The Primacy of L’Homme in the 1664 Parisian Edition by Clerselier

Bitbol-Hespériès, Annie

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-46989-8_2

Annie Bitbol-Hespériès⁹

Part of the book series: Studies in History and Philosophy of Science ((AUST,volume 43))

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Abstract

How can we understand the priority ascribed to L’Homme in the Préfaces by Clerselier and Schuyl and in the Remarques by La Forge? What are the reasons of this imbalance? What does the editor’s decision to change the title of the “second treatise” mean? Why, also, the silent attitude of La Forge on important sections of L’Homme? In other words, we wish to understand how Descartes’s specific new way of dealing with important biomedical questions, linked with philosophical implications, in L’Homme, and even more in La Description du corps humain, was concealed. Such is the relevant issue of the content of the Préfaces by Schuyl and Clerselier, and of the Remarques of Louis de La Forge for this posthumous edition of L’Homme and the “second traité”. There is a huge gap between the Préfaces and the content of L’Homme and La Description du corps humain. For instance, the words “heart” and “body” are given less importance in the Préfaces than the word “soul”, which sounds somewhat strange, not to say highly paradoxical, because this is in complete contradiction with Descartes’ writings.

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Notes

1.
L’Homme de René Descartes et un traitté de la formation du fœtus, du même auteur, avec les Remarques de Louis de la Forge, Docteur en médecine demeurant à La Flèche, sur le Traité de l’Homme de René Descartes, et sur les figures par lui inventées, Paris, Ch. Angot, 1664.
2.
Schuyl’s Foreword is included at the end of the 1664 edition in the French translation by Clerselier’s son.
3.
AT VI, 45–46, CSM, I, 134.
4.
See my Introduction to the edition of Descartes, Le Monde, L’Homme, Paris, Le Seuil, 1996, XL-XLV.
5.
See Dioptrics, Discourses IV and V, and my Introduction to Le Monde, L’Homme, op. cit., XXVII–XXIX, XXXV–XXXVI.
6.
Before the publication of Descartes’ s unpublished texts in 1664, Clerselier had issued two volumes of Descartes’ Letters, in 1657 and 1659. The third volume was published after 1664.
7.
AT X, 9–10.
8.
31 January 1648, AT V, 112. Letter XXV, Clerselier, vol. I.
9.
To Mersenne, June 1632, AT I, 254, CSMK, 39.
10.
See also, La Description, AT XI, 252–253.
11.
Cf. Annie Bitbol-Hespériès, « Cartesian Physiology », in Descartes’Natural Philosophy, S. Gaukroger, J. Schuster and J. Sutton Eds, Routledge, 2000, 349–382. See also my Foreword to the edition of Le Monde, L’Homme, Paris, Le Seuil, 1996.
12.
See in particular De usu partium, ed. Kühn, vol. 4, 224 ff, French edition by Daremberg, vol. 2, 137 ff.
13.
Description, beginning of the fourth part, AT XI, 253.
14.
On the importance of the ‘faculties’, see Galen, De naturalibus facultatibus, (On the natural faculties), Kühn, vol. 2, p. 1–214, Daremberg, vol. 2, 212–320.
15.
Description, beginning of the fourth part, AT XI, 253.
16.
L‘Homme, AT XI, 177, Préface np (p. 33), Remarques, 334–345. See Dioptrique, AT VI, 129.
17.
AT VI, 46, CSM, I, 134.
18.
AT I, 263, CSMK, 40.
19.
Cf. Excerpta anatomica.
20.
Cf. Passions, Art. 8.
21.
See Annie Bitbol-Hespériès, Le principe de vie chez Descartes, Paris, Vrin, 1990.
22.
Cf. Passions, Art. 107.
23.
AT XI, 127, AT VI, 50–51.
24.
Cf. AT XI, 239, C.S.M.I, 316.
25.
Cf. letters to Beverwick, 5 July 1643, AT IV, 4, to Newcastle, April 1645, AT IV, 189.
26.
Cf. Passions, Art. 7, C.S.M.I, 330.
27.
AT XI, 240–241.
28.
Remarques, p. 190.
29.
AT XI, 252, CSM, I, 321.
30.
AT XI, 273, not in CSM.
31.
AT XI, 267 and 280–282.
32.
Cf. De motu cordis, cap. 2.
33.
AT XI, 243–244, CSM, I, 318.
34.
AT XI, 241–242. See to Plempius, AT I, 527. Clerselier, vol. I, letter 78.
35.
Remarques, p. 191–192. Bartholin written Bartolin.
36.
AT XI, 244–245. See Plempius to Descartes, January 1638, AT I, 497. See also, Descartes to Plempius, 15 February 1638, AT I, 522.
