Joseph de Maistre (portrait by Karl Vogel von Vogelstein, ca. 1810)

Joseph-Marie, Comte de Maistre (April 1, 1753- February 26, 1821) was a French-speaking Savoyard lawyer, diplomat, writer, and philosopher. He was one of the most influential spokesmen for a counter-revolutionary and authoritarian conservatism in the period immediately following the French Revolution of 1789. De Maistre argued for the restoration of hereditary monarchy, which he regarded as a divinely sanctioned institution, and for the supreme authority of the Pope in both religious and political matters. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (683x899, 51 KB)Portrait of Joseph de Maistre by Karl Vogel von Vogelstein, 1810, Musée dArt et dHistoire de Chambéry. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (683x899, 51 KB)Portrait of Joseph de Maistre by Karl Vogel von Vogelstein, 1810, Musée dArt et dHistoire de Chambéry. ... 1810 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... Look up Count in Wiktionary, the free dictionary Countess redirects here. ... April 1 is the 91st day of the year (92nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar, with 274 days remaining. ... 1753 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... February 26 is the 57th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1821 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... French (français, langue française) is one of the most important Romance languages, outnumbered in speakers only by Spanish and Portuguese. ... This article is about the historical region of Savoy. ... The term authoritarian is used to describe an organization or a state which enforces strong and sometimes oppressive measures against the population, generally without attempts at gaining the consent of the population. ... Conservatism [derivative of conserve; from Latin conservare, to keep, guard, observe] is a philosophy defined by Edmund Burke as a disposition to preserve, and an ability to improve. Classical conservatism does not readily avail itself to the ideology of objectives. ... The French Revolution (1789-1799) was a period in the history of France. ... 1789 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... A monarchy, (from the Greek monos, one, and archein, to rule) is a form of government that has a monarch as Head of State. ... The Divine Right of Kings is a European political and religious doctrine of political absolutism. ... The Pope (from Greek: pappas, father; from Latin: papa, Papa, father) is the head of the Catholic Church. ...

According to de Maistre, only governments founded on the Christian constitution, implicit in the customs and institutions of all European societies but especially in that of Catholic European monarchies, could avoid the disorder and bloodletting that followed the implementation of rationalist political programs, such as that of the 1789 revolution. An enthusiastic believer in the principle of established authority, which the Revolution sought to destroy, de Maistre defended it everywhere: in the State by extolling the monarchy, in the Church by exalting the privileges of the papacy, and in the world by glorifying God's providence. Europe is conventionally considered one of the seven continents of Earth which, in this case, is more a cultural and political distinction than a physiographic one. ... Rationalism, also known as the rationalist movement, is a philosophical doctrine that asserts that the truth can best be discovered by reason and factual analysis, rather than faith, dogma or religious teaching. ... In politics, authority generally refers to the ability to make laws, independent of the power to enforce them, or the ability to permit something. ... A state is an organized political community, occupying a territory, and possessing internal and external sovereignty, which successfully claims the monopoly of the use of force. ... Divine Providence, or simply Providence, is a theological term which refers to the sovereignty, superintendence, or agency of God over events in peoples lives and throughout history. ...

Early life

De Maistre was born at Chambéry, in the Duchy of Savoy, which at the time belonged to the Kingdom of Sardinia. His family was of French origin and had settled in Savoy a century earlier, eventually attaining a high position and aristocratic rank. His father had served as president of the Savoy Senate and his younger brother, Xavier de Maistre, would later become a military officer and a popular writer of fiction. Joseph was probably educated by the Jesuits. After the Revolution, he became an ardent defender of their Order as he came increasingly to associate the spirit of the Revolution with the spirit of the Jesuits' traditional enemies, the Jansenists. After training in the law, he followed in his father's footsteps by becoming a senator in 1787. The city and arrondissement of Chambéry in Savoie, France, has been the historical capital of Savoy since the 13th century, when Amadeus V of Savoy made it his seat. ... For the earlier history of Savoy, see County of Savoy. ... Kingdom of Sardinia, in 1839: Mainland Piedmont, with Savoia upper left (pink) and Nizza (Nice) lower left (brown) both now French, and Sardinia in the inset The Kingdom of Sardinia is a former kingdom in Italy. ... -1... Xavier de Maistre (1763–1852) was a French military man. ... The Society of Jesus (Societas Iesu (S.I. or S.J.) in Latin) is a Christian religious order of the Roman Catholic Church in direct service to the Pope. ... Jansenism was a branch of Christian philosophy founded by Cornelius Jansen (1585 – 1638), a Dutch theologian. ... 1787 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ...

