Abstract
Leibniz’s approach to Chinese thought has been the subject of some scholarly interest in recent years. The prevailing interpretation is that his motivation is that of accommodation between Christianity and Chinese thought. In this paper, I wish to present a different view, namely, that his approach is dominated by his enterprise to combat religious scepticism in Europe.
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References
Richard H. Popkin, “The Religious Background of 17th-century Philosophy,” The Third Force in Seventeenth-Century Thought (Leiden: Brill, 1992), pp. 268–284.
Blaise Pascal, Pensées, No, 822, in Oeuvres Complètes, edited with notes by Louis Lafuma (New York: Macmillan, 1963).
Richard H. Popkin, Isaac La Peyrère (1596–1676): His Life, Work and Influence (Leiden: Brill, 1987).
Martin Martini, Historiae sinicae decas prima a gentis origine ad Christum natum (Amsterdam, 1658); Philippe Couplet, Tabula chronologica monarchiae Sinicae (Paris, 1686).
See Virgile Pinot, La Chine et la Formation de l’Esprit Philosophique en France (Paris, 1932; Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1971), p. 214. The verdict of today’s scholarship is that Fu Hsi is mythical, and that verifiable history began in China around 1766 B.C.
Don Cameron Allen, The Legend of Noah (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1963), p. 65.
Popkin, Isaac La Peyrère, p. 70.
Isaac Vossius, Dissertatio de vera aetate mundi ... (The Hague, 1659), pp. 44–48. See Pinot’s summary, La Chine, pp. 204–206.
Pinot, La Chine, p. 215. Pinot provided a detailed account of the controversy regarding the merit and demerit of the Septuagint version of the Bible in the context of debates on Chinese antiquity. See also Allen, The Legend of Noah, pp. 63–64.
George Horn, Arca Noae (Leyden, 1666). For a succinct account of the controversies surrounding Chinese chronology, See Edwin J. Van Kley, “Europe’s ‘Discovery’ of China and the Writing of World History,” American Historical Review 76 (1971): 358–385.
John Webb, The Antiquity of China (London, 1678), 2nd. edition, p. 193. There is no difference in pagination from the first edition of 1669.
See Arnold Rowbotham, Missionaries and Mandarins (New York: Russell and Russell, 1966), pp. 319–320, note 10; Pinot, La Chine, p. 98; and Le Comte’s Nouveaux Mémoires sur l’état présent de la Chine (Paris, 1696), I:134–135, and 141.
Richard H. Popkin, The History of Scepticism from Erasmus to Spinoza (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1979), p. 228.
Popkin, History of Scepticism, p. 218.
Pinot, La Chine, p. 334.
G. W. Leibniz, Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe, series 1, Allgemeiner politischer und historischer Briefwechsel, edited by the Leibniz Archive of the Niedersächsische Landesbibliothek, Hannover (1691–92) (Berlin, 1964), 7:617. See the translation in Moral Enlightenment: Leibniz and Wolff on China, eds. Julia Ching and Willard G. Oxtoby (Nettetal: Steyler Verlag, 1992), pp. 63–69.
Leibniz, “The Confession of Nature Against Atheists,” 1669 in Leibniz: Philosophical Papers and Letters (PPL), ed. Leroy E. Loemker (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956), 1:169. See Die philosophischen Schriften von G. W. Leibniz, ed. Carl Immanuel Gerhardt (Berlin, 1875–1890; Hildesheim, Georg Olms, 1960), IV.105–110.
Pinot, La Chine, pp. 333–335.
See Pinot, La Chine, p. 334.
Leibniz Selections, ed. Philip P. Wiener (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1951), p. 577. See also Daniel J. Cook, “Leibniz: Biblical Historian and Exegete”, Leibniz’ Auseinandersetzung mit Vorgängern und Zeitgenossen, eds. Ingrid Marchlewitz and Albert Heinekamp (Stuttgart: F. Steiner, 1990), pp. 267–276.
