* * * * *
1. I begin with the preliminary question of the _conformity of faith with
reason_, and the use of philosophy in theology, because it has much
influence on the main subject of my treatise, and because M. Bayle
introduces it everywhere. I assume that two truths cannot contradict each
other; that the object of faith is the truth God has revealed in an
extraordinary way; and that reason is the linking together of truths, but
especially (when it is compared with faith) of those whereto the human mind
can attain naturally without being aided by the light of faith. This
definition of reason (that is to say of strict and true reason) has
surprised some persons accustomed to inveigh against reason taken in a
vague sense. They gave me the answer that they had never heard of any such
explanation of it: the truth is that they have never conferred with people
who expressed themselves clearly on these subjects. They have confessed to
me, nevertheless, that one could not find fault with reason, understood in
the sense which I gave to it. It is in the same sense that sometimes reason
is contrasted with experience. Reason, since it consists in the linking
together of truths, is entitled to connect also those wherewith experience
has furnished it, in order thence to draw mixed conclusions; but reason
pure and simple, as distinct from experience, only has to do with truths
independent of the senses. And one may compare faith with experience, since
faith (in respect of the motives that give it justification) depends [74]
upon the experience of those who have seen the miracles whereon revelation
is founded, and upon the trustworthy tradition which has handed them down
to us, whether through the Scriptures or by the account of those who have
preserved them. It is rather as we rely upon the experience of those who
have seen China and on the credibility of their account when we give
credence to the wonders that are told us of that distant country. Yet I
would also take into account the inward motion of the Holy Spirit, who
takes possession of souls and persuades them and prompts them to good, that
is, to faith and to charity, without always having need of motives.
2. Now the truths of reason are of two kinds: the one kind is of those
called the 'Eternal Verities', which are altogether necessary, so that the
opposite implies contradiction. Such are the truths whose necessity is
logical, metaphysical or geometrical, which one cannot deny without being
led into absurdities. There are others which may be called _positive_,
because they are the laws which it has pleased God to give to Nature, or
because they depend upon those. We learn them either by experience, that
is, _a posteriori_, or by reason and _a priori_, that is, by considerations
of the fitness of things which have caused their choice. This fitness of
things has also its rules and reasons, but it is the free choice of God,
and not a geometrical necessity, which causes preference for what is
fitting and brings it into existence. Thus one may say that physical
necessity is founded on moral necessity, that is, on the wise one's choice
which is worthy of his wisdom; and that both of these ought to be
distinguished from geometrical necessity. It is this physical necessity
that makes order in Nature and lies in the rules of motion and in some
other general laws which it pleased God to lay down for things when he gave
them being. It is therefore true that God gave such laws not without
reason, for he chooses nothing from caprice and as though by chance or in
pure indifference; but the general reasons of good and of order, which have
prompted him to the choice, may be overcome in some cases by stronger
reasons of a superior order.
3. Thus it is made clear that God can exempt creatures from the laws he has
prescribed for them, and produce in them that which their nature does not
bear by performing a miracle. When they have risen to perfections and
faculties nobler than those whereto they can by their nature attain, the
Schoolmen call this faculty an 'Obediential Power', that is to say, a [75]
power which the thing acquires by obeying the command of him who can give
that which the thing has not. The Schoolmen, however, usually give
instances of this power which to me appear impossible: they maintain, for
example, that God can give the creature the faculty to create. It may be
that there are miracles which God performs through the ministry of angels,
where the laws of Nature are not violated, any more than when men assist
Nature by art, the skill of angels differing from ours only by degree of
perfection. Nevertheless it still remains true that the laws of Nature are
subject to be dispensed from by the Law-giver; whereas the eternal
verities, as for instance those of geometry, admit no dispensation, and
faith cannot contradict them. Thus it is that there cannot be any
invincible objection to truth. For if it is a question of proof which is
founded upon principles or incontestable facts and formed by a linking
together of eternal verities, the conclusion is certain and essential, and
that which is contrary to it must be false; otherwise two contradictories
might be true at the same time. If the objection is not conclusive, it can
only form a probable argument, which has no force against faith, since it
is agreed that the Mysteries of religion are contrary to appearances. Now
M. Bayle declares, in his posthumous Reply to M. le Clerc, that he does not
claim that there are demonstrations contrary to the truths of faith: and as
a result all these insuperable difficulties, these so-called wars between
reason and faith, vanish away.
_Hi motus animorum atque haec discrimina tanta,_
_Pulveris exigui jactu compressa quiescunt._
4. Protestant theologians as well as those of the Roman confession admit
the maxims which I have just laid down, when they handle the matter with
attention; and all that is said against reason has no force save against a
kind of counterfeit reason, corrupted and deluded by false appearances. It
is the same with our notions of the justice and the goodness of God, which
are spoken of sometimes as if we had neither any idea nor any definition of
their nature. But in that case we should have no ground for ascribing these
attributes to him, or lauding him for them. His goodness and his justice as
well as his wisdom differ from ours only because they are infinitely more
perfect. Thus the simple notions, the necessary truths and the conclusive
results of philosophy cannot be contrary to revelation. And when some [76]
philosophical maxims are rejected in theology, the reason is that they are
considered to have only a physical or moral necessity, which speaks only of
that which takes place usually, and is consequently founded on appearances,
but which may be withheld if God so pleases.
5. It seems, according to what I have just said, that there is often some
confusion in the expressions of those who set at variance philosophy and
theology, or faith and reason: they confuse the terms 'explain',
'comprehend', 'prove', 'uphold'. And I find that M. Bayle, shrewd as he is,
is not always free from this confusion. Mysteries may be _explained_
sufficiently to justify belief in them; but one cannot _comprehend_ them,
nor give understanding of how they come to pass. Thus even in natural
philosophy we explain up to a certain point sundry perceptible qualities,
but in an imperfect manner, for we do not comprehend them. Nor is it
possible for us, either, to prove Mysteries by reason; for all that which
can be proved _a priori_, or by pure reason, can be comprehended. All that
remains for us then, after having believed in the Mysteries by reason of
the proofs of the truth of religion (which are called 'motives of
credibility') is to be able to _uphold_ them against objections. Without
that our belief in them would have no firm foundation; for all that which
can be refuted in a sound and conclusive manner cannot but be false. And
such proofs of the truth of religion as can give only a _moral certainty_
would be balanced and even outweighed by such objections as would give an
_absolute certainty_, provided they were convincing and altogether
conclusive. This little might suffice me to remove the difficulties
concerning the use of reason and philosophy in relation to religion if one
had not to deal all too often with prejudiced persons. But as the subject
is important and it has fallen into a state of confusion, it will be well
to take it in greater detail.
