Abstract
It may seem very presumptuous to pretend to deal with so vast a subject in a brief paper. However, as I shall try to indicate, if the subject is limited to the traditional philosophical meaning of the term, there was, perhaps surprisingly, very little scepticism in the Enlightenment, and what there was represented either a carry-over of the earlier Montaignian or Baylean tradition, or an anticipation of an irrationalist fideistic scepticism that was to flourish with Kierkegaard, or an anticipation of an epistemological scepticism that was to flourish among the early critics of Kant. And, what scepticism there was in the Enlightenment seems to have been located mainly within the person of one man — David Hume.
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Notes
The French Reformed pastor, David Renaud Boullier, and Father Hubert Hayer refought this battle; cf. Boullier’s Le Pyrrhonisme de l’église romaine, ou lettres du P.H.B.D.R.A.P. á mr.**, avec les réponses (Amsterdam 1757); and Hayer’s La Règle de foi vengée des calomnies des Protestants; et spécialement de celles de m. Boullier, ministre calviniste d’Utrecht (Paris 1761).
Besides some of the works to be discussed in this paper, see, for example, the abbé C.J. Boncerf, Le Vrai philosopher ou l’usage de la philosophie, relativement à la société civile, á la vérité et à la vertu, avec l’histoire, l’exposition exacts et la réfutation du pyrrhonisme ancien et modems (Paris 1762); Jacob Brucker, Historta critica philosophiae (2nd ed., Leipzig 1767), sections on scepticism in vols, i and iv; J.H.S. Formey, Histoire abrégée de la philosophie (Amsterdam 1760); L. M. Kahle’s introduction to La Mothe Le Vayer’s Cinq dialogues faits à l’imitation des anciens, nouvelle édition augmentée d’une réfutation de la philosophie sceptique, ou préservatif contre le pyrrhonisme (Berlin 1744); Lodovico Antonio Muratori, Delle forze dell’intendimento umano, o sia il pirronismo confutato, opposto al libro del preteso monsignor Huet (Venezia 1745); and the abbé Bon François Rivire Pelvert, Exposition succincte et comparaison de la doctrine des anciens et des nouveaux philosophes (Paris 1787), i.
See Harry M. Bracken, The Early reception of Berkeley’s immaterialism, 1710–1733 (The Hague 1959), where several critics who interpreted Berkeley this way are discussed.
See, for example, the review of Hume’s Treatise in the Bibliothéque raisonné des ouvrages des savans de l’Europe (1740), xxiv-324–355; (I 74 1), xxvi-411–427, esp. PP-328 and 353–355; and M. Maty’s review of Hume’s Political discourses in the Journal britannique (1752), vii.243–267 and 387–411, esp. pp. 243–244, where Maty said that Hume’s metaphysical and moral essays were worthy of the pen of Pierre Bayle.
Carl Fridrich Staüdlin, Geschichte und Geist des Skepticismus (Leipzig 1794).
Pierre Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique. The quotations are from my forthcoming new translation of Selections from Bayle’s Dictionary, ‘Third Clarification’, Indianapolis. Hackett Publishing. 1991.
A list of editions is given by Muratori, op. cit, p.xxxv. The German translation is dated Frankfurt-am-Mayn, 1724; and there were actually two English translations, one by Edward Combe, The Weakness of human understanding (London 1725), second edition with appendix (London 1725), and the other without indication of translator, entitled A Philosophical treatise concerning the weakness of human understanding (London 1725); 2nd edition (London 1729).
See Mémoires de Trevoux, (juin 1725), p. 989, where the authenticity of the work is denied. The abbé Olivet defended the authenticity against the claims made in the Mémoires de Trevoux in his Apologie (Paris 1726 and 1727). Each part of the Apologie was answered anonymously in the same years. Olivet claimed that at least four manuscripts existed while Huet was alive. Jean Le Clerc, in his review of the Traité, Bibliothèque ancienne et moderne (1722), xviii, p. 465, said that he had seen a manuscript in Huet’s handwriting, and that one cannot really doubt the work is by him. The R. P. Baltus defended the orthodoxy of Huet’s Christian scepticism, and claimed this was the view of many of the church Fathers. See his ‘Sentiment du R. P. Baltus jésuite, sur le Traité de la foiblesse de l’esprit humain’, Continuation des Memoires de littérature et d’histoire (Paris 1726), ii.I.i69–262.
