Preface to the effect that the individual has a right to demand that (philosophical) science provide a ladder by which to reach up to it .] It cannot be expressed more sharply that the end, the ‘telos’ of spirit cannot be grasped and expressed if one takes it as something self-subsistent, if one takes it as dissolved and separated from the beginning and the middle. Philosophical reflection does not set the end against the middle and the beginning in this way, but rather takes all three as integrating moments of a unitary total development.”

The Preface to the second volume, on Mythical Thought (1925), invokes Hegel in the same vein, while also indicating Cassirer’s remaining fundamental disagreement with him. For Hegel [Hegel (GW 9, 23)]: “Science for its part demands that self-consciousness raise itself into this ether, in order that it may live with and for science. Conversely, the individual has the right to demand that science shall at least provide him with a ladder by which to reach to this height, and show it to him in himself. This right is based on the absolute independence which he knows himself to possess in every form of knowledge; for in each form, whether it be recognized by science or not, and regardless of what its content may be, it is absolute form – that is, it is the immediate certainty of itself, and, if this term be preferred, it is therefore absolute being.”

Cassirer modifies Hegel in 1925 [Cassirer (1925, ix–x)]: “Seen in this way, the problem of myth bursts the bounds of psychology and psychologism and takes its place in that universal domain of problems which Hegel designated as ‘phenomenology of spirit.’ That myth stands to the universal task of the phenomenology of spirit in an internal and necessary relationship can be mediately derived from Hegel’s own conception and determination of this concept: ‘The spirit which … knows itself as developed spirit,’ he writes in the preface to the Phänomenologie des Geistes , ‘is science.’ [Thus begins a considerably longer quotation from (GW 9, 22–4), which concludes ‘Knowledge in its first phase, or immediate spirit , is non-spiritual, i.e., sensible consciousness .’] These propositions, in which Hegel characterizes the relationship of ‘science’ to sensible consciousness, are valid to the full extent and with full precision for the relationship of knowledge to mythical consciousness. For the proper point of departure for all becoming of science, its beginning in the immediate, lies not so much in the sphere of sensible intuition as in that of mythical [intuition]… If, therefore, in accordance with Hegel’s demand, ‘science’ is supposed to offer the ladder to natural consciousness that leads to itself, then it must set this ladder one more rung lower.”

In going beyond sensible consciousness to mythical consciousness, Cassirer emphasizes a non-rational symbolic form as the basis of all the rest. This emphasis had its most striking philosophical payoff in one of Cassirer’s last works, The Myth of the State , which appeared in the year after his death in 1945. Cassirer had written this work encouraged by his colleagues at Yale, as a way in which he could apply his philosophy of symbolic forms to the great calamity of the time – the rise of National Socialism in Germany and the resulting Second World War. Cassirer’s diagnosis of this situation is that it depended on the use of modern technologies of mass communication to awaken, manipulate, and exploit the essentially non-rational mythical functions of thought that are always still present in every human being. Cassirer singles out two German thinkers, Hegel and Spengler, as contributing especially to the Nazi glorification of the totalitarian state – the former less culpably as the most important political philosopher in the nineteenth century background to what Cassirer calls the “modern political myth,” the latter much more culpably as this myth was just coming into being in the twentieth.

Cassirer developed in Göteborg his characteristic perspective on the relationship between the natural and cultural sciences, which also appealed especially to the expressive function of thought. It was in connection with this work that he articulated a pithy defense of Kant’s regulative conception of infinitely distant practical ideals (e.g., the Kingdom of Ends) against what he takes to be the oppressive (speculative) infinity of Hegel’s Absolute Reason [Cassirer (1939, 28)]: “In his philosophy of history Hegel wanted to provide the definitive speculative demonstration that reason is substance and infinite power. For this, however, we must, according to him, above all attain the insight that reason is ‘not so powerless as to pass for a mere ideal, a mere ought.’ This form of proof has become shaky; the critique of the foundations of the Hegelian system has pulled the ground out from under it. If we turn back from the Hegelian meaning of idea to the Kantian, from the idea as ‘absolute power’ back to the idea as ‘infinite problem,’ we must of course give up the speculative optimism of the Hegelian view of history. But, at the same time, we thereby also avoid fatalistic pessimism with its prophecies and visions of decline [ Untergangsprophezeiungen und Untergangsvisionen ]. [Our] acting again has a free path to decide for itself out of its own force and responsibility, and it knows that the direction and future of culture will depend on the manner of this decision.”

Here one already sees, in the two penultimate sentences, the fateful juxtaposition of Hegel and Spengler: the former as philosopher of history and of right; the latter as the author of The Decline of the West (1918), which can only be called a totalitarian social technology.

Hegel’s historical and political writings should be distinguished from the earlier Phenomenology of Spirit . Hegel was then a creature of the Enlightenment – albeit at a time later than Kant’s when the aftermath of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars had begun in earnest along with the Industrial Revolution.

The first topic addressed in Hegel’s Phenomenology is consciousness , beginning with the well-known discussion of sense-certainty and the this . The next topic is self-consciousness , which begins with the famous discussion of mastery and servitude . It here becomes clear that the self-consciousness in question is that of what is sometimes called “modern subjectivity,” focusing on the first-person singular pronoun I – but equally, in this case, on the second-person singular you and the first-person plural we . Here Hegel follows in the footsteps of the Fichtean conception of recognition. But Hegel also adds an essential element of struggle, conflict, and competition depending on inequalities between I and you , or, more generally, among the members of any community of self-conscious human beings ( we ). This element is indebted to Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origin of Inequality (1755), to which Kant’s conception of “unsocial sociability,” introduced in Ideas towards a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Aim (1784), is also indebted. The difference between Kant and Hegel, in this respect, is that such ideas arise only in the context of Kant’s practical philosophy, while they arise at the beginning of the discussion of self-consciousness in Hegel’s Phenomenology . Or, to put it another way, while Kant distinguishes between theoretical and practical reason, only then to build a bridge between them in the Critique of the Power of Judgement , Hegel’s discussion of self-consciousness in the Phenomenology initiates the development of a unified conception of reason as such, at once both theoretical and practical.

What is at issue is the actualization or realization of rational concepts or ideas, as typified, for Kant, by the ideas of God, Freedom, and Immortality produced by pure practical reason. Kant holds that, as a matter of fact (the Fact of Reason), we have such a faculty, which produces these ideas and also gives them motivating force for us. But there is still always the question of whether we shall actually choose to follow this purely rational motivation, and so Kant develops an elaborate theory of how we can cultivate and develop the means for strengthening and supporting it at the expense of motivations to the contrary (always still present due to unsocial sociability).

For Hegel, by contrast, a rational idea is a normative conception or structure, which, to be normative at all, needs to function as a norm (as a law) within some actual human community. Rational ideas, as such, are actualized or realized in human history, so that the questions then becomes one of understanding the historical-conceptual processes that can lead us towards higher forms of consciousness through increasingly comprehensive and coherent normative structures. This leads to the pivotal section on spirit in the Phenomenology , where the historical part of the exposition reaches a culmination, of sorts, in the discussion of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution, the historical context wherein Hegel himself is located. And this sets the stage for the penultimate discussion of religion as the means for solving the remaining problem of fully internalizing the norms of morality by all members of a human community located within this same historical context.

The problem of internalization involves the need to unify the universal objective laws of morality with the particular individuals who make up the relevant community. These laws must be incorporated, that is, within the subjective consciousness of each individual, and Hegel interprets the doctrine of the incarnation thusly. In particular, it is within a philosophically enlightened Christianity, practiced within a philosophically enlightened religious community, that the divine is incarnated within the lives of human beings. As Hegel puts it at the end of the section on morality [Hegel (GW 9, 362)]: “[I]t is God manifested in the midst of those who know themselves in the form of pure knowledge.”