37.
Remarques, p. 186, 188.
38.
AT VI, 47–51, CSM, I, 134–136.
39.
AT XI, 224, CSM, I, 314.
40.
AT XI, 279–280, not in CSM. On the valves of the heart, see also, AT XI, 229–230, L’Homme (AT XI, 124), The Discourse on Method, V, AT VI, 47.
41.
AT VI, 54, CSM, I, 139.
42.
AT XI, 124–125 (‘les petites peaux’).
43.
De motu cordis et sanguinis, 1628, Introduction, cap. VII, cap. XVII.
44.
AT XI, 231 and 253, and the comparison with yeast.
45.
See Le principe de vie chez Descartes.
46.
Remarques, 183.
47.
Remarques about « fort chaud ».
48.
Préface np, (61).
49.
Préface np, (22).
50.
Préface, np. (32).
51.
Du Laurens, Historia anatomica, Paris, 1600, French translation, 1610, by Sizé.
52.
Riolan (The Younger), Anthropographia, Paris, 1618, 1626, French translation 1629.
53.
Cf. Regius’ medical theses called Physiologia sive cognitio sanitatis, 1641. See my paper “Descartes et Regius: leur pensée médicale”, in Descartes et Regius, Autour de l’Explication de l’esprit humain, Theo Verbeek (ed.), Rodopi, Amsterdam-Atlanta, GA, 1993, p. 47–68.
54.
AT III, 369, CSMK, 181.
55.
AT III, 371, CSMK, 182.
56.
Préface, np (14–15)
57.
AT XI, 224–226, CSMI, 314.
58.
AT XI, 224–225, CSMI, 314–315, and Passions, art. 5.
59.
AT XI, 224, CSM, I, 314.
60.
AT XI, 227. See the Meditations, II and beginning of III, the Principles, I, article 9. See also in La Description, the ‘little gland called conarium’, AT XI, 270.
61.
Cf. to Morus, 5 February 1649, AT V, 278–279, CSMK, 366. See also, to Newcastle, 23 November 1646, AT IV, 573–575 and CSMK 301, Passions, art. 50.
62.
Froidmont (Fromondus) to Plemp (Plempius), 13 September 1637, AT I, 403.
63.
Froidmont to Plemp, 13 September 1637, AT I, 406, and Descartes, 3 October 1637, I, 413. See Le principe de vie chez Descartes.
64.
Descartes to Plemp for Froimont, 3 October 1637, AT I, 420–421.
65.
Inserted just after AT XI, 634.
66.
Préface, np (11 and 26).
67.
Préface, np (33).
68.
Cf. AT XI, 120,123 124,125, 138,147, 152, 166, 194, 200.
69.
In my edition of L’Homme, published with Le Monde, I showed some anatomical plates from the Theatrum anatomicum by C. Bauhin, a book of paramount importance for Descartes, as confirmed by my translation and annotation of the Primae cogitationes circa generationem animalium and Excerpta anatomica, with L’Homme and La Description, for the forthcoming vol. II of Descartes Œuvres complètes, Gallimard-Tel.
70.
Cf. AT XI, 224, 226, 228, 231.
71.
Cf. AT XI, 243.
72.
Remarques, 180–181.
73.
Remarques, 175.
74.
Cf. AT XI, 248, 255, 275.
75.
Préface, 445–446. Hoorn= the anatomist Johannes Van Horne, Hornius (1621–1670).
76.
Remarques on art. 63.
77.
Foreword, 434–440.
78.
Foreword, 437. No mention of Lucretius nor Ovid in the Latin Foreword.
79.
Letter to Regius, November 1641, AT III, 445.
80.
Préface, np (p. 52–59). This reference to Augustine influenced La Forge who quoted the same text in his Foreword to his Traité de l’esprit de l’homme.
81.
AT XI, 223 (first page, first sentence of the Description).
82.
See my paper ‘Connaissance de l’homme, connaissance de Dieu’, in Les Études Philosophiques, 1996, n° 4, 507–533.

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Centre d’Etudes Cartésiennes, Paris, France
Annie Bitbol-Hespériès

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Département de Sciences Humaines, CERPHI, IHRIM, CNRS, UMR 5317. ENS de Lyon, Lyon Cédex 07, France
Delphine Antoine-Mahut
Unit for the History and Philosophy of Science, University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Stephen Gaukroger

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Bitbol-Hespériès, A. (2016). The Primacy of L’Homme in the 1664 Parisian Edition by Clerselier. In: Antoine-Mahut, D., Gaukroger, S. (eds) Descartes’ Treatise on Man and its Reception. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol 43. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-46989-8_2

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-46989-8_2
Published: 17 January 2017
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