关于但丁"文艺复兴先驱"的三次大辩论及其政治意义

本文围绕着但丁"文艺复兴先驱"问题的三次大辩论,揭示其文艺复兴运动性质的转变:以复兴古典文化为宗旨的早期文艺复兴运动是如何转变成为以建立自由公民共和国为目标的政治运动的.这三次大辩论,不仅反映出早期人文主义者们思想的矛盾,也透露出他们思想的发展和日渐成熟的信息.辩论者用来评价但丁是否符合先驱的几个标准(古典学权威、新文化的开拓者、优秀的共和国公民、共和国的保卫者),分别代表了不同时期人文主义者们的政治态度.但丁最终被奉为文艺复兴运动先驱这件事,因而具有非常重要的政治意义.尤为重要的是,文艺复兴运动的宗旨是在但丁"文艺复兴先驱"的大辩论中确立的,这也说明了从研究古籍的文化运动向以建立自由公民共和国为目标的政治运动的转变是具有其内在深厚政治传统的,不尽是外敌入侵佛罗伦萨所造成的自然结果.     

钝化的民主利器——文艺复兴时期佛罗伦萨共和国的抽选制

作为官员选拔制度的抽选制曾在古希腊和文艺复兴时期意大利的城邦民主中发挥关键作用。相比带有精英气息的选举,抽选表达了民主制度对于参政机会均等更为彻底的诉求。佛罗伦萨共和国留下了有关抽选的丰富史料,就运用抽选的时段和深度而言,佛罗伦萨对抽选制的实验堪称西方民主制度史上的高峰,而抽选制在佛罗伦萨的腐化和衰亡也给予后世深刻教训。以佛罗伦萨共和国为样本,回溯抽选在一时一地发展的历程得失,总结抽选与选举的辩证关系,将有助于洞察抽选制的特性和利弊,从而更好地理解和应对现实问题。     

美第奇家族对文艺复兴运动的贡献

意大利佛罗伦萨城是欧洲文艺复兴的摇篮。它曾培养出一大批举世闻名的文学家、艺术家、政治家、哲学家和人文主义思想家;出版了大量的文学绘画、政治、雕刻、建筑和自然科学方面的巨著。它对欧洲诸国科学文化的发展起了重大的作用。所以研究文艺复兴运动在佛罗伦萨所起的作用是非常必要的。但当前学者们很少论述美第奇家族对文艺复兴昌盛的贡献,笔者就此问题谈谈个人的看法。美第奇家族在佛罗伦萨历史上是一个很有影响的家族。从1434年击败商人贵族阿尔比齐家族在佛罗伦萨的统治之后,就跻身于佛罗伦萨政界,直至1737年断断续续地统治了该城邦三百余年,其间历经四个阶段:1434—1492年间是柯西莫(1389—1464)和罗伦佐(1449—1492)统治时代。柯西莫     

“小国寡民”与“乌托邦”的大同世界之比较

两千多年前中国的老子提出了"小国寡民"的思想,15、16世纪的英国空想社会主义者托马斯·莫尔在《乌托邦》一书中提出建立"乌托邦"社会的构想。不同的时代及地理环境下,两人本着同一个社会理想,以相似的生产生活方式,创造了两种大同世界。其最根本的区别就是老子的无阶级观与莫尔的"奴隶"阶级观。     

公民参政思想变化新论——文艺复兴时期人文主义者参政思想浅析

本文旨在探讨文艺复兴时期意大利人文主义者政治思想的变化,折射出不同时期公民参政的目标和要求。通过对但丁、彼特拉克、布鲁尼、马基雅维里政治思想的解读,本文揭示了文艺复兴时期公民参政的目标是建立自由的、充分反映民意的公民国家,对近代政治学的诞生具有重要影响。公民参政要求建立新型的政府,既能为社会提供良好的秩序、又能为民众提供良好的生活。这表明:文艺复兴时期的公民参政已经突破了古代希腊、罗马的模式和中世纪公民参政的传统,发展成为以建立近代政府为目标的、人民的政治运动。     

