The Ruins Or Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires ConstantinFrançois Volney 9781546985822 Books
Download As PDF : The Ruins Or Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires ConstantinFrançois Volney 9781546985822 Books
Volney's "The Ruins Or, Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires" strikes the note of vehement protest against contemporary 18th Century institutions and society. It analyzes the governments of the Empires of the past, shows where they failed, and presents us with the moral. In a word it was heartily in accord with the revolutionary spirit of its day. Constantin François Volney (1757 – 1820) was a French philosopher, a republican liberalist of the French Revolution, travel author, and historian. In 1791, he published the original French version of "The Ruins Or, Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires" under the title of "Les Ruines, ou Meditations sur les Revolutions des Empires.'' Although to-day we have forgotten Volney, at the close of the eighteenth century he had wide spread fame as a literary exponent of freedom. Born in 1757, while yet in his minority he made extended travels in Egypt and Palestine. History has it that Napoleon on his Egyptian Campaign, used the guide book Volney had written. Later the States-General elected him a member. He embarked on a journey to the East in late 1782 and reached Ottoman Egypt, where he spent nearly seven months. Thereafter, he lived for nearly two years in Greater Syria in what is today Lebanon and Israel/Palestine in order to learn Arabic. In 1795 he undertook a journey to the United States, where he was accused by John Adams' administration of being a French spy. Sometime during his stay in the United States, he and Thomas Jefferson entered into a secret arrangement whereby Jefferson agreed to translate Volney’s Ruins of Empires into English. According to the evidence discovered by the French researcher Gilbert Chinard, Jefferson translated the invocation plus the first 20 chapters of the 1802 Paris edition of Volney’s Ruins. These first 20 chapters represent a review of human history from the point of view of a post-Enlightenment philosopher. Presumably, Jefferson then became too occupied with the 1800 Presidential campaign and didn't have time to finish the last four chapters of the book. Since Jefferson didn’t have time to complete the translation project, the last four chapters were translated by Joel Barlow (1754 –1812), an American land speculator and poet living in Paris. Contents I. THE JOURNEY. II. THE REVERIE. III. THE APPARITION. IV. THE EXPOSITION V. CONDITION OF MAN IN THE UNIVERSE. VI. THE PRIMITIVE STATE OF MAN. VII. PRINCIPLES OF SOCIETY. VIII. SOURCES OF THE EVILS OF SOCIETY. IX. ORIGIN OF GOVERNMENT AND LAWS. X. GENERAL CAUSES OF THE PROSPERITY OF ANCIENT STATES. XI. GENERAL CAUSES OF THE REVOLUTIONS AND RUIN OF ANCIENT STATES. XII. LESSONS OF TIMES PAST REPEATED ON THE PRESENT. XIII. WILL THE HUMAN RACE IMPROVE? XIV. THE GREAT OBSTACLE TO IMPROVEMENT. XV. THE NEW AGE. XVI. A FREE AND LEGISLATIVE PEOPLE. XVII. UNIVERSAL BASIS OF ALL RIGHT AND ALL LAW. XVIII. CONSTERNATION AND CONSPIRACY OF TYRANTS. XIX. GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE NATIONS. XX. THE SEARCH OF TRUTH. XXI. PROBLEM OF RELIGIOUS CONTRADICTIONS. XXII. ORIGIN AND FILIATION OF RELIGIOUS IDEAS. XXIII. ALL RELIGIONS HAVE THE SAME OBJECT. XXIV. SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM OF CONTRADICTIONS.
The Ruins Or Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires ConstantinFrançois Volney 9781546985822 Books
Volney’s Ruins of Empires (Les Ruines, 1791) is a lost classic in Western Literature. Thomas Jefferson like the book so much he anonymously translated it into English. Jefferson believed the book’s central premise—Empires Rise If Government Allows Enlightened Self-Interest to Flourish—best described the Enlightenment-based principles upon which the United States was founded. Volney saw his book as a direct challenge to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Social Contract—if you refute the Social Contract, you refute the moral foundation of the big government social programs that exist in the world today.However Jefferson also insisted on complete anonymity for his translation due to the book’s controversial religious content. In the last four chapters of the book (translated by Joel Barlow) Volney reviews the history of the world’s major religions and concludes with a call for all nations to adopt the principle of separation of church and state—only then, Volney writes, can our species achieve world peace. These last four chapters have a renewed resonance in the post-9/11 world.
The Jefferson/Barlow translation went through many reprints in the USA during the 19th & 20th centuries. The book was read by the likes of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Walt Whitman, but has fallen out of favor in recent decades. The Left does not like Volney because he refutes Rousseau. The Right does not like him because Volney constructs a universal system of morality without reference to God. But in a world beset by massive government deficits and resurgent religious conflict, Volney’s Ruins of Empires provides a roadmap for the future. In a word, Volney’s Ruins isn’t about Yesterday. It’s about Today. And Tomorrow.
