and existence is incompatible with that of consciousness and existence as a part of a universal, all-absorbing spirit. Further, the beauty and order of the universe were nought "were the variety of existence in innumerable separate souls reduced to a sabbath of quietude" in a single individual being. God is a separate individual, a distinct monad. Since he is the "place" of eternal truths, he must be conceived as possessing wisdom; since he is the source and end of all acts aiming at the better life, or perfection, he possesses goodness; since perfection includes satisfaction in the welfare or happiness of others, he is love. Since he is the sufficient reason of the existence of all things, he is power. His chief attribute is necessarily wisdom; by this, all acts of his will are determined, as the strivings of the monad are determined by its ideas. Hence the world of nature is the best possible natural world, and the world of spirit (of "grace") is the happiest possible; and the two are in the highest possible harmony. God is the author of evil (as well as of the good) because he is the author of that which is, by its very nature, finite, imperfect (it is not finite because of a will to make it such). There can, in other words, be only one perfect or infinite being. Things are good or evil, not in themselves, but in their relation to the general nature and end of existence. From this point of view, the world of finite beings must be deemed the best possible world of finite things. That all sorts of good may—in accordance with the law of continuity-be realized, there is, necessarily, inequality. This is, abstractly and metaphysically speaking, a necessary evil. From this necessary, metaphysical evil flow two others, physical evil, or pain, and moral evil, or sin; inequality is necessarily felt, and there are necessarily imperfect degrees of rationality in action. But evil of whatever nature has a negative rather than a positive existence.' God does not will it; he merely suffers it. God's choice of the present world among all conceivable worlds, was governed by moral necessity; he created the world accor ding to a "divine mathematics." The world, therefore, is the harmony of the principles of freedom, or "grace," and of necessity, or nature; teleological and mechanical laws are everywhere in perfect accord. And since moral necessity is the necessity of the idea of the good, or happiness, or complete perfection of personality, the reality of happiness or personal perfection is a thing of mathematical certainty. The contemplation of the world in its perfection must result in tranquillity of mind, and yield the deepest satisfaction. Man's capacity to apprehend this perfection, a capacity which he possesses by virtue of the possession of reason and the knowledge of the eternal verities, renders him a denizen of the City of God, — of which God is sole ruler, as he is the architect of the realm of nature. In that society there is no crime without punishment, no good deed without proportionate recompense, and as complete virtue and enjoyment as are possible. Result. The theory of Leibnitz is a rationalistic idealism (the opposite of Berkeley's empirical idealism). Its cardinal features and those, naturally, which have had the most important influence upon succeeding thinkers are its conciliatory aim, its monadism, or dynamic atomism, its assertion of the spontaneity of thought (as against the sensationalistic doctrine of the mere passivity or receptivity of thought), the doctrine of pre-established harmony, its determinism and eudæmonism, its optimism, or attempted reconciliation of mechanical and teleological views of na ture. The course of philosophical thought since Leibnitz, has demonstrated that his rationalism was somewhat too subjective and formal, and required to be supplemented by its opposite empiricism, as was in fact done in the system of Kant. § 73. Walther Ehrenfried, Count von Tschirnhausen1 (16511708). — Von Tschirnhausen was a native of Upper Lusatia. 1 See Zeller's "Geschichte der deutschen Philosophie." He resided for a long time in Holland and France (Paris). He took courses in mathematics and physics in the University of Leyden, and afterwards travelled very extensively, and made the acquaintance of distinguished scholars and artists. Among his friends were Spinoza, the mathematician Huyghens, and Leibnitz. He was elected member of the French Academy. His death is said to have deeply grieved Leibnitz. Works. Works of Tschirnhausen are, "Medicina Mentis sive Artis inveniendi Præcepta generalia" (1689), his chief work, and dissertations in the Leipsic "Acta Eruditorum" and in the "Mémoires" of the Paris Academy. Philosophy.