Kant develops an Enlightenment version of moral religion in his Religion within the Boundaries of Pure Reason (1793). Virtue , for Kant, is an enduring disposition to follow the moral law at the expense of motivation to the contrary, and it is this disposition, in particular, that needs to be cultivated and nurtured within our moral sentiments. However, since the problem of unsocial sociability is the primary obstacle to virtue, we need a social solution to the problem. This solution, for Kant, is an ethical community or “ethical state” (in contrast to a legal “juridical state”), in which mutual encouragement and support in the development of the required disposition (rather than fear of legal sanctions) is the primary means of achieving the desired result. Such an ethical community is what Kant calls a “church.” And he goes on to say that we must look to the history of religion to trace the development of such communities, asserts (not surprisingly) that Christianity (through the doctrine of Christ as the redeemer) is the best we have so far, and concludes, finally, that only the regulative ideal of a universal church embracing all of humanity – a church of reason – can fully serve the goal of developing perfect, and therefore universal virtue.

Kant and Hegel are not so very different in their Enlightenment ambitions. They are both concerned with universal normative principles and the actualization of these principles in existing human communities. Moreover, they both find a culmination of this process in what they take to be the best form of religion of the time – Christianity, and, in particular, Lutheranism – which only needs to be fully rationalized and universalized in accordance with Enlightenment demands. The difference between the two, once again, is that, while Kant attempts to meet these demands by sharply distinguishing among different faculties of the mind – in this case, theoretical and practical reason – between which he then builds a bridge, Hegel attempts to meet these same demands by articulating a unified conception of reason as such, at once both theoretical and practical.

In the case of Cassirer, by contrast, although he is certainly a follower and champion of the Enlightenment, he is by no means a thinker of the Enlightenment itself. He is instead a creature of the twentieth century, confronted with forms of science, and also of socio-political organization, technology, warfare, and much else, which could not have been envisaged by either Kant or Hegel. Moreover, the unprecedented horrors of the first half of the twentieth century put Cassirer in a very different moral universe in which no religious or cultural tradition could simply be taken for granted. This is clear in Cassirer’s discussion of religion at the end of Mythical Thought , which, in contrast to both Kant and Hegel, ranks art rather than religion as the highest development of the expressive function of symbolic meaning. We must, in the end, acknowledge that Cassirer’s discussion of myth sheds a bright light on one of the most important problems of his time, namely, the rise of the technologically driven totalitarian state – a problem that continues increasingly to threaten us even today.

(Fuller bibliographies may be found in [Schilpp 1949], [Krois 1987]; many of Cassirer’s German writings are reprinted by the Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt.)

• (1902) Leibniz’ System in seinen wissenschaftlichen Grundlagen . Marburg: Elwert.
• (1906) Das Erkenntnisproblem in der Philosophie und Wissenschaft der neueren Zeit. Erster Band . Berlin: Bruno Cassirer.
• (1907a) Das Erkenntnisproblem in der Philosophie und Wissenschaft der neueren Zeit. Zweiter Band. Berlin: Bruno Cassirer.
• (1907b) “Kant und die moderne Mathematik.” Kant-Studien 12, 1–40.
• (1910) Substanzbegriff und Funktionsbegriff: Untersuchungen über die Grundfragen der Erkenntniskritik . Berlin: Bruno Cassirer. Translated as Substance and Function . Chicago: Open Court, 1923.
• (1921) Zur Einsteinschen Relativitätstheorie. Erkenntnistheoretische Betrachtungen . Berlin: Bruno Cassirer. Translated as Einstein’s Theory of Relativity . Chicago: Open Court, 1923.
• (1923) Philosophie der symbolischen Formen. Erster Teil: Die Sprache . Berlin: Bruno Cassirer. Translated as The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. Volume One: Language . New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955.
• (1925a) Philosophie der symbolischen Formen. Zweiter Teil: Das mythische Denken . Berlin: Bruno Cassirer. Translated as The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. Volume Two: Mythical Thought . New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955.
• (1925b) Sprache und Mythos: Ein Beitrag zum Problem der Götternamen . Leipzig: Teubner. Translated as Language and Myth . New York: Harper, 1946.
• (1927a) Individuum und Kosmos in der Philosophie der Renaissance . Leipzig: Teubner. Translated as The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy . New York: Harper, 1964.
• (1927b) “Erkenntnistheorie nebst den Grenzfragen der Logik und Denkpsychologie.” Jahrbücher der Philosophie 3, 31–92.
• (1929a) Die Idee der republikanischen Verfassung . Hamburg: Friedrichsen.
• (1929b) Philosophie der symbolischen Formen. Dritter Teil: Phänomenologie der Erkenntnis . Berlin: Bruno Cassirer. Translated as The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. Volume Three: The Phenomenology of Knowledge . New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957.
• (1931) “Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik. Bemerkungen zu Martin Heideggers Kantinterpretation.” Kant-Studien 36, 1–16. Translated as “Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics.” In M. Gram, ed. Kant: Disputed Questions . Chicago: Quadrangle, 1967.
• (1932) Die Philosophie der Aufklärung . Tübingen: Morh. Translated as The Philosophy of the Enlightenment . Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1951.
• (1936) Determinismus und Indeterminismus in der modernen Physik . Göteborg: Göteborgs Högskolas Årsskrift 42. Translated as Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics . New Haven: Yale University Press, 1956.
• (1939a) Axel Hägerström: Eine Studie zur Schwedischen Philosophie der Gegenwart . Göteborg: Göteborgs Högskolas Årsskrift 45.
• (1939b) “Naturalistische und humanistische Begründung der Kulturphilosophie.” Göteborg Kungl. Vetenskaps- och Vitterhets-Semhälles Handlingar . 5 e Földjen, Ser. A, Band 7, Nr. 3. Translated as “Introduction: Naturalistic and Humanistic Philosophies of Culture” in (1942/1961) below.
• (1942) Zur Logik der Kulturwissenschaften . Göteborg: Göteborgs Högskolas Årsskrift 47. Translated as The Logic of the Humanities . New Haven: Yale University Press, 1961. Translated as The Logic of the Cultural Sciences . New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000.
• (1944) An Essay on Man . New Haven: Yale University Press.
• (1946) The Myth of the State . New Haven: Yale University Press.

Note: Cassirer’s unpublished writings are now appearing in volumes edited by J. Krois and E. Schwemmer, Nachgelassene Manuskripte und Texte . Hamburg: Meiner.

