O vertu! science sublime des âmes simples, faut-il donc tant de peines et d’appareil pour te connaître? Tes principes ne sont-ils pas graves dans tous les coeurs? et ne suffit-il pas pour apprendre tes lois de rentrer en soi-même et d’écouter la voix de sa conscience dans le silence des passions? Discours sur l’origine et les fondements de l’inégalité parmi les hommes: Il suit de cet exposé que l’inégalité, étant presque nulle dans l’état de nature tire sa force et son accroissement du developpement de nos facultés et des progrès de l’esprit humain, et devient enfin stable et légitime par l’établissement de la propriété et des lois. Il suit encore que l’inégalité morale autorisée par le seul droit positif, est contraire au droit naturel toutes les fois qu’elle ne concourt pas en même proportion avec l’inégalité physique; distinction qui détermine suffisamment ce qu’on doit penser à cet égard de la sorte d’inégalité qui règne parmi tous les peuples policés, puis-qu’il est manifestement contre la loi de nature. The primitivism which stands out in Rousseau’s two discourses is to be seen in a general way in Herder’s dislike for the higher culture that would discourage spontaneous outbursts of human feelings as they appear in the so-called cruder forms of literature; a culture that would displace these by a smoother product born of reflection and regulated by set rules and formulas. He has an admiration for the instinct which to him is always to be found in women, children, and fools, and which he sees as the foundation of a naïveté more valuable as a part of mental equipment than anything which could be substituted by processes of training and culture. Rousseau’s attempt to return to nature for concrete everyday life finds its approval with Herder, but the general idea takes a new turn. He finds in it the inspiration for scientific methods of studying art, history, and philosophy. His line of investigation in these will be by way of nature; i.e., man in his primitive abode; man in the hands of nature; man as the product of his environment. The opposition to a central and superior governing power, which is found in the _Social Contract_, to be opposed to the natural method of community life, finds its echo in Herder in frequent tirades against the _policirte Nationen_. It is the _unpolicirte Nationen_ to whom nature has given a certain solace that can scarcely be found in _Menschliche Künsteleien_. The _Briefe zur Beförderung der Humanität_ carry a constant strain, which makes the interdependence between the individual and the group a requisite for well-being. This theory, we have seen, finds a distinct place in Shaftesbury’s philosophy before Rousseau had voiced it as his own.