[1] Fouquet has been identified with the "Man with the Iron Mask"
(see IRON MASK), but this theory is quite impossible.
FOUQUIER-TINVILLE, ANTOINE QUENTIN (1746-1795), French revolutionist,
was born at Herouel, a village in the department of the Aisne.
Originally a _procureur_ attached to the Chatelet at Paris, he sold his
office in 1783, and became a clerk under the lieutenant-general of
police. He seems to have early adopted revolutionary ideas, but little
is known of the part he played at the outbreak of the Revolution. When
the Revolutionary Tribunal of Paris was established on the 10th of March
1793, he was appointed public prosecutor to it, an office which he
filled until the 28th of July 1794. His activity during this time earned
him the reputation of one of the most terrible and sinister figures of
the Revolution. His function as public prosecutor was not so much to
convict the guilty as to see that the proscriptions ordered by the
faction for the time being in power were carried out with a due regard
to a show of legality. He was as ruthless and as incorrupt as
Robespierre himself; he could be moved from his purpose neither by pity
nor by bribes; nor was there in his cruelty any of that quality which
made the ordinary Jacobin _enrage_ by turns ferocious and sentimental.
It was this very quality of passionless detachment that made him so
effective an instrument of the Terror. He had no forensic eloquence; but
the cold obstinacy with which he pressed his charges was more convincing
than any rhetoric, and he seldom failed to secure a conviction.
His horrible career ended with the fall of Robespierre and the
terrorists on the 9th Thermidor. On the 1st of August 1794 he was
imprisoned by order of the Convention and brought to trial. His defence
was that he had only obeyed the orders of the Committee of Public
Safety; but, after a trial which lasted forty-one days, he was condemned
to death, and guillotined on the 7th of May 1795.
See _Memoire pour A.Q. Fouquier ex-accusateur public pres le tribunal
revolutionnaire_, &c. (Paris, 1794); Domenget, _Fouquier-Tinville et
le tribunal revolutionnaire_ (Paris, 1878); H. Wallon, _Histoire du
tribunal revolutionnaire de Paris_ (1880-1882) (a work of general
interest, but not always exact); George Lecocq, _Notes et documents
sur Fouquier-Tinville_ (Paris, 1885). See also the documents relating
to his trial enumerated by M. Tourneux in _Bibliographie de l'histoire
de Paris pendant la Revolution Francaise_, vol. i. Nos. 4445-4454
(1890).
FOURCHAMBAULT, a town of central France in the department of Nievre, on
the right bank of the Loire, 4-1/2 m. N.W. of Nevers, on the Paris-Lyon
railway. Pop. (1906) 4591. It owes its importance to its extensive
iron-works, established in 1821, which give employment to 2000 workmen
and produce engineering material for railway, military and other
purposes. Among the more remarkable _chefs-d'oeuvre_ which have been
produced at Fourchambault are the metal portions of the Pont du
Carrousel, the iron beams of the roof of the cathedral at Chartres, and
the vast spans of the bridge over the Dordogne at Cubzac. A small canal
unites the works to the Lateral canal of the Loire.
FOURCROY, ANTOINE FRANCOIS, COMTE DE (1755-1809), French chemist, the
son of an apothecary in the household of the duke of Orleans, was born
at Paris on the 15th of June 1755. He took up medical studies by the
advice of the anatomist Felix Vicq d'Azyr (1748-1794), and after many
difficulties caused by lack of means finally in 1780 obtained his
doctor's diploma. His attention was specially turned to chemistry by
J.B.M. Bucquet (1746-1780), the professor of chemistry at the Medical
School of Paris, and in 1784 he was chosen to succeed P.J. Macquer
(1718-1784) as lecturer in chemistry at the college of the Jardin du
Roi, where his lectures attained great popularity. He was one of the
earliest converts to the views of Lavoisier, which he helped to
promulgate by his voluminous writings, but though his name appears on a
large number of chemical and also physiological and pathological
memoirs, either alone or with others, he was rather a teacher and an
organizer than an original investigator. A member of the committees for
public instruction and public safety, and later, under Napoleon,
director general of instruction, he took a leading part in the
establishment of schools for both primary and secondary education,
scientific studies being especially provided for. Fourcroy died at Paris
on the 16th of December 1809, the very day on which he had been created
a count of the French empire. By his conduct as a member of the
Convention he has been accused of contributing to the death of
Lavoisier. Baron Cuvier in his _Eloge historique_ of Fourcroy repels the
charge, but he can scarcely be acquitted of time-serving indifference,
if indeed active, though secret, participation be not proved against
him.
The Royal Society's _Catalogue of Scientific Papers_ enumerates 59
memoirs by Fourcroy himself, and 58 written jointly by him and others,
mostly L.N. Vauquelin.
