Home > Claude Adrien Helvétius

He was born in Paris, France, and was descended from a family of physicians, originally surnamed Schweitzer (latinized as Helvétius). His grandfather introduced the use of ipecacuanha; his father was first physician to Marie Leszczynska, queen of France. Claude Adrien was trained for a financial career, but he occupied his spare time with poetry. Aged twenty-three, at the queen's request, he was appointed farmer-general, a tax-collecting post worth 100,000 crowns a year. Thus provided for, he proceeded to enjoy life to the utmost, with the help of his wealth and liberality, his literary and artistic tastes. As he grew older, he began to seek more lasting distinctions, stimulated by the success of Pierre Louis Maupertuis as a mathematician, of Voltaire as a poet, and of Montesquieu as a philosopher.

His poetic ambitions resulted in the poem called Le Bonheur (published posthumously, with an account of Helvétius's life and works, by Jean François de Saint-Lambert, 1773), in which he develops the idea that true happiness is only to be found in making the interest of one that of all; his philosophical studies ended in the production of his famous book De l'esprit. It was characteristic of him that, as soon as he thought his fortune sufficient, he gave up the post of farmer-general, and retired to a country estate, where he employed his fortune in the relief of the poor, the encouragement of agriculture and the development of industries. De l'esprit, intended to be the rival of Montesquieu's L'Esprit des lois, appeared in 1758Events June 12 French and Indian War: Siege of Louisbourg James Wolfe's attack at Louisbourg, Nova Scotia commences. June 23 Seven Years War: Battle of Krefeld British forces defeat French troops at Krefeld in Germany. July 8 French and Indian War: French. It attracted immediate attention and aroused the most formidable opposition, especially from the dauphinThe Dauphin was the heir apparent to the throne of France under the Valois and Bourbon dynasties. Guy VIII, Count of Vienne, had a dolphin on his coat of arms and had been nicknamed le Dauphin ( French for dolphin . The title of Dauphin du Viennois descen, son of Louis XVLouis XV ( February 15, 1710 May 10, 1774) was king of France from 1715- 74. He was born at the Palace of Versailles. Until the royal legal age of maturity at fourteen, his uncle, Philippe d'Orleans, acted as Regent. Cardinal Fleury, until his death ( 174. The SorbonneLa Sorbonne was the name of the former University of Paris in Paris, France, one among the most ancient in Europe. History It was founded in 1257 by Robert de Sorbon, after whom it is named. It is also the name of its main campus in the 5th arrondissement condemned the book, the priests persuaded the court that it was full of the most dangerous doctrines, and the author, terrified at the storm he had raised, wrote three separate retractions; yet, in spite of his protestations of orthodoxy, the book was publicly burned by the hangman.

The publicity resulted in the book being translated into almost all the languages of Europe. Voltaire said that it lacked originality; RousseauJean Jacques Rousseau ( June 28, 1712 July 2, 1778) was a Swiss-French philosopher, writer, political theorist, and self-taught composer. Biography of Rousseau Rousseau was born in Geneva, Switzerland, and died in Ermenonville (28 miles northeast of Paris declared that the very benevolence of the author gave the lie to his principles; GrimmFriedrich Melchior, baron von Grimm ( December 26, 1723 December 19, 1807), French author, the son of a German pastor, was born at Ratisbon. He studied at the University of Leipzig, where he came under the influence of Gottsched and of JA Ernesti, to whom thought that all the ideas in the book were borrowed from DiderotDenis Diderot ( October 5, 1713 July 31, 1784) was a French writer and philosopher. Born in Langres, Champagne, France in 1713, he was a prominent figure in what became known as The Enlightenment, and was the editor-in-chief of the famous Encyclopedie''.; Madame du DeffandMarie Anne de Vichy-Chamrond, marquise du Deffand ( 1697 September 23, 1780) was a French hostess and patron of the arts. She was born at the Chateau of Chamrond near Charolles departement of Saone-et-Loire) of a noble family. Educated at a convent in Par felt that Helvétius had raised such a storm by saying openly what every one thought in secret; Madame de Graffigny claimed that all the good things in the book had been picked up in her own salon. In 1764 Helvétius visited England, and the next year, at the invitation of Frederick II, went to Berlin, where the king paid him much attention. He then returned to his country estate and passed the remainder of his life peacefully.

His philosophy belongs to the utilitarian school. The four discussions of which his book consists have been thus summed up:

1. All man's faculties may be reduced to physical sensation, even memory, comparison, judgment; our only difference from the lower animals lies in our external organization.
2. Self-interest, founded on the love of pleasure and the fear of pain, is the sole spring of judgment, action, affection; self-sacrifice is prompted by the fact that the sensation of pleasure outweighs the accompanying pain; it is thus the result of deliberate calculation; we have no liberty of choice between good and evil; there is no such thing as absolute right--ideas of justice and injustice change according to customs.
3. All intellects are equal; their apparent inequalities do not depend on a more or less perfect organization, but have their cause in the unequal desire for instruction, and this desire springs from passions, of which all men commonly well organized are susceptible to the same degree; and we can, therefore, all love glory with the same enthusiasm and we owe all to education.
4. In this discourse the author treats of the ideas which are attached to such words as genius, imagination, talent, taste, good sense, etc.

The original ideas in his system are those of the natural equality of intelligences and the omnipotence of education, neither of which gained generally acceptance, though both were prominent in the system of John Stuart Mill. Although his thinking was unsystematic, many of his critics misrepresented him. He had great influence on Jeremy Bentham, and C Beccaria states that he was largely inspired by Helvétius in his attempt to modify penal laws. The keynote of his thought was that public ethics has a utilitarian basis, and he insisted strongly on the importance of culture in national development.

A sort of supplement to the De l'esprit, called De l'homme, de ses facultis intellectuelles et de son education (Eng. trans. by W Hooper, 1777), found among his manuscripts, was published after his death, but created little interest. There is a complete edition of the works of Helvétius, published at Paris, 1818. For an estimate of his work and his place among the philosophers of the 18th century see Victor Cousin's Philosophie sensualiste (1863); PL Lezaud, Résumés philosophiques (1853); FD Maurice, in his Modern Philosophy (1862), pp. 537 seq.; J Morley, Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (London, 1878); DG Mostratos, Die Pädagogik des Helvétius (Berlin, 1891); A Guillois , Le Salon de Madanie Helvétius (1894); A Piazzi, Le idee filosofiche specialmente pedagogiche de C. A. Helvétius (Milan, 1889); G Plekhanov, Beiträge zur Geschichte des Materialismus (Stuttgart, 1896); L Limentani, Le teorie psicologiche de C. A. Helvétius (Verona, 1902); A Keim, Helvétius, sa vie et son œuvre (1907).

This article incorporates text from the public domain 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. 1911 Britannica