Response to the French Revolution

After the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789, de Maistre began to write on current events, e.g. Discours à Mme. la marquise Costa de Beauregard, sur la vie et la mort de son fils ("Discourse to the Marchioness Costa de Beauregard, on the Life and Death of her Son," 1794) and Cinq paradoxes à la Marquise de Nav... ("Five Paradoxes for the Marchioness of Nav...," 1795). In Considerations sur la France ("Considerations on France," 1796), [1] he maintains that France has a divine mission as the principal instrument of good and of evil on earth. De Maistre considered the Revolution of 1789 as a Providential occurrence: the monarchy, the aristocracy, and the whole of the old French society, instead of using the powerful influence of French civilization to benefit mankind, had instead promoted the destructive atheistic doctrines of the eighteenth-century philosophers. The crimes of the Reign of Terror were at once the apotheosis and logical consequence of the destructive spirit of the eighteenth century, as well as the divinely decreed punishment for it. 1789 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... 1794 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... 1795 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... 1796 was a leap year starting on Friday. ... Michelangelos depiction of God in the painting Creation of the Sun and Moon in the Sistine Chapel This article discusses the term God in the context of monotheism and henotheism. ... This article is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... Evil is a term describing that which is regarded as morally bad, intrinsically corrupt, wantonly destructive, inhumane, or wicked. ... Earth is the third planet in the Sol system. ... Divine Providence, or simply Providence, is a theological term which refers to the sovereignty, superintendence, or agency of God over events in peoples lives and throughout history. ... -1... Ancien Régime means Old Rule or Old Order in French; in English, the term refers primarily to the social and political system established in France under the Valois and Bourbon dynasties. ... Atheism, in its broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of gods. ... ... The Reign of Terror (5 September 1793 – 28 July 1794) or simply The Terror (French: la Terreur) was a period in the French Revolution characterized by brutal repression. ...

When Napoleon's army invaded Savoy in 1792, de Maistre fled to Switzerland, where he became a regular participant in the salon of Germaine de Staël. In 1803 he was appointed as the King of Sardinia's diplomatic envoy to the Russian Tsar's court in Saint Petersburg. From 1817 until his death, he served in Turin as a magistrate and minister of state for the Kingdom of Sardinia. For other uses, see Napoleon (disambiguation). ... 1792 was a leap year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... Madame de Staël Anne Louise Germaine de Staël (April 22, 1766 – July 14, 1817) was a French author who determined literary tastes of Europe at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. ... 1803 was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... Look up Tsar in Wiktionary, the free dictionary For the US community of Czar, see Czar, West Virginia. ... Saint Petersburg (Russian: Санкт-Петербу́рг, English transliteration: Sankt-Peterburg), colloquially known as Питер (transliterated Piter), formerly known as Leningrad (Ленингра́д, 1924–1991) and Petrograd (Петрогра́д, 1914–1924), is a city located in Northwestern Russia on the delta of the river Neva at the east end of the Gulf of Finland... 1817 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... Turin (Italian: ; Piedmontese: Türín) is a major industrial city in north-western Italy, capital of the Piedmont region, located mainly on the west bank of the Po River. ... A magistrate is a judicial officer with limited authority to administer and enforce the law. ...

Political and moral philosophy

His little book Essai sur le principe générateur des constitutions politiques et des autres institutions humaines ("Essay on the Generative Principle of Political Constitutions and other Human Institutions," 1809) [2], centers on the idea is that constitutions are not the artificial products of study but come in due time and under suitable circumstances from God, who slowly brings them to maturity in silence. After the appearance in 1816 of his French translation of Plutarch's treatise On the Delay of Divine Justice in the Punishment of the Guilty, de Maistre published in 1819 his masterpiece Du Pape ("On the Pope"). The work is divided into four parts. In the first he argues that, in the Church, the pope is sovereign, and that it is an essential characteristic of all sovereign power that that its decisions should be subject to no appeal. Consequently, the pope is infallible in his teaching, since it is by his teaching that he exercises his sovereignty. In the remaining divisions the author examines the relations of the pope and the temporal powers, civilization and the welfare of nations, and the schismatic Churches. He argues that nations require protection against abuses of power by a sovereignty superior to all others, and that this sovereignty should be that of the papacy, the historical saviour and maker of European civilization. As to the schismatic Churches, de Maistre believed that they would, with time, return to the arms of the papacy because "no religion can resist science, except one." 1809 was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... 1816 was a leap year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... Plutarch Mestrius Plutarchus (c. ... 1819 common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... The Roman Catholic Church, most often spoken of simply as the Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with over one billion members. ... The Pope (from Greek: pappas, father; from Latin: papa, Papa, father) is the head of the Catholic Church. ... Sovereignty is the exclusive right to exercise supreme political (legislative, judicial and/or executive) authority over a geographic region, group of people or oneself. ... In Roman Catholic theology, Papal infallibility is the dogma that the Pope is preserved from error when he solemnly promulgates, or declares, to the Church a decision on faith or morals. ... The word schism (IPA: or ), from the Greek σχισμα, schisma (from σχιζω, schizo, to split), means a division or a split, usually in an organization. ...

