Nicolas Malebranche, and: The Philosophy of Malebranche (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 261 committed to the application of the new science to law and morals to produce a rational, structured system, he tempered this so that "the incorporation of circumstance into his philosophy meant in each case the expansion of his system by that dimension until what seemed arbitrary from an external view took on the character of a logical development internally " (p. 35). The natural tendency of most contemporary scholars is to react against such an intellectual history--to find in it the elements of a sort of treason. The result of this iudgment is that we have rarely viewed the compromiser as much more than one who has sold an intellectual birthright for a mess of pottage--position, security, status. Krieger argues persuasively that the resultant theory of Pufendorf was so malleable that it served every political tendency and ended up standing for none itself, lie shows that Pufendorf's theory was used to buttress absolutism, which he himself would have found a congenial continuation of his thought. Beyond this, however, it was used to develop and defend theories of mixed gowrnment which he would have abhorred. By the middle of the eighteenth century, Pufendorf's position had moved from that of a primary influence to a source to be cited--his absolutism no longer accepted, he still provided felicitous quotations for the Age of Enlightenment. The "recipe for compromise" that Professor Krieger concocts out of Pufendorf's political philosophy begins with the notion that, throughout, the intention is not to reform society, but to rationalize it. While the task shows inner consistency in bringing theoretical principles and particular institutions together into a tightly knit fabric, there was a flexibility that itself was logical and integral to the process. By using twin concepts--the individual and society, interests and duties, liberty and equality--there remained the possibility of referring to "one or the other term in each set as the rationalization requires" (p. 267). Exploring the possibilities inherent in this scheme, Krieger leaves an unanswered query. As conscious of his activities as Pufendorf was, why did he not formulate a theory of compromise himself? Or was it, as he wrote to Thomasius in 1688, that he "had not sufficient courage to publish"? Krieger mentions in his Introduction that the purpose of this book is not to rehabilitate Samuel Pufendorf, but his careful analysis of Pufendorf's thought will do much to that end. At the very least, Krieger has produced the major study of Pufendorf in English. ~0RBERT C. BROCKMAN,S.M. University o] Dayton Nicolas Malebranche. By Genevieve Rodis-Lewis. (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1963. Pp. 357. = Les Grands Penseurs. F. 24.) The Philosophy ofMalebranche. A Study of His Integration of Faith, Reason, and Experimental Observation. By Beatrice K. Rome. (Chicago : Henry Regnery Co., 1963. Pp. x -{-438. $12.50.) In 1678, Malebranche wrote that "les livres qui combattent les pr4jug~s, menant ~ la vdrit~ par des routes nouvelles, demandent encore bien plus de temps que les autres, pour faire le fruit que leurs auteurs en attendent." Making use of the critical edition of the Oeuvres completes de Malebranehe, these two studies travel M.'s "route nouvelle," and bring back fruits long since planted by an expectant Father Malebranche. Both argue for a new interpretation by focussing on Malebranche's ontology. They find it providing a philosophical foundation for faith, intuitive reason, and experimental observation. They argue not only that M.'s "route" was new, but that it also provides systematic relationships between its several fruits. From M.'s contemporaries to the present day, interpreters have agreed on at least one point : that even if M. did develop an ontology, it could account for both faith and reason only by falling into either mysticism or irrationality or both. Mouy studied M. as a precursor of modern physics, in regard to the composite status of finite existents. But he made no claim that one ontology integrated faith with physics. Church could find no philosophical merit in M.'s occasionalism; he claimed that occasionalism was constructed to serve religious purposes. This attack was based on a presumably unavoidable dichotomy between God and creation, Being and beings. Gueroult sees...