Editorial notes: This Essay was found as a ‘draft’ entry in Everything2. It seems to be a continuation of the thought process recorded a few days earlier in A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful and it ends with a number of points for future consideration. It is published here with minor changes. I had first considered illustrating the...
Editorial notes: This Essay[I] was found as a ‘draft’ entry in Everything2 and it is not clear whether it was complete and ready for publication. It is published here with minor changes. A follow-up draft was recorded a number of days later, containing further thoughts on this matter. Beauty. The grandest of human values is beauty. It is the experience of the beautiful that brings...
One of the first features to be observed is that I live in what appears to be a world of things. Everything is.
A fact easily denied in the world of post-modernity.
But I am. But is it fair to transcend from one thing to all things? And is it appropriate to assume that I am the only one, or that those like us are?
If then I conclude that there are things with different domains.
This is for you. I love you. Love is the quintessential romantic, irrational, human experience. It is in the first place the domain of its clients, although readily owned by the poets. As for others. The philosophers are permitted access, though they often regress into poets too; describing love as sacred, profound, and utterly existential. In the penultimate place in the line for love, in front...
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) was born in Geneva. His mother died about a week after his birth, and after his father had to leave the country due to the risk of imprisonment, he was raised by an uncle. He abandoned his education as an engraver due to his bully employer, and at the mere age of 16, moved to France where he met the first major female figure in his life (Mme de Warens). He was...
