Bayle, China, and Shaftesbury's Aesthetic Innovation

Bibliographic Data

ID3971560
AuthorsYu Liu (0000-0002-0016-2902, SUNY Niagara, corresponding author)
Year2025
Volume30
Issue3
Pages307-325
Publication date2025-04-03
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe European Legacy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1084-8770 • E-ISSN: 1470-1316
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/10848770.2025.2454775
OpenAlexW4406803903
LanguageEN
References cited30

Shaftesbury has long been celebrated as the early Enlightenment pioneer in English and European aesthetics. His aesthetic innovation, however, has hitherto been explained as merely a new way of saying or appreciating old things within his inherited European cultural traditions. To read him differently, it is crucial to pay attention to a spiritual crisis which he began to experience in the late 1690s. Both before and during it, he was influenced decisively by Pierre Bayle into utilizing information about China in his works, particularly the Chinese monistic idea of tianren heyi or humanity’s unity with heaven. Fundamentally different from the Platonist and Neo-Platonist monism of his inheritance, that liberating conceptual framework from China can and should be seen in hindsight as what made possible Shaftesbury’s aesthetic breakthrough in The Sociable Enthusiast

Aesthetics · China · Political science · Historical Art and Culture Studies · Historical Philosophy and Science · Law · Philosophy · Scottish History and National Identity

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