Ideas: A History from Fire to Freud

7. In particular, for example, he thought that religion, by which he meant Christianity, hindered the development of a strong state, because it preached meekness. At the same time he thought that some form of religion was desirable, because it acted as a social ‘glue’ that kept people together. But this too was new, in that it was the first time anyone had (openly, at any rate) conceived religion as a coercive rather than as a spiritual force. Bronowski and Mazlish, Op. cit., page 34; Boorstin, Op. cit., page 178.

8. Schulze, Op. cit., page 30.

9. Ibid., page 31.

10. N. Machiavelli, The Prince, translated by Peter Whitshome (1560), reprinted 1905, chapter 18, page 323.

11. Boorstin, Op. cit., page 178.

12. Bronowski and Mazlish, Op. cit., page 36.

13. Ibid., page 32.

14. Bowle, Op. cit., pages 270–272.

15. Allied with its national character, Protestantism laid the spiritual/psychological basis for a political sovereignty based in the people. Calvin’s insistence on the preeminence of individual conscience, which even allowed for tyrannicide against Catholic rulers on confessional grounds, became the forerunner of the right of rebellion, which was to become such a characteristic of later times. Taken together, these elements would lead eventually to the democratic theory of the state. The purpose of the state, for the early Protestants, was to protect the congregations within it, not in itself to provide the spiritual development of the people. ‘The best things in life are not in the state’s province at all.’ Bowle, Op. cit., pages 280–281.

16. Ibid., pages 281–282.

17. Jonathan Wright, The Jesuits: Mission, Myths and Historians, London: HarperCollins, 2004, pages 148–149.

18. Bowle, Op. cit., page 285.

19. Ibid.

20. Reinhard Bendix, Kings or People: Power and the Mandate to Rule, Op. cit., pages 307ff; see also: John Dunn (editor), Democracy: The Unfinished Journey: 508 BC to AD 1993, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, especially pages 71ff.

21. Schulze, Op. cit., page 49.

22. Moynahan, Op. cit., page 455, says the years 1562–1598 were the ones stained worst by massacres, murders and eight wars.

23. Schulze, Op. cit., page 50.

24. Bowle, Op. cit., page 290. Many (French) Huguenots emigrated to America after Louis XIV withdrew toleration in 1685. See: Moynahan, Op. cit., page 576.

25. And in any case, Bodin was not himself a fanatic. Indeed, his thought anticipated the business-like outlook of Cardinal Richelieu, who was to put Bodin’s ideas into practice on an ambitious scale.

26. Bowle, Op. cit., page 291.

27. Schulze, Op. cit., page 53.

28. Ibid., pages 56–57.

29. Poland and the Netherlands were exceptions. Schulze, Op. cit., page 57.

30. Bowle, Op. cit., page 293.

31. Ibid., page 317.

32. Bronowski and Mazlish, Op. cit., page 198.

33. Bowle, Op. cit., page 318. See also: Moynahan, Op. cit., page 492.

34. One of its distinguishing features is the most vivid title page of any book ever printed. The upper half shows a landscape which depicts a neatly planned town against a background of open country. Towering above this scene, however, there stands the crowned figure of a giant, a titan, shown from the waist up, his arms outstretched in a protective embrace, a great sword in one hand, a crozier in the other. Most poignant of all, the body of the figure is formed from a swarm of little people, their backs to the reader and their gaze fixed on the giant’s face. It is one of the most eerie, and most powerful images in all history.

35. Ernst Cassirer, The Philosophy of the Enlightenment, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1951, page 254.

36. Roger Smith, The Fontana History of the Human Sciences, London: Fontana Press, 1997, pages 105ff.

37. Bronowski and Mazlish, Op. cit., page 205.

38. Bowle, Op. cit., page 321.

39. Ibid., page 329.

40. Ibid., page 328.

41. Bronowski and Mazlish, Op. cit., page 206.

42. Ibid., page 207.

43. Bowle, Op. cit., page 331.

44. Ibid., page 361.

45. Boorstin, Op. cit., page 180.

46. Bowle, Op. cit., page 363.

47. Ibid., page 364.

48. Schulze, Op. cit., pages 70–71.

49. Bowle, Op. cit., page 365.

50. Boorstin, Op. cit., page 186, who says the works are ‘labored’ and that it is surprising they have been so inspiring.

51. Bronowski and Mazlish, Op. cit., page 210.

52. Bowle, Op. cit., page 378.

53. Ibid., pages 379–381.

54. The Tractatus was originally published anonymously and, briefly, banned. The Jewish community of Amsterdam expelled him.