English philosopher (1671-1713), the Third Earl of Shaftesbury, whose education was supervised by John Locke and whose Characteristicks of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times (1711) became one of the most widely read works of philosophy in eighteenth-century Europe [IC].
Contribution
Shaftesbury broke with his tutor’s empiricism. He held that beauty is how a mind comes to perceive order in nature (“Harmony is Harmony by Nature”), and that human beings have a moral sense, an inner compass that is itself an aspect of beauty. His ideas reached Adam Smith’s moral philosophy and, on the continent, the German writers who shaped Bildung and the life sciences. Jonathan Rowson credits him as the first to stress inner Bildung, the formation of perception, feeling and valuing, and to see that its quality shows up in outer Bildung, the institutions of a society. The wiki traces this line on Aesthetic Education and uses the inner and outer distinction on Bildung.
Selected works
- An Inquiry Concerning Virtue, or Merit (1699)
- Characteristicks of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times (1711)
Related pages
Sources
- Rowson, J. (2021). What’s the Point of The Realisation Festival?
Provenance
Created 30 October 2026 with the Bildung pages, from Rowson’s account and the public record.