Naude's political thought follows the empiricist positivist approach of Machiavelli, and makes the same presuppositions-on political man- polarised into active ruler and passive ruled- and the state- subject to the cycle of history. Order the defence of the status quo, is Naude's main preoccupation, and his concern is with the Art of Government. He advisees the ruler to acquire by right study, especially history, and by experience, the all important-political virtue of Prudence, which may be "ordinary", respectful of Law, or "extraordinary", above both Law and Christian Ethics. In this case it will take the form of "coups d'etat". Their nature, fields of application, and rules:: of use, are examined in detail by Naude , who aims to justify them by Raison d'Etat, the supreme political value and a.. combination of the normative and the "organic". "Necesseite" and "le bien public" justify the use of religion and all efficient means to achieve this value. The ruler should appoint a minister and protect him from court factions. He should realise the power of the populace and understand how to use it for his own ends by the forces of religion and eloquence. Naude's Humanist erudition was immense; and he desired the setting up of a lending library in Paris for erudites-. He upheld the general superiority of the Humanist Era against the Ancient and the Medieval epochs. These are the three periods of-his cyclic theory of history which subjects all phenomena, human and natural, to the law of-eternal recurrence- a purely natural law in which psychological causation plays a large part. Wisdom consists in detachment from the cosmic-flux-by the exercise of free judgement; which can discover truth by revealing error--due to the various passions. A critical historical method, based on a. common-sense view of man and nature which has-its philosophical formulation in the Alexandrist interpretation of Artistotle, reveals that the purported facts, the of magic; the occult sciences, prophecies, miracles and other supernatural phenomena, are merely natural facts misrepresented by the credulous and the deceiving. And Naude implies that Christianity is, like Paganism, an epiphenomenon. Knowledge starts from particulars given by sense experience; the real is what-is amenable to research. Naude does-not formulate an ontology, or indeed any philosophy in the systematic sense, but aims to establish norms of judgment which will enable the accumulation of reliable knowledge. To the methodology of empirical research his contribution is considerable and lasting.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:548174 |
| Date | January 1964 |
| Creators | Curtis, D. E. |
| Publisher | University of Manchester |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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