Mackintosh is important not as an innovator or an original thinker but as an exemplar of his times. He was a man who straddled both the ideas of the eighteenth century Enlightenment and those of the mid-nineteenth century epitomised by the Rights of Man and utilitarianism. Close study of Mackintosh's developing ideas, political, historical and philosophical yields I better understanding of the position held by the Philosophical Whigs of his day. Mackintosh is also explored in relation to the concept of romantic history which started to surface in England during the 1820s. Mackintosh, who was accepted in his time as a philosopher of history, was a pioneer in detecting and expounding new movements of thought and his writings contain an early prescription for most of the elements of romantic historiography.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:494943 |
| Date | January 2008 |
| Creators | Goodall, Andrew Thomas |
| Publisher | University of Sussex |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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