Adam Ferguson

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Adam Ferguson on a painting by Joshua Reynolds from 1782

Adam Ferguson (born June 20, 1723 in Logierait near Perth , † February 22, 1816 in St Andrews ) was a Scottish historian and social ethicist of the Enlightenment . He is considered a co-founder of sociology , as he derived the class differences in the social structure of bourgeois society from property relations.

Life

Adam Ferguson went to school in Perth, Scotland, and graduated from St Andrews University . From 1745 he worked as a Presbyterian military chaplain and took part in the Battle of Fontenoy in the War of the Austrian Succession in the same year . In 1754 he gave up the church career and from then on devoted himself to literature. In January 1757 he succeeded David Hume as librarian at the law school, but soon took a position as a private tutor in the house of the Earl of Bute.

In 1759 Ferguson became professor of natural philosophy at the University of Edinburgh and in 1764 switched to the subject of spiritual and moral philosophy. His first significant work, the Essay of Civil Society , he published, against Hume's advice, in 1767; it received a lot of attention and has been translated into several languages. In 1776 his work on the American independence movement appeared (anonymously) , which was a reply to a publication by the philosopher Richard Price and with which Ferguson took the side of the British Parliament .

In 1778 Ferguson was appointed head of the commission which - unsuccessfully - tried to negotiate with the American rebels. In 1783 his History of the Progress and Termination of the Roman Republic appeared , which was widely read and had several editions. Using Roman history, he presented the ethical and political doctrines to which he was particularly dedicated. He wrote the historical work as objectively and impartially as possible. It shows a conscientious use of the sources. In some games, the author's practical military experience becomes evident. In 1785 Ferguson resigned his professorship and devoted himself to revising his lectures, which he published in 1792 under the title Principles of Moral and Political Science . Since November 1783 he was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh . In 1793 he was accepted as a foreign member of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences ; In 1812 he became an honorary member.

At the age of 70 Ferguson traveled the continent to visit Italy and the main European metropolises, where he was honored by the respective scientific circles. From 1795 he settled first at Neidpath Castle near Peebles , then in Hallyands at Manor Water and finally in St Andrews, where he died in 1816 at the age of 92.

Teaching

Ferguson sees the human being in his ethical considerations as a social being, and he shows moral ideas concretely using political examples. The Enlightenment believed in human progress and focused his moral considerations on the aspect of striving for perfection. Victor Cousin said:

“In his method we see the wisdom and prudence of the Scottish school , at the same time there is something more masculine and decisive in the results. The principle of perfection is a new one, which is at the same time more rational and comprehensive than benevolence and sympathy , which in our opinion raises Ferguson as a moralist above his predecessors. "

With this principle Ferguson tried to bring all moral systems into harmony. Like Hobbes , he believed in the power of self-interest or utility and introduced it to the realm of morality as the law of self-preservation. Hutcheson's theory of universal benevolence and Smith's idea of ​​sympathy are what he combines in the law of society. Since these two laws serve more as a means than an end of human endeavor, they remain subordinate to the overriding goal, namely perfection.

In the political part of his system, Ferguson follows Montesquieu and advocates the cause of well-regulated freedom and free government. His contemporaries, with the exception of Hume, viewed his work as significant, although he did not make any significant independent contributions to moral and social theory, but merely combined existing approaches.

Works

  • An Essay on the History of Civil Society . Boulter Grierson, Dublin 1767 ( digitized in Google book search).
    • Attempt on the history of civil society. Junius, Leipzig 1768 ( archive.org ).
    • Treatise on the history of civil society. Fischer, Jena 1904 ( Collection of social science masters. Volume 2).
    • Attempt on the history of civil society. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1986, ISBN 3-518-57756-5 .
  • Institutes of Moral Philosophy. Kincaid & Bell, Edinburgh 1769 ( archive.org ).
  • Principles of Moral and Political Science. Strahan & Cadell / Greech, London / Edinburgh 1792 ( archive.org ).

literature

  • John Small: Biographical Sketch of Adam Ferguson . ( From the Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh .) Edinburgh, 1864 ( books.google.com ).
  • Zwi Batscha, Hans Medick : Introduction . In: Adam Ferguson: Attempt on the History of Civil Society . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1988, ISBN 3-518-28339-1 (= Suhrkamp-Taschenbuch Wissenschaft 739).
  • Eugene Heath, Vincenzo Merolle (Eds.): Adam Ferguson. History, Progress and Human Nature . Pickering and Chatto, London 2008, ISBN 978-1-85196-864-0 (= The Enlightenment world 4).
  • Lisa Hill: The Passionate Society. The Social, Political, and Moral Thought of Adam Ferguson . Springer, Dordrecht a. a. 2006, ISBN 978-1-4020-3889-1 (= Archives internationales d'histoire des idées = International archives of the history of ideas 191).
  • David Kettler: Adam Ferguson. His Social and Political Thought . With a new introduction and afterword by the author. Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick 2005, ISBN 1-4128-0475-2 (Original edition: The social and political thought of Adam Ferguson . Ohio State University Press, Columbus 1965).
  • Norbert Waszek : Adam Ferguson . In: Outline of the History of Philosophy. The philosophy of the 18th century . Volume 1, half volume 2: Helmut Holzhey , Vilem Mudroch (eds.): Great Britain and North America, the Netherlands . Completely revised edition. Schwabe, Basel a. a. 2004, ISBN 3-7965-1987-3 , pp. 603-618, 632-635 (bibliography).
  • Danga Vileisis: Adam Ferguson's unknown contribution to the materialistic understanding of history of Karl Marx . In: Contributions to Marx-Engels research. New episode 2009 . Argument Verlag, Hamburg 2010, ISBN 978-3-88619-669-2 , pp. 7-60.
  • Ferguson, Adam . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 10 : Evangelical Church - Francis Joseph I . London 1910, p. 271 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).

Web links

Commons : Adam Ferguson  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Fellows Directory. Biographical Index: Former RSE Fellows 1783–2002. Royal Society of Edinburgh, accessed December 4, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Historical members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences: Adam Ferguson. Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, accessed December 4, 2019 .
  3. ↑ cf. Leslie Steven: English Thought in the Eighteenth Century. Pp. 89-90.
personal data
SURNAME Ferguson, Adam
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Scottish historian and social ethicist of the Enlightenment
DATE OF BIRTH June 20, 1723
PLACE OF BIRTH Logierait near Perth (Scotland)
DATE OF DEATH February 22, 1816
Place of death St Andrews