Maine De Biran Critique de Locke (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 413 Newton's fascination with Robert Boyle's E~er/.~/s Touching Colours and with Walter Charleton's presentation of Gassendist atomism. Much more interesting and surprising is the well documented claim made here that Newton's fascination with optics emerged initially out of his interest in Thomas Hobbes' physiological analysis of vision to which the authors dedicate a full chapter of their commentary. And it is interesting to note that Newton had initiated work on "Newton's rings" before becoming acquainted with Hooke's Micrographia. Finally, though there are a few indications here of what would become Newton's intense and often unorthodox religious positions, there is no hint at all of any alchemical or Hermetic interests. In a small number of places I was disturbed by the authors' tendency to use speculation based on rational reconstructions to fill in what they view to be lacunae in Newton's comments on topics of interest. Thus, where Newton is dealing with how to judge the swiftness or slowness of motions they write: "Unfortunately he does not give an answer, but it can be conjectured..." (89); and where Newton writes of beams of white light giving a "fiercer knock" to the eye without making explicit whether this "fiercer knock" is produced by a greater flux of particles or by par.ticles which individually strike with more force, the authors argue that he must have had in mind the latter because it is more consistent with other comments in the notes (228- ~9). Overall, however, I found the commentary immensely useful and done with great care and subtlety. At all levels, except for that of pricing, the authors and Cambridge University Press have done an admirable job of presenting and interpreting a fascinating and important document, and they have managed to incorporate and often correct the most up to date Newtonian scholarship. RICHARD G. OLSON Harvey Mudd College Lucien Even. Maine De Biran Cr/t/que de Locke. Biblioth~que Philosophique de Louvain , ~9. Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgique: Editions de L'Institut Suparieur de Philosophic , 1983. Pp. vi + xl 5. 640 Francs beiges. Relevant d'un empirisme trop uniquement passif, le sensualisme de Condillac, point de d6part de Biran, le degoit et le fair remonter ~ son inspirateur, Locke, dont il entreprend d'6lucider les ambigu'it6s. De l'Essai lockien proviennent h la fois la simplification de Condillac et l'approfondissement, par Biran, de la "r6flexion" saisie en son acte comme activit~ du sujet pensant. Locke, que Condillac accuse d'en revenir rinn6isme, manque en effet rexpfience originaire de la r6flexion en se fixant sur ses produits, les id6es, et en r6ifiant les facultes sur le module des r6alit6s externes. I1 s'agit au contraire de ne pas quitter le terrain de l'exp6rience v6cue: comme le pressentait Destutt de Tracy, l'activit6 motrice r6v6le le raoi~lui-m6me. Locke efit 6t6 capable de reconnaltre une part d'activit6 subjective jusque dans les sensations, s'il avait admis par contraste rexistence d'impressions purement affectives, n'appartenant pas a un raoi percevant et r6fl6chissant. De m~me, quand il montre, par son 414 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 24:3 JULY x986 inconscient diff~rentiel, la complexit~ qui se cache confus~ment sous la simplicite apparente, Leibniz ale tort de nier la sp&ificit~ des impressions affectives et il ne compose les sensations que d'une faqon ext*rieure et mat~rielle, au lleu de centrer cette composition sur l'unite active du moi. L'exl~rience de reffort moteur, "mode fondemental de mon sentiment d'existence" (59) r~v~le en moi, selon les termes dc Biran, une "force hypersen.dbleet hyperorgan~lt~" (6o) qui, &rit M. Even, "me constitue moi dans le sentiment de mon existence originaire" (/2~d.)et fonde le connaissance sur le vouloir. Locke avait su, contre le rationalisme d'un Malebranche, distinguer et opposer volont~ et d~sir, mais sans identifier volont* et libertY, celle-ci restant d~finie d'un point de vue ext&ieur et non comme pouvoir interne du moi. Ainsi Biran trouve sa vole, celle de l'exp~rience int~rieure, ~ travers rexamen des apports classiques et principalement une critique de l'empirisme h...