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When we turn from Babœuf and Cabet to Saint-Simon we discover a man of a new type. He differed from his predecessors in aims, purposes, and character. We find in him one who did not desire the dead and uninteresting level of communism, but placed before him as an ideal a social system which should more nearly render to man the just fruits of his own individual exertions than does our present society.

Count Henry de Saint-Simon[37] was born at Paris in 1760. He belonged to a noble family of France, which traced its origin to Charlemagne. The family attained distinction early in the fifteenth century through the gallant conduct of one of its members at the battle of Agincourt. It divided into five branches in the seventeenth century. The celebrated Duke de Saint-Simon, author of the “Memoirs of the Reign of Louis XIV. and the Regency,” belonged to one branch; Louis François de Saint-Simon, Marquis de Sandricourt, grandfather of the socialist, to another. Among the sons of the marquis were Balthasar Henri, Maximilien Henri, and Charles François Simeon, of whom the two latter became distinguished. Balthasar Henri was the father of the subject of this chapter.

Although not the grandson of the duke, as has been erroneously supposed,[38] Saint-Simon would naturally have inherited his titles and property. They were lost to him, however, through the quarrel of his father with the duke. The titles he lost were those of a grandee of Spain and a duke of France, while the property he would have inherited yielded an annual income of 500,000 francs. “I have lost the titles and the fortune of the Duke of Saint-Simon,” he writes, “but I have inherited his passion for glory.” This was manifested in a singular way when he was only sixteen years of age. That he might not forget the grand destiny in store for him, he ordered his servant to awaken him every morning with the words, “Arise, Monsieur le Comte, you have grand deeds to perform.” Saint-Simon had already entered the army at this time, and the year afterwards went to America and fought in the War of the Revolution under Washington. He took part in the siege of Yorktown and witnessed the surrender of Lord Cornwallis. He distinguished himself for bravery on this occasion, and received honorable recognition of his gallant conduct from the Society of the Cincinnati. Upon his return to France, he was made colonel of the Regiment of Aquitaine at the early age of twenty-three. But he soon resigned his position and abandoned all hopes of a military career, although his prospects were certainly brilliant. In speaking of his sojourn in the United States, he says: “I occupied myself much more with political science than military tactics. The war in itself did not interest me, but the purpose of the war interested me exceedingly, and this interest enabled me to endure its hardships without repugnance. I desire the attainment of the purpose, I was accustomed to say to myself, and I ought not to rebel against the means thereto. … My vocation was not that of a soldier; I was drawn towards a very different, indeed, I may say, diametrically opposite, kind of activity. The life purpose which I set before me was to study the movements of the human mind, in order that I might then labor for the perfection of civilization. From that time forward I devoted myself to this work without reserve; to it I consecrated my entire life.”[39]

Saint-Simon was taken prisoner by the British when returning to France in the Ville de Paris, and carried to Jamaica, where he was detained until the close of the war. In returning to Europe he visited Mexico, and there made an attempt to carry out one of the magnificent plans for the advancement of mankind which he had been revolving in his mind. He endeavored to interest the viceroy in a project for building a canal to unite the Atlantic with the Pacific. While his exertions were unsuccessful, it is interesting to note that one who drew his inspiration largely from Saint-Simon—viz., De Lesseps—may yet execute his plan.

A few years later Saint-Simon formed designs for a canal to connect Madrid with the sea, and might possibly have succeeded in realizing them, had not the French Revolution recalled him to France. He sided with the people, although his family traditions and early training would have led him to connect himself with the royalists, and although in the struggle he lost the property he had inherited from his mother. He was elected president of the commune where his property was situated, in 1789, and in an address to the electors proclaimed his intention to renounce the title of count, since he regarded it as inferior to that of citizen; and he refused another office lest it should be supposed he owed it to his rank. All this, however, did not prevent his imprisonment on account of his nobility, which rendered him in the eyes of the terrorists a dangerous character. He was kept in prison, first at St. Pélagie, afterwards at the Luxembourg, for eleven months, and was released after the Revolution of Thermidor. It was at this time that his ancestor Charlemagne appeared to him and encouraged him with a prophecy of future greatness. He describes the vision in these words: “At the most cruel epoch of the Revolution, and during a night of my detention at the Luxembourg, Charlemagne appeared to me and said: ‘Since the world has existed, no family has enjoyed the honor of producing a hero and a philosopher of the first rank; this honor has been reserved for my house. My son, thy success as a philosopher will equal mine as a warrior and politician.’ ”

Upon his release from prison Saint-Simon began to speculate in the confiscated national lands, in order to obtain money to enable him to prosecute his plans for the improvement of society. He realized 144,000 francs from his investments, and then retired from business, as he thought he had all the property he needed. He devoted the following seven years to preparatory study, taking up his abode first in the neighborhood of the École Polytechnique, afterwards near the École de Médecine. Physiology and the physical sciences interested him chiefly. What he had in view was a science of the sciences, a science to classify facts derived from all sciences and to unite them into one whole; and it was from him that his scholar, Auguste Comte, derived the idea of founding a universal science, as he attempted in his “Cours de Philosophie Positive.” In fact this work was only a development of his “Système Politique Positive,” which he, as a scholar of Saint-Simon, wrote at the instance of his master.[40]

Saint-Simon thought it necessary to add an experimental training to his theoretical one in order to prepare himself for his mission, and accomplished this by living every kind of life, from that of the wealthy entertainer of savants to one of poverty and dissipation. While this attempt to pass through all the experiences and feelings of a lifetime in a few years was not altogether unsuccessful, it was unfortunate in making him prematurely old.

Saint-Simon began his career as an author and social reformer at the age of forty-three, in 1803, and never abandoned it until his death in 1825.

His life was a sad one. His property was soon gone, and he often worked at his system while suffering the direst want, but he was sustained by the spirit of the martyr. Saint-Simon endeavored to bring to pass the happy future which he believed possible for the human race. “The imagination of poets,” said he, “has placed the golden age at the cradle of the human race, amidst the ignorance and grossness of the earliest times. It had been better to relegate the iron age to that period. The golden age of humanity is not behind us; it is to come, and will be found in the perfection of the social order. Our fathers have not seen it; our children will one day behold it. It is our duty to prepare the way for them.”

Saint-Simon had thus devoted his life to a cause which he held sacred, and he pursued it through fortune and misfortune, through good report and through evil report. For a time he occupied the position of copyist at a salary of $200 per annum; a strange place for a scion of one of the proudest families of France. He copied nine hours a day, and robbed himself of sleep in order to develop his philosophical and social system. His health had begun to fail him, when he was relieved from his deplorable situation by the kindness of a man who had been his valet in brighter days. This servant, one of the few who never lost faith in Saint-Simon, supported him, and assisted him in the publication of his works. The death in 1810 of the former valet, Diard by name, again left Saint-Simon in a wretched state, but he continued his labors, and wrote two works, entitled “Sur la Science de l’Homme” and “Sur la Gravitation Universelle.” As he had no means of printing them, he sent them in manuscript to various scientists and other prominent men, with the following letter: