Prime Movers Hardcover – 5 April 2018

Well written and imaginative in true Mount style

On the Mount Rushmere there are the carvings of four former Presidents.Above Thomas Jefferson there is a chamber cut into the rock. Inside are the texts of the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution. Jefferson gets the credit for coining the memorable words of the Declaration despite being in Paris while it was being drafted.The words were not original either. Mount points out in this engrossing account the pretentious and often false claims by many famous people to have discovered a momentous theory or that experiencing, something led them to formulate an indelible mantra.Marx is a very good example. The Communist League was insignificant and played a minor part in the 1848 revolutions, save in Germany. In 1852 it disappeared for thirty odd years. Marx had seldom met real manual workers. He was the son of a rich Jewish lawyer. Aged thirty when writing the Manifesto he knew nothing of the toils of industrial life or the 'chains'.In fact the workers of the world had no desire to unite. The Great War proved that.Other examples include Mazzini the father of a united Italy knew little of the land. Bentham and Mary Woolstonecraft are other examples. Both proclaimed free sexual relations despite one being celibate and the other ignorant of sex until her last few years. Gandhi insisted on India returning to village life despite being a city dweller. His knowledge of village life was slender.Mount reminds us that many of these heroes had deep and often unpleasant flaws. Gandhi was very cruel to his own children. Marx and Engels wrote letters to each other in which nasty things were said about Jews and Blacks. Jefferson would have been called a racist today. Bentham mocked religion. Yet these and others are among the prime movers of our minds. Their views have shaped our politics and institutions. Mount argues convincingly that if you wish to study political ideas you have to examine in depth what Rousseau, Marx, Plato, and a host of other individuals wrote and said and did. He says his prime motive on writing this book is to. 'reunite the person and dogma to get as vivid an idea as possible of how one gave birth to the other'.Reason and passion flow through the writings and sayings of those selected by Mount. Marx's love of violence, and Jefferson's racist views, for example are manifest. In all their doctrines there are gaping holes. Truth is often partial. But rhey all nevertheless made a lasting contribution to how we view our world.There are twelve sections dealing with : Pericles, Jesus, Rousseau, Adam Smith, Burke, Jefferson, Bentham, Mary Woolstonecraft, Mazzini, Marx, Gandhi and Muhammad Iqbal. There are illustrations and a bibliography.The author writes beautifully and with enviable efficiency. Some chapters are quite superb. We learn just how quirky these people were. They are filleted intellectually. Bentham an odd ball, hated verbs, Marx loved smashing street lights, and Rousseau had some disgusting habits. Read and enjoy.

Book is probably good but the print size makes it impossible to read. Would need magnifying glass.