Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding Part 6

If we follow the discussion as it centres about the terms "nominal"

and "real," it stands as follows: Leibniz objects to the use of the term "essence" in this connection, but is willing to accept that of "definition;" for, as he says, a substance can have but one essence, while there may be several definitions, which, however, all express the same essence. The essence is the _possibility_ of that which is under consideration; the definition is the statement of that which is supposed to be possible. The "nominal" definition, however, while it implies this possibility, does not expressly affirm it,--that is to say, it may always be doubted whether the nominal definition has any possibility (or reality) corresponding to it until experience comes to our aid and makes us know it _a posteriori_. A "real" definition, on the other hand, makes us know _a priori_ the reality of the thing defined by showing us the mode of its production, "by exhibiting its cause or generation." Even our knowledge of facts of experience cannot be said, therefore, to be arbitrary, for we do not combine ideas just as we please, but "our combinations may be justified by reason which shows them to be possible, or by experience which shows them to be actual, and consequently also possible." To take Locke's example about gold, "the essence of gold is that which const.i.tutes it and gives it its sensible qualities, and these qualities, so far as they enable us to recognize it, const.i.tute its nominal essence, while a real and causal definition would enable us to explain the contexture or internal disposition. The nominal definition, however, is also real in one sense,--not in itself, indeed, since it does not enable us to know _a priori_ the possibility or production of the body, but empirically real."

It is evident from these quotations that what Leibniz understands by "possibility" is the condition or cause of a given fact; and that, while Locke distinguishes between particular, accidental and demonstrative, general knowledge as two opposed kinds, concerned with two distinct and mutually exclusive spheres, with Leibniz they are distinctions in the aspect of the same sphere of fact. In reality there is no combination of qualities accidental, as Locke thought that by far the greater part were; in every empirical fact there is a cause or condition involved that is invariable, and that const.i.tutes the reason of the fact. The "accidental" is only in the relation of our ideas to objects, not in the objects themselves. There may be accidental mental a.s.sociations; there are no accidental relations. In empirical, or _a posteriori_, knowledge, so-called, the reason is there, but is not known. _A priori_ knowledge, the real definition, discovers and explicitly states this reason. Contingent knowledge is therefore potentially rational; demonstrative knowledge is the actual development of the reasons implicitly contained in experience.

We may with advantage connect this discussion with the fundamental doctrine of Locke and Leibniz regarding intelligence and reality. To Locke, as we have seen, knowledge is essentially a matter of relations or connections; but relations are "superinduced" and "extraneous" as regards the facts. Every act of knowledge const.i.tutes, therefore, in some way a departure from the reality to be known. Knowledge and fact are, by their very definition, opposed to one another. But in Leibniz's view intelligence, or reason, enters into the const.i.tution of reality; indeed, it is reality. The relations which are the "creatures of the understanding" are, therefore, not foreign to the material to be known, but are organic to it, forming its content. The process, then, in which the mind perceives the connections or relations of ideas or objects, is simply the process by which the mind comes to the consciousness of the real nature of these objects, not a process of "superinducing"

unreal ideas upon them. The difficulty of Locke is the difficulty of every theory of knowledge that does not admit an organic unity of the knowing mind and the known universe. The theory is obliged to admit that all knowledge is in the form of relations which have their source in intelligence. But being tied to the view that reality is distinct from intelligence, it is obliged to draw the conclusion that these relations are not to be found in actual existence, and hence that all knowledge, whatever else it may be, is unreal in the sense that it does not and cannot conform to actual fact. But, in the theory of Leibniz, the process of relating which is the essence of knowledge is only the realization on the part of the individual mind of the relations or reasons that eternally const.i.tute reality. Since reality is, and is what it is, through intelligence, whatever relations intelligence rightly perceives are not "extraneous" to reality, but are its "essence." As Leibniz says, "Truth consists in the relations between the objects of our ideas. This does not depend upon language, but is common to us with G.o.d, so that when G.o.d manifests a truth to us, _we acquire what is already in his understanding_. For although there is an infinite difference between his ideas and ours as to their perfection and extent, yet it is always true that as to the same relation they are identical. And it is in this relation that truth exists." To this may be added another statement, which throws still further light on this point: "Ideas are eternally in G.o.d, and are in us before we perceive them."

We have now to consider somewhat more in detail the means by which the transformation of empirical into rational knowledge is carried on. Leibniz points out that the difficulty concerning scientific knowledge of sensible facts is not lack of data, but, in a certain sense, superfluity of data. It is not that we perceive no connections among objects, but that we perceive many which we cannot reduce to one another. "Our experiences," says Leibniz, "are simple only in appearance, for they are always accompanied by circ.u.mstances connected with them, although these relations are not understood by us. These circ.u.mstances furnish material capable of explanation and a.n.a.lysis. There is thus a sort of _pleonasm_ in our perceptions of sensible objects and qualities, since we have more than one idea of the same object. Gold can be nominally defined in many ways. Such definitions are only _provisional_." This is to say, empirical knowledge will become rational when it is possible to view any subject-matter as a unity, instead of a multiplicity of varied aspects. And on this same subject he says, in another connection: "A great number of experiences can furnish us data more than sufficient for scientific knowledge, provided only we have the art of using these data." The aim of science is therefore, to discover the dynamic unity which makes a whole of what appears to be a mere ma.s.s of accidentally connected circ.u.mstances. This unity of relations is the individual.