New Essays on Human Understanding, translated and edited by Peter Remnant and Jonathan Bennett (London: Cambridge University Press 1981), IV, 2,14, and lxvi.
Louis Davillé, Leibniz Historien: Essai sur l’activité et la méthode historiques de Leibniz (Paris: Scientia Verlag Aalen, 1986), p. 426.
New Essays, IV, 16, 11.
See Pinot, La Chine, p. 335.
See René Etiemble, L’Orient philosophique au XVIIIe Siècle (Paris: Centre de documentation universitaire, 1957–58), p. 140.
R. W. Meyer, Leibnitz and the Seventeenth-Century Revolution, translated by J. P. Stern (Cambridge: Bowes & Bowes, 1952), pp. 66–67.
Ibid., p. 64.
See Adolf Reichwein, China and Europe (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1925), p. 81 and note 12.
Ibid. See also Donald F. Lach, “Leibniz and China,” Journal of the History of Ideas 4 (1945): 436–455.
Leibniz, Oeuvres de Leibniz, ed. Louis Alexandre Foucher de Careil (Verlag:Georg Olms, 1969), 5: 32–58.
Leroy E. Loemker, “A Note on the Origin and Problem of Leibniz’ Discourse of 1686,” Journal of the History of Ideas 8 (1949): 449–466.
Leibniz, The Preface to Leibniz’ Novissima Sinica, trans. Donald F. Lach (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1957), p. 68.
Leibniz, untitled, in Schriften, ed. Gerhardt VIII: 188. This translation is from Leibniz Selections, ed. Wiener, p. 25.
See Joseph de Acosta, Historia natural y moral de los Indios (1590). This has been translated as The Natural and Moral History of the Indies in Hakluytus Posthumus, or Purchas His Pilgrimes (Glasgow, 1906). See Bk 6, ch. 5, p. 398. See also Matteo Ricci ‘s China diaries, edited by Jesuit Father Nichola Trigault, published as De Christiane Expeditione apud Sinas, suscepta ab Societe Jesu... (1615), and translated by L. J. Gallagher, The China that Was; China as Discovered by the Jesuits at the Close of the Sixteenth Century (Milwaukee, 1952). See pp. 446–447.
Francis Bacon, Of the Advancement of Learning (1605), Bk. 2.
This view had many subscribers. It was the position, for example, of Athanasius Kircher as set forth in Turris Babel (Amsterdam, 1679). Kircher was a professor of oriental languages in the Roman College of the Jesuits. See Paul Cornelius, Languages in Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth-Century Imaginary Voyages (Geneva: Librarie Droz, 1965), pp. 7ff. Leibniz was familiar with Kircher’s writings.
Johannes Goropius Becanus, Origines Antwerpiannae (Antwerp, 1569). See Arnold Williams, The Common Expositor (Chapel Hill: University of Northern Carolina Press, 1948), p. 230. Leibniz thought Becanus’ approach ridiculous. See Leibniz, New Essays, III, 2, 1.
This view was held by Athanasius Kircher. Paul Cornelius claims that the French linguist Claude Duret held substantially the same view. See his Languages in Imaginary Voyages, pp. 7–10. Allison P. Coudert mentions that the search for a universal language, or “real” characters which “unambiguously denote the essence of things,” was influenced by Kabbalistic language theory. See her “Forgotten ways of knowing: the Kabbalah, language, and science in the seventeenth century,” in Donald R. Kelley and Richard H. Popkin eds., The Shapes of Knowledge from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment (Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1991), p. 89.
John Webb, Antiquity of China, p. 148.
Ibid., p. 86.
See Louis Couturat and Leopold Leau, Histoire de la Langue Universelle (Paris: Librarie Hachette, 1903), p. 11.
René Descartes, Oeuvres, ed. Charles Adam and Paul Tannery (Paris: L. Cerf, 1897–1910), 1:76–82. Translation is from Philosophical Letters, ed. Anthony Kenny (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970), pp. 4–5.
Ibid., p. 5.
Ibid., pp. 3–6.
Leibniz, Schriften, ed. Gerhardt, IV: 27–104.