• Aubenque, P., L. Ferry, E. Rudolf, J.-F. Courtine, F. Capeillières (1992) “Philosophie und Politik: Die Davoser Disputation zwischen Ernst Cassirer und Martin Heidegger in der Retrospektive.” Internationale Zeitschrift für Philosophie , 2: 290–312.
• Burtt, E. (1925) The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science . London: Paul, Trench, Trubner.
• Cassirer, T. (1981) Mein Leben mit Ernst Cassirer . Hildesheim: Gerstenberg.
• Cohen, H. (1871) Kants Theorie der Erfahrung . Berlin: Dümmler.
• ––– (1883) Das Princip der Infinitesimal-Methode und seine Geschichte: ein Kapitel zur Grundlegung der Ekenntnißkritik . Berlin: Dümmler.
• Dijksterhuis, E. (1959) De Mechanisering van get Wereldbeeld . Amsterdam: Uitgeverif Meulenhoff. Translated as The Mechanization of the World Picture . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961.
• Friedman, M. (2000) A Parting of the Ways: Carnap, Cassirer, and Heidegger . Chicago: Open Court.
• Gay, P. (1977) The Enlightenment: An Interpretation , 2 vols. New York: Norton .
• Gordon, P. (2010) Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos . Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
• Hegel, G. W. F. (1807) Phänomenologie des Geistes. Gesammelte Werke [GW]. Bd. 9. Hamburg, 1980.
• Heidegger, M. (1927) Sein und Zeit . Tübingen: Max Niemeyer. Translated as Being and Time . New York: Harper, 1962.
• ––– (1928) “Ernst Cassirer: Philosophie der symbolischen Formen. 2. Teil: Das mythische Denken.” Deutsche Literaturzeitung , 21: 1000–1012. Translated as “Book Review of Ernst Cassirer’s Mythical Thought .” In The Piety of Thinking . Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1976.
• ––– (1929) Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik . Bonn: Friedrich Cohen. Translated (together with a protocol of the Davos disputation with Cassirer) as Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics . Bloomington: Indiana University Press: 1990.
• Ihmig, K.-N. (2001) Grundzüge einer Philosophie der Wissenschaften bei Ernst Cassirer . Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft.
• Kaegi, D. and E. Rudolph, eds. (2000) 70 Jahre Davoser Disputation . Hamburg: Meiner.
• Knoppe, T. (1992) Die theoretische Philosophie Ernst Cassirers: Zu den Grundlagen transzendentaler Wissenschafts- und Kulturtheorie . Hamburg: Meiner.
• Koyré, A. (1939) Etudes galiléennes . 3 vols. Paris: Hermann. Translated as Galileo Studies . Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1978.
• Krois, J. (1987) Cassirer: Symbolic Forms and History . New Haven: Yale University Press.
• Langer, S. (1942) Philosophy in a New Key: A Study in the Symbolism of Reason, Rite and Art . Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
• Luft, Sebastian. (2015) The Space of Culture. Towards a Neo-Kantian Philosophy of Culture (Cohen, Natorp & Cassirer) . Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Moss, G. S. (2015) Ernst Cassirer and the Autonomy of Language . Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books.
• Matherne, S. (2021) Ernst Cassirer. Abingdon-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, UK: Routledge.
• Paetzold, H. (1995) Ernst Cassirer – Von Marburg nach New York: eine philosophische Biographie . Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft.
• Panofsky, E. (1939) Studies in Iconology: Humanistic Themes in the Art of the Renaissance . New York: Oxford University Press.
• Pap, A. (1946) The A Priori in Physical Theory . New York: King’s Cross Press.
• Renz, U. (2002) Die Rationalität der Kultur: Zur Kulturphilosophie und ihrer transzendentalen Begründung bei Cohen, Natorp und Cassirer . Hamburg: Meiner.
• Schilpp, P., ed. (1949) The Philosophy of Ernst Cassirer . La Salle: Open Court.
• Schlick, M. (1921) “Kritizistische oder empiristische Deutung der neuen Physik?” Kant-Studien , 26: 96–111. Translated as “Critical or Empiricist Interpretation of Modern Physics?” In H. Mulder and B. van de Velde-Schlick, eds. Moritz Schlick: Philosophical Papers . Vol. 2. Dordrecht: Reidel, 1979.
• Schwemmer, O. (1997) Ernst Cassirer. Ein Philosoph der europäischen Moderne . Berlin: Akademie.
• Skidelsky, E. (2008) Ernst Cassirer: The Last Philosopher of Culture . Princeton: Princeton University Press.

How to cite this entry . Preview the PDF version of this entry at the Friends of the SEP Society . Look up topics and thinkers related to this entry at the Internet Philosophy Ontology Project (InPhO). Enhanced bibliography for this entry at PhilPapers , with links to its database.

• Review of S. Langer’s translation of Cassirer’s Language and Myth , by W. Sellars, published in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research , 9 (1948).

Einstein, Albert: philosophy of science | general relativity: early philosophical interpretations of | Heidegger, Martin | Kant, Immanuel | Natorp, Paul | Schlick, Moritz | Vienna Circle

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An Essay on Man

An Essay on Man is a poem written by Alexander Pope in 1733–1734. It is a rationalistic effort to use philosophy in order to, as John Milton attempted, justify the ways of God to man. It is concerned with the part evil plays in the world and with the social order God has decreed for man. Because man cannot know God's purposes, he cannot complain about the existence of evil and must accept that Whatever is, is right. More than any other work, it popularized optimistic philosophy throughout England and the rest of Europe.

• 1 Epistle I
• 2 Epistle II
• 3 Epistle III
• 4 Epistle IV
• 6 External links

• Line 95. Compare: Dum spiro spero .
• Line 139. Compare: "All the parts of the universe I have an interest in: the earth serves me to walk upon; the sun to light me; the stars have their influence upon me", Montaigne , Apology for Raimond Sebond .
• Line 217. Compare: "Much like a subtle spider which doth sit / In middle of her web, which spreadeth wide; / If aught do touch the utmost thread of it, / She feels it instantly on every side", John Davies , The Immortality of the Soul .
• Line 225. Compare: "Great wits are sure to madness near allied, / And thin partitions do their bounds divide", John Dryden , Absalom and Achitophel , part I, line 163.
• Line 289. Compare: "Whatever is, is in its causes just", John Dryden , Œdipus , Act III, scene 1.
• Line 1. Compare: "La vray science et le vray étude de l'homme c'est l'homme" (Translated: "The true science and the true study of man is man"), Pierre Charron , De la Sagesse , lib. i. chap. 1; "Trees and fields tell me nothing: men are my teachers", Plato , Phædrus .
• Line 13. Compare: "What a chimera, then, is man! what a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a subject of contradiction, what a prodigy! A judge of all things, feeble worm of the earth, depositary of the truth, cloaca of uncertainty and error, the glory and the shame of the universe", Blaise Pascal , Thoughts , chap. x.
• Line 217. Compare: " For truth has such a face and such a mien, As to be lov’d needs only to be seen", John Dryden , The Hind and the Panther , Part I, line 33.

Epistle III

• Line 45; comparable with: "Why may not a goose say thus?… there is nothing that yon heavenly roof looks upon so favourably as me; I am the darling of Nature. Is it not man that keeps and serves me? ", Michel de Montaigne , "Apology for Raimond Lebond".
• Line 303, this relates to the biblical "Faith, Hope and Charity" of Paul of Tarsus , in I Corinthians , Ch. 13, v. 13. " And now abideth And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity. " It is also comparable with Abraham Cowley , On the Death of Crashaw : "His faith , perhaps, in some nice tenets might / Be wrong; his life , I'm sure, was in the right."
• Lines 79-82.
• Line 247. Compare: "Man is his own star; and that soul that can / Be honest is the only perfect man", John Fletcher , Upon an "Honest Man’s Fortune" .
• Line 281. Compare: "Charm'd with the foolish whistling of a name", Abraham Cowley , Virgil, Georgics , Book ii, Line 72; "May see thee now, though late, redeem thy name, And glorify what else is damn'd to fame", Richard Savage , Character of Foster .
• Line 331. Compare: "One follows Nature and Nature’s God; that is, he follows God in his works and in his word", Henry, Viscount Bolingbroke St. John , Letter to Alexander Pope . Later used by Thomas Jefferson in the language of the Declaration of Independence , asserting that a people may "assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them".
• Line 379. Compare: " D'une voix légère / Passer du grave au doux, du plaisant au sévère ", Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux , The Art of Poetry , Canto I, line 75 (translated by John Dryden as "Happy who in his verse can gently steer / From grave to light, from pleasant to severe").
• Line 397. Compare: "'Tis virtue makes the bliss where'er we dwell", William Collins Oriental Eclogues , i, line 5.
• Samuel Johnson , The Life of Pope (1781).

External links

• Full text at Project Gutenberg
• An introduction to the poem from a Hartwicke College professor: [1]

• Works by Alexander Pope

An Essay on Man (Epistle I)

An essay on man (epistle i) lyrics, the design..

Having proposed to write some pieces on human life and manners, such as (to use my Lord Bacon’s expression) come home to men’s business and bosoms, I thought it more satisfactory to begin with considering man in the abstract, his nature and his state; since, to prove any moral duty, to enforce any moral precept, or to examine the perfection or imperfection of any creature whatsoever, it is necessary first to know what condition and relation it is placed in, and what is the proper end and purpose of its being. The science of human nature is, like all other sciences, reduced to a few clear points: there are not many certain truths in this world. It is therefore in the anatomy of the mind as in that of the body; more good will accrue to mankind by attending to the large, open, and perceptible parts, than by studying too much such finer nerves and vessels, the conformations and uses of which will for ever escape our observation. The disputes are all upon these last, and, I will venture to say, they have less sharpened the wits than the hearts of men against each other, and have diminished the practice, more than advanced the theory, of morality. If I could flatter myself that this essay has any merit, it is in steering betwixt the extremes of doctrines seemingly opposite, in passing over terms utterly unintelligible, and in forming a yet not, and a yet not system of ethics. This I might have done in prose; but I chose verse, and even rhyme, for two reasons. The one will appear obvious; that principles, maxims, or precepts so written, both strike the reader more strongly at first, and are more easily retained by him afterwards: the other may seem odd, but is true; I found I could express them more shortly this way than in prose itself; and nothing is more certain, than that much of the force as well as grace of arguments or instructions, depends on their conciseness. I was unable to treat this part of my subject more in detail, without becoming dry and tedious; or more poetically, without sacrificing perspicuity to ornament, without wandering from the precision, or breaking the chain of reasoning: If any man can unite all these without diminution of any of them, I freely confess he will compass a thing above my capacity. What is now published, is only to be considered as a general map of Man, marking out no more than the greater parts, their extent, their limits, and their connexion, but leaving the particular to be more fully delineated in the charts which are to follow. Consequently, these epistles in their progress (if I have health and leisure to make any progress) will be less dry, and more susceptible of poetical ornament. I am here only opening the, and clearing the passage. To deduce the, to follow them in their course, and to observe their effects, may be a task more agreeable.