It is thus evident that to Leibniz the individual is not the beginning of knowledge, but its goal. The individual is the organic, the dynamic unity of the variety of phases or notions presented us in sense-experience. Individuality is not "simplicity" in the sense of Locke; that is, separation from all relations. It is complete connection of all relations. "It is impossible for us to have [complete] knowledge of individuals, and to find the means of determining exactly the individuality of anything; for in individuality all circ.u.mstances are combined. Individuality envelops the infinite. Only so far as we know the infinite do we know the individual, on account of the influence (if this word be correctly understood) that all things in the universe exercise upon one another." Leibniz, in short, remains true to his conception of the monad as the ultimate reality; for the monad, though an individual, yet has the universe as its content. We shall be able, therefore, to render our sensible experiences rational just in the degree in which we can discover the underlying relations and dependencies which make them members of one individual.

For the process of transformation Leibniz relies especially upon two methods,--those of mathematics and of cla.s.sification. Of the former he here says but little; but the entire progress of physical science since the time of Leibniz has been the justification of that little. In the pa.s.sage already quoted regarding the need of method for using our sensible data, he goes on to say that the "infinitesimal a.n.a.lysis has given us the means of allying physics and geometry, and that dynamics has furnished us with the key to the general laws of nature." It is certainly competent testimony to the truth of Leibniz's fundamental principles that he foresaw also the course which the development of biological science would take. No cla.s.sification based upon resemblances, says Leibniz in effect, can be regarded as wholly arbitrary, since resemblances are found in nature also. The only question is whether our cla.s.sification is based upon superficial or fundamental ident.i.ties; the superficial resemblances being such as are external, or the effects of some common cause, while the fundamental resemblances are such as are the cause of whatever other similarities are found. "It can be said that whatever we compare or distinguish with truth, nature differentiates, or makes agree, also; but that nature has differences and ident.i.ties which are better than ours, which we do not know... . _The more we discover the generation of species_, and the more we follow in our cla.s.sifications the conditions that are required for their production, the nearer we approach the natural order." Our cla.s.sifications, then, so far as they depend upon what is conditioned, are imperfect and provisional, although they cannot be said to be false (since "while nature may give us those more complete and convenient, it will not give the lie to those we have already"); while so far as they rest upon what is causal and conditioning, they are true, general, and necessary. In thus insisting that cla.s.sification should be genetic, Leibniz antic.i.p.ated the great service which the theory of evolution has done for biological science in enabling science to form cla.s.ses which are "natural;" that is, based on ident.i.ty of origin.

Leibniz culminates his discussion of cla.s.sification as a method of translating the empirical into the rational, by pointing out that it rests upon the law of continuity; and that this law contains two factors,--one equivalent to the axiom of the Realists, that nature is nowhere empty; the other, to that of the Nominalists, that nature does nothing uselessly. "One of these principles seems to make nature a prodigal, the other a miser; and yet both are true if properly understood," says Leibniz. "Nature is like a good manager, sparing where it is necessary, in order to be magnificent. It is magnificent in its effects, and economical in the causes used to produce them." In other words, cla.s.sification becomes science when it presents us with both unity and difference. The principle of unity is that of nature as a miser and economical; that of differentiation is the principle of nature as prodigal and magnificent. The thoroughly differentiated unity is nature as self-specifying, or as an organic, not an abstract, unity.

The gist of the whole matter is, then, that experience presents us with an infinity of ideas, which may appear at first sight arbitrary and accidental in their connections. This appearance, however, is not the fact. These ideas are the effects of certain causes; and in ascertaining these conditions, we reduce the apparently unrelated variety of experiences to underlying unities, and these unities, like all real unities or simple beings, are spiritual and rational in nature. Leibniz's ordinary way of stating this is that the principle of truths of fact is that of _sufficient reason_. This principle Leibniz always treats as distinguished from that of ident.i.ty (and contradiction) as the ruling category of truths of reason. And we shall follow him in discussing the two together.

"Our reasonings are based on two leading principles,--that of contradiction, in virtue of which we judge false all which contains contradiction, and true that which is opposed or contradictory to that which is false; and that of sufficient reason, in virtue of which we judge that no fact is true or actual, no proposition veritable, unless there is a sufficient reason why it is as it is, and not otherwise, although these reasons are generally unknown to us. Thus there are two sorts of truths,--those of reason, and those of fact. The truths of reason are necessary, and their opposites impossible; while those of fact are contingent, and their opposites possible. When a truth is necessary, its reason can be discovered by a.n.a.lysis, resolving it into ideas and truths that are simpler, until the primitive truths are arrived at. It is thus that the mathematicians proceed in reducing by a.n.a.lysis the theorems of speculation and the canons of practice into definitions, axioms, and postulates. Thus they come to simple ideas whose definition cannot be given; primitive truths that cannot be proved, and which do not need it, since they are identical propositions, whose opposite contains a manifest contradiction."

