Emilie du Châtelet's Metaphysics of Substance

I argue that Emilie du Châtelet's metaphysics of corporeal substance in the 1740s was a species of realism. This result challenges the ruling consensus, which takes her to have been decisively influenced by Leibniz, an idealist. In addition, I argue that du Châtelet's ontology of body is a mixture of realism and idealism, likewise non-Leibnizian. This, too, questions the scholarly consensus and opens the way for an overdue careful reassessment of her overall doctrine. I suggest that her view is best understood as dualism, a two-substance metaphysics that puts du Châtelet quite close to Christian Wolff.