论自然环境对古希腊文明的影响

自然环境是影响古希腊文明产生和发展的一个重要因素。希腊半岛山脉纵横,内陆的交通异常不便,从而使各城邦之间相对封闭,各自为政,难以统一。同时,希腊半岛多山阻隔的地理形势,造成希腊半岛各地区社会经济发展不平稳。而这种由地理造成的经济发展的不平衡,更加加剧了各城邦的分立。三面环海使古希腊航海业发展迅速,加强古代希腊奴隶制城邦之间的政治、经济、文化的联系。同时频繁的海外贸易活动,也使希腊人练就了善于探索,勇于开拓的民族性格。但岛屿众多耕地有限无法满足人口的增长的需要,于是古希腊人开始了海外殖民活动。古希腊在地理位置上靠近古埃及文明和古美索不达米亚文明,这使得古希腊易于吸收两大文明的积极因素,达到文明的顶峰。     

“小国寡民”与“乌托邦”的大同世界之比较

两千多年前中国的老子提出了“小国寡民”的思想,15、16世纪的英国空想社会主义者托马斯·莫尔在《乌托邦》一书中提出建立“乌托邦”社会的构想。不同的时代及地理环境下,两人本着同一个社会理想,以相似的生产生活方式,创造了两种不同世界。其最根本的区别就是老子的无阶级观与莫尔的“奴隶”阶级观。     

古希腊乌托邦思想的起源与演变

乌托邦思想是古希腊重要文化遗产之一。它源于荷马史诗,发展并成熟于古典时代后期与希腊化时代之初,先后出现了三种主要的类型。其一是神话乌托邦,即诗人笔下所反映的人类对美好生活及境界的向往,具有神话传说的性质。其二是政治乌托邦,即立足于对现实城邦的改造和重建,但其理想严重脱离实际,无法实现。其三是自然乌托邦或远地乌托邦,即将人类生活的美景嵌置于遥远的海外孤岛之上。正是这类乌托邦故事与柏拉图式的乌托邦理想对后世、特别是16世纪以来的社会空想家产生了重要影响。     

意大利文艺复兴时期的赫尔墨斯主义解析

赫尔墨斯主义源于古埃及的透特崇拜与古希腊的赫尔墨斯崇拜的杂糅与融合,其教义包含了古埃及、古希腊、犹太教及诺斯替主义的因素。文艺复兴时期的人文主义者出于时代的需要,对赫尔墨斯主义做出了独特的阐释。他们在理论上把赫尔墨斯主义塑造成了古代智慧的代表,认为其中包含着人类社会最为原初的智慧,纯洁宗教、证明基督教的真理以及赞同和实现"人的尊严"的因素。赫尔墨斯的这一形象是文艺复兴"复古运动"的延续和结果,更是在新的历史背景之下,人文主义者试图解决意大利面临的社会问题、重构基督教信仰而进行的一种积极和深刻的思考。此外,它还与当代学者的学术构建有着紧密的联系。     

论意大利文艺复兴时期人文主义者的自由观——以德性政治为视角

文艺复兴时期,意大利人文主义者的自由观被当代共和主义思想史家一并纳入共和主义政治文化传统的宏大体系中。然而,十四五世纪人文主义者对自由的理解没有局限在共和主义的框架内,"德性"这个充满伦理色彩的概念才是布鲁尼、帕特里齐、斯卡拉等人文主义者权衡自由的准绳,他们以"德性"为中心展开的政治思考可称为"德性政治"。在德性政治的统摄下,自由说到底是对德性的嘉奖,在政体争辩的背后,上层统治集团是否具备德性才是关键所在。德性政治一方面决定了自上而下等级秩序的合理性,另一方面决定了由内而外扩张征服的合法性。我们一则需要肯定人文主义者崇德、重德、立德之说不失为改善社会风气的一种策略;再则必须警惕在德性名义下的精英主义与帝国主义。     

Florentine networks in the Middle East in the early Renaissance

By crossing data from Florentine collections with notarial records produced in Egypt and Syria, this article focuses on the Florentine trading networks operating in the eastern Mediterranean during the fifteenth century. It highlights two factors influencing Florence’s long-distance trade in the area: political unrest characteristic of Italian Renaissance cities, and the scant interest of the Florentine government in building diplomatic and commercial institutions. Initially woven by exiled merchant-bankers and offshore companies, the network reconfigured towards the middle of the century around a group of entrepreneurs based in Rhodes, who were deeply entrenched in local finance and in business with the Islamic cities. The article provides a more complex view of relations between government institutions and Mediterranean long-distance trade by approaching the rise of the Medici in Florentine politics and their handling of the network.     