Ibid., VII: 184–189. Translation is from “Towards a Universal Characteristic,” in Leibniz Selections, ed. P. P. Wiener, p. 20.
Ibid, p. 22.
Leibniz, “Disputatio Metaphysica de Principio Individui” (1663) in Schriften, ed. Gerhardt IV: 14–26. See also “Leibniz,” Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, IV: 422–423.
Leibniz, untitled, in Schriften, ed. Gerhardt,VII: 184–5.
Couturat and Leau, Histoire de la Langue Universelle, ch. 5.
Untitled, in Schriften, ed. Gerhardt, VII: 198–199. Translation is from “On the Universal Science: Characteristic,” in Monadology and Other Philosophical Essays, translated by Paul and Anne Schrecker (New York: Bobbs Merrill, 1965), p. 12.
Descartes, Oeuvres, I: 76–82. Translation is from Philosophical Letters, ed. Kenny, pp. 3–6.
See Donald F. Lach, “The Chinese Studies of Andreas Müller,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 60 (1940): 564–575. The list of questions can be found in Leibniz, Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe, Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Darmstadt, 1927), Series I, II: 419.
Leibniz, New Essays, III, 7, 6; III, 1, 5; III, 9, 10.
Leibniz, New Essays, II, 9, 8.
Olivier Roy, Leibniz et la Chine (Paris: J. Vrin, 1972), p. 132.
Friedrich Schlegel (1772–1829) discussed this parallel in Vorlesungen zur Philosophie der Geschichte (Vienna, 1829), translated by J. B. Robertson, The Philosophy of History, 2 vols (London, 1835). Subsequent scholars have written on this. The contributions of Gorai Kinzo and to a lesser extent, of Liu Pai-min, Hellmut Wilhelm, and Arthur Waley have been discussed by E. J. Aiton and Eikoh Shimao, “Gbrai Kinzo’s Study of Leibniz and the I Ching Hexagrams,’“ Annals of Science 38 (1981): 71–92. For recent authoritative accounts, see Joseph Needham, Science and Civilisation in China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1962), 2: 340–345, and David Mungello in Leibniz and Confucianism: The Search for Accord (Honolulu, University Press of Hawaii, 1977). See also Hans J. Zacher, Die Hauptschriften zur Dyadik von G. W. Leibniz (Frankfurt am Main, 1973).
Leibniz korrespondiert mit China. Der Briefwechsel mit den Jesuitenmissionaren (1689–1714), ed. Rita Widmaier (Frankfurt: V. Klostermann, 1990), pp. 47–170. David Mungello’s careful analyses of the correspondence are invaluable. See Leibniz and Confucianism and Curious Land: Jesuit Accommodation and the Origin of Sinology (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1985).
Bouvet’s diagram featuring the Prior to Heaven order of the hexagrams in his letter to Leibniz on November 4, 1701 is archived, as a part of his correspondence with Leibniz, at the Leibniz Gesellschaft, Niedersächsische Landesbibliothek, Hanover, Germany. It has been either copied or reproduced in several publications. The most accessible in North America is Mungello, Leibniz and Confucianism, p. 50.
Leibniz mistakenly believed that the Prior to Heaven hexagram order was extremely ancient. It was actually the result of a speculative effort of Shao Yung (1011–1077 A. D.). See Hellmut Wilhelm, “Leibniz and the I-Ching,” Collectanea Commissionis Synodalis in Sinis 16 (1948): 210.
Leibniz korrespondiert, ed. Widmaier, pp. 134–146.
Leibniz to Bouvet, 18 May 1703. See Leibniz korrespondiert, p. 185.
Leibniz korrespondiert, pp. 54–57.
Ibid., p. 57.
D. P. Walker, The Ancient Theology; Studies in Christian Platonism from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1972), p. 224.
Leibniz korrespondiert, pp. 135–136.
Ibid, p. 187.
This paper is published in Mémoires de l’Academie des Sciences de Paris, and included in G. G. Leibnintii: Opera Omnia, ed. Ludovici Dutens (Geneva: Fratnes de Tournes, 1768) 3: 390–394.