"But in contingent truths--those of fact--the sufficient reason must be found; namely, in the succession of things which fill the created universe,--for otherwise the a.n.a.lysis into particular reasons would go into detail without limit, by reason of the immense variety of natural things, and of the infinite divisibility of bodies. There are an infinity of figures and of past and present movements which enter into the efficient cause of my present writing, and there are an infinity of minute inclinations and dispositions of my soul which enter into its final cause. And since all this detail contains only other contingent and particular antecedents, each of which has need of a similar a.n.a.lysis to account for it, we really make no progress by this a.n.a.lysis; and it is necessary that the final or sufficient reason be outside the endless succession or series of contingent particulars, that it consist in a necessary being, in which this series of changes is contained only _eminenter_, as in its source. This necessary being and source is what we call G.o.d."

In other words, the tracing of empirical facts to their causes and conditions does not, after all, render them wholly rational. The series of causes is endless. Every condition is in turn conditioned. We are not so much solving the problem of the reason of a given fact, as we are stating the problem in other terms as we go on in this series. Every solution offers itself again as a problem, and this endlessly. If these truths of fact, then, are to be rendered wholly rational, it must be in something which lies outside of the series considered as a series; that is, something which is not an antecedent of any one of the series, but is equally related to each and to all as their ground and source. This, considered as an argument for the existence of G.o.d, we shall deal with hereafter; now we are concerned only with its bearing upon the relation of experience to the universality and necessity of knowledge. According to this, the ultimate meaning of facts is found in their relation to the divine intelligence; for Leibniz is emphatic in insisting that the relation of G.o.d to experience is not one of bare will to creatures produced by this will (as Descartes had supposed), but of a will governed wholly by Intelligence. As Leibniz states it in another connection, not only matters of fact, but mathematical truths, have the same final basis in the divine understanding.

"Such truths, strictly speaking, are only conditional, and say that in case their subject existed they would be found such and such. But if it is again asked in what consists this conditional connection in which there is necessary reality, the reply is that it is in the relation of ideas. And by the further question, Where would be the ideas if no spirit existed; and what would then become of the foundation of the certainty of such truths?--we are brought to the final foundation of truths; namely, that supreme and universal spirit, which must exist, and whose understanding is, in reality, the region of the eternal truths. And in order that it may not be thought that it is not necessary to have recourse to this region, we must consider that these necessary truths contain the determining reason and regulative principle of existence, and, in a word, of the laws of the universe. Thus these necessary truths, being anterior to the existences of contingent beings, must in turn be based upon the existence of a necessary substance."

It is because facts are not _mere_ facts, in short, but are the manifestation of a "determining reason and regulative principle" which finds its home in universal intelligence, that knowledge of them can become necessary and general.

The general nature of truths of reason and of their ruling principle, ident.i.ty and contradiction, has already been given in the quotation regarding the principle of sufficient reason. It is Leibniz's contention that only in truths whose opposite is seen to involve self-contradiction can we have absolute certainty, and that it is through connection with such eternal truths that the certainty of our other knowledge rests. It is thus evident why Leibniz insists, as against Locke, upon the great importance of axioms and maxims. They are important, not merely in themselves, but as the sole and indispensable bases of scientific truth regarding all matters. Leibniz at times, it is true, speaks as if demonstrative and contingent truths were of themselves, in principle, distinct, and even opposed. But he also corrects himself by showing that contingency is rather a subjective limitation than an objective quality. We, indeed, do not see that the truth "I exist," for example, is necessary, because we cannot see how its opposite involves contradiction. But "G.o.d sees how the two terms 'I' and 'exist' are connected; that is, _why_ I exist." So far as we can see facts, then, from the standpoint of the divine intelligence, so far, it would appear, our knowledge is necessary.

Since these axioms, maxims, or first truths are "innate," we are in a condition to complete (for the first time) the discussion of innate ideas. These ideas const.i.tute, as we have learned, the essential content of the divine intelligence, and of ours so far as we have realized our ident.i.ty with G.o.d's understanding. The highest form of knowledge, therefore, is self-consciousness. This bears the same relation to necessary truths that the latter bear to experience. "Knowledge of necessary and eternal truths," says Leibniz, "distinguishes us from simple animals, and makes us have reason and science, _elevating us to the knowledge of ourselves_. We are thus developed to self-consciousness; and in being conscious of ourselves we are conscious of being, of substance, of the simple, of the spiritual, of G.o.d." And again he says that "those that know necessary truths are rational spirits, capable of self-consciousness, of recognizing what is termed Ego, substance, and monad. _Thus_ they are rendered capable of demonstrative knowledge." "We are innate to ourselves; and since we are beings, being is innate to us, for knowledge of it is implicit in that which we have of ourselves."