OF THE NATURE AND STATE OF MAN WITH RESPECT TO THE UNIVERSE.

Of man in the abstract. I. That we can judge only with regard to our own system, being ignorant of the relations of systems and things, ver. 17, &c. II. That Man is not to be deemed imperfect, but a being suited to his place and rank in the creation, agreeable to the general order of things, and conformable to ends and relations to him unknown, ver. 35, &c. III. That it is partly upon his ignorance of future events, and partly upon the hope of a future state, that all his happiness in the present depends, ver. 77, &c. IV. The pride of aiming at more knowledge, and pretending to more perfection, the cause of Man’s error and misery. The impiety of putting himself in the place of God, and judging of the fitness or unfitness, perfection or imperfection, justice or injustice of his dispensations, ver. 109, &c. V. The absurdity of conceiting himself the final cause of the creation, or expecting that perfection in the moral world, which is not in the natural, ver. 131, &c. VI. The unreasonableness of his complaints against Providence, while on the one hand he demands the perfections of the angels, and on the other the bodily qualifications of the brutes; though to possess any of the sensitive faculties in a higher degree, would render him miserable, ver. 173, &c. VII. That throughout the whole visible world, an universal order and gradation in the sensual and mental faculties is observed, which causes a subordination of creature to creature, and of all creatures to Man. The gradations of sense, instinct, thought, reflection, reason; that reason alone countervails all the other faculties, ver. 207. VIII. How much further this order and subordination of living creatures may extend, above and below us; were any part of which broken, not that part only, but the whole connected creation must be destroyed, ver. 233. IX. The extravagance, madness, and pride of such a desire, ver. 259. X. The consequence of all, the absolute submission due to Providence, both as to our present and future state, ver. 281, &c. to the end.

