The idea was applied to government in a treatise entitled the Social Contract (1761). The "social-contract" theory was not new, but Rousseau made it famous. He taught that government, law, and social conventions were the outcome of an agreement or contract by which at the misty dawn of history all members of the state had voluntarily bound themselves. All governments exercised their power in last analysis by virtue of this social contract, by will of the people. Laws, therefore, should be submitted to popular vote. The republic is the best form of government, because it is the most sensitive to the desires of the people. This idea of "popular sovereignty," or rule of the people, was in men's minds when they set up a republic in France fourteen years after the death of Rousseau.
Rousseau's cry, "Back to nature," had still another aspect. He said that children should be allowed to follow their natural inclinations, instead of being driven to study. They should learn practical, useful things, instead of Latin and Greek. "Let them learn what they must do when they are men, and not what they must forget."
It is hard to fix limits to the influence of Rousseau's writings. True, both the orthodox Catholics and the philosophical Deists condemned him. But his followers were many, both bourgeois and noble. "Back to nature" became the fad of the day, and court ladies pretended to live a "natural" life and to go fishing. His theory of the social contract, his contention that wealth should not be divided among a few, his idea that the people should rule themselves,—these were to be the inspiration of the republican stage of the French Revolution, and in time to permeate all Europe.
[Sidenote: Beccaria]
The spirit of reform was applied not only against the clergy, the nobles, the monarchy, and faulty systems of law and education, but likewise to the administration of justice. Hitherto the most barbarous "punishments" had been meted out. A pickpocket might be hung for stealing a couple of shillings [Footnote: In England.]; for a more serious offense the criminal might have his bones broken and then be laid on his back on a cart-wheel, to die in agony while crowds looked on and jeered. In a book entitled Crimes and Punishments (1764), an Italian marquis of the name of Beccaria (1738-1794) held that such punishments were not only brutal and barbarous, but did not serve to prevent crimes as effectually as milder sentences, promptly and surely administered. Beccaria's ideas are the basis of our modern laws, although the death penalty still lingers in a few cases.
[Sidenote: Political Economy: the Physiocrats]
In yet another sphere—that of economics—philosophers were examining the old order of things, and asking, as ever, "Is it reasonable?" As we have repeatedly observed, most governments had long followed the mercantilist plan more or less consistently. But in the eighteenth century, François Quesnay, a bourgeois physician at the court of Louis XV, announced to his friends that mercantilism was all wrong. He became the center of a little group of philosophers who called themselves "economists," and who taught that a nation's wealth comes from farming and mining; that manufacturers and traders produce nothing new, but merely exchange or transport commodities. The manufacturers and merchants should therefore be untaxed and unhampered. Laissez- faire—"Let them do as they will." Let the farmers pay the taxes. The foremost disciple of laisser-faire in France was Turgot (1727-1781). As minister of finance under Louis XVI he attempted to abolish duties and restrictions on commerce, but his efforts were only partially successful.
[Sidenote: Adam Smith]
Meanwhile, a Scotchman, who had visited France and had known Quesnay, was conveying the new ideas across the Channel. It was Adam Smith, the "father of political economy." Smith was quite in harmony with the philosophic spirit, with its "natural rights," "natural religion," and "natural laws." He was a professor of "moral philosophy" in the University of Glasgow, and as an incident of his philosophical speculations, he thought out a system of political economy, i.e., the "laws" by which a nation might increase its wealth, on the lines suggested by Quesnay. Adam Smith's famous book The Wealth of Nations appeared in 1776, the year of American independence. It was a declaration of independence for industry. Let each man, each employer of labor, each seller of merchandise follow his own personal business interests without let or hindrance, for in so doing he is "led by an invisible hand" to promote the good of all. Let the government abolish all monopolies, [Footnote: He was somewhat inconsistent in approving joint-stock monopolies and shipping regulations.] all restrictions on trade, all customs duties, all burdens on industry. Thus only can the true wealth of a nation be promoted.
Smith's opinions were so plausible and his arguments so ingenious that his doctrines steadily gained in influence, and in the first half of the nineteenth century pretty generally triumphed. In actual practice the abolition of restrictions on industry was destined to give free rein to the avarice and cruelty of the most selfish employers, to enrich the bourgeoisie, and to leave the lower classes more miserable than ever. The "Wealth of Nations" was to be the wealth of the bourgeoisie. But meanwhile, it was to destroy mercantilism.