Inauguration: Enthusiasm for the Enlightenment

More than a few people around here have commented that Barack Obama’s Inaugural Address constituted the return of the Enlightenment. His assertions of constitutional values, universal aspirations, the re-establishment of science as the basis for policy, even his scriptural invocation of putting aside childish things, reminded some of Immanuel Kant’s very definition: “Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-incurred immaturity.” In other words, the childishness that we ought set aside was produced by those whom we let rule over us. It is not natural, but rather a stupor we let others induce upon us. (See, just thinking about the speech gets you writing complex clauses.) So the speech was marking the end of that rule and its accompanying immaturity.
Copying the President’s speech patterns is just another way expressing admiration. If Obama revived the Enlightenment, he did so by rallying a vast crowd, not the usual way of spreading rationalism. The thrill of hearing the inaugural speech was in being reminded why one had voted for him, that he is articulate beyond most speakers you hear in public, I worried that his earnestness will wear on people, that the public will in a short time want some happy news. He was wisely kept out of sight during the transition, so that his appearance revived the enthusiasm felt at the election, though this time without the immediate anxiety that it could all go wrong. Having been contested for the last two years, this time the revival of the Enlightenment was secured not only by debate and reflection, but by rhetoric, pageantry and the long-term stability of the government-- a touch of the baroque.