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BOOK REVIEWS The Sacred Monster of Thomism: An Introduction to the Life and Legacy of Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, 0.P. By RICHARD PEDDICORD, 0.P. South Bend, Ind.: St. Augustine's Press, 2005. Pp. 250. $25.00 (cloth). ISBN 158731 -752-4. The purpose of this book is to make known several aspects of Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange's teaching for the good of philosophy, theology, and spirituality at the beginning of the third millenium. This study is laid out in nine chapters. The first chapter is a brief introduction (1-4) and the last chapter is an expanded conclusion (211-32). The bulk of the book is divided into two parts: from chapter 2 to chapter 5, the author presents Garrigou-Lagrange in his Dominican and intellectual contexts; from chapter 6 to chapter 8, he presents the philosophical, theological, and spiritual choices of Garrigou-Lagrange. This division of the topics is clear, but not entirely suitable, as we will show further. The presentation of Garrigou-Lagrange's life (chapters 2 and 3) is well done. The author. has well noted the restoration of the Dominican charism following the impulse of Lacordaire, and the amazing renewal of Thomism following Leo XIII's encyclical Aeterni Patris. For readers not familiar with this religious and intellectual world, this presentation is clear and accurate. Concerning GarrigouLagrange 's great intellectual relationships (chapters 4 and 5), the author focuses on Blonde! and Bergson in the field of philosophy, and on Maritain and Chenu with respect to politics and history. Against the philosophers-well situated in the context of the crisis of Modernism (66-73)-Garrigou-Lagrange was principally the advocate of the definition of speculative truth (adequatio rei et intellectu). Blonde! proposed a new approach (adequatio realis mentis et vitae) (74-78) that Garrigou-Lagrange interpreted as knowledge by connaturality, and consequently subordinate to speculative truth. This subordination was, for him, the only way to avoid the separation, in the field of the revealed truths, between the {ides qua and the {ides quae, which would leave onlyinternal adhesion (trust by confidence) without the intellectual objectivity of knowledge (172-73). The author's presentation here is very well done, and the nonspecialist will find this a helpful guide to understanding this aspect of modernity. The conflicts with Maritain and Chenu pertained to the question of history. The author carefully recalls the contexts of the Action franqaise (Charles 621 622 BOOK REVIEWS Maurras), of the civil war in Spain, and of the German occupation of France during the Second World War (88-100). The cause of the clash betwwen Garrigou-Lagrange and Maritain was not philosophical or directly theological, but concerned rather the appreciation of political contingences with a certain sense of history. One wishes that the author would have supported his presentation by appeal to the edited correspondence between ]. Maritain and Ch. Journet. Some letters show very well the form of Garrigou-Lagrange's mind, unable to accept a certain sense of history. The same thing appears clearly in the presentation of the relationship between Chenu and Garrigou-Lagrange (100112 ). Concerning the history of Christian doctrines, the opposition of both was without resolution. With chapter 6, we enter the second part of the book, focused on GarrigouLagrange 's choices in philosophy, theology, and spirituality. Forthe presentation of Garrigou-Lagrange's Thomism, the author recalls his two main mentors: Fr. Ambroise Gardeil (115-18), who gave his student the strongest metaphysical convictions; and Fr. Benoit Schwalm (118-19), from whom he learned to regard Blondel's philosophy of knowledge as one of the most dangerous propositions against Scholastic teaching. The author thinks that Thomism is, first, a metaphysic correctly connectedby its realism-to the fact of public revelation. The metaphysical basics are shown (124-35) after a short mention of the theory of knowledge. The author is right when he presents the "structure" of this metaphysic that is based on the principle of contradiction (sometimes called noncontradiction) immediately perceived by common sense. It would have been good to have a more consistent development on this topic. It was the purpose of Garrigou-Lagrange's first book Le sens commun: La philosophie de l'etre et les formules...

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