The Social Contract

Term Paper Title	The Social Contract
# of Words	644
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	2.58

"The Social Contract"

by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

        "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains. One man thinks
       himself the master of others, but remains more of a slave than they
                                             are."

          Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in his dramatic opening lines to his immensely powerful
          treatise "The Social Contract," wrote that man was naturally good but becomes
          corrupted by the pernicious influence of human society and institutions. He
          preached a mankind improved by returning to nature and living a natural life at
          peace with his neighbors and himself. He claims to be in favor of democracy, but
          what he really favors is egalitarianism. Rousseau's influence both in art and politics
          was huge in his own day and continues to be strong today.

                                       Voltaire and Rousseau
                                   "To hold a pen is to be at war!"
                                     Voltaire to Mme. d' Angenthal
                                          Octiber 4, 1748

                                  Voltaire and Rousseau

          Although they are two of the most famous of the great French philosophes,
          Rousseau and Voltaire hated each other. In fact, it would be hard to ever envision
          the urbane and suave Voltaire and the radically democratic Rousseau ever seeing
          eye to eye on much: Voltaire believed that through education and reason man could
          separate himself from the beasts while Rousseau thought that it was precisely all
          this which made men "unnatural" and corrupted. As Betrand Russell put it so
          eloquently: "It is not surprising that Rousseau and Voltaire ultimately quarreled; the
          marvel is that they did not quarrel sooner." Like many intellectuals, Rousseau was a
          great lover of mankind as a collective but singularly unable to appreciate or get
          along with any individual persons who he encountered in his life. On the other
          hand, Voltaire was not a person you wanted to engage in a literary t�te-a-t�te as his
          scorn and ridicule were lethal.

       ...

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