Sextus Empiricus, Opera graece et latine (Leipzig 1718). See list of promised edition in introduction for mention of the possibility of a commentary and refutation by Leibniz.
Sextus Empiricus, Les Hipotiposes ou institutions pirroniennes de Sextus Empiricus en trois livres (traduit par Claude Huart) ([Amsterdam?] 1725). See preface, esp. pp. [3], [22].
Q.D.B.V. de scepticorum praecipuis hypothesibus, secundum constitutionem Fridericianum, Prae-side Georgio Paschio (Kiloni [n. d.), p. 4. There are many dissertations on various aspects of Pyrrhonism, dating from the mid 17th century, onward until late in the 18th century, from German, Dutch and other universities.
Cf. translator’s preface to Shaftesbury’s Essai sur l’usage de la raillerie et de l’enjoument dans les conversations qui roulent sur les matieres les plus importantes (La Haye 1710), pp. iii.iv.
Cf. the manuscript autobiography of the Chevalier Ramsay at the Bibliothèque Méjanes, Aix-en-Provence.
The discussion of Huart’s case appears in Jean Pierre de Crousaz, La Logique ou système de réflexions (4e éd., Genève 1741), V.U. 129ff.
See Bibliothèque germanique (1724), vii.222; (1729), xviii.99–104; (1730), xx. 114–144. Crousaz’s opus is reviewed in the Bibliothèque germanique (1733), xxvii-14–36 and (1734), xxviii. 105–126.
Crousaz, Examen du Pyrrhonisme ancien & modem (La Haye 1733). On the 3rd page of the preface, Crousaz claims that the pyrrhonism of Bayle has led to corruption of the heart, incredulity, and irreligion, and ‘Qui pourroit méconnoître les effets de l’Irreligion dans le Projet & l’Oeconomie de ce qu’on a appellé Actions de Missicipi, ensuite Direction du Sud, & tout récemment dans celle de la Charitable Corporation?’ Berkeley is attacked on p. 97.
Jean Le Clerc, review of the Fabricius edition of Sextus Empiricus, Bibliothèque ancienne et moderne (1720), xiv. 1–113.
Letter of Crousaz to J.H.S. Formey, Lausanne, 1 June 1740, which is published at the end of the German version of Formey’s abridgement, entitled Prüfung der Sekte die an allem zweifelt (Göttingen 1751).
See, for example, the long review of Formey’s Le Triomphe de l’évidence in the Bibliothèque des sciences et des beaux arts (1757), vii.160–185 and 472–491, esp. p. 161. Formey reviewed the work in the Nouvelle bibliothèque germanique (1757), xx.87–93, and said on p.88 that his pyrrhonian friend Louis de Beausobre (who will be discussed later) was the one who insisted on the publication of the abridgement and revision that Formey had done years earlier.
Mathieu Marais, Journal et Mémoires, ed. par M. De Lescure (Paris 1868), iv.451.
‘Apologie de monsieur Bayle, ou lettre d’un sceptique sur l’Examen du pyrrhonisme; pour servir de réponse au livre de M. de Crouzas sur le pyrrhonisme’ in Nouvelles lettres de Mr. P. Bayle (La Haye 1739), pp. xxv-lxxxii. The quotation is on p. lviii. Barbier attributes the ‘Apologie’ to a M. de Monier, ancien procureur général de la chambre des comptes de Provence.
David Hume, ‘My own Life’, published in The Letters of David Hume; ed. by J.Y.T. Greig (Oxford 1932), i.2, where he says, ‘Never literary Attempt was more unfortunate than my Treatise of human Nature. It fell dead-born from the Press; without reaching such distinctions as even to excite a Murmur among the Zealots’. E.C. Mossner, in his Life of David Hume (Austin, Texas 1954), pp. 116–132, shows that Hume had overstated the lack of interest or response.
