I have lately been testing the durability of the idea of human “progress.” It is a subject that has interested me now for some time. We recently examined the idea of progress advocated by Fontenelle. We will now turn to another important French thinker who played a significant role in the idea of progress, a man whose name is unfortunately almost forgotten today. His name is Charles-Irénée Castel de Saint-Pierre, but this is usually shortened to Abbé de Saint-Pierre (1658-1743).
The first Western thinker to come up with a comprehensive theory of “progress” was Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle (1657-1757). His importance today rests on the fact that he was a promoter and popularizer of the ideas of Rene Descartes in the face of the sustained attacks that Cartesian ideas came under from established religious and academic circles. Descartes was one of the true visionaries of the Western tradition, and is rightly considered to be one of the fathers of modern philosophy and science.
Quintus Curtius 
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