Idleness, Contemplation and the Aesthetic, 1750–1830

Abstract

Reconstructing the literary and philosophical reaction to Adam Smith's dictum that man is a labouring animal above and before all else, this study explores the many ways in which Romantic writers presented idle contemplation as the central activity in human life. By contrasting the British response to Smith's political economy with that of contemporary German Idealists, Richard Adelman also uses this consideration of the importance of idleness to Romantic aesthetics to chart the development of a distinctly British idealism in the last decades of the eighteenth century. Exploring the work of Adam Smith, Jeremy Bentham, Friedrich Schiller, William Cowper, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Mary Wollstonecraft and many of their contemporaries, this study pinpoints a debate over human activity and capability taking place between 1750 and 1830, and considers its social and political consequences for the cultural theory of the early nineteenth century.

IDLENESS AND THE VERY SPARING HAND OF GOD: THE INVISIBLE TIE BETWEEN HUME’SDIALOGUES CONCERNING NATURAL RELIGIONAND SMITH’SWEALTH OF NATIONS

“…2), was a means to extract as much labor as possible from poor workers. The reaction of Romantic authors, such as William Coleridge, William Wordsworth, and Mary Wollstonecraft, also praised idleness against the excesses of industrial life (Adelman 2011;Packham 2012). This could be read as an additional outcome of such eighteenth-century hypocrisy.…”

“…Not surprisingly, Adelman (2011) underlines a tension between the TMS and the WN: "We could say that Smith's attempt, in the Wealth of Nations, to align human activities and desires with the model of the division of labor, encounters the problem of human nature as he had already expressed it in the Theory" (Adelman 2011, p. 30). I agree with Adelman that idleness for Smith is a central feature of human beings, and it is extensively considered in the TMS.…”

“…It is not a new thesis that idleness is a fundamental concept to understanding the birth of political economy (Hundert 1974;Marshall 2000;Davis 2003) and eighteenthcentury culture (Jordan 2003;Adelman 2011;Fludernik 2017). What is less obvious is that idleness holds a central role in Hume's and Smith's philosophies and constitutes a bond between them.…”

Youth Idleness in Indonesia

“…The origin of literatures concerning the relationship between capitalism and idleness in the mid 17s has been examined by Adelman (2011). The context of selected Asian Tribes has been discussed by Alatas (1977).…”

Idleness and the Very Sparing Hand of God: The invisible tie between Hume’s "Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion" and Smith’s "Wealth of Nations"

“…It is not a new thesis that idleness is a fundamental concept to understand the birth of political economy (Hundert 1974;Marshall 2000;Davis 2003) and eighteenth-century culture (Jordan 2003;Adelman 2011;Fludernik 2017). What is less obvious is that idleness holds a central role in Hume's and Smith's philosophies and constitutes a bond between them.…”