FOURIER, FRANCOIS CHARLES MARIE (1772-1837), French socialist writer,
was born at Besancon in Franche-Comte on the 7th of April 1772. His
father was a draper in good circumstances, and Fourier received an
excellent education at the college in his native town. After completing
his studies there he travelled for some time in France, Germany and
Holland. On the death of his father he inherited a considerable amount
of property, which, however, was lost when Lyons was besieged by the
troops of the Convention. Being thus deprived of his means of livelihood
Fourier entered the army, but after two years' service as a chasseur was
discharged on account of ill-health. In 1803 he published a remarkable
article on European politics which attracted the notice of Napoleon,
some of whose ideas were foreshadowed in it. Inquiries were made after
the author, but nothing seems to have come of them. After leaving the
army Fourier entered a merchant's office in Lyons, and some years later
undertook on his own account a small business as broker. He obtained in
this way just sufficient to supply his wants, and devoted all his
leisure time to the elaboration of his first work on the organization of
society.
During the early part of his life, and while engaged in commerce, he had
become deeply impressed with the conviction that social arrangements
resulting from the principles of individualism and competition were
essentially imperfect and immoral. He proposed to substitute for these
principles co-operation or united effort, by means of which full and
harmonious development might be given to human nature. The scheme,
worked out in detail in his first work, _Theorie des quatre mouvements_
(2 vols., Lyons, 1808, published anonymously), has for foundation a
particular psychological proposition and a special economical doctrine.
Psychologically Fourier held what may with some laxity of language be
called natural optimism,--the view that the full, free development of
human nature or the unrestrained indulgence of human passion is the only
possible way to happiness and virtue, and that misery and vice spring
from the unnatural restraints imposed by society on the gratification of
desire. This principle of harmony among the passions he regarded as his
grandest discovery--a discovery which did more than set him on a level
with Newton, the discoverer of the principle of attraction or harmony
among material bodies. Throughout his works, in uncouth, obscure and
often unintelligible language, he endeavours to show that the same
fundamental fact of harmony is to be found in the four great
departments,--society, animal life, organic life and the material
universe. In order to give effect to this principle and obtain the
resulting social harmony, it was needful that society should be
reconstructed; for, as the social organism is at present constituted,
innumerable restrictions are imposed upon the free development of human
desire. As practical principle for such a reconstruction Fourier
advocated co-operative or united industry. In many respects what he says
of co-operation, in particular as to the enormous waste of economic
force which the actual arrangements of society entail, still deserves
attention, and some of the most recent efforts towards extension of the
co-operative method, e.g. to house-keeping, were in essentials
anticipated by him. But the full realization of his scheme demanded much
more than the mere admission that co-operation is economically more
efficacious than individualism. Society as a whole must be organized on
the lines requisite to give full scope to co-operation and to the
harmonious evolution of human nature. The details of this reorganization
of the social structure cannot be given briefly, but the broad outlines
may be thus sketched. Society, on his scheme, is to be divided into
departments or _phalanges_, each _phalange_ numbering about 1600
persons. Each _phalange_ inhabits a _phalanstere_ or common building,
and has a certain portion of soil allotted to it for cultivation. The
_phalansteres_ are built after a uniform plan, and the domestic
arrangements are laid down very elaborately. The staple industry of the
_phalanges_ is, of course, agriculture, but the various _series_ and
_groupes_ into which the members are divided may devote themselves to
such occupations as are most to their taste; nor need any occupation
become irksome from constant devotion to it. Any member of a group may
vary his employment at pleasure, may pass from one task to another. The
tasks regarded as menial or degrading in ordinary society can be
rendered attractive if advantage is taken of the proper principles of
human nature: thus children, who have a natural affinity for dirt, and a
fondness for "cleaning up," may easily be induced to accept with
eagerness the functions of public scavengers. It is not, on Fourier's
scheme, necessary that private property should be abolished, nor is the
privacy of family life impossible within the _phalanstere_. Each family
may have separate apartments, and there may be richer and poorer
members. But the rich and poor are to be locally intermingled, in order
that the broad distinction between them, which is so painful a feature
in actual society, may become almost imperceptible. Out of the common
gain of the _phalange_ a certain portion is deducted to furnish to each
member the minimum of subsistence; the remainder is distributed in
shares to labour, capital and talent,--five-twelfths going to the first,
four-twelfths to the second and three-twelfths to the third. Upon the
changes requisite in the private life of the members Fourier was in his
first work more explicit than in his later writings. The institution of
marriage, which imposes unnatural bonds on human passion, is of
necessity abolished; a new and ingeniously constructed system of licence
is substituted for it. Considerable offence seems to have been given by
Fourier's utterances with regard to marriage, and generally the later
advocates of his views are content to pass the matter over in silence or
to veil their teaching under obscure and metaphorical language.
