Early Modern Low Countries 3 (2019) 1, pp.

155-157 - eISSN: 2543-1587 155

Review

Margaret C. Jacob, The Secular Enlightenment, New Haven, Princeton University

Press, 2019, 352 pp. isbn 9780691189123.

The concept of ‘Enlightenment’ is without

doubt one of the most enduring, and at the
same time most disputed notions within
eighteenth-century studies. Ever since the
professionalisation of humanities scholarship
in the nineteenth century, the Enlightenment
has been a central concern for anyone work-
ing on the history of Europe between roughly
1680 and 1800, including those who deny or
strongly downplay the importance and valid-
ity of the concept. The boundaries between
so-called dix-huitièmistes and scholars of
the Enlightenment remain blurry until this
day: for example, the main conference of the
International Society for Eighteenth-Century
Studies (isecs), which takes place every four
years, is also known as the International Con-
gress on the Enlightenment.
Apart from the vast body of scholarly work
in eighteenth-century studies that is implicitly
connected to the notion of ‘Enlightenment’,
either through its choice of subject (such
as educational reform, the rise of female authorship, or political economy) or through
the way in which it approaches this subject, there is also a more narrowly defined line of
research that addresses the Enlightenment as a social and intellectual movement in its own
right. Researchers following this line take their lead from Immanuel Kant’s seminal essay
‘Was ist Aufklärung?’, published in the Berlinische Monatsschrift of December 1784, which
can be considered as one of the first attempts to theorise the Enlightenment.
It is within the latter framework that we should also place The Secular Enlightenment,
written by the eminent historian Margaret C. Jacob, who has been a prominent scholar
in the field of Enlightenment studies for many decades. A tenured professor of history
since 1971, Jacob has made a significant contribution to the scholarly debate on Euro-
pean intellectual history of the last fifty years, most visibly by coining the term ‘radical

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Review 156

Enlightenment’, which she introduced in her 1981 landmark study The Radical Enlighten-
ment. Pantheists, Republicans and Freemasons.
Reading The Secular Enlightenment, one is immediately struck by the immense amount
of knowledge that Jacob brings to bear on her topic. Both geographically and in terms of
the themes discussed, the scope of her book is very broad. We are taken on a tour of prac-
tically all the European intellectual hotspots of the day, from Edinburgh in the north to
Naples in the south, and Vienna in the east. Thematically, the book ranges from in-depth
discussions of the ideas of prominent philosophes, such as Voltaire and Adam Smith, to a
more general account of the fundamental changes in how people of all ranks experienced
time and space from the late seventeenth century onwards.
The guiding principle behind all these observations on Enlightenment thinking and its
overall impact on human life, as already suggested by the title of the book, is the notion of
the secular, which is almost as disputed as the term Enlightenment itself. What is more, the
two concepts have an intimate relationship that leads us directly to the heart of the afore-
mentioned scholarly debate about the meaning of the Enlightenment. Jacob’s stance in this
debate is clear. Already in the opening lines of her book, she writes: ‘The Enlightenment
was an eighteenth-century movement of ideas and practices that made the secular world its
point of departure. It did not necessarily deny the meaning or emotional hold of religion,
but it gradually shifted attention away from religious questions towards secular ones’ (1). By
thus presenting the processes of Enlightenment and secularisation as inseparable, and to a
large degree even synonymous, Jacob aligns herself with those who see the Enlightenment
as a radical and irrevocable rift in European intellectual history, which caused the birth of
Western modernity. Opposed to this are the views of scholars like David Sorkin, who in his
2011 monograph The Religious Enlightenment. Protestants, Jews, and Catholics from London
to Vienna defended the position that ‘the Enlightenment, at its heart, was religious in nature’.
Based on the diverse examples that are brought together in this book, one has to admit
that Jacob makes a compelling case for the existence of a secular Enlightenment. Roughly
speaking, the first three chapters lay the general basis for her argument by showing how
the conception of human life changed fundamentally in the eighteenth century, making it
in the end more directed towards the here and now and less to divine providence and the
afterlife. Chapter 1 focuses on the spatial dimension and includes a discussion of how colo-
nial expansion, together with technological innovation, led not only to a much broader but
also a more concrete idea of the world in which people lived. Chapter 2 explores the notion
of time. Here technological developments, such as the invention of the pocket watch, are
discussed in conjunction with philosophical debates on the age of the earth and the emer-
gence of the idea of linear time. Chapter 3 connects these conceptual changes to the lives
of ‘ordinary’ citizens, defined by Jacob as ‘literate, reasonably educated eighteenth-century
people’ (66). Using their diaries and other private sources, she brings many of them to life,
showing their strong inclination towards the secular.
Chapters 4 to 7 discuss the meaning and content of the Enlightenment in specific geo-
graphic areas, or within specific linguistic communities, starting with the most famous ‘high’
francophone Enlightenment of Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau, and their likes in c­ hapter 4,
followed by the Scottish Enlightenment of David Hume and Adam Smith in chapter 5.
Chapter 6 and 7 focus on the generally lesser-known developments in the German-speaking
Review 157