Awake, my St. John! leave all meaner things To low ambition, and the pride of Kings. Let us (since Life can little more supply Than just to look about us and to die) Expatiate free o’er all this scene of Man; A mighty maze! but not without a plan; A Wild, where weeds and flow’rs promiscuous shoot; Or Garden, tempting with forbidden fruit. Together let us beat this ample field, Try what the open, what the covert yield; The latent tracts, the giddy heights, explore Of all who blindly creep, or sightless soar; Eye Nature’s walks, shoot Folly as it flies, And catch the Manners living as they rise; Laugh where we must, be candid where we can; But vindicate the ways of God to Man. I. Say first, of God above, or Man below, What can we reason, but from what we know? Of Man, what see we but his station here, From which to reason, or to which refer? Thro’ worlds unnumber’d tho’ the God be known, ‘Tis ours to trace him only in our own. He, who thro’ vast immensity can pierce, See worlds on worlds compose one universe, Observe how system into system runs, What other planets circle other suns, What vary’d Being peoples ev’ry star, May tell why Heav’n has made us as we are. But of this frame the bearings, and the ties, The strong connexions, nice dependencies, Gradations just, has thy pervading soul Look’d thro’? or can a part contain the whole? Is the great chain, that draws all to agree, And drawn supports, upheld by God, or thee? II. Presumptuous Man! the reason wouldst thou find, Why form’d so weak, so little, and so blind? First, if thou canst, the harder reason guess, Why form’d no weaker, blinder, and no less? Ask of thy mother earth, why oaks are made Taller or stronger than the weeds they shade? Or ask of yonder argent fields above, Why Jove’s satellites are less than Jove? Of Systems possible, if ‘tis confest That Wisdom infinite must form the best, Where all must full or not coherent be, And all that rises, rise in due degree; Then, in the scale of reas’ning life, ‘tis plain, There must be, somewhere, such a rank as Man: And all the question (wrangle e’er so long) Is only this, if God has plac’d him wrong? Respecting Man, whatever wrong we call, May, must be right, as relative to all. In human works, tho’ labour’d on with pain, A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain; In God’s, one single can its end produce; Yet serves to second too some other use. So Man, who here seems principal alone, Perhaps acts second to some sphere unknown, Touches some wheel, or verges to some goal; ‘Tis but a part we see, and not a whole. When the proud steed shall know why Man restrains His fiery course, or drives him o’er the plains: When the dull Ox, why now he breaks the clod, Is now a victim, and now Ægypt’s God: Then shall Man’s pride and dulness comprehend His actions’, passions’, being’s, use and end; Why doing, suff’ring, check’d, impell’d; and why This hour a slave, the next a deity. Then say not Man’s imperfect, Heav’n in fault; Say rather, Man’s as perfect as he ought: His knowledge measur’d to his state and place; His time a moment, and a point his space. If to be perfect in a certain sphere, What matter, soon or late, or here or there? The blest to day is as completely so,, As who began a thousand years ago. III. Heav’n from all creatures hides the book of Fate, All but the page prescrib’d, their present state: From brutes what men, from men what spirits know: Or who could suffer Being here below? The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day, Had he thy Reason, would he skip and play? Pleas’d to the last, he crops the flow’ry food, And licks the hand just rais’d to shed his blood. Oh blindness to the future! kindly giv’n, That each may fill the circle mark’d by Heav’n: Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish, or a sparrow fall, Atoms or systems into ruin hurl’d, And now a bubble burst, and now a world. Hope humbly then: with trembling pinions soar; Wait the great teacher Death; and God adore. What future bliss, he gives not thee to know, But gives that Hope to be thy blessing now. Hope springs eternal in the human breast: Man never Is, but always To be blest: The soul, uneasy and confin’d from home, Rests and expatiates in a life to come. Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutor’d mind Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind: His soul, proud Science never taught to stray Far as the solar walk, or milky way; Yet simple Nature to his hope has giv’n, Behind the cloud-topt hill, an humbler heav’n; Some safer world in depth of woods embrac’d, Some happier island in the watry waste, Where slaves once more their native land behold, No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold. To Be, contents his natural desire, He asks no Angel’s wing, no Seraph’s fire; But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, His faithful dog shall bear him company. IV. Go, wiser thou! and, in thy scale of sense, Weight thy Opinion against Providence; Call imperfection what thou fancy’st such, Say, here he gives too little, there too much: Destroy all Creatures for thy sport or gust, Yet cry, If Man’s unhappy, God’s unjust; If Man alone engross not Heav’n’s high care, Alone made perfect here, immortal there: Snatch from his hand the balance and the rod, Re-judge his justice, be the God of God. In Pride, in reas’ning Pride, our error lies; All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes, Men would be Angels, Angels would be Gods. Aspiring to be Gods, if Angels fell, Aspiring to be Angels, Men rebel: And who but wishes to invert the laws Of Order, sins against th’ Eternal Cause. V. Ask for what end the heav’nly bodies shine, Earth for whose use? Pride answers, “‘Tis for mine: For me kind Nature wakes her genial Pow’r, Suckles each herb, and spreads out ev’ry flow’r; Annual for me, the grape, the rose renew The juice nectareous, and the balmy dew; For me, the mine a thousand treasures brings; For me, health gushes from a thousand springs; Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me rise; My foot-stool earth, my canopy the skies.” But errs not Nature from his gracious end, From burning suns when livid deaths descend, When earthquakes swallow, or when tempests sweep Towns to one grave, whole nations to the deep? “No, (‘tis reply’d) the first Almighty Cause Acts not by partial, but by gen’ral laws; Th’ exceptions few; some change since all began: And what created perfect?” — Why then Man? If the great end be human Happiness, Then Nature deviates; and can Man do less? As much that end a constant course requires Of show’rs and sun-shine, as of Man’s desires; As much eternal springs and cloudless skies, As Men for ever temp’rate, calm, and wise. If plagues or earthquakes break not Heav’n’s design, Why then a Borgia, or a Catiline? Who knows but he, whose hand the lightning forms, Who heaves old Ocean, and who wings the storms; Pours fierce Ambition in a Caesar’s mind, Or turns young Ammon loose to scourge mankind? From pride, from pride, our very reas’ning springs; Account for moral, as for nat’ral things: Why charge we Heav’n in those, in these acquit? In both, to reason right is to submit. Better for Us, perhaps, it might appear, Were there all harmony, all virtue here; That never air or ocean felt the wind; That never passion discompos’d the mind. But All subsists by elemental strife; And Passions are the elements of Life. The gen’ral Order, since the whole began, Is kept in Nature, and is kept in Man. VI. What would this Man? Now upward will he soar, And little less than Angel, would be more; Now looking downwards, just as griev’d appears To want the strength of bulls, the fur of bears. Made for his use all creatures if he call, Say what their use, had he the pow’rs of all? Nature to these, without profusion, kind, The proper organs, proper pow’rs assign’d; Each seeming want compensated of course, Here with degrees of swiftness, there of force; All in exact proportion to the state; Nothing to add, and nothing to abate. Each beast, each insect, happy in its own: Is Heav’n unkind to Man, and Man alone? Shall he alone, whom rational we call, Be pleas’d with nothing, if not bless’d with all? The bliss of Man (could Pride that blessing find) Is not to act or think beyond mankind; No pow’rs of body or of soul to share, But what his nature and his state can bear. Why has not Man a microscopic eye? For this plain reason, Man is not a Fly. Say what the use, were finer optics giv’n, T’ inspect a mite, not comprehend the heav’n? Or touch, if tremblingly alive all o’er, To smart and agonize at every pore? Or quick effluvia darting thro’ the brain, Die of a rose in aromatic pain? If Nature thunder’d in his op’ning ears, And stunn’d him with the music of the spheres, How would he wish that Heav’n had left him still The whisp’ring Zephyr, and the purling rill? Who finds not Providence all good and wise, Alike in what it gives, and what denies? VII. Far as Creation’s ample range extends, The scale of sensual, mental pow’rs ascends: Mark how it mounts, to Man’s imperial race, From the green myriads in the peopled grass: What modes of sight betwixt each wide extreme, The mole’s dim curtain, and the lynx’s beam: Of smell, the headlong lioness between, And hound sagacious on the tainted green: Of hearing, from the life that fills the Flood, To that which warbles thro’ the vernal wood: The spider’s touch, how exquisitely fine! Feels at each thread, and lives along the line: In the nice bee, what sense so subtly true From pois’nous herbs extracts the healing dew? How Instinct varies in the grov’lling swine, Compar’d, half-reas’ning elephant, with thine! ‘Twixt that, and Reason, what a nice barrier, For ever sep’rate, yet for ever near! Remembrance and Reflection how ally’d; What thin partitions Sense from Thought divide: And Middle natures, how they long to join, Yet never pass th’ insuperable line! Without this just gradation, could they be Subjected, these to those, or all to thee? The pow’rs of all subdu’d by thee alone, Is not thy Reason all these pow’rs in one? VIII. See, thro’ this air, this ocean, and this earth, All matter quick, and bursting into birth. Above, how high, progressive life may go! Around, how wide! how deep extend below! Vast chain of Being! which from God began, Natures ethereal, human, angel, man, Beast, bird, fish, insect, what no eye can see, No glass can reach; from Infinite to thee, From thee to Nothing. — On superior pow’rs Were we to press, inferior might on ours: Or in the full creation leave a void, Where, one step broken, the great scale’s destroy’d: From Nature’s chain whatever link you strike, Tenth or ten thousandth, breaks the chain alike. And, if each system in gradation roll Alike essential to th’ amazing Whole, The least confusion but in one, not all That system only, but the Whole must fall. Let Earth unbalanc’d from her orbit fly, Planets and Suns run lawless thro’ the sky; Let ruling Angels from their spheres be hurl’d, Being on Being wreck’d, and world on world; Heav’n’s whole foundations to their centre nod, And Nature tremble to the throne of God. All this dread Order break — for whom? for thee? Vile worm! — Oh Madness! Pride! Impiety! IX. What if the foot, ordain’d the dust to tread, Or hand, to toil, aspir’d to be the head? What if the head, the eye, or ear repin’d To serve mere engines to the ruling Mind? Just as absurd for any part to claim To be another, in this gen’ral frame: Just as absurd, to mourn the tasks or pains, The great directing Mind of All ordains. All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body Nature is, and God the soul; That, chang’d thro’ all, and yet in all the same; Great in the earth, as in th’ ethereal frame; Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees, Lives thro’ all life, extends thro’ all extent, Spreads undivided, operates unspent; Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart: As full, as perfect, in vile Man that mourns, As the rapt Seraph that adores and burns: To him no high, no low, no great, no small; He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all. X. Cease then, nor Order Imperfection name: Our proper bliss depends on what we blame. Know thy own point: This kind, this due degree Of blindness, weakness, Heav’n bestows on thee. Submit. — In this, or any other sphere, Secure to be as blest as thou canst bear: Safe in the hand of one disposing Pow’r, Or in the natal, or the mortal hour. All Nature is but Art, unknown to thee; All Chance, Direction, which thou canst not see; All Discord, Harmony not understood; All partial Evil, universal Good: And, spite of Pride, in erring Reason’s spite, One truth is clear, Whatever Is, Is Right.

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• 1. An Essay on Man (Epistle I)
• 2. An Essay on Man (Epistle II)
• 3. An Essay on Man (Epistle III)
• 4. An Essay on Man (Epistle IV)

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An Essay on Man

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Summary and Study Guide

Alexander Pope is the author of “An Essay on Man,” published in 1734. Pope was an English poet of the Augustan Age, the literary era in the first half of the 18th century in England (1700-1740s). Neoclassicism, a literary movement in which writers and poets sought inspiration from the works of Virgil, Ovid, and Horace, influenced the poem. Writing in heroic couplets, Pope explores the connection between God, human nature , and society. The poem is philosophical and discusses order, reason, and balance, themes that dominated the era. Pope dedicated the poem to Henry St. John, one of his close friends and a famous Tory politician.

This is Pope’s final long poem. It was intended to be the first part of a book-length poem on his philosophy of the world, but Pope did not live to complete the book. Pope initially published “An Essay on Man” anonymously, as he had a fractious relationship with critics and wanted to see how people would respond to the work if unaware that he had written it. The work was praised highly when it was published, and is still esteemed as one of the most elegant didactic poems ever composed.

Poet Biography

Alexander Pope was born in 1688 in London, England. His father was a wealthy merchant, but because he was Catholic and the Church of England was extremely anti-Catholic, his family could not live within ten miles of London, and Pope could not receive a formal education. As a result, Pope grew up near Windsor Forest and was self-taught. At the age of 12, he contracted spinal tuberculosis, which resulted in lifelong debilitating pain. He grew to be four and a half feet tall and was dependent on others.

Despite these early challenges, Pope’s poetic talent enabled him to attain a higher social status. He began publishing poetry at the age of 16. He translated Homer’s The Iliad and The Odyssey , as well as the works of Shakespeare, and sold the translations for a subscription fee. From the profits of these translations, Pope purchased a grand mansion and large plot of land in Twickenham in 1719. Pope is famous for being the first poet able to support himself entirely on his writing. He valued his friendships, which were with some of the greatest minds of his time, including Jonathan Swift, the famous satirist and author of A Modest Proposal .  Pope also had many enemies due to his biting wit and talent for mocking the conventions of his era. For this, he was called “The Wasp of Twickenham.” His Essay on Criticism (1711) expressed his views on criticism and poetry. His mock-epic poem, The Rape of the Lock (1714), was one of his most famous satirical poems. His satire , The Dunciad (1728) lambasted the culture and literature of his day.

He died in 1744 at the age of 56 from edema and asthma. He never married and had no children. Pope is considered one of the greatest English poets of the 18th century and his style defined the Augustan age of poetry. After Shakespeare, he is the second most quoted writer in the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations .

Pope, Alexander. “ An Essay on Man .” 2007. Project Gutenberg .

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An Essay on Man

• Alexander Pope

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A definitive new edition of one of the greatest philosophical poems in the English language

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Voltaire called it “the most sublime didactic poem ever written in any language.” Rousseau rhapsodized about its intellectual consolations. Kant recited long passages of it from memory during his lectures. And Adam Smith and David Hume drew inspiration from it in their writings. This was Alexander Pope’s Essay on Man (1733–34), a masterpiece of philosophical poetry, one of the most important and controversial works of the Enlightenment, and one of the most widely read, imitated, and discussed poems of eighteenth-century Europe and America. This volume, which presents the first major new edition of the poem in more than fifty years, introduces this essential work to a new generation of readers, recapturing the excitement and illuminating the debates it provoked from the moment of its publication. Echoing Milton’s purpose in Paradise Lost , Pope says his aim in An Essay on Man is to “vindicate the ways of God to man”—to explain the existence of evil and explore man’s place in the universe. In a comprehensive introduction, Tom Jones describes the poem as an investigation of the fundamental question of how people should behave in a world they experience as chaotic, but which they suspect to be orderly from some higher point of view. The introduction provides a thorough discussion of the poem’s attitudes, themes, composition, context, and reception, and reassesses the work’s place in history. Extensive annotations to the text explain references and allusions. The result is the most accessible, informative, and reader-friendly edition of the poem in decades and an invaluable book for students and scholars of eighteenth-century literature and thought.

" An Essay on Man . . . was one of the most widely disseminated and well-known publications of the 18th century, notably impacting Enlightenment writers Voltaire, David Hume, Adam Smith, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Jones provides a reliable modern version."— Library Journal

"The book is exemplary in its scholarship. [Jones] has unearthed a multiplicity of references and illuminates the antecedents of Pope's ideas with authority. This is an edition which should be recommended to every student and teacher of the poem…. There is no sensible criticism that could be levelled at his work in this volume."— Penniless Press

"Jones's edition makes the energetically paradoxical Essay on Man accessible…. The introduction is extensive and excellent."—Robert Phiddian, Australian Book Review

"This is a definitive, reader-friendly edition of a poem that ought to be circulated as widely as possible. The textual commentary is a model of its kind—lucid, full, rich in insight, and especially good at tracking down and elucidating the allusions in which the poem abounds. The introduction is also an exemplary piece of literary scholarship."—Brian Young, Christ Church College, University of Oxford

"Tom Jones's edition of An Essay on Man is an impressive achievement. His introduction and notes are deeply learned and useful. They synthesize much of what we know about the poem's composition, publication, sources, analogues, and influence, but also present fresh, original insights into its meanings and importance as a document of eighteenth-century intellectual history. The sophistication with which Jones treats the philosophical contexts of the poem is exceptional."—James Noggle, Wellesley College

"This is a very good edition. The lively and wide-ranging introduction is attentive to both the original context and continuing relevance of Pope's poem."—David Womersley, St. Catherine's College, University of Oxford

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Pope's Poems and Prose

By alexander pope, pope's poems and prose summary and analysis of an essay on man: epistle i.

The subtitle of the first epistle is “Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to the Universe,” and this section deals with man’s place in the cosmos. Pope argues that to justify God’s ways to man must necessarily be to justify His ways in relation to all other things. God rules over the whole universe and has no special favorites, not man nor any other creature. By nature, the universe is an order of “strong connexions, nice dependencies, / Gradations just” (30-1). This order is, more specifically, a hierarchy of the “Vast chain of being” in which all of God’s creations have a place (237). Man’s place in the chain is below the angels but above birds and beasts. Any deviation from this order would result in cosmic destruction. Because the universe is so highly ordered, chance, as man understands it, does not exist. Chance is rather “direction, which thou canst not see” (290). Those things that man sees as disparate or unrelated are all “but parts of one stupendous whole, / Whose body nature is, and God the soul” (267-8). Thus every element of the universe has complete perfection according to God’s purpose. Pope concludes the first epistle with the statement “Whatever is, is right,” meaning that all is for the best and that everything happens according to God’s plan, even though man may not be able to comprehend it (294).

Here is a section-by-section explanation of the first epistle:

Introduction (1-16): The introduction begins with an address to Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke, a friend of the poet from whose fragmentary philosophical writings Pope likely drew inspiration for An Essay on Man . Pope urges his friend to “leave all meaner things” and rather embark with Pope on his quest to “vindicate the ways of God to man (1, 16).

Section I (17-34): Section I argues that man can only understand the universe with regard to human systems and constructions because he is ignorant of the greater relationships between God’s creations.

Section II (35-76): Section II states that man is imperfect but perfectly suited to his place within the hierarchy of creation according to the general order of things.

Section III (77-112): Section III demonstrates that man's happiness depends on both his ignorance of future events and on his hope for the future.

Section IV (113-30): Section IV claims that man’s sin of pride—the attempt to gain more knowledge and pretend to greater perfection—is the root of man’s error and misery. By putting himself in the place of God, judging perfection and justice, man acts impiously.

Section V (131-72): Section V depicts the absurdity of man’s belief that he is the sole cause of the creation as well as his ridiculous expectation of perfection in the moral world that does not exist in the natural world.

Section VI (173-206): Section VI decries the unreasonableness of man’s complaints against Providence; God is good, giving and taking equally. If man had the omniscience of God, he would be miserable: “The bliss of man [...] / Is, not to act of think beyond mankind” (189-90).

Section VII (207-32): Section VII shows that throughout the visible world, a universal order and gradation can be observed. This is particularly apparent in the hierarchy of earthly creatures and their subordination to man. Pope refers specifically to the gradations of sense, instinct, thought, reflection, and reason. Reason is superior to all.

Section VIII (233-58): Section VIII indicates that if God’s rules of order and subordination are broken, the whole of creation must be destroyed.

Section IX (259-80): Section IX illustrates the madness of the desire to subvert God’s order.

Section X (281-94): Section X calls on man to submit to God’s power. Absolute submission to God will ensure that man remains “Safe in the hand of one disposing Pow’r” (287). After all, “Whatever is, is right” (294).

Pope’s first epistle seems to endorse a sort of fatalism, in which all things are fated. Everything happens for the best, and man should not presume to question God’s greater design, which he necessarily cannot understand because he is a part of it. He further does not possess the intellectual capability to comprehend God’s order outside of his own experience. These arguments certainly support a fatalistic world view. According to Pope’s thesis, everything that exists plays a role in the divine plan. God thus has a specific intention for every element of His creation, which suggests that all things are fated. Pope, however, was always greatly distressed by charges of fatalism. As a proponent of the doctrine of free will, Pope’s personal opinions seem at odds with his philosophical conclusions in the first epistle. Reconciling Pope’s own views with his fatalistic description of the universe represents an impossible task.

The first epistle of An Essay on Man is its most ambitious. Pope states that his task is to describe man’s place in the “universal system” and to “vindicate the ways of God to man” (16). In the poem’s prefatory address, Pope more specifically describes his intention to consider “man in the abstract, his Nature and his State, since, to prove any moral duty, to enforce any moral precept, or to examine the perfection of imperfection of any creature whatsoever, it is necessary first to know what condition and relation it is placed in, and what is the proper end and purpose of its being.” Pope’s stated purpose of the poem further problematizes any critical reading of the first epistle. According to Pope’s own conclusions, man’s limited intellect can comprehend only a small portion of God’s order and likewise can have knowledge of only half-truths. It therefore seems the height of hubris to presume to justify God’s ways to man. His own philosophical conclusions make this impossible. As a mere component part of God’s design and a member of the hierarchical middle state, Pope exists within God’s design and therefore cannot perceive the greater logic of God’s order. To do so would bring only misery: “The bliss of man [...] / Is, not to act of think beyond mankind” (189-90).

