G.B. Vico: The Making of an Anti-Modern

by Mark Lilla

This comprehensive introduction to the philosophy of Giovanni Battista Vico puts all the elements of his theories of authority, politics and civil religion in their proper relationship with his theory of history. As such, it raises provocative questions about the subsequent intellectual development of the anti-modern tradition as it relates to the historical and social sciences of our time.

Genres: Philosophy, Politics

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

Mark Lilla is an American political scientist, historian of ideas, journalist, and professor of humanities at Columbia University in New York City. A self-described liberal, he typically, though not always, presents views from that perspective.

Reviews

[Judy]

"When Joseph de Maistre attached the Enlightenment on the grounds that man needs religion and authority, he was echoing Vico, whose works he knew well. When Saint-Simon denounced the 'critical' power of philosophy in the name of modern social science, and when Auguste Comte proposed to found a new religion through the same science, both were retracing Vico's steps. All these nineteenth century authors agreed with Vico that man is weak and irrational, threatened by skepticism and in need of religion and authority. They like him concluded that man needed to be freed from reason and philosophy, not freed by means of them. " p. 13
"Whereas moderns saw the lamp of man's reason covered by the basket of dogma and superstition, Vico saw a fallen creature whose irrational drives would always dominate his weak reason." p.15
"Rather than speak of 'harmony,' Vico only refers to the 'constancy' of God's presence in the human realm." p. 71"
Lilla's view is that Vico selects Rome over Greece because the Romans "became wise without the aid of philosophy. Its wisdom consisted in its remarkably strong attachment to religion, and tradition, which were developed and codified in a rich jurisprudence that managed to balance the rational with the customary, the 'verum' with the 'certum'." p. 152
The author posits that Vico's two societies are in no way the same as Saint Augustine's "two cities."
"He is unwilling to surrender politics to Machiavelli, Hobbes, Spinoza, and Bayle by withdrawing into a Catholic otherworldliness." p. 82
"Religion is the foundation for all social relations: on this point Vico never wavers. In the New Science however, he finally explains the genesis of philosophy from this irrational foundation.
This book for me is an amazing treatise, however I find Lilla wrong on the following points:
(1) Lilla says that religion and original sin are a basis because that is what is found in Vico's earlier work. Yet he allows for no growth or change. In the New Science, religion appears to have a back seat.
(2) In On Methods, Vico does not pick only the ancient and throw out modern pedagogy as Lilla claims
(3) Lilla claims that Vico is putting Jerusalem and Athens to the side-- less important than Rome.