MONTESQUIEU: Influential French Enlightenment figure of the ‘siècle des Lumières’
If you read the history of the world, you would know how greedy people were at that time. They fought wars to expand their power and land; because the bigger the territory, the more prestige the king had.
The rulers of the medieval ‘Moyen Age’, from the 5th to the 15th century, had absolute power over their land and people. The succession of power will be given to the descendants of the previous ruling monarch. In this event, a country will apply a feudal system of a monarch— the king is by no means limited and has absolute power. This situation can be illustrated by the slogan “L’État, c’est moi” ‘I am the state’ declared by Louis XIV in 1655 before the French Parliament.
This is what happened in France from the ancient régime to the regime of Louis XVI or Louis-Auguste, as we know, the one who was executed on the guillotine on January 21, 1793. However, before the execution, the French Revolution also took place. Precisely on May 5, 1789–November 9, 1799. This was noticeable in the evolution of the system of France's government, from a monarchy to a republic.
This situation was also inseparable from Montesquieu’s criticism as a political philosopher and explained that the monarchical system was no longer relevant in France. None of this would have happened if he hadn’t travelled, read and written so much. In the end, he also devoted himself to French literature. As time passed, he produced many writings and contributed to the political world. His thoughts are still widely used today.
Life History
Montesquieu’s real name was Charles-Louis de Secondat. He was born on 18 January 1689 in Château de la Brède — died on February 10, 1755, in Paris. From a modest family and his father was a former military man named Jacques de Secondat and his mother was Marie-Françoise de Pesnel, of noble birth. After the death of his father (1713) and his uncle (1716), he was granted the titles Baron de la Brède and de Montesquieu. Consequently, his name was therefore changed to Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de la Brède et de Montesquieu.
He was educated at the Faculty of Law, Université Bordeaux. After his graduation, he worked as a lawyer in 1708 in Paris and it was there that his political skills improved. Not long after, his father’s death forced him to return to his hometown. Here, he married a Protestant woman named Jeanne de Lartigue and had three children.
Still in his birthplace, he worked as a Counsellor in the Parliament of Bordeaux (1714); président à mortier (1716) — a term used since the ancien régime and referring to the highest position in the judiciary; and a member of the local Académie, where he focused on literacy and produced many writings.
Major Contributions
In 1721, he surprised many people with his satirical writing entitled “lettre persanes” ‘letters from the Persians’ or also known as un roman épistolaire. This letter tells the story of the chaos in France from the perspective of a Persian during the time of Louis XVI. The story is imaginary, but the plot is quite illustrative of the absurdity of contemporary French society.
In addition, his other phenomenal work has surprisingly brought the world to the separation of powers — executive, legislature and judiciary. Formerly, the king had absolute power regarding making, supervising, and implementing regulations, so Montesquieu divided it into three. This separation is called as trias politica.
His ideas were presented in a book entitled “de l’esprit des lois”, which literally means ‘of the spirit of the law’. This writing has influenced many governance systems in the world, one of which is my country, Indonesia, which applies the trias politica. So, a leader will not have absolute power anymore.
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