Montaigne’s view is actually a third, a synthesis of the two views mentioned above. We might call Montaigne’s view of human nature a critical realist view. In this perspective, all humans, Europeans and others, have both savage and noble characteristics. Montaigne influenced the development of the noble savage theory, which was later adopted by other writers including Jean Jacques Rousseau. While Montaigne notes the many ways that tribal cultures were superior to the culture of Western Europe at the time of his writing, his idealization is a bit chastened. Montaigne neither sanctions cannibalism, nor the killing of prisoners of war. Yet, he notes that Europeans were also guilty of practicing cruelty and murder, so that the notion that European
