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Part of the book: The Appearance of Character

Melissa Percival

MHRA Texts and Dissertations 47

W. S. Maney & Son Ltd for the Modern Humanities Research Association

EnlightenmentFrenchPhilosophyopen

Abstract.  Lavater's Fragments are multi-faceted, looking simultaneously in many different directions. Critics have tended to seize upon single aspects of the work without acknowledging the breadth and multiplicity of its standpoints. As a result, Lavater has been labelled ingenious and pernicious, liberal and reactionary, highbrow and lowbrow, cautious and dogmatic, a representative of the Sturm und Drang and of Neo-Classicism. In some measure, Lavater is all of these things and it is necessary to accept the plurality and diversity of his thinking rather than dwelling on its more obvious shortcomings.

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