On Condorcet's Enlightenment Thoughts

Condorcet was an important representative figure of the French in the later stage of the Enlightenment, and he was considered as the last person who had embodied encyclopedia spirit. Condorcet was not only a thinker and scholar, but also a revolutionary. He was one of the Enlightenment thinkers who had took part in the political practice of the French Revolution.Because of the double identity of a thinker and a revolutionary, the research of Condorcet's thought and its practical meanings had special theoretical and realistic value. Now, scholars abroad had studied Condorcet's thoughts and scholars home translated Condorcet's book "The Progress Of Human Mind". But they all paid attention to the certain aspects, such as historical thought or educational thought. Seldom scholars had studied Condorcet's Enlightenment thought systematically.The essay attempts to study systematically Condorcet's Enlightenment thoughts and traces the main meaning in his thoughts. Condorcet's thoughts had included political thought, historical thought and educational thought and the rationalism was the main meaning. He regarded reason as the motive of human advance and pursued equality and freedom. He brought forward the notion of progressive history, and the method of natural science to study society. He regarded the education as the major means to liberate human's reason. These thoughts contributed to the development of human civilization.But because of the restriction of historical condition Condorcet's thought had fantasticality inevitably. Therefore, the essay tries to ponder over his thought and summarize the hint history left.