Though Pope’s philosophical ambitions result in a rather incoherent epistle, the poem demonstrates a masterful use of the heroic couplet. Some of the most quoted lines from Pope’s works actually appear in this poem. For example, the quotation “Hope springs eternal in the human breast: / Man never is, but always to be blest” appears in the problematic first epistle (95-6). Pope’s skill with verse thus far outweighs his philosophical aspirations, and it is fortunate that he chose to write in verse rather than prose. Indeed, eighteenth-century critics saw An Essay on Man as a primarily poetic work despite its philosophical themes.

Pope’s Poems and Prose Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Pope’s Poems and Prose is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Attempt a short critical essay on Pope use of the sylph machinary in the rape of the lock

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The Rape of the Lock

In Canto I, a dream is sent to Belinda by Ariel, “her guardian Sylph” (20). The Sylphs are Belinda’s guardians because they understand her vanity and pride, having been coquettes when they were humans. They are devoted to any woman who “rejects...

Study Guide for Pope’s Poems and Prose

Pope's Poems and Prose study guide contains a biography of Alexander Pope, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Pope's Poems and Prose
• Pope's Poems and Prose Summary
• Character List

Essays for Pope’s Poems and Prose

Pope's Poems and Prose essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of Alexander Pope's Poems and Prose.

• Of the Characteristics of Pope
• Breaking Clod: Hierarchical Transformation in Pope's An Essay on Man
• Fortasse, Pope, Idcirco Nulla Tibi Umquam Nupsit (The Rape of the Lock)
• An Exploration of 'Dulness' In Pope's Dunciad
• Belinda: Wronged On Behalf of All Women

Wikipedia Entries for Pope’s Poems and Prose

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An Essay on Man

• Alexander Pope
• Edited by: Tom Jones
• With contributions by: Tom Jones
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• Language: English
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Copyright year: 2016
• Audience: General/trade;
• Main content: 248
• Other: 5 b/w illus.
• Keywords: Poetry ; Lucretius ; All things ; Prose ; Good and evil ; Philosophy ; Self-love ; Alexander Pope ; The Soul of the World ; Epistle ; Plotinus ; Treatise ; An Essay on Man ; The Dunciad ; Philosopher ; Stoicism ; V. ; Essays (Montaigne) ; Suetonius ; Anecdote ; Austin Farrer ; Note (typography) ; Writing ; Epicurus ; Cambridge University Press ; Opticks ; William Wycherley ; God ; Man alone (stock character) ; Religion ; Deism ; On the Soul ; Mr. ; Calvin (Calvin and Hobbes) ; Justus Lipsius ; Empedocles ; Plutarch ; Spinozism ; Greatness ; Virtues (number and structure) ; Thomas Shadwell ; Thomas Tickell ; Man and Wife (novel) ; Francis Atterbury ; An Essay on Criticism ; Jansenism ; Ralph Cudworth ; Thought ; G. (novel) ; Joseph Addison ; Baruch Spinoza ; The Various ; Piety ; Alessandro Tassoni ; Nicolas Malebranche ; William Warburton ; Democritus ; Alciphron ; Skepticism ; Themistocles ; Narrative ; Oppian ; Slavery ; Roger L'Estrange ; Absurdity ; Impiety ; Earl of Oxford ; Collation ; Deity ; First principle
• Published: June 21, 2016
• ISBN: 9781400880447