-Tschirnhausen emphasizes four "fundamental facts" of consciousness,—(1) the consciousness of ourselves (as shown by Descartes), through which we get the idea of mind; (2) the consciousness of agreeable and painful feelings, whence we derive the idea of good and evil; (3) the consciousness of our comprehending some things and not others, whence we derive the notion of the understanding, and of the true and the false; (4) the consciousness of passivity in ourselves and of our having impressions, upon which the knowledge of external existences is based. All knowledge begins with these inwardly experienced facts: all knowledge is based on experience. To constitute real knowledge experience has to undergo a reduction to the third sort of consciousness above mentioned, i. e., to terms of the understanding, or to conceptions (rationalia); which must be discriminated from perceptions (sensibilia) and from imaginations (imaginabilia). From the simplest conceptions expressed in genetic definitions or definitions explaining the origin of the thing defined (for, as Spinoza showed, all things must flow from a single primal nature)—must be deduced, by analysis, axioms; by synthesis, theorems, etc. That is to say, knowledge is a product of experience transformed by the application of "mathematical" method, or mathematics verified by expe rience. The method of knowledge is the same for all branches of knowledge. According to subject-matter, knowledge is knowledge either of sensibilia (and imaginabilia), rationalia, or realia. The ultimate elements of sensibilia are the solid and the fluid, of rationalia the point and the line, of realia, extension and motion. The science of realia is physics, which, naturally, is the highest of the sciences; the science of rationalia is mathematics; of the passions produced in us by sensibilia and imaginabilia and of the will as being subject to or free from these passions, is ethics. The knowledge of realia delivers us from the bondage of sensibilia and imaginabilia: physics is the basis of ethics. The science of science in general, the philosophy of method (the only branch of philosophy treated in extenso by Tschirnhausen) is philosophia prima (expounded in " Medicina mentis”).— Tschirnhausen is a forerunner, as regards theory of philosophic method, of Wolff. § 74 Samuel Puffendorf1 (1632–1694). — Puffendorf, born in Saxony, began the study of theology at Leipsic, but abandoned it for that of law, which he studied chiefly at Jena. In 1661 he accepted the chair of the Law of Nature and Nations at Heidelberg, a chair created for him. He was afterwards, at different times, professor in the University of Lund (Sweden), historiographer-royal of Sweden, historiographer and privy-councillor of Frederick III. of Brandenburg. A recent writer speaks of him as one to whom "scant justice has been done," and as at once, "philosopher, lawyer, economist, historian, and even statesman." Works. Works of Puffendorf are, "Elementa Jurisprudentiæ Universalis Libri duo" (circa 1660), "De Statu Imperii Germanici" (1667), " De Jure Naturæ Gentium" (1692), and "De Officio Hominis et Civis" (1695). Philosophy. Puffendorf bases right on the divine law or 1 Hallam's "Literature of Europe," Part IV. pp. 165-171; see also Zeller and Erdmann. will, but maintains, nevertheless, that it may be discovered by reason, and that moral science is as certain as mathematical. "Common consent" and "self-interest" are insufficient as bases for a doctrine of right. Society takes its rise from the "nature of man, his wants, his powers of doing mischief to others," and hence it may be said that the source of law is self-preservation. On the other hand, it is a duty to live for the common good. In fact, besides duties to ourselves there are duties to others and duties to God. Among the minor principles laid down by Puffendorf are, that free consent and knowledge of the whole subject are required for the validity of a promise, that there can be no obligation without a corresponding right, that veracity is not always obligatory, that property is grounded in an express or tacit contract of mankind, made while all was yet in common, that each should possess a separate portion, that the right of the husband to rule the wife is grounded in a tacit or express promise of obedience, that the power of a master over his servant is not by nature nor by the law of war, but originally by a contract founded on necessity. The ruler of the State derives his authority, not from a divine source, but from the State-compact. Resistance to authority is justifiable only in certain very special instances. Tolerance should be shown in religion except as regards non-belief in God and providence. - Puffendorf is a follower though also a critic - of Hobbes and Grotius. He is a forerunner of Wolff in the theory of law. § 75. Christian Thomasius1 (1655–1728). — Thomasius was an anti-theological, anti-Scholastic, and in general anticonservative, professor of law who is sometimes styled the father of the German Illumination (to be spoken of hereafter). He received from his father and in Leipsic University a thorough training in philosophy and its history, and 1 See Erdmann's "Grundriss der Geschichte der Philosophie;" also Zeller's "Geschichte der deutschen Philosophie." |