6. The question of the _conformity of faith with reason_ has always been a
great problem. In the primitive Church the ablest Christian authors adapted
themselves to the ideas of the Platonists, which were the most acceptable
to them, and were at that time most generally in favour. Little by little
Aristotle took the place of Plato, when the taste for systems began to
prevail, and when theology itself became more systematic, owing to the
decisions of the General Councils, which provided precise and positive
formularies. St. Augustine, Boethius and Cassiodorus in the West, and [77]
St. John of Damascus in the East contributed most towards reducing theology
to scientific form, not to mention Bede, Alcuin, St. Anselm and some other
theologians versed in philosophy. Finally came the Schoolmen. The leisure
of the cloisters giving full scope for speculation, which was assisted by
Aristotle's philosophy translated from the Arabic, there was formed at last
a compound of theology and philosophy wherein most of the questions arose
from the trouble that was taken to reconcile faith with reason. But this
had not met with the full success hoped for, because theology had been much
corrupted by the unhappiness of the times, by ignorance and obstinacy.
Moreover, philosophy, in addition to its own faults, which were very great,
found itself burdened with those of theology, which in its turn was
suffering from association with a philosophy that was very obscure and very
imperfect. One must confess, notwithstanding, with the incomparable
Grotius, that there is sometimes gold hidden under the rubbish of the
monks' barbarous Latin. I have therefore oft-times wished that a man of
talent, whose office had necessitated his learning the language of the
Schoolmen, had chosen to extract thence whatever is of worth, and that
another Petau or Thomasius had done in respect of the Schoolmen what these
two learned men have done in respect of the Fathers. It would be a very
curious work, and very important for ecclesiastical history, and it would
continue the History of Dogmas up to the time of the Revival of Letters
(owing to which the aspect of things has changed) and even beyond that
point. For sundry dogmas, such as those of physical predetermination, of
mediate knowledge, philosophical sin, objective precisions, and many other
dogmas in speculative theology and even in the practical theology of cases
of conscience, came into currency even after the Council of Trent.
7. A little before these changes, and before the great schism in the West
that still endures, there was in Italy a sect of philosophers which
disputed this conformity of faith with reason which I maintain. They were
dubbed 'Averroists' because they were adherents of a famous Arab author,
who was called the Commentator by pre-eminence, and who appeared to be the
one of all his race that penetrated furthest into Aristotle's meaning. This
Commentator, extending what Greek expositors had already taught, maintained
that according to Aristotle, and even according to reason (and at that time
the two were considered almost identical) there was no case for the [78]
immortality of the soul. Here is his reasoning. The human kind is eternal,
according to Aristotle, therefore if individual souls die not, one must
resort to the metempsychosis rejected by that philosopher. Or, if there are
always new souls, one must admit the infinity of these souls existing from
all eternity; but actual infinity is impossible, according to the doctrine
of the same Aristotle. Therefore it is a necessary conclusion that the
souls, that is, the forms of organic bodies, must perish with the bodies,
or at least this must happen to the passive understanding that belongs to
each one individually. Thus there will only remain the active understanding
common to all men, which according to Aristotle comes from outside, and
which must work wheresoever the organs are suitably disposed; even as the
wind produces a kind of music when it is blown into properly adjusted organ
pipes.
8. Nothing could have been weaker than this would-be proof. It is not true
that Aristotle refuted metempsychosis, or that he proved the eternity of
the human kind; and after all, it is quite untrue that an actual infinity
is impossible. Yet this proof passed as irresistible amongst Aristotelians,
and induced in them the belief that there was a certain sublunary
intelligence and that our active intellect was produced by participation in
it. But others who adhered less to Aristotle went so far as to advocate a
universal soul forming the ocean of all individual souls, and believed this
universal soul alone capable of subsisting, whilst individual souls are
born and die. According to this opinion the souls of animals are born by
being separated like drops from their ocean, when they find a body which
they can animate; and they die by being reunited to the ocean of souls when
the body is destroyed, as streams are lost in the sea. Many even went so
far as to believe that God is that universal soul, although others thought
that this soul was subordinate and created. This bad doctrine is very
ancient and apt to dazzle the common herd. It is expressed in these
beautiful lines of Vergil (_Aen._, VI, v. 724):
_Principio coelum ac terram camposque liquentes,_
_Lucentemque globum Lunae Titaniaque astra,_
_Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus_
_Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet._
_Inde hominum pecudumque genus vitaeque volantum._
[79]
And again elsewhere (_Georg._, IV, v. 221):
_Deum namque ire per omnes_
_Terrasque tractusque maris caelumque profundum:_
_Hinc pecudes, armenta, viros, genus omne ferarum,_
_Quemque sibi tenues nascentem arcessere vitas._
_Scilicet huc reddi deinde ac resoluta referri._
9. Plato's Soul of the World has been taken in this sense by some, but
there is more indication that the Stoics succumbed to that universal soul
which swallows all the rest. Those who are of this opinion might be called
'Monopsychites', since according to them there is in reality only one soul
that subsists. M. Bernier observes that this is an opinion almost
universally accepted amongst scholars in Persia and in the States of the
Grand Mogul; it appears even that it has gained a footing with the
Cabalists and with the mystics. A certain German of Swabian birth,
converted to Judaism some years ago, who taught under the name Moses
Germanus, having adopted the dogmas of Spinoza, believed that Spinoza
revived the ancient Cabala of the Hebrews. And a learned man who confuted
this proselyte Jew appears to be of the same opinion. It is known that
Spinoza recognizes only substance in the world, whereof individual souls
are but transient modifications. Valentin Weigel, Pastor of Zschopau in
Saxony, a man of wit, even of excessive wit, although people would have it
that he was a visionary, was perhaps to some extent of that opinion; as was
also a man known as Johann Angelus Silesius, author of certain quite
pleasing little devotional verses in German, in the form of epigrams, which
have just been reprinted. In general, the mystics' doctrine of deification
was liable to such a sinister interpretation. Gerson already has written
opposing Ruysbroek, a mystical writer, whose intention was evidently good
and whose expressions are excusable. But it would be better to write in a
manner that has no need of excuses: although I confess that oft-times
expressions which are extravagant, and as it were poetical, have greater
force to move and to persuade than correct forms of statement.