Poems & Poets

An Essay on Man: Epistle II

I. Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man. Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state, A being darkly wise, and rudely great: With too much knowledge for the sceptic side, With too much weakness for the stoic's pride, He hangs between; in doubt to act, or rest; In doubt to deem himself a god, or beast; In doubt his mind or body to prefer; Born but to die, and reas'ning but to err; Alike in ignorance, his reason such, Whether he thinks too little, or too much: Chaos of thought and passion, all confus'd; Still by himself abus'd, or disabus'd; Created half to rise, and half to fall; Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all; Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd: The glory, jest, and riddle of the world! Go, wondrous creature! mount where science guides, Go, measure earth, weigh air, and state the tides; Instruct the planets in what orbs to run, Correct old time, and regulate the sun; Go, soar with Plato to th' empyreal sphere, To the first good, first perfect, and first fair; Or tread the mazy round his follow'rs trod, And quitting sense call imitating God; As Eastern priests in giddy circles run, And turn their heads to imitate the sun. Go, teach Eternal Wisdom how to rule— Then drop into thyself, and be a fool! Superior beings, when of late they saw A mortal Man unfold all Nature's law, Admir'd such wisdom in an earthly shape, And showed a Newton as we shew an Ape. Could he, whose rules the rapid comet bind, Describe or fix one movement of his mind? Who saw its fires here rise, and there descend, Explain his own beginning, or his end? Alas what wonder! Man's superior part Uncheck'd may rise, and climb from art to art; But when his own great work is but begun, What Reason weaves, by Passion is undone. Trace science then, with modesty thy guide; First strip off all her equipage of pride; Deduct what is but vanity, or dress, Or learning's luxury, or idleness; Or tricks to show the stretch of human brain, Mere curious pleasure, or ingenious pain; Expunge the whole, or lop th' excrescent parts Of all our Vices have created Arts; Then see how little the remaining sum, Which serv'd the past, and must the times to come! II. Two principles in human nature reign; Self-love, to urge, and reason, to restrain; Nor this a good, nor that a bad we call, Each works its end, to move or govern all: And to their proper operation still, Ascribe all good; to their improper, ill. Self-love, the spring of motion, acts the soul; Reason's comparing balance rules the whole. Man, but for that, no action could attend, And but for this, were active to no end: Fix'd like a plant on his peculiar spot, To draw nutrition, propagate, and rot; Or, meteor-like, flame lawless through the void, Destroying others, by himself destroy'd. Most strength the moving principle requires; Active its task, it prompts, impels, inspires. Sedate and quiet the comparing lies, Form'd but to check, delib'rate, and advise. Self-love still stronger, as its objects nigh; Reason's at distance, and in prospect lie: That sees immediate good by present sense; Reason, the future and the consequence. Thicker than arguments, temptations throng, At best more watchful this, but that more strong. The action of the stronger to suspend, Reason still use, to reason still attend. Attention, habit and experience gains; Each strengthens reason, and self-love restrains. Let subtle schoolmen teach these friends to fight, More studious to divide than to unite, And grace and virtue, sense and reason split, With all the rash dexterity of wit: Wits, just like fools, at war about a name, Have full as oft no meaning, or the same. Self-love and reason to one end aspire, Pain their aversion, pleasure their desire; But greedy that its object would devour, This taste the honey, and not wound the flow'r: Pleasure, or wrong or rightly understood, Our greatest evil, or our greatest good. III. Modes of self-love the passions we may call: 'Tis real good, or seeming, moves them all: But since not every good we can divide, And reason bids us for our own provide; Passions, though selfish, if their means be fair, List under reason, and deserve her care; Those, that imparted, court a nobler aim, Exalt their kind, and take some virtue's name. In lazy apathy let Stoics boast Their virtue fix'd, 'tis fix'd as in a frost; Contracted all, retiring to the breast; But strength of mind is exercise, not rest: The rising tempest puts in act the soul, Parts it may ravage, but preserves the whole. On life's vast ocean diversely we sail, Reason the card, but passion is the gale; Nor God alone in the still calm we find, He mounts the storm, and walks upon the wind. Passions, like elements, though born to fight, Yet, mix'd and soften'd, in his work unite: These 'tis enough to temper and employ; But what composes man, can man destroy? Suffice that reason keep to nature's road, Subject, compound them, follow her and God. Love, hope, and joy, fair pleasure's smiling train, Hate, fear, and grief, the family of pain, These mix'd with art, and to due bounds confin'd, Make and maintain the balance of the mind: The lights and shades, whose well accorded strife Gives all the strength and colour of our life. Pleasures are ever in our hands or eyes, And when in act they cease, in prospect, rise: Present to grasp, and future still to find, The whole employ of body and of mind. All spread their charms, but charm not all alike; On diff'rent senses diff'rent objects strike; Hence diff'rent passions more or less inflame, As strong or weak, the organs of the frame; And hence one master passion in the breast, Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up the rest. As man, perhaps, the moment of his breath, Receives the lurking principle of death; The young disease, that must subdue at length, Grows with his growth, and strengthens with his strength: So, cast and mingled with his very frame, The mind's disease, its ruling passion came; Each vital humour which should feed the whole, Soon flows to this, in body and in soul. Whatever warms the heart, or fills the head, As the mind opens, and its functions spread, Imagination plies her dang'rous art, And pours it all upon the peccant part. Nature its mother, habit is its nurse; Wit, spirit, faculties, but make it worse; Reason itself but gives it edge and pow'r; As Heav'n's blest beam turns vinegar more sour. We, wretched subjects, though to lawful sway, In this weak queen some fav'rite still obey: Ah! if she lend not arms, as well as rules, What can she more than tell us we are fools? Teach us to mourn our nature, not to mend, A sharp accuser, but a helpless friend! Or from a judge turn pleader, to persuade The choice we make, or justify it made; Proud of an easy conquest all along, She but removes weak passions for the strong: So, when small humours gather to a gout, The doctor fancies he has driv'n them out. Yes, nature's road must ever be preferr'd; Reason is here no guide, but still a guard: 'Tis hers to rectify, not overthrow, And treat this passion more as friend than foe: A mightier pow'r the strong direction sends, And sev'ral men impels to sev'ral ends. Like varying winds, by other passions toss'd, This drives them constant to a certain coast. Let pow'r or knowledge, gold or glory, please, Or (oft more strong than all) the love of ease; Through life 'tis followed, ev'n at life's expense; The merchant's toil, the sage's indolence, The monk's humility, the hero's pride, All, all alike, find reason on their side. Th' eternal art educing good from ill, Grafts on this passion our best principle: 'Tis thus the mercury of man is fix'd, Strong grows the virtue with his nature mix'd; The dross cements what else were too refin'd, And in one interest body acts with mind. As fruits, ungrateful to the planter's care, On savage stocks inserted, learn to bear; The surest virtues thus from passions shoot, Wild nature's vigor working at the root. What crops of wit and honesty appear From spleen, from obstinacy, hate, or fear! See anger, zeal and fortitude supply; Ev'n av'rice, prudence; sloth, philosophy; Lust, through some certain strainers well refin'd, Is gentle love, and charms all womankind; Envy, to which th' ignoble mind's a slave, Is emulation in the learn'd or brave; Nor virtue, male or female, can we name, But what will grow on pride, or grow on shame. Thus nature gives us (let it check our pride) The virtue nearest to our vice allied: Reason the byass turns to good from ill, And Nero reigns a Titus, if he will. The fiery soul abhorr'd in Catiline, In Decius charms, in Curtius is divine: The same ambition can destroy or save, And make a patriot as it makes a knave. IV. This light and darkness in our chaos join'd, What shall divide? The God within the mind. Extremes in nature equal ends produce, In man they join to some mysterious use; Though each by turns the other's bound invade, As, in some well-wrought picture, light and shade, And oft so mix, the diff'rence is too nice Where ends the virtue, or begins the vice. Fools! who from hence into the notion fall, That vice or virtue there is none at all. If white and black blend, soften, and unite A thousand ways, is there no black or white? Ask your own heart, and nothing is so plain; 'Tis to mistake them, costs the time and pain. V. Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, As, to be hated, needs but to be seen; Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, We first endure, then pity, then embrace. But where th' extreme of vice, was ne'er agreed: Ask where's the North? at York, 'tis on the Tweed; In Scotland, at the Orcades; and there, At Greenland, Zembla, or the Lord knows where: No creature owns it in the first degree, But thinks his neighbour farther gone than he! Ev'n those who dwell beneath its very zone, Or never feel the rage, or never own; What happier natures shrink at with affright, The hard inhabitant contends is right. VI. Virtuous and vicious ev'ry man must be, Few in th' extreme, but all in the degree; The rogue and fool by fits is fair and wise; And ev'n the best, by fits, what they despise. 'Tis but by parts we follow good or ill, For, vice or virtue, self directs it still; Each individual seeks a sev'ral goal; But heav'n's great view is one, and that the whole: That counterworks each folly and caprice; That disappoints th' effect of ev'ry vice; That, happy frailties to all ranks applied, Shame to the virgin, to the matron pride, Fear to the statesman, rashness to the chief, To kings presumption, and to crowds belief, That, virtue's ends from vanity can raise, Which seeks no int'rest, no reward but praise; And build on wants, and on defects of mind, The joy, the peace, the glory of mankind. Heav'n forming each on other to depend, A master, or a servant, or a friend, Bids each on other for assistance call, 'Till one man's weakness grows the strength of all. Wants, frailties, passions, closer still ally The common int'rest, or endear the tie: To these we owe true friendship, love sincere, Each home-felt joy that life inherits here; Yet from the same we learn, in its decline, Those joys, those loves, those int'rests to resign; Taught half by reason, half by mere decay, To welcome death, and calmly pass away. Whate'er the passion, knowledge, fame, or pelf, Not one will change his neighbour with himself. The learn'd is happy nature to explore, The fool is happy that he knows no more; The rich is happy in the plenty giv'n, The poor contents him with the care of heav'n. See the blind beggar dance, the cripple sing, The sot a hero, lunatic a king; The starving chemist in his golden views Supremely blest, the poet in his Muse. See some strange comfort ev'ry state attend, And pride bestow'd on all, a common friend; See some fit passion ev'ry age supply, Hope travels through, nor quits us when we die. Behold the child, by nature's kindly law, Pleas'd with a rattle, tickl'd with a straw: Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight, A little louder, but as empty quite: Scarfs, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage, And beads and pray'r books are the toys of age: Pleas'd with this bauble still, as that before; 'Till tir'd he sleeps, and life's poor play is o'er! Meanwhile opinion gilds with varying rays Those painted clouds that beautify our days; Each want of happiness by hope supplied, And each vacuity of sense by Pride: These build as fast as knowledge can destroy; In folly's cup still laughs the bubble, joy; One prospect lost, another still we gain; And not a vanity is giv'n in vain; Ev'n mean self-love becomes, by force divine, The scale to measure others' wants by thine. See! and confess, one comfort still must rise, 'Tis this: Though man's a fool, yet God is wise.

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• An Essay on Man

In this Book

• Alexander Pope Edited and with an introduction by Tom Jones
• Published by: Princeton University Press
• View Citation

A definitive new edition of one of the greatest philosophical poems in the English language Voltaire called it "the most sublime didactic poem ever written in any language." Rousseau rhapsodized about its intellectual consolations. Kant recited long passages of it from memory during his lectures. And Adam Smith and David Hume drew inspiration from it in their writings. This was Alexander Pope's Essay on Man (1733–34), a masterpiece of philosophical poetry, one of the most important and controversial works of the Enlightenment, and one of the most widely read, imitated, and discussed poems of eighteenth-century Europe and America. This volume, which presents the first major new edition of the poem in more than fifty years, introduces this essential work to a new generation of readers, recapturing the excitement and illuminating the debates it provoked from the moment of its publication. Echoing Milton's purpose in Paradise Lost , Pope says his aim in An Essay on Man is to "vindicate the ways of God to man"—to explain the existence of evil and explore man's place in the universe. In a comprehensive introduction, Tom Jones describes the poem as an investigation of the fundamental question of how people should behave in a world they experience as chaotic, but which they suspect to be orderly from some higher point of view. The introduction provides a thorough discussion of the poem's attitudes, themes, composition, context, and reception, and reassesses the work's place in history. Extensive annotations to the text explain references and allusions. The result is the most accessible, informative, and reader-friendly edition of the poem in decades and an invaluable book for students and scholars of eighteenth-century literature and thought.

Table of Contents

• Half-Title, Title, Copyright
• Acknowledgments
• pp. vii-viii
• Abbreviations and Frequently Cited Works
• Introduction
• pp. xv-cxvi
• A Note on the Text
• pp. cxvii-cxviii
• POPE’S KNOWLEDGE OF AUTHORS CITED
• BIBLIOGRAPHY
• pp. 107-122
• pp. 123-130

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