FIVE GENERAL RULES TO PURCHASE A JEFFERSON-BARLOW TRANSLATION
(1) The first US edition of the translation by Thomas Jefferson and Joel Barlow was published by Dixon and Sickles of New York in 1828. (According to this rule, the commonly found editions published by James Lyon of Philadelphia, 1799, and by William Davies of New York, 1796, are NOT Jefferson-Barlow translations.)
(2) Beware of editions published in the UK: 99 percent are NOT the Jefferson-Barlow translation. If you see the word "survey" in the title, that is a clear indication the book was published in the UK and is NOT a Jefferson-Barlow translation. In general, it's best to look for US editions post-1828.
(3) If the title page includes the phrase "translated under the inspection of the author," this is the Jefferson-Barlow translation.
(4) The Acid Test: turn to the Invocation: the first sentence should read: "Hail solitary ruins, holy sepulchres and silent walls! you I invoke; to you I address my prayer!" This is the Jefferson-Barlow translation.
(5) If you still want confirmation, go to Gutenberg.org => Volney. There you will find a free electronic copy of the (unacknowledged) Jefferson-Barlow translation for your comparison.
For more details, join me on Twitter @RuinsofEmpires
Or at GoodReads:
[...]
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Tags : The Ruins: Or, Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires [Constantin-François Volney] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Volney's The Ruins: Or, Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires strikes the note of vehement protest against contemporary 18th Century institutions and society. It analyzes the governments of the Empires of the past,Constantin-François Volney,The Ruins: Or, Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires,CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform,1546985824,POLITICAL SCIENCE Comparative Politics
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The Ruins Or Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires ConstantinFrançois Volney 9781546985822 Books Reviews
This book was secretly translated by Thomas Jefferson and was one of Abraham Lincoln's favorite books.
It was (obviously except for Thomas Paine's "Age of Reason") the most popular Deist book among late 18th and early 19th century radicals. It is very dated now. It evokes a scene similar to Shelley's poem Ozymandias of an enlightenment intellectual reflecting on the folly of human vanity in view of the ruins of ancient civilizations and asks the question why does everything fall apart. The core of the book is a comparative analysis of all the world's religions as understood by a knowledgeable European in 1795. With all the contradictions between them and no solid basis for deciding which is valid. Only for those interested in that era.
Volney’s Ruins of Empires (Les Ruines, 1791) is a lost classic in Western Literature. Thomas Jefferson like the book so much he anonymously translated it into English. Jefferson believed the book’s central premise—Empires Rise If Government Allows Enlightened Self-Interest to Flourish—best described the Enlightenment-based principles upon which the United States was founded. Volney saw his book as a direct challenge to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Social Contract—if you refute the Social Contract, you refute the moral foundation of the big government social programs that exist in the world today.
However Jefferson also insisted on complete anonymity for his translation due to the book’s controversial religious content. In the last four chapters of the book (translated by Joel Barlow) Volney reviews the history of the world’s major religions and concludes with a call for all nations to adopt the principle of separation of church and state—only then, Volney writes, can our species achieve world peace. These last four chapters have a renewed resonance in the post-9/11 world.
The Jefferson/Barlow translation went through many reprints in the USA during the 19th & 20th centuries. The book was read by the likes of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Walt Whitman, but has fallen out of favor in recent decades. The Left does not like Volney because he refutes Rousseau. The Right does not like him because Volney constructs a universal system of morality without reference to God. But in a world beset by massive government deficits and resurgent religious conflict, Volney’s Ruins of Empires provides a roadmap for the future. In a word, Volney’s Ruins isn’t about Yesterday. It’s about Today. And Tomorrow.
FIVE GENERAL RULES TO PURCHASE A JEFFERSON-BARLOW TRANSLATION
(1) The first US edition of the translation by Thomas Jefferson and Joel Barlow was published by Dixon and Sickles of New York in 1828. (According to this rule, the commonly found editions published by James Lyon of Philadelphia, 1799, and by William Davies of New York, 1796, are NOT Jefferson-Barlow translations.)
(2) Beware of editions published in the UK 99 percent are NOT the Jefferson-Barlow translation. If you see the word "survey" in the title, that is a clear indication the book was published in the UK and is NOT a Jefferson-Barlow translation. In general, it's best to look for US editions post-1828.
(3) If the title page includes the phrase "translated under the inspection of the author," this is the Jefferson-Barlow translation.
(4) The Acid Test turn to the Invocation the first sentence should read "Hail solitary ruins, holy sepulchres and silent walls! you I invoke; to you I address my prayer!" This is the Jefferson-Barlow translation.
(5) If you still want confirmation, go to Gutenberg.org => Volney. There you will find a free electronic copy of the (unacknowledged) Jefferson-Barlow translation for your comparison.
For more details, join me on Twitter @RuinsofEmpires
Or at GoodReads
[...]
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