10. The annihilation of all that belongs to us in our own right, carried to
great lengths by the Quietists, might equally well be veiled irreligion in
certain minds, as is related, for example, concerning the Quietism of Foë,
originator of a great Chinese sect. After having preached his religion [80]
for forty years, when he felt death was approaching, he declared to his
disciples that he had hidden the truth from them under the veil of
metaphors, and that all reduced itself to Nothingness, which he said was
the first source of all things. That was still worse, so it would seem,
than the opinion of the Averroists. Both of these doctrines are
indefensible and even extravagant; nevertheless some moderns have made no
difficulty about adopting this one and universal Soul that engulfs the
rest. It has met with only too much applause amongst the so-called
freethinkers, and M. de Preissac, a soldier and man of wit, who dabbled in
philosophy, at one time aired it publicly in his discourses. The System of
Pre-established Harmony is the one best qualified to cure this evil. For it
shows that there are of necessity substances which are simple and without
extension, scattered throughout all Nature; that these substances must
subsist independently of every other except God; and that they are never
wholly separated from organic body. Those who believe that souls capable of
feeling but incapable of reason are mortal, or who maintain that none but
reasoning souls can have feeling, offer a handle to the Monopsychites. For
it will ever be difficult to persuade men that beasts feel nothing; and
once the admission has been made that that which is capable of feeling can
die, it is difficult to found upon reason a proof of the immortality of our
souls.
11. I have made this short digression because it appeared to me seasonable
at a time when there is only too much tendency to overthrow natural
religion to its very foundations. I return then to the Averroists, who were
persuaded that their dogma was proved conclusively in accordance with
reason. As a result they declared that man's soul is, according to
philosophy, mortal, while they protested their acquiescence in Christian
theology, which declares the soul's immortality. But this distinction was
held suspect, and this divorce between faith and reason was vehemently
rejected by the prelates and the doctors of that time, and condemned in the
last Lateran Council under Leo X. On that occasion also, scholars were
urged to work for the removal of the difficulties that appeared to set
theology and philosophy at variance. The doctrine of their incompatibility
continued to hold its ground _incognito_. Pomponazzi was suspected of it,
although he declared himself otherwise; and that very sect of the
Averroists survived as a school. It is thought that Caesar Cremoninus, [81]
a philosopher famous in his time, was one of its mainstays. Andreas
Cisalpinus, a physician (and an author of merit who came nearest after
Michael Servetus to the discovery of the circulation of the blood), was
accused by Nicolas Taurel (in a book entitled _Alpes Caesae_) of belonging
to these anti-religious Peripatetics. Traces of this doctrine are found
also in the _Circulus Pisanus Claudii Berigardi_, an author of French
nationality who migrated to Italy and taught philosophy at Pisa: but
especially the writings and the letters of Gabriel Naudé, as well as the
_Naudaeana_, show that Averroism still lived on when this learned physician
was in Italy. Corpuscular philosophy, introduced shortly after, appears to
have extinguished this excessively Peripatetic sect, or perhaps to have
been intermixed with its teaching. It may be indeed that there have been
Atomists who would be inclined to teach dogmas like those of the
Averroists, if circumstances so permitted: but this abuse cannot harm such
good as there is in Corpuscular philosophy, which can very well be combined
with all that is sound in Plato and in Aristotle, and bring them both into
harmony with true theology.
12. The Reformers, and especially Luther, as I have already observed, spoke
sometimes as if they rejected philosophy, and deemed it inimical to faith.
But, properly speaking, Luther understood by philosophy only that which is
in conformity with the ordinary course of Nature, or perhaps even
philosophy as it was taught in the schools. Thus for example he says that
it is impossible in philosophy, that is, in the order of Nature, that the
word be made flesh; and he goes so far as to maintain that what is true in
natural philosophy might be false in ethics. Aristotle was the object of
his anger; and so far back as the year 1516 he contemplated the purging of
philosophy, when he perhaps had as yet no thoughts of reforming the Church.
But at last he curbed his vehemence and in the _Apology for the Augsburg
Confession_ allowed a favourable mention of Aristotle and his _Ethics_.
Melanchthon, a man of sound and moderate ideas, made little systems from
the several parts of philosophy, adapted to the truths of revelation and
useful in civic life, which deserve to be read even now. After him, Pierre
de la Ramée entered the lists. His philosophy was much in favour: the sect
of the Ramists was powerful in Germany, gaining many adherents among the
Protestants, and even concerning itself with theology, until the revival of
Corpuscular philosophy, which caused that of Ramée to fall into [82]
oblivion and weakened the authority of the Peripatetics.
13. Meanwhile sundry Protestant theologians, deviating as far as they could
from Scholastic philosophy, which prevailed in the opposite party, went so
far as to despise philosophy itself, which to them was suspect. The
controversy blazed up finally owing to the rancour of Daniel Hoffmann. He
was an able theologian, who had previously gained a reputation at the
Conference of Quedlinburg, when Tilemann Heshusius and he had supported
Duke Julius of Brunswick in his refusal to accept the Formula of Concord.
For some reason or other Dr. Hoffmann flew into a passion with philosophy,
instead of being content to find fault with the wrong uses made thereof by
philosophers. He was, however, aiming at the famous Caselius, a man
esteemed by the princes and scholars of his time; and Henry Julius, Duke of
Brunswick (son of Julius, founder of the University), having taken the
trouble himself to investigate the matter, condemned the theologian. There
have been some small disputes of the kind since, but it has always been
found that they were misunderstandings. Paul Slevogt, a famous Professor at
Jena in Thuringia, whose still extant treatises prove how well versed he
was in Scholastic philosophy, as also in Hebrew literature, had published
in his youth under the title of _Pervigilium_ a little book 'de dissidio
Theologi et Philosophi in utriusque principiis fundato', bearing on the
question whether God is accidentally the cause of sin. But it was easy to
see that his aim was to demonstrate that theologians sometimes misuse
philosophical terms.
