democracy ant> TRellgton.

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Chapter III

SOCIAL DEMOCRACY AS A WESTERNIDEAL

Between the ideal of a political and economicworld order which embodies both liberty andsolidarity, justice and peace, such as haunts to-daythe mind of western man, and that seventeenthcentury's vision of the new Zion, there stands atleast for the Continent of Europe and the non-Anglo-Saxon World, the French Revolution. Weknow how much this marvellous event was deter-mined by the American War of Independence andhow markedly the French " Rights of Man " showthe influence of the American formulation. Anextensive literature has confirmed the penetratingconjecture of Jellinek , 1 as his opponents onlytouch minor points.

To summarise the matter briefly, the philosophyof natural right was the general basis of the move-ment. In the background stood Locke, who hadgone through the school of the Independents.Thus Gooch ventures to assert, 1 that there is littlein Rousseau , that is not to be found in Locke,

1 Georg Jellinek , Die Erklarung der Menschen—undBiirgerrechte, 3 Auflage, 1919.

- G. P. Gooch, History of the Democratic Ideas in the 17 thCentury, Cambridge, 1898, p. 358.