Knowledge, in fine, may be regarded as an ascending series of four terms. The first is const.i.tuted by sensations a.s.sociated together in such a way that a relation of antecedence and consequence exists between them. This is "experience." The second stage comes into existence when we connect these experiences, not by mere relations of "consecution," but by their conditions, by the principle of causality, and especially by that of sufficient reason, which connects them with the supreme intelligence, G.o.d. This stage is science. The third is knowledge of the axioms and necessary truths in and of themselves, not merely as involved in science. The fourth is self-consciousness, the knowledge of intelligence, in its intimate and universal nature, by which we know G.o.d, the mind, and all real substance. In the order of time the stage of experience is first, and that of self-consciousness last. But in the lowest stage there are involved the others. The progress of knowledge consists in the development or unfolding of this implicit content, till intelligence, spirit, activity, is clearly revealed as the source and condition of all.

CHAPTER XI.

THE THEOLOGY OF LEIBNIZ.

One of the chapters concerning knowledge is ent.i.tled, "The Knowledge that we have of G.o.d." This introduces us to the theology of Leibniz and indirectly to the completion of those ethical doctrines already outlined in the chapter on will. Leibniz employs three arguments to prove the existence of G.o.d: that of G.o.d as the sufficient reason of the world (substantially the cosmological proof); of G.o.d as the source of the pre-established harmony (an extension of the teleological proof); and the ontological. The latter he accepts as it came from the hands of Descartes, but insists that it requires an added argument before it ranks as anything more than presumptive proof. The Anselmic-Cartesian argument, as stated by Leibniz, is as follows: "G.o.d is defined as the greatest, or most perfect, of beings, or as a being of supreme grandeur and perfection. But in the notion of a perfect being, existence must be included, since it is something more to exist than not to exist. Or existence is a perfection, and hence must belong to the most perfect being; otherwise some perfection would be lacking, which is contrary to the definition." Or as Descartes sometimes puts it, in the notion of anything like a tree, a mountain, a triangle, contingency is contained. We may conceive such an object to exist or not, as we like. There is no necessity involved in our thought. But we cannot think of a perfect being except as existing. It does not rest with the decision of our thinking whether or not to include existence in this notion. We must necessarily think existence as soon as we think such a being.

Leibniz takes a middle position, he says, between those who consider this a demonstrative argument, and those who regard it as a mere paralogism. It is pre-supposed by this argument that the notion of a Supreme Being is possible, or that it does not involve contradiction. This pre-supposition is to be proved. First, it is well to simplify the argument itself. The Cartesian definition may be reduced to this: "G.o.d is a being in whom existence and essence are one. From this definition it follows as a corollary that such a being, if possible, exists. For the essence of a thing being just that which const.i.tutes its possibility, it is evident that to exist by its essence is the same as to exist by its possibility. Being in itself, then, or G.o.d, may be most simply defined as the Being who must exist if he is possible."

There are two ways of proving this last clause (namely, that he is possible) the direct and the indirect. The indirect is employed against those who a.s.sert that from mere notions, ideas, definitions or possible essences, it is not possible to infer actual existence. Such persons simply deny the possibility of being in itself. But if being-in-itself, or absolute being, is impossible, being-by-another, or relative, is also impossible; for there is no "other" upon which it may depend. Nothing, in this case, could exist. Or if necessary being is not possible, there is no being possible. Put in another way, G.o.d is as necessary for possibility as for actual existence. If there is possibility of anything, there is G.o.d. This leads up to the direct proof; for it follows that, if there be a possibility of G.o.d,--the Being in whom existence and essence are one,--he exists. "G.o.d alone has such a position that existence is necessary, if possible. But since there can be nothing opposed to the possibility of a being without limit,--a being therefore without negations and without contradiction,--this is sufficient to prove _a priori_ the existence of G.o.d." In short, G.o.d being pure affirmation, pure self-ident.i.ty, the idea of his Being cannot include contradiction, and hence is possible,--and since possible, necessary. Of this conception of G.o.d as the purely self-identical, without negation, we shall have something to say in the next chapter.

The cosmological proof is, as we have already seen, that every cause in the world being at the same time an effect, it cannot be the sufficient reason of anything. The whole series is contingent, and requires a ground not prior to, but beyond, the series. The only _sufficient_ reason of anything is that which is also the sufficient reason of itself,--absolute being. The teleological argument Leibniz invariably, I believe, presents in connection with the idea of pre-established harmony. "If the substances of experience," runs the argument, "had not received their being, both active and pa.s.sive, from one universal supreme cause, they would be independent of one another, and hence would not exhibit that order, harmony, and beauty which we notice in nature. This argument possesses only moral certainty which becomes demonstrative by the new kind of harmony which I have introduced,--pre-established harmony. Since each substance expresses in its own way that which occurs beyond it, and can have no influence on other particular beings, it is necessary that each substance, before developing these phenomena from the depth of its own being, must have received this nature (this internal ground of external phenomena) from a universal cause from whom all beings depend, and which effects that one be perfectly in accord with and corresponding to every other. This cannot occur except through a being of infinite knowledge and power."

