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PHILOSOPHY OF HAPPINESS IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY RUSSIA
Abstract
The history of happiness in the European Enlightenment is well researched and studied. In eighteenth-century Russia the problem of happiness was also one of the central philosophical issues of the time, as were questions about the meaning of human life and human nature. Nevertheless, the concept of Russian happiness was on the periphery of humanitarian thought. This paper deals with philosophical aspects of happiness presented in eighteenth-century Russian literature; the main goal of the article is to identify the major interpretations of happiness and to analyse the logic of change in conceptions. Seeking happiness moves along different trajectories throughout the Russian Enlightenment. Two main types of happiness presented in the Russian written works of the time are public happiness and individual happiness. Public (universal) happiness is thought attainable by the foundation of a just society. Development of this type of happiness goes in two directions: the first is the positive (perfect) direction, such as in the solemn odes (Lomonosov, Sumarokov, Petrov), happiness, as well as utopias, are conceived as having already been achieved in Russia, represented in the model of an ideal society that exists in a dream (Sumarokov), on the Moon (Levshin) or on the edge of the world (Shcherbatov). The second direction is accusatory or satirical, for example, satires (Kantemir) and odes “to happiness” (translations of the ode by G.-B. Rousseau). Personal (private) happiness is achievable in different ways, through: an escape from a society; the harmony of love and friendship; wealth or career (L'vov, Nicolev, Murav'ov, Kheraskov, Kapnist, Karamzin). True happiness in Russian culture is endowed with an important temporal characteristic: it must be constant, eternal. That is why by the end of the eighteenth century Russian thinkers and writers came to the conclusion that true – absolute – happiness could only be found in Heaven and there is no happiness on Earth.
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