14. To come now to the events of my own time, I remember that when in 1666
Louis Meyer, a physician of Amsterdam, published anonymously the book
entitled _Philosophia Scripturae Interpres_ (by many persons wrongly
attributed to Spinoza, his friend) the theologians of Holland bestirred
themselves, and their written attacks upon this book gave rise to great
disputes among them. Divers of them held the opinion that the Cartesians,
in confuting the anonymous philosopher, had conceded too much to
philosophy. Jean de Labadie (before he had seceded from the Reformed
Church, his pretext being some abuses which he said had crept into public
observance and which he considered intolerable) attacked the book by Herr
von Wollzogen, and called it pernicious. On the other hand Herr Vogelsang,
Herr van der Weye and some other anti-Cocceïans also assailed the same [83]
book with much acrimony. But the accused won his case in a Synod.
Afterwards in Holland people spoke of 'rational' and 'non-rational'
theologians, a party distinction often mentioned by M. Bayle, who finally
declared himself against the former. But there is no indication that any
precise rules have yet been defined which the rival parties accept or
reject with regard to the use of reason in the interpretation of Holy
Scripture.
15. A like dispute has threatened of late to disturb the peace in the
Churches of the Augsburg Confession. Some Masters of Arts in the University
of Leipzig gave private lessons at their homes, to students who sought them
out in order to learn what is called 'Sacra Philologia', according to the
practice of this university and of some others where this kind of study is
not restricted to the Faculty of Theology. These masters pressed the study
of the Holy Scriptures and the practice of piety further than their fellows
had been wont to do. It is alleged that they had carried certain things to
excess, and aroused suspicions of certain doctrinal innovations. This
caused them to be dubbed 'Pietists', as though they were a new sect; and
this name is one which has since caused a great stir in Germany. It has
been applied somehow or other to those whom one suspected, or pretended to
suspect, of fanaticism, or even of hypocrisy, concealed under some
semblance of reform. Now some of the students attending these masters had
become conspicuous for behaviour which gave general offence, and amongst
other things for their scorn of philosophy, even, so it was said, burning
their notebooks. In consequence the belief arose that their masters
rejected philosophy: but they justified themselves very well; nor could
they be convicted either of this error or of the heresies that were being
imputed to them.
16. The question of the use of philosophy in theology was debated much
amongst Christians, and difficulty was experienced over settling the limits
of its use when it came to detailed consideration. The Mysteries of the
Trinity, of the Incarnation and of the Holy Communion gave most occasion
for dispute. The new Photinians, disputing the first two Mysteries, made
use of certain philosophic maxims which Andreas Kessler, a theologian of
the Augsburg Confession, summarized in the various treatises that he
published on the parts of the Socinian philosophy. But as to their
metaphysics, one might instruct oneself better therein by reading the [84]
work of Christopher Stegmann the Socinian. It is not yet in print; but I
saw it in my youth and it has been recently again in my hands.
17. Calovius and Scherzer, authors well versed in Scholastic philosophy,
and sundry other able theologians answered the Socinians at great length,
and often with success: for they would not content themselves with the
general and somewhat cavalier answers that were commonly used against that
sect. The drift of such answers was: that their maxims were good in
philosophy and not in theology; that it was the fault of heterogeneousness
called [Greek: metábasis eis állo génos] to apply those maxims to a matter
transcending reason; and that philosophy should be treated as a servant and
not a mistress in relation to theology, according to the title of the book
by a Scot named Robert Baronius, _Philosophia Theologiae ancillans_. In
fine, philosophy was a Hagar beside Sara and must be driven from the house
with her Ishmael when she was refractory. There is something good in these
answers: but one might abuse them, and set natural truths and truths of
revelation at variance. Scholars therefore applied themselves to
distinguishing between what is necessary and indispensable in natural or
philosophic truths and that which is not so.
18. The two Protestant parties are tolerably in agreement when it is a
question of making war on the Socinians; and as the philosophy of these
sectaries is not of the most exact, in most cases the attack succeeded in
reducing it. But the Protestants themselves had dissensions on the matter
of the Eucharistic Sacrament. A section of those who are called Reformed
(namely those who on that point follow rather Zwingli than Calvin) seemed
to reduce the participation in the body of Jesus Christ in the Holy
Communion to a mere figurative representation, employing the maxim of the
philosophers which states that a body can only be in one place at a time.
Contrariwise the Evangelicals (who name themselves thus in a particular
sense to distinguish themselves from the Reformed), being more attached to
the literal sense of Scripture, opined with Luther that this participation
was real, and that here there lay a supernatural Mystery. They reject, in
truth, the dogma of Transubstantiation, which they believe to be without
foundation in the Text; neither do they approve that of Consubstantiation
or of Impanation, which one could only impute to them if one were
ill-informed on their opinion. For they admit no inclusion of the body [85]
of Jesus Christ in the bread, nor do they even require any union of the one
with the other: but they demand at least a concomitance, so that these two
substances be received both at the same time. They believe that the
ordinary sense of the words of Jesus Christ on an occasion so important as
that which concerned the expression of his last wishes ought to be
preserved. Thus in order to show that this sense is free from all absurdity
which could make it repugnant to us, they maintain that the philosophic
maxim restricting the existence of, and partaking in, bodies to one place
alone is simply a consequence of the ordinary course of Nature. They make
that no obstacle to the presence, in the ordinary sense of the word, of the
body of our Saviour in such form as may be in keeping with the most
glorified body. They do not resort to a vague diffusion of ubiquity, which
would disperse the body and leave it nowhere in particular; nor do they
admit the multiple-reduplication theory of some Schoolmen, as if to say one
and the same body could be at the same time seated here and standing
elsewhere. In fine, they so express themselves that many consider the
opinion of Calvin, authorized by sundry confessions of faith from the
Churches that have accepted his teaching, to be not so far removed from the
Augsburg Confession as one might think: for he affirmed a partaking in the
substance. The divergence rests perhaps only upon the fact that Calvin
demands true faith in addition to the oral reception of the symbols, and
consequently excludes the unworthy.
19. Thence we see that the dogma of real and substantial participation can
be supported (without resorting to the strange opinions of some Schoolmen)
by a properly understood analogy between _immediate operation_ and
_presence_. Many philosophers have deemed that, even in the order of
Nature, a body may operate from a distance immediately on many remote
bodies at the same time. So do they believe, all the more, that nothing can
prevent divine Omnipotence from causing one body to be present in many
bodies together, since the transition from immediate operation to presence
is but slight, the one perhaps depending upon the other. It is true that
modern philosophers for some time now have denied the immediate natural
operation of one body upon another remote from it, and I confess that I am
of their opinion. Meanwhile remote operation has just been revived in
England by the admirable Mr. Newton, who maintains that it is the nature of
bodies to be attracted and gravitate one towards another, in proportion[86]
to the mass of each one, and the rays of attraction it receives.
Accordingly the famous Mr. Locke, in his answer to Bishop Stillingfleet,
declares that having seen Mr. Newton's book he retracts what he himself
said, following the opinion of the moderns, in his _Essay concerning Human
Understanding_, to wit, that a body cannot operate immediately upon another
except by touching it upon its surface and driving it by its motion. He
acknowledges that God can put properties into matter which cause it to
operate from a distance. Thus the theologians of the Augsburg Confession
claim that God may ordain not only that a body operate immediately on
divers bodies remote from one another, but that it even exist in their
neighbourhood and be received by them in a way with which distances of
place and dimensions of space have nothing to do. Although this effect
transcends the forces of Nature, they do not think it possible to show that
it surpasses the power of the Author of Nature. For him it is easy to annul
the laws that he has given or to dispense with them as seems good to him,
in the same way as he was able to make iron float upon water and to stay
the operation of fire upon the human body.
20. I found in comparing the _Rationale Theologicum_ of Nicolaus Vedelius
with the refutation by Johann Musaeus that these two authors, of whom one
died while a Professor at Franecker after having taught at Geneva and the
other finally became the foremost theologian at Jena, are more or less in
agreement on the principal rules for the use of reason, but that it is in
the application of these rules they disagree. For they both agree that
revelation cannot be contrary to the truths whose necessity is called by
philosophers 'logical' or 'metaphysical', that is to say, whose opposite
implies contradiction. They both admit also that revelation will be able to
combat maxims whose necessity is called 'physical' and is founded only upon
the laws that the will of God has prescribed for Nature. Thus the question
whether the presence of one and the same body in divers places is possible
in the supernatural order only touches the application of the rule; and in
order to decide this question conclusively by reason, one must needs
explain exactly wherein the essence of body consists. Even the Reformed
disagree thereon amongst themselves; the Cartesians confine it to
extension, but their adversaries oppose that; and I think I have even
observed that Gisbertus Voëtius, a famous theologian of Utrecht, [87]
doubted the alleged impossibility of plurality of locations.
21. Furthermore, although the two Protestant parties agree that one must
distinguish these two necessities which I have just indicated, namely
metaphysical necessity and physical necessity, and that the first excludes
exceptions even in the case of Mysteries, they are not yet sufficiently
agreed upon the rules of interpretation, which serve to determine in what
cases it is permitted to desert the letter of Scripture when one is not
certain that it is contrary to strictly universal truths. It is agreed that
there are cases where one must reject a literal interpretation that is not
absolutely impossible, when it is otherwise unsuitable. For instance, all
commentators agree that when our Lord said that Herod was a fox he meant it
metaphorically; and one must accept that, unless one imagine with some
fanatics that for the time the words of our Lord lasted Herod was actually
changed into a fox. But it is not the same with the texts on which
Mysteries are founded, where the theologians of the Augsburg Confession
deem that one must keep to the literal sense. Since, moreover, this
discussion belongs to the art of interpretation and not to that which is
the proper sphere of logic, we will not here enter thereon, especially as
it has nothing in common with the disputes that have arisen recently upon
the conformity of faith with reason.
22. Theologians of all parties, I believe (fanatics alone excepted), agree
at least that no article of faith must imply contradiction or contravene
proofs as exact as those of mathematics, where the opposite of the
conclusion can be reduced _ad absurdum_, that is, to contradiction. St.
Athanasius with good reason made sport of the preposterous ideas of some
writers of his time, who maintained that God had suffered without any
suffering. _'Passus est impassibiliter. O ludicram doctrinam aedificantem
simul et demolientem!'_ It follows thence that certain writers have been
too ready to grant that the Holy Trinity is contrary to that great
principle which states that two things which are the same as a third are
also the same as each other: that is to say, if A is the same as B, and if
C is the same as B, then A and C must also be the same as each other. For
this principle is a direct consequence of that of contradiction, and forms
the basis of all logic; and if it ceases, we can no longer reason with
certainty. Thus when one says that the Father is God, that the Son is God
and that the Holy Spirit is God, and that nevertheless there is only [88]
one God, although these three Persons differ from one another, one must
consider that this word _God_ has not the same sense at the beginning as at
the end of this statement. Indeed it signifies now the Divine Substance and
now a Person of the Godhead. In general, one must take care never to
abandon the necessary and eternal truths for the sake of upholding
Mysteries, lest the enemies of religion seize upon such an occasion for
decrying both religion and Mysteries.
23. The distinction which is generally drawn between that which is _above_
reason and that which is _against_ reason is tolerably in accord with the
distinction which has just been made between the two kinds of necessity.
For what is contrary to reason is contrary to the absolutely certain and
inevitable truths; and what is above reason is in opposition only to what
one is wont to experience or to understand. That is why I am surprised that
there are people of intelligence who dispute this distinction, and that M.
Bayle should be of this number. The distinction is assuredly very well
founded. A truth is above reason when our mind (or even every created mind)
cannot comprehend it. Such is, as it seems to me, the Holy Trinity; such
are the miracles reserved for God alone, as for instance Creation; such is
the choice of the order of the universe, which depends upon universal
harmony, and upon the clear knowledge of an infinity of things at once. But
a truth can never be contrary to reason, and once a dogma has been disputed
and refuted by reason, instead of its being incomprehensible, one may say
that nothing is easier to understand, nor more obvious, than its absurdity.
