It was not the theory of a revolutionary class; it did not preach war but contemplative enjoyment. Platonic Idealism and Theism represented far more the overthrow of the traditional religious views—a theory of the discontented classes.
But with the Philosophy of Enlightenment it was otherwise. Though certainly even this has a conservative root; it regarded contemplative enjoyment as happiness, that is, so far as it served the needs of the Court nobility, which drew its living from the existing absolutist State. But in the main it was the philosophy of the most intelligent and most developed as well as the most courageous elements in the bourgeoisie. It gave them a revolutionary character. Standing from the very beginning in the most absolute opposition to the traditional religion and Ethics, these classes acquired—in proportion as the bourgeoisie increased in strength and class consciousness—the conception of a fight—a conception quite foreign to the old Epicureans—a fight against priests and tyrants, a fight for the new ideals.
The nature and method of the moral views and the height of the moral passions are, according to human life, and especially by the constitution of the French Materialists, determined by the conditions of State, as well as by education. It is always self-interest that determines man; this can, however, become a very social interest, if society is so organised that the individual interest coincides with the interest of the community, so that the passions of men serve the common welfare. True virtue consists in the care for the commonweal; it can only flourish where the commonwealth at the same time advances the interests of the individual, where he cannot damage the commonwealth without damaging himself.
It is incapacity to perceive the more durable interests of mankind, ignorance as to the best form of government, society, and education which renders a state of affairs possible, which of necessity brings the individual interest into conflict with that of the community. It only remains to make an end to this ignorance to find