Hume, A Treatise of human nature, ed. Selby-Bigge (Oxford 1951), title page and introduction.
Hume, An Abstract of a treatise of human nature (Cambridge 1938), P. 24.
Hume, Dialogues concerning natural religion, ed. by Norman Kemp Smith (London 1947), p. 228.
Review of Hume’s Treatise in the Bibliothèque raisonnie des ouvrages des savons de l’Europe (1740), xxiv.328. See also the review in the Nouvelle bibliothèque (1740), Vi.291–316, vii.44–63.
Hume, Enquiry concerning human understanding, ed. Selby-Bigge (Oxford 1951), p. 155n, where Hume makes this remark about Berkeley’s arguments in calling them actually sceptical ones.
Laurence Bongie, ‘Hume, “Philosophe” and Philosopher in Eighteenth-Century France’, French Studies (1961), XV.213–227.
Voltaire, The Lisbon Earthquake.
This term appears at the beginning of Voltaire’s Le Pyrrhonisme de l’histoire (M.xxvii.235). See also the note explaining Voltaire’s view of scepticism in his Siècle de Louis A7K(M.xiv.76).
Douglas H. Gordon and Norman L. Torrey, The Censoring of Diderot’s Encyclopédie, (New York 1947)PP-47ff., 74–78.
Denis Diderot, ‘Pyrrhonienne ou sceptique philosophic’, Encyclopédie xiii.613b.
Condillac, Cours d’études pour l’instruction du prince de Parme, iii.xxii, in Oeuvres philosophiques de Condillac, ed. Georges Le Roy, (Paris 1948), ii.73–76.
Original version of a poem by Thomas Blacklock, as it appeared in Hume’s letter of 20 April 1756 to John Clephane, in Letters, i.231.
Thomas Reid, Inquiry into the human mind on the principles of common sense.
Hume’s letter to Reid, 25 February 1763, in Letters, i.375–376
See Reid’s reply of 18 March 1763, quoted in Letters, i.376n.
Hume, letter to William Strahan, 26 October 1775, in Letters, ii.301.
J.H.S. Formey, Histoire abrégée de la philosophie (Amsterdam 1760), pp. 243–248 on ‘De la Secte des Sceptiques modernes’.
J.H.S. Formey, review of Philosophische Versuche über die Menschliche Erkenntniss, etc., in Nouvelle bibliothèque germanique (1756), xix.78–109, 311–332; (1757), xx.57–86, 268–298; (1757), xxi.65–81.
Formey’s translation of Hume is entitled Essais philosophiques sur l’entendement humain (Amsterdam 1758). J.B. Mérian translated Hume’s Natural history of religion, in 1759, at the request of Maupertuis, who couldn’t read English. Formey, Mérian and Sulzer offered criticisms of Hume in their translations, as well as in the proceedings of the Prussian Academy.
Louis de Beausobre, Le Pyrrhonisme raisonnable (Berlin 1755). There is another work with a similar title which is attributed by Barbier to M.d’Autrey. This work is called Le Pyrrhonien raisonnable, ou méthode nouvelle proposie aux incrédules (La Haye 1765). It contends that a reasonable pyrrhonism, that is doubting what is ‘really’ dubitable, and accepting what is plausible, leads to a defense of Catholic Christianity.
Platner’s aphorisms appeared in Leipzig 1776–1782. J.C. Eschenbach’s Sammlung der vornehmsten Schriftsteller die die Wirklichkeit ihres eignem Körpers und der ganzen Körperweltläugnen was published in Rostock in 1756.
Immanuel Kant, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, ed. Adickes (Berlin 1889), ‘Vorrede zur ersten Auflage vom Jahre 1781, p. 6.
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Popkin, R.H. (1997). Scepticism in the Enlightenment. In: Popkin, R.H., De Olaso, E., Tonelli, G. (eds) Scepticism in the Enlightenment. Archives Internationales d’histoire des Idées / International Archives of the History of Ideas, vol 152. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-8953-6_1
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