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Auguste Comte

Auguste Comte is considered one of the great intellectual figures of modern European history. He is responsible for introducing to European thought the concepts of positivism and the field of sociology. Comte, who was born in the pivotal year of the French Revolution and died in 1857, was very much a product of his times. In the aftermath of the French Revolution and the massive wars which swept Europe (consequently spreading many of the themes of that revolution), European intellectuals were preoccupied with the disposition and use of power in society. The challenge before intellectuals on both sides of the Atlantic, such as Comte, was how to harness what they considered the best themes of the French Revolution while arresting the more sinister consequences of that momentous event, such as the anarchy and bloodshed that event unleashed through years of civil war. Mary Pickering (1993), author of the biography on Comte called, Auguste Comte: An Intellectual Biography, Volume I, writes:

The issue that was most important in the aftermath of the French Revolution was that of the basis and ends of power. How could the nation best be governed? How could it avoid the problem of mob rule (i.e., a renewal of the Terror) as well as that of dictatorship (i.e., a new Napoleon)?

Comte was truly a child of the revolution and as such he was deeply impressed with most of its liberal and republican themes. These early influences would play a critical role as the basis of his life's work.

Auguste Comte was born into a minor bourgeoisie family in the town of Montpellier. At the time Montpellier had a reputation as a hotbed of resistance to the revolution, and indeed, Comte's family strongly opposed the revolution (particularly after the banning of Catholicism of which they were adherents). Despite this fact, as a teenager Comte embraced the revolution. In his most famous work, Cours de Philosophie Positive (1842), Comte wrote in h...

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Auguste Comte. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 10:42, March 29, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1691078.html