Enlightenment In Henry David Thoreau's 'Foucault'

INTRODUCTION

'Have you ever heard of the madman who on a bright morning lighted a lantern and ran to the market-place calling out unceasingly: "I seek God! I seek God!" As there were many people standing about who did not believe in God, he caused a great deal of amusement. Why? is he lost? said one. Has he strayed away like a child? said another. Or does he keep himself hidden? Is he afraid of us? Has he taken a sea voyage? Has he emigrated? - the people cried out laughingly, all in a hubbub. The insane man jumped into their midst and transfixed them with his glances. "Where is God gone?" he called out. "I mean to tell you! We have killed him, you and I! We are all his murderers!'

"But how have we done it? How were we able to drink up the

And by immaturity he means a certain state of our will that makes us accept someone else’s authority to lead will us in areas where the use of reason is called for. For Foucault in any case, Enlightenment is defined by a modification of the pre-existing relation linking will, authority, and the use of reason. And Kant presented this ‘way out’ as a phenomenon, an ongoing process, but he also presents it as a task and an obligation. Foucault pointed out that Kant said that this enlightenment has a Wahlspruch: now a wahlspruch is a heraldic device, that is a distinctive feature by which one can be recognized and it is also a motto, an instruction that one gives oneself and proposes to other. What then is this instruction? Aude sapere: “dare to know” have the courage, the audacity to know. For Foucault thus enlightenment must be considered both as a process in which men participate collectively and as an act of courage to be accomplished personally . Men are at once elements and agents of a single process. They may be actors in the process to the extent that they participate in it; and the process occurs to the extent that men decide to be its voluntary