ABSTRACT
This rhetorical question well describes the ambitions of the French Enlightenment. The Encyclopaedists, who belong among the founders of Western culture, had no doubts that human progress meant the development of ‘man’s moral and intellectual faculties’ (Condorcet 1955 [1794]: 8), and, at the same time, the development of economic conditions adequate for the entire population and their happiness. This was not a dream, but an expectation, because it was based not only on the revolutionary experience of the time but also on logical arguments. When Nicolas de Condorcet wrote the Historical View of the Progress of the Human Mind in 1794, he argued that human progress would take place because three components – that is, individual faculties, economic conditions, and happiness – positively affect one another in a dynamic way once people have been properly educated and free trade has been guaranteed.