Having determined the existence of G.o.d, Leibniz states his attributes. These may be reduced to three. He is perfect in power, in wisdom, and in goodness. "Perfection is nothing other than the whole of positive reality separated from the limits and bounds of things. Where there are no limits, as in G.o.d, perfection is absolutely infinite." "In G.o.d exists _power_, which is the source of all _knowledge_,--which comprehends the realm of ideas, down to its minutest detail,--and _will_, which directs all creations and changes according to the principle of the best." Or as he expands it at another time: "The supreme cause must be intelligent, for the existing world being contingent, and an infinity of other worlds being equally possible, it is necessary that the cause of the world take into consideration all these possible worlds in order to decide upon one. Now this relation of a substance to simple ideas must be the relation of understanding to its ideas, while deciding upon one is the act of will in choosing. Finally it is the power of this substance which executes the volition. Power has its end in being; wisdom, or understanding, in truth; and will in good. Thus the cause must be absolutely perfect in power, wisdom, and goodness. His understanding is the source of essences, and his will the origin of existences."

This brings us to the relation of G.o.d to the world, or to an account of the creating activity of G.o.d. This may be considered to be metaphysically, logically, or morally necessary. To say that it is metaphysically necessary is to say that it is the result of the divine essence, that it would imply a contradiction of the very being of G.o.d for the world not to be and not to be as it is. In short, the world becomes a mere emanation of power, since, as we have just learned, power and being are correlative. But this leaves out of account the divine understanding. Not all possible worlds emanate from G.o.d's being, but there is recognition of them and of their relations to one another. Were the world to proceed from the divine understanding alone, however, it would be logically necessary,--that is, it would bear the same relation to his understanding that necessary truths do. Its opposite would imply contradiction, not indeed of the being of G.o.d, but of his understanding. But the will of G.o.d plays the all-important part of choosing among the alternative worlds presented by reason, each of which is _logically_ possible. One of these worlds, although standing on the same intellectual plane as the others, is _morally_ better,--that is, it involves greater happiness and perfection to the creatures const.i.tuting it. G.o.d is guided then by the idea of the better (and this is the best possible) world. His will is not arbitrary in creating: it does not work by a _fiat_ of brute power. But neither is it fatalistic: it does not work by compulsory necessity. It is both free and necessary; free, for it is guided by naught excepting G.o.d's own recognition of an end; necessary, for G.o.d, being G.o.d, cannot _morally_ act otherwise than by the principle of the better,--and this in contingent matters is the best. Hence the optimism of Leibniz, to which here no further allusion can be made.

Since the best is precisely G.o.d himself, it is evident that the created world will have, _as far as possible_, his perfections. It would thus be possible to deduce from this conception of G.o.d and his relation to the world all those characteristics of the Leibnizian monadology which we formerly arrived at a.n.a.lytically. G.o.d is individual, but with an infinite comprehensiveness. Each substance repeats these properties of the supreme substance. There is an infinity of such substances, in order that the world may as perfectly as possible mirror the infinity of G.o.d. Each, so far as in it lies, reflects the activity of G.o.d; for activity is the very essence of perfection. And thus we might go through with the entire list of the properties of the monad.

To complete the present discussion, however, it is enough to notice that intelligence and will must be found in every creature, and that thus we account for the "appet.i.tion" and the "perception" that characterize even the lowest monad. The scale of monads, however, would not be as complete as possible unless there were beings in whom appet.i.tion became volition, and perception, self-conscious intelligence. Such monads will stand in quite other relation to G.o.d than the blind impulse-governed substances. "Spirits," says Leibniz, "are capable of entering into community with G.o.d, and G.o.d is related to them not only as an inventor to his machine (as he is to other creatures) but as a prince to his subjects, or, better, as a father to his children. This society of spirits const.i.tutes the city of G.o.d,--the most perfect state under the most perfect monarch. This city of G.o.d, this truly cosmopolitan monarchy, is a moral world within the natural. Among all the works of G.o.d it is the most sublime and divine. In it consists the true glory of G.o.d, for there would be no glory of G.o.d unless his greatness and goodness were known and admired by spirits; and in his relation to this society, G.o.d for the first time reveals his goodness, while he manifests everywhere his power and wisdom. And as previously we demonstrated a perfect harmony between the two realms of nature,--those of efficient and final causes,--so must we here declare harmony between the physical realm of nature and the moral realm of grace,--that is, between G.o.d as the architect of the mechanical world-structure, and G.o.d as the monarch of the world of spirits." G.o.d fulfils his creation, in other words, in a realm of spirits, and fulfils it because here there are beings who do not merely reflect him but who enter into relations of companionship with him, forming a community. This community of spirits with one another and with G.o.d is the moral world, and we are thus brought again to the ethics of Leibniz.

It has been frequently pointed out that Leibniz was the first to give ethics the form which it has since kept in German philosophy,--the division into _Natur-recht_ and _Natur-moral_. These terms are difficult to give in English, but the latter corresponds to what is ordinarily called "moral philosophy," while the former is political philosophy so far as that has an ethical bearing. Or the latter may be said to treat of the moral ideal and of the moral motive and of duty in themselves, while the former deals with the social, the public, and in a certain sense the external, aspects of morality.

