Edinburgh University Press
Positive Atheism
About this book
Charles Devellennes looks at the the religious, social and political thought of the first four thinkers of the French Enlightenment: Pierre Bayle, Jean Meslier, Paul-Henri Thiry d’Holbach and Denis Diderot to explicitly argue for atheism as a positive philosophy. He shows how atheism evolved considerably over the century that spans the works of these four authors: from the possibility of the virtuous atheist in the late 17th century, to a deeply rooted materialist philosophy with radical social and political consequences by the eve of the French revolution. The metamorphosis of atheism from a purely negative phenomenon to one that became self-aware had profound consequences for establishing an ethics without God and the rise of republicanism as a political philosophy.
Topics
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Frontmatter
i -
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Contents
v -
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Introduction: The Birth of Positive Atheism
1 -
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1. Bayle and Virtuous Atheism
29 -
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2. Meslier the First Atheist
63 -
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3. D’Holbach’s Systematic Materialist Ontology
96 -
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4. Diderot the Metatheist
150 -
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5. The State of Atheism in France, 1789
188 -
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Bibliography
210 -
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Index
225