Leibniz, Oeuvres de Leibniz, ed. Foucher de Careil, 5:28. See also Madeleine V. David, Le débat sur les écritures et l’hyéroglyphe au XVIIe etXVIIIe siècles (S.E.V.P. E.N., Paris, 1965), p. 63.
Leibniz to Bouvet, 18 May 1703, see especially Leibniz korrespondiert, ed. Widmaier, p. 188.
Leibniz, Discourse on the Natural Theology of the Chinese in Writings on China, trans. Daniel J. Cook and Henry Rosemont, Jr. (Chicago and La Salle: Open Court, 1994). I shall refer to this work as Discourse, and follow the numbering of the sections, which is similar to Dutens’ numbering, with minor differences. See p. 31.
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, ch. 11, in Oeuvres Diverses (Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1965), 3: 927.
See Pinot, La Chine, p. 327.
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, ch. 11, in Oeuvres Diverses, 3:915.
Nicholas Malebranche, Oeuvres complètes de Malebranche, ed. André Robinet (Paris: J. Vrin, 1958–1967), vol. 15.
Nichola Longobardi, Traité sur quelques points de la religion des chinois (Paris, 1701); Antoine de Sainte-Marie, Traité sur quelques points importants de la mission de la Chine (Paris, 1701).
See my paper entitled “The Linking of Spinoza and China by Bayle and Malebranche,” Journal of the History of Philosophy 23 (1985): 151–178.
For a description of the two versions of naturalistic providentialism which Bayle attributed to the Chinese, see my Ph. D. dissertation, Variations on the Theme of the Philosopher’s God: Europe and China (University of California, San Diego, 1984), p. 213.
See Leibniz, Discourse, p. 31
Ibid., pp. 16–19.
Ibid., pp. 10–11.
Leibniz, Ibid., p. 2.
Ibid., p. 47.
Ibid., p. 16.
Leibniz, Essais de Théodicée, p. 181 in Schriften ed. Gerhardt, VI:223. This quotation is from Theodicy, translated by E. M. Huggard (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1952), p. 240.
Quoted from the English translation: “Letter of Mr. Leibniz on a General Principle useful in explaining the Laws of Nature through a consideration of the Divine Wisdom: to serve as a Reply to the Response of the Rev. Father Malebranche,” Leibniz: PPL, ed. Loemker, 1: 352–353.
Ibid., p. 350.
Ibid.
André Robinet, Malebranche et Leibniz: relationspersonells (Paris: J. Vrin, 1955), p. 490.
For an account of Malebranche’s approach to Chinese thought, see Yuen-Ting Lai, Philosopher’s God: Europe and China, ch. 2–6; and David Mungello, “Malebranche and Chinese Philosophy,” Journal of the History of Ideas 41, 4 (1980): 551 – 578.
Bayle, Oeuvres Diverses (Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1965) III:113: 344.
See C. B. Kerford, “Strato and Stratonism,” Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, 8: 24.
Bayle, Réponse aux questions d’un Provincial, 111: 341.
Ibid., 113:344–345.
Ibid., 114:346–347.
Ibid.
Leibniz, Essais de Théodicée, p. 187 in Schriften, ed. Gerhardt, 6: 224. The quotation is from the English translation: Theodicy, ed. Huggard, p. 245.
Ibid., p. 188.
Ibid., p. 189. In this passage, Leibniz clearly implies that it is not the case that all possible worlds are infused with order and regularity. His claim is that the existent world is orderly, is regular, and is due to the preference in the understanding of God.
Ibid., pp. 171–173.
Leibniz, Discourse, 18.
Ibid., 2 and 45.
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Lai, YT. (1998). Leibniz and Chinese Thought. In: Coudert, A.P., Popkin, R.H., Weiner, G.M. (eds) Leibniz, Mysticism and Religion. Archives Internationales D’histoire des Idées / International Archives of the History of Ideas, vol 158. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-9052-5_6
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