Puffendorf undoubtedly suggested this division to Leibniz by his cla.s.sification of duties as external and internal,--the first comprehending natural and civil law, the second moral theology. But Puffendorf confined the former to purely external acts, excluding motives and intentions, and the latter to divine revelation. Both are "positive," and in some sort arbitrary,--one resting merely on the fact that certain inst.i.tutions obtain, the other on the fact that G.o.d has made certain declarations. To Leibniz, on the other hand, the will of G.o.d is in no sense the source of moral truths. The will of G.o.d does not create truth, but carries into effect the eternal truths of the divine understanding. Moral truths are like those of mathematics. And again, there is no such thing as purely external morality: it always contains an inner content, of which the external act is only the manifestation. Leibniz may thus be said to have made two discoveries, or rather re-discoveries: one, that there is a science of morals, independent of law, custom, and positive right; the other, that the basis of both "natural" and "positive" morals is not the mere will of G.o.d, but is reason with its content of eternal truths.

In morals the end is happiness, the means wisdom. Happiness is defined, not as an occurrence, but as a condition, or state of being. "It is the condition of permanent joy. This does not mean that the joy is actually felt every moment, but that one is in the condition to enjoy whenever he thinks of it, and that, in the interval, joyfulness arises from his activity and being." Pleasure, however, is not a state, but a feeling. It is the feeling of perfection, whether in ourselves or in anything else. It does not follow that we perceive intellectually either in what the perfection of the pleasant thing consists or in what way it develops perfection within us. It is enough that it be realized in feeling, so as to give us pleasure. Perfection is defined "as increase of being. As sickness is, as it were, a lowering and a falling off from health, so perfection is something which mounts above health. It manifests itself in power to act; for all substance consists in a certain power, and the greater the power the higher and freer the substance. But power increases in the degree that the many manifests itself from one and in one, while the one rules many from itself and transforms them into self. But unity in plurality is nothing else than harmony; and from this comes order or proportion, from which proceeds beauty, and beauty awakens love. Thus it becomes evident how happiness, pleasure, love, perfection, substance, power, freedom, harmony, proportion, and beauty are bound up in one another."

From this condensed sketch, taken from Leibniz himself, the main features of his ethical doctrine clearly appear. When we were studying freedom we saw that it was not so much a starting-point of the will as its goal and ideal. We saw also that true freedom is dependent upon knowledge, upon recognition of the eternal and universal. What we have here is a statement of that doctrine in terms of feeling and of will instead of knowledge. The end of man is stated to be happiness, but the notion of happiness is developed in such a way that it is seen to be equivalent to the Aristotelian notion of self-realization; "it is development of substance, and substance is activity." It is the union of one and the many; and the one, according to the invariable doctrine of Leibniz, is the spiritual element, and the many is the real content which gives meaning to this rational unity. Happiness thus means perfection, and perfection a completely universalized individual. The motive toward the moral life is elsewhere stated to be love; and love is defined as interest in perfection, and hence culminates in love of G.o.d, the only absolute perfection. It also has its source in G.o.d, as the origin of perfection; so that Leibniz says, Whoso loves G.o.d, loves all.

Natural right, as distinguished from morals, is based upon the notion of justice, this being the outward manifestation of wisdom, or knowledge,--appreciation of the relation of actions to happiness. The definitions given by Leibniz are as follows: Just and unjust are what are useful or harmful to the public,--that is, to the community of spirits. This community includes first G.o.d, then humanity, then the state. These are so subordinated that, in cases of collision of duty, G.o.d, the universe of relations, comes before the profit of humanity, and this before the state. At another time Leibniz defines justice as social virtue, and says that there are as many kinds of "right"

as there are kinds of natural communities in which happiness is an end of action. A natural community is defined as one which rests upon desire and the power of satisfying it, and includes three varieties,--domestic, civil, and ecclesiastic. "Right" is defined as that which sustains and develops any natural community. It is, in other words, the will for happiness united with insight into what makes happiness.

Corresponding to the three forms of the social organism (as we should now call the "natural community"), are the three kinds of _jus_,--_jus strictum_, equity, and piety. Each of these has its corresponding prescript. That of _jus strictum_ is to injure no one; of equity, to render to each his own; and of piety, to make the ethical law the law of conduct. _Jus strictum_ includes the right of war and peace. The right of peace exists between individuals till one breaks it. The right of war exists between men and things. The victory of person over thing is _property_. Things thus come to possess the right of the person to whom they belong as against every other person; that is, in the right of the person to himself as against the attacks of another (the right to peace) is included a right to his property. _Jus strictum_ is, of course, in all cases, enforceable by civil law and the compulsory force which accompanies it. Equity, however, reaches beyond this to obligation in cases where there is no right of compulsion. Its law is, Be of aid to all, but to each according to his merits and his claims. Finally comes piety. The other two stages are limited. The lowest is negative, it wards off harm; the second aims after happiness, but only within the limits of earthly existence. That we should ourselves bear misery, even the greatest, for the sake of others, and should subject the whole of this existence to something higher, cannot be proved excepting as we regard the society, or community, of our spirits with G.o.d. Justice with relation to G.o.d comprehends all virtues. Everything that is, is from G.o.d; and hence the law of all conduct is to use everything according to its place in the idea of G.o.d, according to its function in the universal harmony. It thus not only complements the other two kinds of justice but is the source of their inner ethical worth. "Strict justice" may conflict with equity. But G.o.d effects that what is of use to the public well-being--that is, to the universe and to humanity--shall be of use also to the individual. Thus from the standpoint of G.o.d the moral is advantageous, and the immoral hurtful. Kant's indebtedness to Leibniz will at once appear to one initiated into the philosophy of the former.