Language and Nationalism in Italy

ABSTRACT. Language is a central gauge of a culture's desire for and ability to articulate a common cultural, and political, identity. As such, historical figures, as well as theorists and historians, often view linguistic standardisation as a critical step on the road to forging a nation. This article explores linguistic standardisation in Italy, focusing on the Cruscan Academy dictionaries, and assesses any links between the standardisation of Florentine and nationalism. It then compares the changing political terminology in Florentine to comparable terms in French and English. The article concludes that (a) unlike the cases of French and English and much current theory on linguistic standardisation, in Italy there was no connection between standardisation and nationalism; (b) the standardisation of Florentine was accompanied by the collapse of political concepts that could have been used to bolster a nationalist movement; and (c) Italian ideas about reason of state are distinguishable from other theoretical justifications of absolutism by the removal of political morality (virtù) from the political realm.     

Human Rights,Modernity, and Milton’s Areopagitica

Some of the founding documents of our modern human rights culture assert that, by virtue of natural law, the will of God, the will of a Supreme Being, or some kind of natural world order, all humans have a right to civil liberties. In Areopagitica (1644), Milton rejects this way of grounding the claim to civil liberties. Instead, he argues for civil liberties on pragmatic grounds, but also on the premise that members of political societies are entitled to civil liberties from their governors only insofar as those members are rational and virtuous. His argument for civil liberties is also grounded in the view that the proper function of government includes propagating virtue in those it governs, assessing their rationality and moral virtue, and extending civil liberties to them in accordance with this assessment. Arguing in this way, Milton opposes the notion that, simply by virtue of being human, all members of political societies have a specific set of rights which their governments, and indeed all other people on earth, are bound to respect. He thus has more in common with Isocrates and Renaissance humanists than he does with the defenders of our modern human rights culture.     

Machiavelli's scientific method: a common understanding of his novelty in the sixteenth century

This paper argues that Machiavelli's method, his inductive and comparative use of history and experience for political analysis, and his fashioning of historical-political analysis as ‘science’, played an important and still unrecognised role in his reception in the sixteenth century. It makes the case that Machiavelli's inductive reasoning and stress on historia and experientia offered a model for scientific method that open-minded sixteenth-century scholars, eager to understand, organise and augment human knowledge (scientia), could fit to their own epistemology. By focusing on the question of method—a crucial issue for sixteenth-century contemporaries—the paper offers more than a key to the understanding of Machiavelli's positive reception. It also helps in apprehending the crucial importance of Lucretius to Machiavelli's scholarship; the role of the late Renaissance fascination with historia in his reception; and the breadth of appropriation of his method exactly in the decades when anti-Machiavellianism became official politics all over Europe. These claims are sustained through the cases of Machiavelli's early translators and promulgators; the French legal humanists and historiographers; the Swiss, Italian and French scholars engaging with medicine, Paracelsism and astronomy; the authors of political maxims from all over Europe; and finally Francis Bacon.     

Words and Deeds, Stasis and Change: New Directions in Florentine Devotion Around 1500

Members of Renaissance Italian confraternities spoke an official language that emphasized stability and permanence rather than change, a fact which can obscure the precise relationship between the culture of organized lay devotion and events in society as a whole. Examining four miraculous cults that achieved prominence in Florence around 1500, this essay argues that, far from their being static or conservative organizations, confraternities exemplify major changes transforming Florentine society at this time. The representations of class, wealth, gender, and age that emerge from the analysis help to problematize and complicate developments that otherwise appear as overly simplified, teleological trends.     

