Volume 5, Issue 1, July 2014, Pages 9–15
Abbess Marzouki1
1 Département de Français, Université de Sousse, Faculté des Lettres et des Sciences Humaines de Sousse, Cité Erriadh, Sousse, 4023, Tunisie
Original language: French
Copyright © 2014 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
It is claimed that happiness is the motive and the aim of every human act at the same time. Around this issue, so many opinions and ideologies are forged which ponder upon the possible means that allow Man to fulfill his/ her happiness. In the XVIIIth century, the quest of happiness is often laid in an ineluctable philosophic paradox. That is to say, Man wants to be happy, but he /she ignores the means to achieve it. To Voltaire, this paradox starts by the demonstration of the tension between good and bad, and between melancholy and happiness. In his poem « On the natural law », his ultimate objective is to get rid of such tension. For him, Man should dodge every cruel act to seize the opportunities of happiness; this happiness cannot be possible only through a universal morality which unites all human beings such as the execution of the law of natural religion which permits to get rid off of irrational dogma and every insignificant illusion. In this case, Man, the first responsible of his/ her proper happiness, should get away from prejudices and metaphysical ideas in order to have access to the approval of the universal morality translated by the justice and tolerance and not by fanatism and intolerance. The voltairien humanism is in this case an important condition.
Author Keywords: happiness, prejudices, Reason, universal morality, humanism.
Abbess Marzouki1
1 Département de Français, Université de Sousse, Faculté des Lettres et des Sciences Humaines de Sousse, Cité Erriadh, Sousse, 4023, Tunisie
Original language: French
Copyright © 2014 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
It is claimed that happiness is the motive and the aim of every human act at the same time. Around this issue, so many opinions and ideologies are forged which ponder upon the possible means that allow Man to fulfill his/ her happiness. In the XVIIIth century, the quest of happiness is often laid in an ineluctable philosophic paradox. That is to say, Man wants to be happy, but he /she ignores the means to achieve it. To Voltaire, this paradox starts by the demonstration of the tension between good and bad, and between melancholy and happiness. In his poem « On the natural law », his ultimate objective is to get rid of such tension. For him, Man should dodge every cruel act to seize the opportunities of happiness; this happiness cannot be possible only through a universal morality which unites all human beings such as the execution of the law of natural religion which permits to get rid off of irrational dogma and every insignificant illusion. In this case, Man, the first responsible of his/ her proper happiness, should get away from prejudices and metaphysical ideas in order to have access to the approval of the universal morality translated by the justice and tolerance and not by fanatism and intolerance. The voltairien humanism is in this case an important condition.
Author Keywords: happiness, prejudices, Reason, universal morality, humanism.
Abstract: (french)
Il est avéré que le bonheur est à la fois le motif et la fin de tout acte humain. Autour de cette question sont forgées maintes opinions et idéologies qui réfléchissent sur les moyens possibles permettant à l'homme de réaliser son bonheur. Au XVIIIème siècle, la quête du bonheur est souvent bâtie sur un paradoxe philosophique inéluctable: l'homme veut être heureux mais il ignore les moyens pour y accéder. Chez Voltaire, ce paradoxe débute par la démonstration d'une tension entre le mal et le bien, entre le malheur et le bonheur. Dans son Poème sur la loi naturelle, son objectif ultime sera d'éviter une telle tension. Selon lui, l'homme doit esquiver tout acte maléfique pour cautionner plus d'opportunités de bonheur, lequel bonheur ne serait possible qu'à travers une morale universelle qui unit tous les hommes comme l'exige la loi d'une religion naturelle permettant d'esquisser tout dogme irrationnel et toute illusion insignifiante. Dans ce cas, l'homme, premier responsable de son propre bonheur, doit dissiper les préjugés et les idées métaphysiques pour en fin de compte accéder à l'approbation d'une morale universelle traduite par la justice et la tolérance non le fanatisme et l'intolérance. L'humanisme voltairien est dans ce cas une condition pour y accomplir.
Author Keywords: bonheur, préjugés, Raison, morale universelle, humanisme.
How to Cite this Article
Abbess Marzouki, “La quête du bonheur dans « poème sur la loi naturelle » de voltaire,” International Journal of Innovation and Scientific Research, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 9–15, July 2014.