Leibniz never worked out either his ethics or his political philosophy in detail; but it is evident that they both take their origin and find their scope in the fact of man's relationship to G.o.d, that they are both, in fact, accounts of the methods of realizing a universal but not a merely formal harmony. For harmony is not, with Leibniz, an external arrangement, but is the very soul of being. Perfect harmony, or adaptation to the universe of relations, is the end of the individual, and man is informed of his progress toward this end by an inner sentiment of pleasure.

It may be added that Leibniz's aesthetic theory, so far as developed, rests upon the same basis as his ethical,--namely, upon membership in the "city of G.o.d," or community of spiritual beings. This is implied, indeed, in a pa.s.sage already quoted, where he states the close connection of beauty with harmony and perfection. The feeling of beauty is the recognition in feeling of an order, proportion, and harmony which are not yet intellectually descried. Leibniz ill.u.s.trates by music, the dance, and architecture. This feeling of the harmonious also becomes an impulse to produce. As perception of beauty may be regarded as unexplained, or confused, perception of truth, so creation of beauty may be considered as undeveloped will. It is action on its way to perfect freedom, for freedom is simply activity with explicit recognition of harmony.

We cannot do better than quote the conclusion of the matter from Leibniz's "Principles of Nature and of Grace," although, in part, it repeats what we have already learned. "There is something more in the rational soul, or spirit, than there is in the monad or even in the simple soul. Spirit is not only a mirror of the universe of creatures, but is also an image of the divine being. Spirit not only has a perception of the works of G.o.d, but is also capable of producing something which resembles them, though on a small scale. To say nothing of dreams, in which we invent without trouble and without volition things upon which we must reflect a long time in order to discover in our waking state,--to say nothing of this, our soul is architectonic in voluntary actions; and, in discovering the sciences in accordance with which G.o.d has regulated all things (_pondere_, _mensura_, _numero_), it imitates in its department and in its own world of activity that which G.o.d does in the macrocosm. This is the reason why spirits, entering through reason and eternal truths into a kind of society with G.o.d, are members of the city of G.o.d,--that is, of the most perfect state, formed and governed by the best of monarchs, in which there is no crime without punishment, and no good action without reward, and where there is as much of virtue and of happiness as may possibly exist. And this occurs not through a disturbance of nature, as if G.o.d's dealing with souls were in violation of mechanical laws, but by the very order of natural things, on account of the eternal, pre-established harmony between the kingdoms of nature and grace, between G.o.d as monarch and G.o.d as architect, since nature leads up to grace, and grace makes nature perfect in making use of it."

No better sentences could be found with which to conclude this a.n.a.lysis of Leibniz. They resound not only with the grandeur and wide scope characteristic of his thought, but they contain his essential idea, his pre-eminent "note,"--that of the harmony of the natural and the supernatural, the mechanical and the organic. The mechanical is to Leibniz what the word signifies; it is the _instrumental_, and this in the full meaning of the term. Nature is instrumental in that it performs a function, realizes a purpose, and instrumental in the sense that without it spirit, the organic, is an empty dream. The spiritual, on the other hand, is the meaning, the _idea_ of nature. It perfects it, in that it makes it instrumental to itself, and thus renders it not the pa.s.sive panorama of _mere_ material force, but the manifestation of living spirit.

CHAPTER XII.

CRITICISM AND CONCLUSION.

In the exposition now completed we have in general taken for granted the truth and coherency of Leibniz's fundamental ideas, and have contented ourselves with an account of the principles and notions that flow from these ideas. The time has come for retracing our steps, and for inquiring whether the a.s.sumed premises can be thus unquestioningly adopted. This final chapter, therefore, we shall devote to criticism of the basis of Leibniz's philosophy, not attempting to test it by a comparison with other systems, but by inquiring into its internal coherency, and by a brief account of the ways in which his successors, or at least one of them, endeavored to make right the points in which he appeared to fail.

The fundamental contradiction in Leibniz is to be found, I believe, between the method which he adopted--without inquiry into its validity and scope--and the subject-matter, or perhaps better the att.i.tude, to which he attempted to apply this method; between, that is to say, the scholastic formal logic on the one hand and the idea of inter-relation derived from the development of scientific thought, on the other. Leibniz never thought of investigating the formal logic bequeathed by scholasticism, with a view to determining its adequacy as philosophic method. He adopted, as we have seen, the principles of ident.i.ty and contradiction as sole principles of the only perfect knowledge. The type of knowledge is that which can be reduced to a series of identical propositions, whose opposite is seen to be impossible, because self-contradictory. Only knowledge in this form can be said to be demonstrative and necessary. As against Locke he justified the syllogistic method of the schoolmen as the typical method of all rational truth.

