[779] Gassendi Opera, vol. vi., p. 130. These letters are interesting to those who would study the philosophy of Gassendi.
[780] Baillet, in his Life of Descartes, would lead us to think that Gassendi was too much influenced by personal motives in writing against Descartes, who had mentioned the phenomena of parhelia, without alluding to a dissertation of Gassendi on the subject. The latter, it seems, owns in a letter to Rivet that he should not have examined so closely the metaphysics of Descartes, if he had been treated by him with as much politeness as he had expected. Vie de Descartes, liv. vi. The retort of Descartes, O caro! (see chap. xx. of this work, p. 497) offended Gassendi, and caused a coldness; which, according to Baillet, Sorbière aggravated acting a treacherous part in exasperating the mind of Gassendi.
Bernier’s epitome of Gassendi. 27. Stewart had evidently little or no knowledge of the Syntagma Philosophicum. But he had seen an Abridgment of the Philosophy of Gassendi by Bernier, published at Lyons in 1678, and finding in this the doctrine of Locke on ideas of reflection, conceived that it did not faithfully represent its own original. But this was hardly a very plausible conjecture; Bernier being a man of considerable ability, an intimate friend of Gassendi, and his epitome being so far from concise that it extends to eight small volumes. Having not indeed collated the two books, but read them within a short interval of time, I can say that Bernier has given a faithful account of the philosophy of Gassendi, as it is contained in the Syntagma Philosophicum, for he takes notice of no other work; nor has he here added anything of his own. But in 1682 he published another little book, entitled, Doutes de M. Bernier sur quelques uns des principaux Chapitres de son Abrégé de la Philosophie de Gassendi. One of these doubts relates to the existence of space; and in another place he denies the reality of eternity or abstract duration. Bernier observes, as Descartes had done, that it is vain and even dangerous to attempt a definition of evident things, such as motion, because we are apt to mistake a definition of the word for one of the thing; and philosophers seem to conceive that motion is a real being, when they talk of a billiard-ball communicating or losing it.[781]
[781] Even Gassendi has defined duration “an incorporeal flowing extension,” which is a good instance of the success that can attend such definitions of simple ideas.
Process of Cartesian philosophy. 28. The Cartesian philosophy, which its adversaries had expected to expire with its founder, spread more and more after his death, nor had it ever depended on any personal favour or popularity of Descartes, since he did not possess such except with a few friends. The churches and schools of Holland were full of Cartesians. The old scholastic philosophy became ridiculous, its distinctions, its maxims were laughed at, as its adherents complain; and probably a more fatal blow was given to the Aristotelian system by Descartes than even by Bacon. The Cartesian theories were obnoxious to the rigid class of theologians; but two parties of considerable importance in Holland, the Arminians and the Coccejans, generally espoused the new philosophy. Many speculations in theology were immediately connected with it, and it acted on the free and scrutinising spirit which began to sap the bulwarks of established orthodoxy. The Cartesians were denounced in ecclesiastical synods, and were hardly admitted to any office in the church. They were condemned by several universities, and especially by that of Leyden, in 1678, for the position that the truth of scripture must be proved by reason.[782] Nor were they less exposed to persecution in France.[783]
[782] Leyden had condemned the whole Cartesian system as early as 1651, on the ground that it was an innovation on the Aristotelian philosophy so long received; and ordained, ut in Academia intra Aristotelicæ philosophiæ limites, quæ hic hactenus recepta fuit, nos contineamus, utque in posterum nec philosophiæ, neque nominis Cartesiani in disputationibus lectionibus aut publicis aliis exercitiis, nec pro nec contra mentio fiat. Utrecht, in 1644, had gone farther, and her decree is couched in terms which might have been used by anyone who wished to ridicule university prejudice by a forgery. Rejicere novam istam philosophiam, primo quia veteri philosophiæ, quam Academiæ toto orbi terrarum hactenus optimo consilio docuere, adversatur, ejusque fundamenta subvertit; deinde quia juventutem a veteri et sana philosophia avertit, impeditque quo minus ad culmen eruditionis provehatur; eo quod istius præsumptæ philosophiæ adminiculo et technologemata in auctorum libris professorumque lectionibus et disputationibus usitata, percipere, nequit; postremo quod ex eadem variæ falsæ et absurdæ opiniones partim consignantur, partim ab improvida juventute deduci possint pugnantes cum cæteris disciplinis et facultatibus, atque imprimis cum orthodoxa theologia; censere igitur et statuere omnes philosophiam in hac academia docentes imposterum a tali instituto et incepto abstinere debere, contentos modica libertate dissentiendi in singularibus nonnullis opinionibus ad aliarum celebrium Academiarum exemplum hic usitata, ita ut veteris et receptæ philosophiæ fundamenta non labefactent. Tepel. Hist. Philos. Cartesianæ, p. 75.
[783] An account of the manner in which the Cartesians were harassed through the Jesuits is given by M. Cousin, in the Journal des Sçavans, March, 1838.
29. The Cartesian philosophy, in one sense, carried in itself the seeds of its own decline; it was the Scylla of many dogs; it taught men to think for themselves, and to think often better than Descartes had done. A new eclectic philosophy, or rather the genuine spirit of free inquiry, made Cartesianism cease as a sect, though it left much that had been introduced by it. We owe thanks to these Cartesians of the seventeenth century for their strenuous assertion of reason against prescriptive authority: the latter part of this age was signalised by the overthrow of a despotism which had fought every inch in its retreat, and it was manifestly after a struggle, on the continent, with this new philosophy, that it was ultimately vanquished.[784]
[784] For the fate of the Cartesian philosophy in the life of its founder, see the life of Descartes by Baillet, 2 vols., in quarto, which he afterwards abridged in 12mo. After the death of Descartes, it may be best traced by means of Brucker. Buhle, as usual, is a mere copyist of his predecessor. He has, however, given a fuller account of Regis. A contemporary History of Cartesian Philosophy by Tepel contains rather a neatly written summary of the controversies it excited both in the lifetime of Descartes and for a few years afterwards.
La Forge. Regis. 30. The Cartesian writers of France, the Low Countries, and Germany, were numerous and respectable. La Forge of Saumur first developed the theory of occasional causes to explain the union of soul and body, wherein he was followed by Geulinx, Regis, Wittich, and Malebranche.[785] But this and other innovations displeased the stricter Cartesians who did not find them in their master. Clauberg in Germany, Clerselier in France, Le Grand in the Low Countries, should be mentioned among the leaders of the school. But no one has left so comprehensive a statement and defence of Cartesianism, as Jean Silvain Regis, whose système de la Philosophie, in three quarto volumes, appeared at Paris in 1690. It is divided into four parts, on Logic, Metaphysics, Physics, and Ethics. In the three latter, Regis claims nothing as his own except some explanations, “All that I have said, being due to M. Descartes, whose method and principles I have followed, even in explanations that are different from his own.” And in his Logic he professes to have gone little beyond the author of the Art de Penser.[786] Notwithstanding this rare modesty, Regis is not a writer unworthy of being consulted by the studious of philosophy, nor deficient in clearer and fuller statements than will always be found in Descartes. It might even be said that he has many things which would be sought in vain through his master’s writings, though I am unable to prove that they might not be traced in those of the intermediate Cartesians. Though our limits will not permit any further account of Regis, I will give a few passages in a note.[787]