Étienne-Gabriel Morelly (; 1717–1778) was a French

utopian A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia'', describing a fictional island society ...

thinker, philosopher and novelist. An otherwise "obscure tax official",Michael Sonenscher, ''Sans-Culottes: An Eighteenth-Century Emblem in the French Revolution'', Princeton University Press, 2008, p.229 and teacher, Morelly wrote two books on education, a critique of

Montesquieu Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu (; ; 18 January 168910 February 1755), generally referred to as simply Montesquieu, was a French judge, man of letters, historian, and political philosopher. He is the princi ...

and ''The Code of Nature,'' which was published anonymously in France in 1755.De Boni, C. (2012). Nature and Utopia in Morelly's Code De La Nature. In M.A. Ramiro Avilés & J.C. Davis (Eds.). Utopian Moments: Reading Utopian Texts (Textual Moments in the History of Political Thought, pp. 74–79). London: Bloomsbury Academic. Retrieved April 12, 2022, from http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781849666848.ch-012 This book, initially attributed to

philosophes The ''philosophes'' () were the intellectuals of the 18th-century Enlightenment.Kishlansky, Mark, ''et al.'' ''A Brief History of Western Civilization: The Unfinished Legacy, volume II: Since 1555.'' (5th ed. 2007). Few were primarily philosophe ...

including

Rousseau Jean-Jacques Rousseau (, ; 28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer. His political philosophy influenced the progress of the Age of Enlightenment throughout Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolu ...

and Diderot, criticised contemporary society, postulated a social order without avarice, and proposed a constitution intended to lead to an egalitarian society without property, marriage, church or police.''The Cambridge History of Eighteenth-Century Political Thought'', ed.

Mark Goldie Mark Goldie is an English historian and Professor of Intellectual History at Churchill College, Cambridge. He has written on the English political theorist John Locke and is a member of the Early Modern History and Political Thought and Intellec ...

and

Robert Wokler Robert Lucien Wokler (6 December 1942 – 30 July 2006) was a British historian who was a leading scholar of the political thought of the Enlightenment. References * https://www.jstor.org/stable/26222117 * https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rob ...

, Cambridge University Press, 2006, p.762

Outline

According to ''The Code of Nature'', "...where no property exists, none of its pernicious consequences could exist...." As Morelly believed that almost all social and moral ills were a consequence of private property, his proposed constitution eliminates most private property. As a result of this latter characteristic of his utopia, Morelly is often seen as a significant forerunner of later

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...

and communist thinkers.

François-Noël Babeuf François-Noël Babeuf (; 23 November 1760 – 27 May 1797), also known as Gracchus Babeuf, was a French proto-communist, revolutionary, and journalist of the French Revolutionary period. His newspaper ''Le tribun du peuple'' (''The Tribune of ...

Charles Fourier François Marie Charles Fourier (;; 7 April 1772 – 10 October 1837) was a French philosopher, an influential early socialist thinker and one of the founders of utopian socialism. Some of Fourier's social and moral views, held to be radical ...

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (, , ; 15 January 1809, Besançon – 19 January 1865, Paris) was a French socialist,Landauer, Carl; Landauer, Hilde Stein; Valkenier, Elizabeth Kridl (1979) 959 "The Three Anticapitalistic Movements". ''European Socia ...

Louis Blanc Louis Jean Joseph Charles Blanc (; ; 29 October 1811 – 6 December 1882) was a French politician and historian. A socialist who favored reforms, he called for the creation of cooperatives in order to guarantee employment for the urban poor. Alt ...

Friedrich Engels Friedrich Engels ( ,"Engels"
'' Karl Marx Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...

all discussed Morelly's ideas in their own writing. Among the "sacred and fundamental laws" Morelly proposed was "Nothing in society will belong to anyone, either as a personal possession or as capital goods, except the things for which the person has immediate use, for either his needs, his pleasures, or his daily work." He was opposed to the possession of property beyond what an individual needed and, especially, to private property used to employ others. According to Morelly, "All.. durable products will be gathered together in public stores in order to be distributed to all the citizens, daily or at some other specified interval..." He also proposed banning of trade between individuals: "In accordance with the sacred laws, nothing will be sold or exchanged between citizens. Someone who needs, for example greens, vegetables or fruits, will go to the public square, which is where these items will have been brought by the man who cultivate them, and take what he needs for one day only."

Works

* ''Essai sur l'esprit humain'', 1743 * ''Essai sur le coeur humain'', 1745 * ''Le Prince, les délices des coeurs, ou traité des qualités d'un grand roi et système d'un sage gouvernement'' he Prince, the delights of the heart, or, A treatise on the qualities of a great king and system of wise government 1751 * ''Naufrage des isles flottantes, ou Basiliade du célèbre Pilpai'', 1753 * ''Code de la nature, ou le véritable esprit de ses lois'', 1755

References

External links

Excerpts from ''The Code of Nature'' in English
*
Code de la Nature
', 1953 edition of the French text with an introduction by

Vyacheslav Volgin Vyacheslav Petrovich Volgin (russian: Вячесла́в Петро́вич Во́лгин; 14 June 1879 – 3 July 1962) was a Soviet and Russian historian who wrote a number of books on early forms or precursors of communism, and who became vice- ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Morelly, Etienne-Gabriel 1717 births 1778 deaths 18th-century French philosophers People from Vitry-le-François Proto-socialists Authors of utopian literature Enlightenment philosophers Age of Enlightenment

Outline

Works

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References

External links