百科全书与启蒙运动

Encyclopedia and the Enlightenment

本文通过研究百科全书从17世纪的早期目录学模式到18世纪繁盛期的发展历史、对启蒙运动时期百科全书的特征予以了检视。其主要考察的百科全书包括英国的钱伯斯《百科全书》、法国的狄德罗《百科全书》和德国的策德勒《综合大词典》。流行观点认为启蒙运动时期的百科全书展示了知识的相互关联和内在秩序。作者则指出,尽管钱伯斯和狄德罗提出要对知识进行体系整理,但这一要求并未得到充分实现。而与此相反,对于策德勒《综合大词典》的编写者而言,首要的问题不是知识的秩序,而是知识的汇集和规模。

This article examines the character of encyclopedia in the period of Enlightenment through a study of the history of encyclopedia from its early stage of bibliographical model in the 17 thcentury until its peak in the 18 thcentury.The main cases studieded includes Chamber’s Cyclopaedia,Diderot’s Encyclopédie,and Zedler’s Universal-Lexicon.This article challenges the popular opinion that the encyclopedias in the period of Enlightenment demonstrated the nexus and inner order of knowledge.The author states that the systematic processing of knowledge,despite of Chamber’s and Diderot’s claim to it,was not fully realized in their encyclopedias.In contrast,for the composers of Zedler’s Universal-Lexicon,the most important thing is not order of knowledge,but collection and extent of knowledge.