Claude Henri De Rouvroy Saint-Simon

The members formed themselves into an association arranged in three grades, and constituting a society or family, which lived out of a common purse in the Rue Monsigny. Before long, how ever, the sect was split by dissensions between Bazard, a man of logical and solid temperament, and Enfantin, who desired to establish a fantastic sacerdotalism with lax notions as to the rela tion of the sexes. After a time Bazard seceded, together with many of the strongest supporters of the school. A series of extravagant entertainments given by the society during the winter of 1832 reduced its financial resources and discredited it in char acter. They finally removed to Menilmontant, to a property of Enfantin, where they lived in a communistic society, distinguished by a peculiar dress. Shortly after the chiefs were tried and con demned for proceedings prejudicial to the social order; and the sect was broken up (1832).

Saint-Simonism.

In the doctrine of the followers of Saint Simon we find a great advance on the confused views of the mas ter. In the philosophy of history they recognize epochs of two kinds, the critical or negative and the organic or constructive. The, former, in which philosophy is the dominating force, is charac terized by war, egotism and anarchy; the latter, which is con trolled by religion, is marked by the spirit of obedience, devotion and association. The two spirits of antagonism and association are the social principles whose prevalence determines the character of an epoch. The spirit of association, which tends more and more to prevail over its opponent, is to be the keynote of the social development of the future. Under the present system the industrial chief exploits the proletariat, the members of which, though nominally free, must accept his terms under pain of star vation. The only remedy for this is the abolition of the law of inheritance, and the union of all the instruments of labour in a social fund, which shat be exploited by association. Society thus becomes sole proprietor, intrusting to social groups and social functionaries the management of the various properties. The right

of succession is transferred from the family to the state.

The school of Saint-Simon insists strongly on the claims of merit ; they advocate a social hierarchy in which each man shall be placed according to his capacity and rewarded according to his works. This is, indeed, a most special and pronounced feature of the Saint-Simon socialism, whose theory of government is a kind of spiritual or scientific autocracy, degenerating into the fantastic sacerdotalism of Enfantin. With regard to the family and the relation of the sexes the school of Saint-Simon advocated the complete emancipation of woman and her entire equality with man. The "social individual" is man and woman, who are asso ciated in the exercise of the triple function of religion, the state and the family. In its official declarations the school maintained the sanctity of the Christian law of marriage. Connected with these doctrines was their famous theory of the "rehabilitation of the flesh," deduced from the philosophic theory of the school, which was a species of Pantheism, though they repudiated the name. On this theory they rejected the dualism so much em phasized by Catholic Christianity in its penances and mortifica tions, and held that the body should be restored to its due place of honour.

An excellent edition of the works of Saint-Simon and Enfantin was published by the survivors of the sect (47 vols., Paris, 1865-78). Of his other works the most important are, Lettres d'un habitant de Geneve (1802) ; Du Systeme Industriel (1821) ; Catechisme des Indus triels (1823-24) ; Nouveau Christianisme (1825). See also Georges Weill, Un Precurseur du socialisme, Saint-Simon et son oeuvre (Paris, 1894), and a history of the Ecole Saint-Simonienne, by the same author (1896) ; G. Dumas, Psychologie de deux messies positivistes St. Simon et Comte (19o5) ; G. Brunet, Mysticisme social de Saint-Simon (1925) ; E. N. Butler, The St-Simonian Religion in Germany (1926) ; and M. Leroy, Vie veritable de Saint-Simon (1925).