The scheme thus sketched attracted no attention when the _Theorie_ first
appeared, and for some years Fourier remained in his obscure position at
Lyons. In 1812 the death of his mother put him in possession of a small
sum of money, with which he retired to Bellay in order to perfect his
second work. The _Traite de l'association agricole domestique_ was
published in 2 vols. at Paris in 1822, and a summary appeared in the
following year. After its publication the author proceeded to Paris in
the hope that some wealthy capitalist might be induced to attempt the
realization of the projected scheme. Disappointed in this expectation he
returned to Lyons. In 1826 he again visited Paris, and as a considerable
portion of his means had been expended in the publication of his book,
he accepted a clerkship in an American firm. In 1829 and 1830 appeared
what is probably the most finished exposition of his views, _Le Nouveau
Monde industriel_. In 1831 he attacked the rival socialist doctrines of
Saint-Simon and Owen in the small work _Pieges et charlatanisme de deux
sectes, St Simon et Owen_. His writings now began to attract some
attention. A small body of adherents gathered round him, and the most
ardent of them was Victor Considerant (q.v.). In 1832 a newspaper, _Le
Phalanstere ou la reforme industrielle_ was started to propagate the
views of the school, but its success was not great. In 1833 it declined
from a weekly to a monthly, and in 1834 it died of inanition. It was
revived in 1836 as _Le Phalange_, and in 1843 became a daily paper, _La
Democratie pacifique_. In 1850 it was suppressed.
Fourier did not live to see the success of his newspaper, and the only
practical attempt during his lifetime to establish a _phalanstere_ was a
complete failure. In 1832 M. Baudet Dulary, deputy for Seine-et-Oise,
who had become a convert, purchased an estate at Conde-sur-Vesgre, near
the forest of Rambouillet, and proceeded to establish a socialist
community. The capital supplied was, however, inadequate, and the
community broke up in disgust. Fourier was in no way discouraged by this
failure, and till his death, on the 10th of October 1837, he lived in
daily expectation that wealthy capitalists would see the merits of his
scheme and be induced to devote their fortunes to its realization. It
may be added that subsequent attempts to establish the _phalanstere_
have been uniformly unsuccessful.[1]
Fourier seems to have been of an extremely retiring and sensitive
disposition. He mixed little in society, and appeared, indeed, as if he
were the denizen of some other planet. Of the true nature of social
arrangements, and of the manner in which they naturally grow and become
organized, he must be pronounced extremely ignorant. The faults of
existing institutions presented themselves to him in an altogether
distorted manner, and he never appears to have recognized that the evils
of actual society are immeasurably less serious than the consequences of
his arbitrary scheme. Out of the chaos of human passion he supposed
harmony was to be evolved by the adoption of a few theoretically
disputable principles, which themselves impose restraints even more
irksome than those due to actual social facts. With regard to the
economic aspects of his proposed new method, it is of course to be
granted that co-operation is more effective than individual effort, but
he has nowhere faced the question as to the probable consequences of
organizing society on the abolition of those great institutions which
have grown with its growth. His temperament was too ardent, his
imagination too strong, and his acquaintance with the realities of life
too slight to enable him justly to estimate the merits of his fantastic
views. That this description of him is not expressed in over-strong
language must be clear to any one who not only considers what is true in
his works,--and the portion of truth is by no means a peculiar discovery
of Fourier's,--but who takes into account the whole body of his
speculations, the cosmological and historical as well as the economical
and social. No words can adequately describe the fantastic nonsense
which he pours forth, partly in the form of general speculation on the
universe, partly in the form of prophetic utterances with regard to the
future changes in humanity and its material environment. From these
extraordinary writings it is no extreme conclusion that there was much
of insanity in Fourier's mental constitution.
AUTHORITIES.--Ch. Pellarin, _Fourier, sa vie et sa theorie_ (5th ed.,
1872); Sargant, _Social Innovators_ (1859); Reybaud, _Reformateurs
modernes_ (7th ed., 1864); Stein, _Socialismus und Communismus des
heutigen Frankreichs_ (2nd ed., 1848); A.J. Booth, _Fortnightly
Review_, N. S., vol. xii.; Czynski, _Notice bibliographique sur C.
Fourier_ (1841); Ferraz, _Le Socialisme, le naturalisme et le
positivisme_ (1877); Considerant, _Exposition abregee du systeme de
Fourier_ (1845); Transon, _Theorie societaire de Charles Fourier_
(1832); Stein, _Geschichte der sozialen Bewegung in Frankreich_
(1850); Marlo, _Untersuchungen uber die Organisation der Arbeit_
(1853); J.H. Noyes, _History of American Socialisms_ (1870); Bebel,
_Charles Fourier_ (1888); Varschauer, _Geschichte des Sozialismus und
Kommunismus im 19. Jahrhundert_ (1903); Sambuc, _Le Socialisme de
Fourier_ (1900); M. Hillquit, _History of Socialism in the United
States_ (1903); H. Bourgin, _Fourier, contribution a l'etude de
socialisme francais_ (1905). (R. Ad.)