The Jacobinism and patriotism of Ernest Belfort Bax

This article examines Ernest Belfort Bax's interpretation of the French Revolution and traces the impact that his idea of the Revolution had on his philosophy and his political thought. The first section considers Bax's understanding of the Revolution in the context of his theory of history and analyses his conception of the Revolution's legacy, drawing particularly on his portraits of Robespierre, Marat and Babeuf. The second section shows how the lessons Bax drew from this history shaped his socialist republicanism and discusses his support for Jacobin methods of revolutionary change. The third section of the article looks at the ways in which Bax's reading of revolutionary history affected his internationalism and shows how his ‘anti-patriotism’ led him to support the Anglo-French campaign in 1914. I argue that the Bax's understanding of the French Revolution gave body to his philosophy and greatly influenced his understanding of the socialist struggle. Bax believed that socialists had history on their side, but was so emboldened by the idea of the Revolution that he was led to advance a view of socialist change that undermined the historic values that socialism was supposed to enshrine.     

Vienna and the Jews, 1867–1938: A cultural history

This article examines Ernest Belfort Bax's interpretation of the French Revolution and traces the impact that his idea of the Revolution had on his philosophy and his political thought. The first section considers Bax's understanding of the Revolution in the context of his theory of history and analyses his conception of the Revolution's legacy, drawing particularly on his portraits of Robespierre, Marat and Babeuf. The second section shows how the lessons Bax drew from this history shaped his socialist republicanism and discusses his support for Jacobin methods of revolutionary change. The third section of the article looks at the ways in which Bax's reading of revolutionary history affected his internationalism and shows how his ‘anti-patriotism’ led him to support the Anglo-French campaign in 1914. I argue that the Bax's understanding of the French Revolution gave body to his philosophy and greatly influenced his understanding of the socialist struggle. Bax believed that socialists had history on their side, but was so emboldened by the idea of the Revolution that he was led to advance a view of socialist change that undermined the historic values that socialism was supposed to enshrine.     

FLORENTINE CIVIC HUMANISM AND THE EMERGENCE OF MODERN IDEOLOGY

This article revisits the question of the modernity of the Renaissance by examining the political language of Florentine civic humanism and by critically analyzing the debate over Hans Baron's interpretation of the movement. It engages two debates that are usually conducted separately: one concerning the originality of civic humanism in comparison to medieval thought, and the other concerning the political and social function of the civic humanists' political republicanism in fifteenth‐century Florence. The article's main contention is that humanist political discourse rejected the perception of social and political reality as being part of, or reflecting, a metaphysical and divine order or things, and thus undermined the traditional justifications for political hierarchies and power relations. This created the conditions of possibility for the distinctively modern aspiration for a social and political order based on liberty and equality. It also resulted in the birth of a distinctively modern form of ideology, one that legitimizes the social order by disguising its inequalities and structures of domination. Humanism, like modern political thought generally, thus simultaneously constructs and reflects the dialectic of emancipation and domination so central to modernity itself.     

Recovering Republican Eloquence: John Cheke versus Stephen Gardiner on the Pronunciation of Greek

Abstract

The controversy over Greek pronunciation at Cambridge University in 1542, principally between university chancellor Stephen Gardiner and regius professor of Greek John Cheke, marked the emergence of not only the linguistic but also the political agenda of the mid-Tudor Cambridge humanists. This important group included future statesmen and political thinkers such as William Cecil, later Elizabeth's famous minister, Thomas Smith, author of De republica anglorum, and John Ponet, leading exponent of ‘resistance theory’. In the 1542 Greek controversy Cheke and his allies advocated the restoration of an ancient pronunciation they saw as having been the medium of eloquence in the Athenian republic. Their concepts of language provide a template for their political concepts: both language and political structures are generated by the community, reflective of the community's particular character, susceptible to change and capable of improvement. Throughout their subsequent careers and especially in the reign of Edward VI, when their influence was at its height, these humanists fostered a ‘monarchical republican’ politics; it involved rhetorical persuasion as the main mode of political action, programmes of religious and economic reform, and popular consent as an important factor in the good governance of the commonwealth.