For I observed at the beginning that by REASON here I do not mean the
opinions and discourses of men, nor even the habit they have formed of
judging things according to the usual course of Nature, but rather the
inviolable linking together of truths.
24. I must come now to the great question which M. Bayle brought up
recently, to wit, whether a truth, and especially a truth of faith, can
prove to be subject to irrefutable objections. This excellent author
appears to answer with a bold affirmative: he quotes theologians of repute
in his party, and even in the Church of Rome, who appear to say the same as
he affirms; and he cites philosophers who have believed that there are even
philosophical truths whose champions cannot answer the objections that are
brought up against them. He believes that the theological doctrine of [89]
predestination is of this nature, and in philosophy that of the composition
of the _Continuum_. These are, indeed, the two labyrinths which have ever
exercised theologians and philosophers. Libertus Fromondus, a theologian of
Louvain (a great friend of Jansenius, whose posthumous book entitled
_Augustinus_ he in fact published), who also wrote a book entitled
explicitly _Labyrinthus de Compositione Continui_, experienced in full
measure the difficulties inherent in both doctrines; and the renowned
Ochino admirably presented what he calls 'the labyrinths of
predestination'.
25. But these writers have not denied the possibility of finding thread in
the labyrinth; they have recognized the difficulty, but they have surely
not turned difficulty into sheer impossibility. As for me, I confess that I
cannot agree with those who maintain that a truth can admit of irrefutable
objections: for is an _objection_ anything but an argument whose conclusion
contradicts our thesis? And is not an irrefutable argument a
_demonstration_? And how can one know the certainty of demonstrations
except by examining the argument in detail, the form and the matter, in
order to see if the form is good, and then if each premiss is either
admitted or proved by another argument of like force, until one is able to
make do with admitted premisses alone? Now if there is such an objection
against our thesis we must say that the falsity of this thesis is
demonstrated, and that it is impossible for us to have reasons sufficient
to prove it; otherwise two contradictories would be true at once. One must
always yield to proofs, whether they be proposed in positive form or
advanced in the shape of objections. And it is wrong and fruitless to try
to weaken opponents' proofs, under the pretext that they are only
objections, since the opponent can play the same game and can reverse the
denominations, exalting his arguments by naming them 'proofs' and sinking
ours under the blighting title of 'objections'.
26. It is another question whether we are always obliged to examine the
objections we may have to face, and to retain some doubt in respect of our
own opinion, or what is called _formido oppositi_, until this examination
has been made. I would venture to say no, for otherwise one would never
attain to certainty and our conclusion would be always provisional. I
believe that able geometricians will scarce be troubled by the objections
of Joseph Scaliger against Archimedes, or by those of Mr. Hobbes [90]
against Euclid; but that is because they have fully understood and are sure
of the proofs. Nevertheless it is sometimes well to show oneself ready to
examine certain objections. On the one hand it may serve to rescue people
from their error, while on the other we ourselves may profit by it; for
specious fallacies often contain some useful solution and bring about the
removal of considerable difficulties. That is why I have always liked
ingenious objections made against my own opinions, and I have never
examined them without profit: witness those which M. Bayle formerly made
against my System of Pre-established Harmony, not to mention those which M.
Arnauld, M. l'Abbé Foucher and Father Lami, O.S.B., made to me on the same
subject. But to return to the principal question, I conclude from reasons I
have just set forth that when an objection is put forward against some
truth, it is always possible to answer it satisfactorily.
27. It may be also that M. Bayle does not mean 'insoluble objections' in
the sense that I have just explained. I observe that he varies, at least in
his expressions: for in his posthumous Reply to M. le Clerc he does not
admit that one can bring demonstrations against the truths of faith. It
appears therefore that he takes the objections to be insoluble only in
respect of our present degree of enlightenment; and in this Reply, p. 35,
he even does not despair of the possibility that one day a solution
hitherto unknown may be found by someone. Concerning that more will be said
later. I hold an opinion, however, that will perchance cause surprise,
namely that this solution has been discovered entire, and is not even
particularly difficult. Indeed a mediocre intelligence capable of
sufficient care, and using correctly the rules of common logic, is in a
position to answer the most embarrassing objection made against truth, when
the objection is only taken from reason, and when it is claimed to be a
'demonstration'. Whatever scorn the generality of moderns have to-day for
the logic of Aristotle, one must acknowledge that it teaches infallible
ways of resisting error in these conjunctures. For one has only to examine
the argument according to the rules and it will always be possible to see
whether it is lacking in form or whether there are premisses such as are
not yet proved by a good argument.
28. It is quite another matter when there is only a question of
_probabilities_, for the art of judging from probable reasons is not yet
well established; so that our logic in this connexion is still very [91]
imperfect, and to this very day we have little beyond the art of judging
from demonstrations. But this art is sufficient here: for when it is a
question of opposing reason to an article of our faith, one is not
disturbed by objections that only attain probability. Everyone agrees that
appearances are against Mysteries, and that they are by no means probable
when regarded only from the standpoint of reason; but it suffices that they
have in them nothing of absurdity. Thus demonstrations are required if they
are to be refuted.
29. And doubtless we are so to understand it when Holy Scripture warns us
that the wisdom of God is foolishness before men, and when St. Paul
observed that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is foolishness unto the Greeks, as
well as unto the Jews a stumbling-block. For, after all, one truth cannot
contradict another, and the light of reason is no less a gift of God than
that of revelation. Also it is a matter of no difficulty among theologians
who are expert in their profession, that the motives of credibility
justify, once for all, the authority of Holy Scripture before the tribunal
of reason, so that reason in consequence gives way before it, as before a
new light, and sacrifices thereto all its probabilities. It is more or less
as if a new president sent by the prince must show his letters patent in
the assembly where he is afterwards to preside. That is the tendency of
sundry good books that we have on the truth of religion, such as those of
Augustinus Steuchus, of Du Plessis-Mornay or of Grotius: for the true
religion must needs have marks that the false religions have not, else
would Zoroaster, Brahma, Somonacodom and Mahomet be as worthy of belief as
Moses and Jesus Christ. Nevertheless divine faith itself, when it is
kindled in the soul, is something more than an opinion, and depends not
upon the occasions or the motives that have given it birth; it advances
beyond the intellect, and takes possession of the will and of the heart, to
make us act with zeal and joyfully as the law of God commands. Then we have
no further need to think of reasons or to pause over the difficulties of
argument which the mind may anticipate.
30. Thus what we have just said of human reason, which is extolled and
decried by turns, and often without rule or measure, may show our lack of
exactitude and how much we are accessary to our own errors. Nothing would
be so easy to terminate as these disputes on the rights of faith and of
reason if men would make use of the commonest rules of logic and reason[92]
with even a modicum of attention. Instead of that, they become involved in
oblique and ambiguous phrases, which give them a fine field for
declamation, to make the most of their wit and their learning. It would
seem, indeed, that they have no wish to see the naked truth, peradventure
because they fear that it may be more disagreeable than error: for they
know not the beauty of the Author of all things, who is the source of
truth.
31. This negligence is a general defect of humanity, and one not to be laid
to the charge of any particular person. _Abundamus dulcibus vitiis_, as
Quintilian said of the style of Seneca, and we take pleasure in going
astray. Exactitude incommodes us and rules we regard as puerilities. Thus
it is that common logic (although it is more or less sufficient for the
examination of arguments that tend towards certainty) is relegated to
schoolboys; and there is not even a thought for a kind of logic which
should determine the balance between probabilities, and would be so
necessary in deliberations of importance. So true is it that our mistakes
for the most part come from scorn or lack of the art of thinking: for
nothing is more imperfect than our logic when we pass beyond necessary
arguments. The most excellent philosophers of our time, such as the authors
of _The Art of Thinking_, of _The Search for Truth_ and of the _Essay
concerning Human Understanding_, have been very far from indicating to us
the true means fitted to assist the faculty whose business it is to make us
weigh the probabilities of the true and the false: not to mention the art
of discovery, in which success is still more difficult of attainment, and
whereof we have nothing beyond very imperfect samples in mathematics.
32. One thing which might have contributed most towards M. Bayle's belief
that the difficulties of reason in opposition to faith cannot be obviated
is that he seems to demand that God be justified in some such manner as
that commonly used for pleading the cause of a man accused before his
judge. But he has not remembered that in the tribunals of men, which cannot
always penetrate to the truth, one is often compelled to be guided by signs
and probabilities, and above all by presumptions or prejudices; whereas it
is agreed, as we have already observed, that Mysteries are not probable.
For instance, M. Bayle will not have it that one can justify the goodness
of God in the permission of sin, because probability would be against a man
that should happen to be in circumstances comparable in our eyes to [93]
this permission. God foresees that Eve will be deceived by the serpent if
he places her in the circumstances wherein she later found herself; and
nevertheless he placed her there. Now if a father or a guardian did the
same in regard to his child or his ward, if a friend did so in regard to a
young person whose behaviour was his concern, the judge would not be
satisfied by the excuses of an advocate who said that the man only
permitted the evil, without doing it or willing it: he would rather take
this permission as a sign of ill intention, and would regard it as a sin of
omission, which would render the one convicted thereof accessary in
another's sin of commission.
33. But it must be borne in mind that when one has foreseen the evil and
has not prevented it although it seems as if one could have done so with
ease, and one has even done things that have facilitated it, it does not
follow on that account _necessarily_ that one is accessary thereto. It is
only a very strong presumption, such as commonly replaces truth in human
affairs, but which would be destroyed by an exact consideration of the
facts, supposing we were capable of that in relation to God. For amongst
lawyers that is called 'presumption' which must provisionally pass for
truth in case the contrary is not proved; and it says more than
'conjecture', although the _Dictionary_ of the Academy has not sifted the
difference. Now there is every reason to conclude unquestionably that one
would find through this consideration, if only it were attainable, that
reasons most just, and stronger than those which appear contrary to them,
have compelled the All-Wise to permit the evil, and even to do things which
have facilitated it. Of this some instances will be given later.
34. It is none too easy, I confess, for a father, a guardian, a friend to
have such reasons in the case under consideration. Yet the thing is not
absolutely impossible, and a skilled writer of fiction might perchance find
an extraordinary case that would even justify a man in the circumstances I
have just indicated. But in reference to God there is no need to suppose or
to establish particular reasons such as may have induced him to permit the
evil; general reasons suffice. One knows that he takes care of the whole
universe, whereof all the parts are connected; and one must thence infer
that he has had innumerable considerations whose result made him deem it
inadvisable to prevent certain evils.
35. It should even be concluded that there must have been great or [94]
rather invincible reasons which prompted the divine Wisdom to the
permission of the evil that surprises us, from the mere fact that this
permission has occurred: for nothing can come from God that is not
altogether consistent with goodness, justice and holiness. Thus we can
judge by the event (or _a posteriori_) that the permission was
indispensable, although it be not possible for us to show this (_a priori_)
by the detailed reasons that God can have had therefor; as it is not
necessary either that we show this to justify him. M. Bayle himself aptly
says concerning that (_Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_, vol. III,
ch. 165, p. 1067): Sin made its way into the world; God therefore was able
to permit it without detriment to his perfections; _ab actu ad potentiam
valet consequentia._ In God this conclusion holds good: he did this,
therefore he did it well. It is not, then, that we have no notion of
justice in general fit to be applied also to God's justice; nor is it that
God's justice has other rules than the justice known of men, but that the
case in question is quite different from those which are common among men.
Universal right is the same for God and for men; but the question of fact
is quite different in their case and his.
