An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, Vol. I
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Selection or partial work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~130,000 words · 630 passages
Cite this work
- APAWilliam Godwin. (n.d.). An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, Vol. I. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/william-godwin/an-enquiry-concerning-political-justice-vol-i
- MLAWilliam Godwin. An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, Vol. I. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/william-godwin/an-enquiry-concerning-political-justice-vol-i.
- ChicagoWilliam Godwin. An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, Vol. I. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/william-godwin/an-enquiry-concerning-political-justice-vol-i.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
The first volume of the 1793 book with which Godwin founded, without using the word, philosophical anarchism: the thesis that government is always an evil, however necessary it may be for the present.
Context and history
The argument is rationalist to the limit: if men are perfectible by reason, then any institution that makes them obey instead of convincing them holds them back. Hence his criticism not only of the state but of accumulated property, of promises, and even of marriage, as commitments that bind future judgement. The book appeared in the midst of the British reaction against the French Revolution and escaped suppression, so the story goes, because it cost three guineas and the government decided that no one who could pay that was dangerous. It influenced Shelley — who became his son-in-law — and his wife was Mary Wollstonecraft, who is also in the corpus.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
to undertake the prefent treatife. The dire6l execution may be difmiffed in a few words. It was projefted in the month of May 1791 : the compofition was begun in the following September, and has therefore occupied a fpace of fixteen months. This period was devoted to" the purpofe with unremitted ardour. It were to be wiflied it had been longer ; but it feemed as if no contemptible part of the utility of the work depended upon its early appearance. The printing of the following treatife, as well as the compofition, was influenced by the fame principle, a defire to reconcile a certain degree of difpatch with the neceffary deliberation. The printing was for that reafon commenced, long before the compofition was finiihed. Some difadvantages have arifen from this circumftance. The ideas of the author became more perfpicuous and digefted, as his enquiries advanced. The longer he confidered the fubjeft, the more accub rately X PREFACE. b rately X PREFACE. rately he feemed to underftand it. This circum- fiance has led him into a few contradiftions. The principal of thefe confifls in an occafional inaccuracy of language, particularly in the lirft book, refpefting the word government. He did not enter upon the w^ork, without being aware that government by its very nature countera61;s the improvement of individual mind ; but he underftood the full meaning of this proportion more completely as he proceeded, and faw more diftinftly into the nature of the remedy. This, and a few other defers, under a different mode of preparation would have been avoided. The candid reader will make a fuitable allowance.…