Besides a voluminous correspondence, de Maistre left two posthumous works. One of these, L'examen de la philosophie de Bacon, ("An Examination of the Philosophy of Bacon," 1836), develops a spiritualist epistemology out of a critique of Francis Bacon, whom de Maistre considers as a fountainhead of the Enlightenment in its most destructive form. The Soirées de St. Pétersbourg ("The St. Petersburg Dialogues", 1821) [3] is a theodicy in the form of a Platonic dialogue, where de Maistre proposes his own solution to the age-old problem of the existence of evil. For him, the existence of evil throws light on the designs of God; for the moral world and the physical world are interrelated. Physical evil is the necessary corollary of moral evil, which humanity expiates and minimizes through prayer and sacrifice. The shedding of blood, the expiation of the sins of the guilty by the innocent is for de Maistre a law as mysterious as it is indubitable, the principle that propels humanity in its return to God and the explanation for the existence and the perpetuity of war. Sir Francis Bacon For other people named Francis Bacon, see Francis Bacon (disambiguation). ... Charles Darwin 1836 was a leap year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... 1821 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Plato Plato (Greek: Πλάτων, Plátōn) (c. ... Morality, in the strictest sense of the word, deals with that which is regarded as right or wrong. ... The only atomic weapons ever used in war - the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan by the United States on August 9, 1945, effectively ending World War II. The bombs over Hiroshima (August 6) and Nagasaki immediately killed over 120,000 people. ...

Influence

De Maistre can be counted, with the Anglo-Irish statesman Edmund Burke, as one of the fathers of European conservatism. Since the 19th century, however, the providentialist, authoritarian, "throne and altar" strand of conservatism that he represented has greatly declined in political influence when compared to the more pragmatic and adaptable conservatism of Burke. De Maistre's stylistic and rhetorical brilliance, on the other hand, have made him enduringly popular as a writer and controversialist. The Catholic Encyclopedia of 1910 describes de Maistre's style as "strong, lively, picturesque," and adds, "animation and good humour temper his dogmatic tone. He possesses a wonderful facility in exposition, precision of doctrine, breadth of learning, and dialectical power." The great liberal poet Alphonse de Lamartine praised the lively splendour of de Maistre's prose in the following terms: The term Anglo-Irish means English-Irish. ... Edmund Burke The Right Honourable Edmund Burke (January 12, 1729 – July 9, 1797) was an Anglo-Irish statesman, author, orator and political philosopher, who served for many years in the British House of Commons as a member of the Whig party. ... Conservatism [derivative of conserve; from Latin conservare, to keep, guard, observe] is a philosophy defined by Edmund Burke as a disposition to preserve, and an ability to improve. Classical conservatism does not readily avail itself to the ideology of objectives. ... Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ... -1... In classical philosophy, dialectic (Greek: διαλεκτική) is an exchange of propositions (theses) and counter-propositions (antitheses) resulting in a synthesis of the opposing assertions, or at least a qualitative transformation in the direction of the dialogue. ... Portrait of Alphonse de Lamartine Lamartine on front of the Hôtel de Ville de Paris, on the 25 February 1848, by Philippoteaux Alphonse Marie Louise Prat de Lamartine (Alphonse-Marie-Louis de Prat de Lamartine) (October 21, 1790 - February 28, 1869) was a French writer, poet and politician. ...

That brief, nervous, lucid style, stripped of phrases, robust of limb, did not at all recall the softness of the eighteenth century, nor the declamations of the latest French books: it was born and steeped in the breath of the Alps; it was virgin, it was young, it was harsh and savage; it had no human respect, it felt its solitude; it improvised depth and form all at once… That man was new among the enfants du siècle.

De Maistre's tightly-reasoned attacks on the shallow and contradictory aspects of Enlightenment thought have long made him an attractive countercultural figure in certain circles. For example, the decadent poet Charles Baudelaire claimed that de Maistre had taught him "how to think" and declared himself a disciple of the Savoyard counter-revolutionary. In sociology, counterculture is a term used to describe a cultural group whose values and norms are at odds with those of the social mainstream, a cultural equivalent of a political opposition. ... Decadence generally refers to the supposed decline of a society because of moral weakness. ... Charles Baudelaire, photograph taken by Nadar. ...

External links

• Some writings of de Maistre in English translation
• The Joseph de Maistre Homepage

Reference

This article incorporates text from the public domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1910. Please update as needed. The Catholic Encyclopedia (also referred to as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia today) is an English-language encyclopedia published in 1913 by the The Encyclopedia Press, designed to give authoritative information on the entire cycle of Catholic interests, action and doctrine. // History The writing of the encyclopedia began on January 11...