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The Philosophy of Leibniz and the Modern World (review)
- Journal of the History of Philosophy
- Johns Hopkins University Press
- Volume 12, Number 2, April 1974
- pp. 260-261
- 10.1353/hph.2008.0693
- Review
- Additional Information
260 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY correspondent, "Vous me ferez encore plaisir de vous servir de la voye d'ami quand il s'en trouvera et non de la poste, comme je suis ici d'une communaut6 religieuse, je ne puis pas faire tout ce que je voudrois" (p. 233). In the same letter he spoke wistfully of the satisfaction he would have to be able to go to London to meet "illustrious persons who compose your Royalle SocietC" The correspondence ends there abruptly. The question of the beast-machine, we read on page 94, seems to have agitated the Romance countries (France, Spain, Italy) more than the northern countries. True, the debate was centered in France beginning in the seventeenth century. The "countries of the north," at least England, Holland and Germany, were, however, by no means deficient in literature on the subject as compared to Spain and Italy. The distinction between the two areas seems an artificial one. Three or four Germans and five Hollanders that I can think of contributed to the subject. The Discours de la connoissance des bestes was published in Holland almost as many times as in France. Wallace Shugg and I have written articles on the impact of the controversy in England. One hopes that Italian and Spanish chapters will follow. "The empirical attitude of Newton encountered insufficient resonance in the mind of Pardies, who is fond of speculating, as was customary in his milieu" (translated from page 184). This is a conventional generalization that should be weighed against Newton's own words to the effect that his "experiment [is] not so much to prove the Doctrine as to illustrate it" (Philosophical Transactions, I, 147, abridged edition, London, 1748). The typographical errors that most call for correction are the date of Descartes' Meditationes as 1647 instead of 1641 (p. 58) and what I think is the omission of the negative on page 226 ("Pardies mentionne"). It would also be helpful to identify Henri Duroy as Regius at the first mention of him on page 89 and in the Index. J. B. Cohen on page 236 is I. B. Cohen. The book has an Index but no formal bibliography of works by and about Pardies. The reader has to compile such lists for himself from the detailed notes. Since Ziggelaar has used the fullest, most up-to-date collection of works on Pardies ever referred to, and has drawn up the most accurate description of works by him, one can only say that by including a formal bibliography in his dissertation he would have given the student of Pardies or the general reader an even handier tool. The author might have laid more stress on the number of eclectics who like Pardies combined Aristotelian, Cartesian, and later elements: This is an attractive publication with seventeen illustrations and numerous scientific diagrams. Curious that after three hundred years without a book on Pardies, two have just come out in time for the tercentenary, this one in 1971 and in 1972 my edition of his Discours de la connoissance des bestes. Dr. Ziggelaar's work will long stand as the definitive treatment of a figure worthy of recall. LEONORACOHENROSENFIELD University o/Maryland The Philosophy of Leibniz and the Modern WorM. Edited by Ivor Leclerc. (Nashville, Tenn.: Vanderbilt University Press, 1973. Pp. 297. $15.00) At a time when there is an increasing amount of attention being paid to Leibniz, this collection of essays provides a good overview of his philosophical interests and makes several interesting historical points about Leibniz's relationship to his contemporaries. 1 See "Peripatetic Adversaries of Cartesianism in 17th Century France," in Leonora Cohen Rosenfield, From Beast-Machine to Man-Machine (new and enlarged edition, New York: Octagon Books, 1968). BOOK REVIEWS 261 The reader who is looking for close analysis of distinctive Leibnizian doztrines, problems, or texts will, with the exceptions noted below, be disappointed; most of the essays in this book are too general and philosophically nonchalant. The book consists of an introductory chapter followed by thirteen chapters which are divided into three parts entitled respectively "Investigations," "Assessments," and "Historical Studies." In the brief introductory chapter Leroy Loemker provides a thorough summary of the...