Joseph de Maistre

Joseph Marie, comte de Maistre (1 April 1753 – 26 February 1821), was a Savoyard lawyer, diplomat, and political philosopher. He is chiefly remembered as one of the intellectual forefathers of modern conservatism.

Born in the Kingdom of Sardinia, Maistre was noted for his advocacy of monarchism and social stratification in the period immediately following the French Revolution. French by language and culture, Maistre was nonetheless a subject of the King of Piedmont–Sardinia, whom he served in various government positions, including stints in the Savoy Senate (1787–1792), as ambassador to the Russian Empire (1803–1817), and as minister of state to the court in Turin (1817–1821).

A key figure of the Counter-Enlightenment and a precursor of Romanticism, Maistre regarded monarchy both as a divinely sanctioned institution and as the only stable form of government. Maistre argued that the rationalist rejection of Christianity was directly responsible for the Reign of Terror and the chaos that followed the Revolution of 1789 in France. He therefore called for the restoration of the House of Bourbon to the throne of France and for the ultimate authority of the Pope in both spiritual and temporal matters.