In this, his final book in a tragically truncated
career, Roy Porter brings together many of the themes and interests he had been
exploring for more than 20 years. What were the circumstances and what are the
consequences of the fundamental shifts in human consciousness that occurred in
the period from the late seventeenth century to the early nineteenth;
specifically, in the context of this work, as the mind took precedence over the
soul as the center of our humanness?

As always, and I say this as a great admirer, Porter tackles the issues
with enormous zest, obvious enjoyment, diligent scholarship and wit and style.
His command of the literature of the period is remarkable as he moves easily
between dense philosophical tracts, to obscure scientific papers, to racy
memoirs and scatological poetry. However, he also possesses the gift of the
common touch and the modern idiom €“ at the end of a passage on Edward Gibbon’s
consideration of his own "grosser appetites" and "more noble
parts" he gets down to the nitty gritty of whether he is straight, gay or
simply uninterested. When discussing the diaries of George Cheyne, possibly the
fattest man in Europe, he wonders if England was becoming a "nation of
fatties". He also shows his delight in, and contemporary relevance of,
satire and the text is sprinkled with both the bile and the whimsy of writers
from Erasmus, Mandeville, Peacock, Sterne and, of course, the curmudgeonly
Swift.

The book is written in four parts. In Part One, "Souls and
Bodies", he contextualizes the great ferment to come. He realizes, like
every historian, that there is indeed an archaeology of knowledge, and some
times a little excavation to expose and reconsider the foundations is
necessary. Porter brings together classical Greek thought and early Christian
meditations through the enormous ramifications of Descartes to put the reader
firmly in the place of his eighteenth century protagonists. The world had
changed, perhaps it had been turned upside down, and what could be made of it?

In Part Two, "Men of Letters", Porter uses many of the great
figures of the time, clearly those whose company he relishes, to exemplify and
counterpoint the debates and consciousness-wrestling he describes. Some, like
Samuel Johnson and to some extent Gibbon as well, seem to embody the issue
exactly. In a world of scrofula, the pox and untreated hydroceles (apparently
the ultimate cause of Gibbon’s death) the weakness of the flesh and the
strength of the will seem to be played out as on a stage. It is the unbearable
tension of the bodily pleasures and dictates of the rational mind that Porter
examines so delicately and perceptively. He writes of Lawrence Sterne, one of
his greater pleasures, that he was "uncommonly sensitive to the conundrum
of embodiment". Indeed, the articulation of conundrums in general, as well
a fierce self-examination seems to be a constant theme.

Cultural history, the history of fashionable complaints, is also
illustrative of the changes taking place. As gout compares with melancholia so
the discomforts of this mortal life are suggested. Gout is Gibbon’s pride,
while the dark moods of Johnson, not to think of the romantic despair of
Chatterton, are the mark of a sensitive mind.

In Part Three, "The Frailty of the Flesh", he considers the
changes in the construction of sex and death €“ and all that might mean in its
full realization. Here he sees the beginning of a differently socially
constructed woman, not least due to a change in roles, at least for women of a
certain class and status. The differentiation of the sexes, perhaps shown
clearly in the educative values of a book like Rouseau’s Émile, took on
a new form. And if death came to be seen as the end of it all and not the
entrée into eternal life, it may in fact concentrate the mind wonderfully.

There is also an enlightening consideration of the changing conceptions
of mental disorder. This is familiar territory to Porter, but he uses this
opportunity to examine the way in which the very idea of a mental disease was
debated and juxtaposed to a Cartesian doctrine. The competing ideas of a
physical cause, the value of moral treatments, the imbalance of humors (not yet
discarded or discredited by any means) all affected the way the nature of the
soul was seen. It was a time of true intellectual ferment.

In Part Four, "The Science of Man for a New Society", Porter
is able to put his finger on those pivotal moments at which the whole balance
of understanding seems to shift. The corporeal and the ascetic are shown with
clarity and perception, and also with a shining relevance to us today.

One of Porter’s great legacies is the enthusiasm he managed to engender
in this particular period of history. He infects his reader with a hopeless
curiosity about the great characters and the mighty questions with which they
wrestle. The chapter which deals with Sterne and Tristam Shandy is a case in point. The reader feels he knows these
great characters so well; they are almost family with all their brilliance and
pettiness revealed. Despite the tremendous amount of detail and scope of the
book, it may be, for some tastes, a little too focused on Britain (Swift in
Ireland notwithstanding), but that is his field. The passages that refer to
contemporary France or America are comparatively slight although others may
argue that equally significant developments were taking place there. However,
this does not really detract from the worth of the book.

The richness of the work and the skill of the argument should not be
lost among all the entertainments. This is a deeply serious and insightful
work. It deals in a scholarly manner with issues of real and present concern.
Porter’s concern is not simply the history of the Eighteenth Century; it is the
understanding of ourselves. His careful and precise analysis of the rational
and irrational is every bit an issue of debate now as then. His final words,
perhaps his final words in print in a remarkable career, are that
"progress became the secularization of salvation. The doctrine of the mind
over matter stood for power over the people". It is our loss that Roy
Porter will no longer be around to help us negotiate the meaning of this.

© 2004 Mark Welch

Mark Welch, Assistant Professor in the Faculty of
Nursing at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta and Co-Director of the
PAHO/WHO Collaborating Centre for Nursing & Mental Health.

Categories: Philosophical