world and on the Italian peninsula, taking the local contexts of Berlin, Vienna, Naples, and
Milan as their starting point. Although the overview of ideas and key texts that is given in
these four chapters is both impressive in its scope and lucid in its presentation, the endless
parade of philosophical and theological quarrels on Newtonianism, state politics, the place
of the church, economy, morality, and human rights, also lacks somewhat in urgency. With
their focus on ‘Great Names’ and major trends, these chapters read like intellectual history
in the more traditional sense: a discussion of original thinking and its progress through
time that takes the value and societal impact of this thinking as self-evident.
The book’s final chapter addresses yet another topos of eighteenth-century studies,
namely the issue of how the Enlightenment as an intellectual movement is related to the
revolutionary events that took place in the Atlantic world in the last few decades of the
eighteenth century, starting with the American revolution and ending with Napoleon’s
appointment as first consul in 1799. Jacob makes it clear that the connection between
the two events, although undeniable, was also highly ambivalent. The democratic ideals
of the French Revolution were at first welcomed in the new republic of the United States,
but after the Reign of Terror their popularity decreased significantly. In the German and
Italian lands, the lifespan of these ideals was even shorter, and anti-Enlightenment spirits
took over in the blink of an eye.
Margaret Jacob has always had a special interest in the Dutch Republic. Already in 1992,
she co-edited the volume The Dutch Republic in the Eighteenth Century. Decline, Enlight-
enment, and Revolution, together with Wijnand Mijnhardt. It is thus no surprise that the
Dutch Republic receives ample attention in The Secular Enlightenment. Jacob writes exten-
sively about the importance of the Dutch book trade for the international circulation of
new, enlightened ideas, and on how the French Huguenots living in the Dutch Republic
significantly contributed to the emergence of the radical Enlightenment in Paris around
the mid-eighteenth century. Given this generous treatment, her discussion of the revolu-
tionary period in the Netherlands is somewhat disappointing. The Batavian Revolution
and its aftermath are summarised in less than two pages, leaving out many noteworthy
developments and giving the overall impression that this was an episode that does not
deserve any serious attention by international scholars.
All in all, Jacob’s latest book offers a good synthesis of her ideas on the Enlightenment,
developed over the course of her long and outstanding academic career. Though mainly an
intellectual history, The Secular Enlightenment also has a sharp eye for the social, political, and
cultural contexts in which the new ideas on nature, man, society, and state came about, pay-
ing special attention to the prominent role of masonic lodges in the spread of Enlightenment
thinking. This makes the book a suitable reading for those who have little to no knowledge
of eighteenth-century history, although they should be aware that Jacob’s distinctly secular
perspective portrays only one side of the medal. Specialists of the Enlightenment period on
the other hand will discover a treasure-trove of materials and ideas, but not the kind of grand
new insights or interpretations as in some of Jacob’s earlier works. Be that as it may, The Sec-
ular Enlightenment can still be considered as an impressive scholarly work, which deserves a
spot on the bookshelf of any scholar interested in the eighteenth century.

 Ivo Nieuwenhuis, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen