Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding: A Critical ExpositionDewey, John
Philosophy
Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding: A Critical Exposition
Dewey, John
Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm, Freiherr von, 1646-1716
Puffendorf undoubtedly suggested this division to Leibniz by
his classification of duties as external and internal,--the first
comprehending natural and civil law, the second moral theology. But
Puffendorf confined the former to purely external acts, excluding
motives and intentions, and the latter to divine revelation. Both are
"positive," and in some sort arbitrary,--one resting merely on the fact
that certain institutions obtain, the other on the fact that God has
made certain declarations. To Leibniz, on the other hand, the will of
God is in no sense the source of moral truths. The will of God does
not create truth, but carries into effect the eternal truths of the
divine understanding. Moral truths are like those of mathematics. And
again, there is no such thing as purely external morality: it always
contains an inner content, of which the external act is only the
manifestation. Leibniz may thus be said to have made two discoveries,
or rather re-discoveries: one, that there is a science of morals,
independent of law, custom, and positive right; the other, that the
basis of both "natural" and "positive" morals is not the mere will of
God, but is reason with its content of eternal truths.
In morals the end is happiness, the means wisdom. Happiness is defined,
not as an occurrence, but as a condition, or state of being. "It is
the condition of permanent joy. This does not mean that the joy is
actually felt every moment, but that one is in the condition to enjoy
whenever he thinks of it, and that, in the interval, joyfulness arises
from his activity and being." Pleasure, however, is not a state, but
a feeling. It is the feeling of perfection, whether in ourselves or
in anything else. It does not follow that we perceive intellectually
either in what the perfection of the pleasant thing consists or in
what way it develops perfection within us. It is enough that it be
realized in feeling, so as to give us pleasure. Perfection is defined
"as increase of being. As sickness is, as it were, a lowering and a
falling off from health, so perfection is something which mounts above
health. It manifests itself in power to act; for all substance consists
in a certain power, and the greater the power the higher and freer the
substance. But power increases in the degree that the many manifests
itself from one and in one, while the one rules many from itself and
transforms them into self. But unity in plurality is nothing else than
harmony; and from this comes order or proportion, from which proceeds
beauty, and beauty awakens love. Thus it becomes evident how happiness,
pleasure, love, perfection, substance, power, freedom, harmony,
proportion, and beauty are bound up in one another."
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