During the second half of the eighteenth century, a number of natural philosophers were attempting to break free of the rigid interpretation of the world imposed by Christian theologians’ belief in the literal account of creation in the Bible. With new information flowing in from around the world, the idea that some kind of creator-god had created the world in a short period of time, that all of the animal species alive today had been created at that time, and that no animal species had become extinct seemed increasingly out of touch with reality. Radical ideas—often condemned as atheistic by some Christians—such as evolution, began to be considered.
One of the philosophers and prominent social figures of the French Enlightenment was Paul Henri Thiry, baron d’Holbach. In 1770, Holbach’s System of Nature was published in which he put forth the idea that inert matter could self-organize into complex structures. As these structures became more complex, they would exhibit the properties of life. No creator, god, or divine designer was thus needed for life to come into existence. In Paris, his book was publically burned and it was condemned by the parliament of Paris.
In Parisian society, Holbach was well-known for holding dinner parties for serious intellectuals. Many of the French intellectuals who attended his dinners were atheists who advocated radical and revolutionary agendas. Among the non-French intellectuals who attended Holbach’s dinner included the statesman and scientist Benjamin Franklin, the philosopher David Hume, and the economist Adam Smith. Michael LeBuffe, in his biography of Holbach in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, writes:
“Holbach's character must have been remarkable to have maintained a salon in which the espousers of political and religious reform met so freely and so often with visitors who either cannot have been accustomed to such open dialogue or who were themselves parts of the establishment under attack.”
Since Holbach published his books anonymously in Holland, many people were unaware of his radical views.
While Paul Henri Thiry, baron d’Holbach is known for his involvement in Paris intellectual society, he was actually born in 1723 in Edesheim in present-day Germany. He was raised in Paris by his uncle Franciscus Adam d'Holbach. He attended the University of Leiden from 1744 until 1748 or 1749. In 1749, he married his second cousin Basile-Geneviève d'Aine.
Both his uncle and his father died about 1753 or 1754, and, as a result, he inherited a great deal of wealth as well as his title.
Holbach opposed and criticized religion (i.e. Christianity) and its political affiliate, the absolute monarchy. In Systems of Nature, he writes:
“The ignorance of natural causes created Gods, and imposture made them terrible. Man lived unhappy, because he was told that God had condemned him to misery. He never entertained a wish of breaking his chains, as he was taught, that stupidity, that the renouncing of reason, mental debility, and spiritual debasement, were the means of obtaining eternal felicity.”
Michael LeBuffe writes:
“Holbach was notorious in the 18th century for his atheism and for his criticisms of Christianity.”
Michael LeBuffe also writes:
“His criticism of religion, and of Catholicism in particular, is founded at least in part in the conviction that religion is the source of vice and unhappiness and that virtue can only be fostered in people who seek to preserve themselves in the world of their immediate acquaintance.”
There are some people who consider him to be one of the most radical individuals of his time. As an atheist, he felt that atheism was a prerequisite for any real ethical theory. Contrary to views common in the eighteenth century (and still common today), he felt that one could be both virtuous and an atheist. Ethics were to be based on social unity and cooperation among people.
With regard to the place of humans in the natural world, he writes in Systems of Nature:
“…Man is, as a whole, the result of a certain combination of matter, endowed with particular properties, competent to give, capable of receiving, certain impulses, the arrangement of which is called organization, of which the essence is, to feel, to think, to act, to move, after a manner distinguished from other beings with which he can be compared. Man, therefore, ranks in an order, in a system, in a class by himself, which differs from that of other animals, in whom we do not perceive those properties of which he is possessed.”
Human nature is to be understood in terms of laws rather than in relation to some supernatural being.
Holbach’s political theory, which he called “ethocracy,” developed the notion of a just state founded for the purposes of securing the general welfare. He expressed these ideas in Natural Politics (1773), The Social System (1773), Universal Morality (1776), and Ethocracy (1776). According to Holbach, society contracts with government for the preservation of the common welfare. This is a social pact in which individuals realize that other people can be the greatest help in their own welfare and security.
According to some sources, Holbach authored or coauthored more than 50 books and more than 400 articles. He died in 1789.