About a human

Claude Adrian Helvetius is a French philosopher-materialist, an outstanding thinker of the Enlightenment, one of the authors of the famous “Encyclopedia” of Didro and d"Alambert, the publication in 1758. His treatise “On Mind” became an event in the intellectual life of France and caused a scandal : The book, which affirmed the theory of personal interest as the most important anthropological principle, has introduced the anger of government and church circles, was immediately prohibited and sentenced by a parliamentary court to burn. In the treatise About man, written in the 1760s. And published posthumously in 1772 in the Hague, the philosopher develops the ideas of the first book, this time focusing on the problems of education and political reorganization of society. Defending the idea of ​​the natural equality of people, he draws the image of the ideal state - the Federation of small republics, with the equality of citizens" rights and the enlightened monarch in the role of the president. According to Helvetia, the task of a truly wise ruler is not to impede the realization of the personal interests of people, but to create laws that would educate a person and contribute to the development of virtue, combining it with personal benefit. The views of Helvetius on human nature and society laid the foundations of the philosophy of utilitarianism and became the starting point of the later philosophical constructions of Jeremiah Bentam and John Stuart Mill