Page - 328 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe

Chapter 7328 commissioner of Hungarian Protestants in Vienna—he was more inclined to compromise with the policies urged at court in social and national as well as confessional issues than most others. On the contrary: assigning an unassail- able social preeminence to the nobility on account of its historical roles, what he sought was a new justification for these roles, to be found in superior learn- ing, while he still regarded the gulf that separated the nobility from the peas- antry as unbridgeable. Bessenyei supported this by referring to Werbőczy and his own A’ törvénynek útja (Of the course of the law [1777]). As a matter of fact, as the whole of this treatise addressed the relationship of the nation and the ruler in law-making, its topic and argument closely followed Werbőczy, whose work Bessenyei was obviously thoroughly familiar with. His claim that the people raised “captains” and masters above themselves through the voluntary consent of all echoes the relevant passages of the Tripartitum as well as Kézai’s Gesta—although with- out explicit reference to the Huns and the presumed continuity with the Hun- garians, in its political terminology recalling the staples of Scythianism.50 The same applies to the justification of differences between the “people” and the “common folk”: more generally, in terms of voluntary subordination of the cowardly to the brave warriors, and specifically by reference to forfeiture of right as a result of rebellion (almost a word-by-word quotation of Werbőczy’s argument from the consequences of the 1514 peasant war).51 In a later work, Magyarországnak törvényes állása (On the legal status of Hungary [1802]), Bessenyei leaves no doubt that his strong commitment to im- portant Enlightenment values and goals was fully compatible not only with this kind of social conservatism but also with cherishing the medieval legacy of the Hun–Hungarian discourse of origin: The people of Áttila is marked by triumph, valor, thirst for glory, and pru- dence required for domination, despite its paganness, ignorance, and ferocious nature. The only thing Attila wanted was conversion to Christi- anity, together with his foremost men, like Saint Stephen. Had he formed a kingdom and settled in his country in a Christian manner, no court would have been superior to his in the prudent wisdom of government, in splendor, wealth, triumph, and glory.52 50 György Bessenyei, A’ törvénynek útja, in Bessenyei, Társadalombölcseleti írások, 167–90, here 175. 51 Bessenyei, A’ törvénynek útja, 177. 52 György Bessenyei, Magyarországnak törvényes állása, in Bessenyei, Összes művei: Prózai munkák, 1802–1804, ed. György Kókay (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1986), 209–54, here 233.