“Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains.” Rousseau

Rousseau’s passage from the beginning of The Social Contract contends for the most famous in philosophy.

Rousseau’s point was simple: Humans are good, but there’s a lot of suffering, so social institutions must be corrupting everything.

Significantly, Rousseau didn’t see any problems with himself. He was arguably the most self-centered philosopher of all time. He was so self-centered, biographers wonder if he was even capable of love.

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