On the other hand, Leibniz, as we saw in the earlier chapters, had learned positively from the growth of science, negatively from the failures of Descartes and Spinoza, to look upon the universe as a unity of inter-related members,--as an organic unity, not a mere self-identical oneness. Failing to see the cause of the failures of Descartes and Spinoza in precisely their adoption of the logic of ident.i.ty and contradiction as ultimate, he attempted to reconcile this method with the conception of organic activity. The result is constant conflict between the method and content of his philosophy, between its letter and its spirit. The contradiction is a twofold one. The unity of the content of his philosophy, the conception of organism or harmony, is a unity which essentially involves difference. The unity of his method is a formal ident.i.ty which excludes it. The unity, whose discovery const.i.tutes Leibniz's great glory as a philosopher, is a unity of activity, a dynamic process. The unity of formal logic is exclusive of any mediation or process, and is essentially rigid and lifeless. The result is that Leibniz is constantly wavering (in logical result, not of course in spirit) between two opposed errors, one of which is, in reality, not different from Spinozism, in that it regards all distinction as only phenomenal and unreal, while the other is akin to atomism, in that attempting to avoid the doctrine of the all-inclusive one, it does so only by supposing a mult.i.tude of unrelated units, termed monads. And thus the harmony, which in Leibniz's intention is the very content of reality, comes to be, in effect, an external arrangement between the one and the many, the unity and the distinction, in themselves incapable of real relations. Such were the results of Leibniz's failure, in Kantian language, to criticise his categories, in Hegelian language, to develop a logic,--the results of his a.s.suming, without examination, the validity of formal logic as a method of truth.

So thoroughly is Leibniz imbued with the belief in its validity, that the very conception, that of sufficient reason, which should have been the means of saving him from his contradictions, is used in such a way as to plunge him deeper into them. The principle of sufficient reason may indeed be used as purely formal and external,--as equivalent to the notion that everything, no matter what, has _some_ explanation. Thus employed, it simply declares that everything has _a_ reason, without in the least determining the _what_ of that reason,--its content. This is what we mean by calling it formal. But this is not the way in which Leibniz conceives of it. According to him, it is not a principle of the external connection of one finite, or phenomenal, fact with another. It is a principle in the light of which the whole phenomenal world is to be viewed, declaring that its ground and meaning are to be found in reason, in self-conscious intelligence. As we have seen, it is equivalent, in Leibniz's case, to the notion that we have no complete nor necessary knowledge of the world of scientific fact until we have referred it to a conditioning "Supreme Spirit."

Looked at in this way, we see that the unity which Leibniz is positively employing is an organic unity, a unity of intelligence involving organic reference to the known world. But such a conception of sufficient reason leaves no place for the final validity of ident.i.ty and non-contradiction; and therefore Leibniz, when dealing with his method, and not, as in the pa.s.sages referred to, with his subject-matter, cannot leave the matter thus. To do so indeed would have involved a complete reconstruction of his philosophy, necessitating a derivation of all the categories employed from intelligence itself (that is, from the sufficient or conditioning reason). But the bondage to scholastic method is so great that Leibniz can see no way but to measure intelligence by the ready-made principle of ident.i.ty, and thus virtually (though not in purpose) to explain away the very principle of sufficient reason. In Leibniz's words: "Contingent truths require an infinite a.n.a.lysis which only G.o.d can carry out. Whence by him alone are they known _a priori_ and demonstratively. For although the reason can always be found for some occurring state in a prior state, this reason again requires a reason, and we never arrive in the series to the ultimate reason. But this _progressus ad infinitum_ takes (in us) the place of a sufficient reason, which can be found only outside the series in G.o.d, on whom all its members, prior and posterior depend, rather than upon one another. _Whatever truth, therefore, is incapable of a.n.a.lysis, and cannot be demonstrated from its own reasons, but has its ultimate reason and certainty only from the divine mind, is not necessary._ Everything that we call truths of fact come under this head, and this is the root of their contingency."

The sentences before the one italicized repeat what we have learned before, and seem to convey the idea that the phenomenal world is that which does not account for itself, because not itself a self-determining reason, and which gets its ultimate explanation and ground in a self-sufficient reason,--G.o.d. But notice the turn given to the thought with the word "therefore." Therefore all truth incapable of a.n.a.lysis,--that is, of reduction to identical propositions, whose opposite is impossible because self-contradictory,--all truth whose meaning depends upon not its bare ident.i.ty, but upon its relation to the very content of all intelligence, is not necessary, but contingent. Leibniz here distinctly opposes identical truths as necessary, to truth connected with reason as contingent. Synthetic reference to the very structure of intelligence is thus made, not the ground of truth, but a blot upon its completeness and necessity. Perfect truth, it is implied in the argument, is self-identical, known by mere a.n.a.lysis of itself, and needs no reference to an organism of reason. The reference, therefore, to a principle of sufficient reason is simply a concession to the fragmentary and imperfect condition of all knowledge. Truth in itself is self-identical; but appearing to us only confusedly, we employ the idea of sufficient reason as a makeshift, by which we refer, in a ma.s.s, all that we cannot thus reduce to identical propositions, to an intelligence, or to a _Deus ex machina_ which can so reduce it. This is the lame and impotent conclusion.