The Turgot Collection

On Universal History

Turgot gives a much more extensive account of human civilization and the growth of knowledge than in the previous selection. He describes the growth of states, in particular drawing a contrast between despotism and cities. The Ottoman Empire is analyzed at length. Turgot then turns to an account of intellectual progress. Ideas arise from the senses, and more general concepts arise by abstraction from sensory information. People at first ascribe natural occurrences to minds; they know how they themselves can produce effects in the external world and assume that nature is the effect of other minds. Later, they assume that the abstractions they derive from the senses are really existing essences with causal powers. It is only later that true scientific investigation begins, based on empirical investigation. Turgot’s account of these stages of intellectual growth prefigures the three-stage theory of Auguste Comte.