ABSTRACT
In order to show that the border between artifice and nature becomes increasingly blurred once we start thinking of human beings as forming themselves by affectively responding to their social environment, Part II will relate Rousseau’s account of moral education to Herder’s account of self-formation. According to Herder, we must actualise our moral capacities by multiplying our sentiments in our engagement with historically shaped representations of human life. By stressing this use of man-made artefacts, Herder renders explicit a point already implicitly contained in Rousseau. That is, that human nature is incomplete and naturally shapes itself by affectively engaging with the artifices around which our existence as humans revolves.
