What is Property? An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of GovernmentProudhon, P.-J. (Pierre-Joseph)
Philosophy
What is Property? An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government
Proudhon, P.-J. (Pierre-Joseph)
Economics; Property
All that he does from instinct man despises; or, if he admires it, it
is as Nature's work, not as his own. This explains the obscurity
which surrounds the names of early inventors; it explains also our
indifference to religious matters, and the ridicule heaped upon
religious customs. Man esteems only the products of reflection and of
reason. The most wonderful works of instinct are, in his eyes, only
lucky GOD-SENDS; he reserves the name DISCOVERY--I had almost said
creation--for the works of intelligence. Instinct is the source of
passion and enthusiasm; it is intelligence which causes crime and
virtue.
In developing his intelligence, man makes use of not only his own
observations, but also those of others. He keeps an account of his
experience, and preserves the record; so that the race, as well as
the individual, becomes more and more intelligent. The animals do not
transmit their knowledge; that which each individual accumulates dies
with him.
It is not enough, then, to say that we are distinguished from the
animals by reflection, unless we mean thereby the CONSTANT TENDENCY OF
OUR INSTINCT TO BECOME INTELLIGENCE. While man is governed by instinct,
he is unconscious of his acts. He never would deceive himself, and never
would be troubled by errors, evils, and disorder, if, like the animals,
instinct were his only guide. But the Creator has endowed us with
reflection, to the end that our instinct might become intelligence;
and since this reflection and resulting knowledge pass through various
stages, it happens that in the beginning our instinct is opposed, rather
than guided, by reflection; consequently, that our power of thought
leads us to act in opposition to our nature and our end; that, deceiving
ourselves, we do and suffer evil, until instinct which points us towards
good, and reflection which makes us stumble into evil, are replaced by
the science of good and evil, which invariably causes us to seek the one
and avoid the other.
Thus, evil--or error and its consequences--is the firstborn son of
the union of two opposing faculties, instinct and reflection; good,
or truth, must inevitably be the second child. Or, to again employ the
figure, evil is the product of incest between adverse powers; good will
sooner or later be the legitimate child of their holy and mysterious
union.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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