36. We may even assume or pretend (as I have already observed) that there
is something similar among men to this circumstance in God's actions. A man
might give such great and strong proofs of his virtue and his holiness that
all the most apparent reasons one could put forward against him to charge
him with an alleged crime, for instance a larceny or murder, would deserve
to be rejected as the calumnies of false witnesses or as an extraordinary
play of chance which sometimes throws suspicion on the most innocent. Thus
in a case where every other would run the risk of being condemned or put to
the torture (according to the laws of the country), this man would be
absolved by his judges unanimously. Now in this case, which indeed is rare,
but which is not impossible, one might say in a sense (_sano sensu_) that
there is a conflict between reason and faith, and that the rules of law are
other in respect of this person than they are in respect of the remainder
of mankind. But that, when explained, will signify only that appearances of
reason here give way before the faith that is due to the word and the
integrity of this great and holy man, and that he is privileged above other
men; not indeed as if there were one law for others and another for him,
nor as if one had no understanding of what justice is in relation to him.
It is rather because the rules of universal justice do not find here [95]
the application that they receive elsewhere, or because they favour him
instead of accusing him, since there are in this personage qualities so
admirable, that by virtue of a good logic of probabilities one should place
more faith in his word than in that of many others.
37. Since it is permitted here to imagine possible cases, may one not
suppose this incomparable man to be the Adept or the Possessor of
_'that blessed Stone_
_Able to enrich all earthly Kings alone'_
and that he spends every day prodigious sums in order to feed and to rescue
from distress countless numbers of poor men? Be there never so many
witnesses or appearances of every kind tending to prove that this great
benefactor of the human race has just committed some larceny, is it not
true that the whole earth would make mock of the accusation, however
specious it might be? Now God is infinitely above the goodness and the
power of this man, and consequently there are no reasons at all, however
apparent they be, that can hold good against faith, that is, against the
assurance or the confidence in God wherewith we can and ought to say that
God has done all things well. The objections are therefore not insoluble.
They only involve prejudices and probabilities, which are, however,
overthrown by reasons incomparably stronger. One must not say either that
what we call _justice_ is nothing in relation to God, that he is the
absolute Master of all things even to the point of being able to condemn
the innocent without violating his justice, or finally that justice is
something arbitrary where he is concerned. Those are rash and dangerous
expressions, whereunto some have been led astray to the discredit of the
attributes of God. For if such were the case there would be no reason for
praising his goodness and his justice: rather would it be as if the most
wicked spirit, the Prince of evil genii, the evil principle of the
Manichaeans, were the sole master of the universe, just as I observed
before. What means would there be of distinguishing the true God from the
false God of Zoroaster if all things depended upon the caprice of an
arbitrary power and there were neither rule nor consideration for anything
whatever?
38. It is therefore more than evident that nothing compels us to commit
ourselves to a doctrine so strange, since it suffices to say that we [96]
have not enough knowledge of the facts when there is a question of
answering probabilities which appear to throw doubt upon the justice and
the goodness of God, and which would vanish away if the facts were well
known to us. We need neither renounce reason in order to listen to faith
nor blind ourselves in order to see clearly, as Queen Christine used to
say: it is enough to reject ordinary appearances when they are contrary to
Mysteries; and this is not contrary to reason, since even in natural things
we are very often undeceived about appearances either by experience or by
superior reasons. All that has been set down here in advance, only with the
object of showing more plainly wherein the fault of the objections and the
abuse of reason consists in the present case, where the claim is made that
reason has greatest force against faith: we shall come afterwards to a more
exact discussion of that which concerns the origin of evil and the
permission of sin with its consequences.
39. For now, it will be well to continue our examination of the important
question of the use of reason in theology, and to make reflexions upon what
M. Bayle has said thereon in divers passages of his works. As he paid
particular attention in his _Historical and Critical Dictionary_ to
expounding the objections of the Manichaeans and those of the Pyrrhonians,
and as this procedure had been criticized by some persons zealous for
religion, he placed a dissertation at the end of the second edition of this
_Dictionary_, which aimed at showing, by examples, by authorities and by
reasons, the innocence and usefulness of his course of action. I am
persuaded (as I have said above) that the specious objections one can urge
against truth are very useful, and that they serve to confirm and to
illumine it, giving opportunity to intelligent persons to find new openings
or to turn the old to better account. But M. Bayle seeks therein a
usefulness quite the reverse of this: it would be that of displaying the
power of faith by showing that the truths it teaches cannot sustain the
attacks of reason and that it nevertheless holds its own in the heart of
the faithful. M. Nicole seems to call that 'the triumph of God's authority
over human reason', in the words of his quoted by M. Bayle in the third
volume of his _Reply to the Questions of a Provincial_ (ch. 177, p. 120).
But since reason is a gift of God, even as faith is, contention between
them would cause God to contend against God; and if the objections of
reason against any article of faith are insoluble, then it must be said
that this alleged article will be false and not revealed: this will be [97]
a chimera of the human mind, and the triumph of this faith will be capable
of comparison with bonfires lighted after a defeat. Such is the doctrine of
the damnation of unbaptized children, which M. Nicole would have us assume
to be a consequence of original sin; such would be the eternal damnation of
adults lacking the light that is necessary for the attainment of salvation.
40. Yet everyone need not enter into theological discussions; and persons
whose condition allows not of exact researches should be content with
instruction on faith, without being disturbed by the objections; and if
some exceeding great difficulty should happen to strike them, it is
permitted to them to avert the mind from it, offering to God a sacrifice of
their curiosity: for when one is assured of a truth one has no need to
listen to the objections. As there are many people whose faith is rather
small and shallow to withstand such dangerous tests, I think one must not
present them with that which might be poisonous for them; or, if one cannot
hide from them what is only too public, the antidote must be added to it;
that is to say, one must try to add the answer to the objection, certainly
not withhold it as unobtainable.
41. The passages from the excellent theologians who speak of this triumph
of faith can and should receive a meaning appropriate to the principles I
have just affirmed. There appear in some objects of faith two great
qualities capable of making it triumph over reason, the one is
_incomprehensibility_, the other is _the lack of probability_. But one must
beware of adding thereto the third quality whereof M. Bayle speaks, and of
saying that what one believes is _indefensible_: for that would be to cause
reason in its turn to triumph in a manner that would destroy faith.
Incomprehensibility does not prevent us from believing even natural truths.
For instance (as I have already pointed out) we do not comprehend the
nature of odours and savours, and yet we are persuaded, by a kind of faith
which we owe to the evidence of the senses, that these perceptible
qualities are founded upon the nature of things and that they are not
illusions.