[17] Bichat (1771-1802) was a noted physiologist and anatomist. In 1800 appeared his Recherches physiologiques sur la Vie et la Mort, followed in 1801 by Anatomie générale, appliquée à la Physiologie et à la Médecine.
The immediate influence of Cournot was felt by only a small circle, and his most notable affinity was with Renouvier, although Cournot was less strictly an intellectualist. Like Renouvier he looked upon philosophy as a “Critique générale.” He was also concerned with the problem of the categories and with the compatibility of science and freedom, a problem which was now assuming a very central position in the thought of the period.
Renouvier, in the construction of his philosophy, was partly influenced by the work of Cournot. In this lone, stern, indefatigable worker we have one of the most powerful minds of the century. Charles Renouvier shares with Auguste Comte the first honours of the century in France so far as philosophical work is concerned. Curiously enough he came from Comte’s birth-place, Montpellier. When Renouvier was born in 1815, seventeen years later than Comte, the great positivist was in his second year of study at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris. To this great scientific and mathematical institution came Renouvier, to find Comte as Répétiteur of Higher Mathematics. He was not only a keen student of the mathematical sciences but also an ardent follower of Saint-Simon, and although in later life he lost many of the hopes of his youth the Saint-Simon spirit remained with him, and he retained a keen interest in social ethics and particularly in the ideas of Fourier, Proudhon and Blanc. At the Ecole he met as fellow-pupils Jules Lequier and Felix Ravaisson.
Instead of entering the civil service Renouvier then applied himself to philosophy and political science, influenced undoubtedly by Comte’s work. The year 1848, which saw the second attempt to establish a republic, gave Renouvier, now a zealous republican, an opportunity, and he issued his Manuel républicain de l’Homme et du Citoyen. This volume, intended for schoolmasters, had the approval of Carnot, Minister of Education to the Provisionary Government. Its socialist doctrines were so criticised by the Chamber of 1849 that Carnot, and with him the Government, fell from power. Renouvier went further in his Gouvernement direct et Organisation communale et centrale de la République, in which he collaborated with his socialist friends in outlining a scheme of communism, making the canton a local power, a scheme which contained the germ-idea of the Soviet of Bolshevik Russia. Such ideas were, however, far too advanced for the France of that date and their proposal did more harm than good to the progressive party by producing a reaction in wavering minds. Renouvier, through the paper Liberté de penser, launched attacks upon the policy of the Presidency, and began in the Revue philosophique a serial Uchronie, a novel of a political and philosophical character. It was never finished. Suddenly, like a bolt from the blue, came, on December and, the coup d’état. The effect of this upon Renouvier was profound. Disgusted at the power of the monarchy, the shattering of the republican hopes, the suppression of liberty and the general reaction, he abandoned political life entirely. What politics lost, however, philosophy has gained, for he turned his acute mind with its tremendous energy to the study of the problems of the universe.
Three years after the coup d’état, in the same year in which Comte completed his Système de Politique positive, 1854, Renouvier published the first volume of his magnum opus, the Essais de Critique générale.[[18]] The appearance of this work is a notable date in the development of modern French philosophy. The problems therein discussed will concern us in later chapters. Here we must point out the indefatigable labour given to this work by Renouvier. The writing and revision of these essays covered almost the whole of the half century, concluding in 1897. In their first, briefer form they occupied the decade 1854-64, and consisted of four volumes only, which on revision became finally thirteen.[[19]] These Essays range over Logic, Psychology, the Philosophy of the Sciences and the Philosophy of History.
[18] It is interesting for the comparative study of the thought of the century to observe that the great work of Lotze in Germany, Mikrocosmos, was contemporaneous with the Essais of Renouvier. Lotze’s three volumes appeared in 1856, 1858 and 1864. The Logik and Metaphysik of Lotze should also be compared with Renouvier’s Essais. Further comparison or contrast may be made with reference to the Logic of both Bradley and Bosanquet in England.
[19] Since 1912 the Essais de Critique générale are available in ten volumes, owing to the publications of new editions of the first three Essays by A. Colin in five volumes. For details of the original and revised publication of the work, see our Bibliography, under Renouvier (pp. 334-335).
Having thus laid the foundations of his own throught, Renouvier, in conjunction with his scholarly friend Pillon, undertook the publication of a monthly periodical, L’Année philosophique, to encourage philosophic thought in France. This appeared first in 1867, the same year in which Ravaisson laid the foundations of the new spiritualism by his celebrated Rapport. In 1869 Renouvier published his noteworthy treatise upon Ethics, in two volumes, La Science de la Morale.
The war of 1870 brought his monthly periodical to an untimely end. The conclusion of the war in 1871 resulted in the establishment, for the third time, of a republic, which in spite of many vicissitudes has continued even to this day. With the restoration of peace and of a republic, Renouvier felt encouraged to undertake the ambitious scheme of publishing a weekly paper, not only philosophical in character but political, literary and religious. He desired ardently to address his countrymen at a time when they were rather intellectually and morally bewildered. He felt he had something constructive to offer, and hoped that the “new criticism,” as he called it, might become the philosophy of the new republic. Thus was founded, in 1872, the famous Critique philosophique, which aimed primarily at the consolidation of the republic politically and morally,[[20]] This paper appeared as a weekly from its commencement until 1884,then continued for a further five years as a monthly. Renouvier and his friend Pillon were assisted by other contributors, A. Sabatier, L. Dauriac, R. Allier, who were more or less disciples of the neo-critical school. Various articles were contributed by William James, who had a great admiration for Renouvier. The two men, although widely different in temperament and method, had certain affinities in their doctrine of truth and certitude.[[21]]
[20] In the early numbers, political articles, as was natural in the years following 1871, were prominent. Among these early articles we may cite the one, “Is France morally obliged to carry out the terms of the Treaty imposed upon her by Prussia?”