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Newton, Spinoza, Stoics and Others: a Battle Line in Leibniz’S Wars of (Natural) Religion

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Newton, Spinoza, Stoics and Others: a Battle Line in Leibniz’S Wars of (Natural) Religion Newton, Spinoza, Stoics and Others: A Battle Line in Leibniz’s Wars of (Natural) Religion Mark A. Kulstad, Rice University Abstract Starting from Leibniz’s complaint that Newton’s views seem to make God the soul of the world, this paper examines Leibniz’s critical stance more generally towards God as the soul of the world and related theses. A preliminary task is determining what the related theses are. There are more of these than might have been thought. Once the relations are established, it becomes clear how pervasive the various guises of the issue of God as the soul of the world are in Leibniz’s thought and how central they are in his debates with contemporaries about the truths of natural religion and even more strictly philosophical issues. Leibniz’s arguments against God as the soul of the world are reconstructed and evaluated, and the difficult question of the exact meaning, or meanings, that Leibniz ascribes to the thesis that God is the soul of the world is taken up. The clearest core of meaning discussed in this paper is most directly relevant to Leibniz’s criticisms of Spinoza and the Stoics, as well as of Descartes. Less clear, but obviously important, are meanings relevant to Leibniz’s debates with the occasionalists and Newtonians. begin with two of Leibniz’s criticisms of his contemporaries, one criticism fairly well known, the other not well known at all. The more familiar criticism appearsI in the Leibniz-Clarke correspondence of 1715-16. In that correspondence, Leibniz is, among other things, attempting to find a theological Achilles’ heel in the Newtonians’ world view, just as Clarke is attempting to do the same in connection with Leibniz’s. In this context Leibniz claims that Newton’s views seem to make of God the soul of the world, the anima mundi. Leibniz makes the point, with varying degrees of intensity, several times during the correspondence, and with reference to a diverse aspects of Newtonian theory.1 Here is one of the examples, drawn from Leibniz’s Fourth Paper: There is hardly any expression less proper upon this subject, than that which makes God to have a sensorium. It seems to make God the soul of the world. And it will be a hard matter to put a justifiable sense upon this word, according to the use Sir Isaac Newton makes of it. (LC 4, sec. 27; G VII 375) The Leibniz Review, Vol. 18, 2008 MARK A. KULStaD What does it mean to say God is the soul of the world? What are the arguments against this view, and how strong are they? Are there different meanings of this doctrine in different contexts? These are among the points we will consider in what follows. Perhaps surprisingly, it will help in answering these questions if we look back roughly forty years in Leibniz’s life to a much less public criticism he made of another contemporary, Spinoza. Leibniz was near the end of his Paris years, having just invented his version of the calculus. Although Leibniz could not have known it at the time, this very invention would ultimately lead to bitter disputes with the Newtonians late in his life, ending with the same Leibniz and Clarke correspondence quoted from above. According to the Academy editors of Leibniz’s collected works and letters, the likely time frame for the second criticism is between the beginning of winter in 1675 and the fall of 1676. At that time Leibniz reread Spinoza’s Tractatus Theologico- Politicus,2 made extracts, and at one point added what G. H. R. Parkinson claims is the only philosophical comment Leibniz made on the work at this time.3 The fairly obscure comment, in fact also a criticism, is this: Here [Spinoza] sufficiently reveals his judgment, that God is not a mind, but is the nature of things, etc., which I do not accept. (A VI.iii�������� 269-70)4 Despite the very different character of these two thinkers, Newton and Spinoza, and despite the apparent diversity of the two criticisms themselves, I will argue that the views being attacked are much more closely related than they might at first seem. Moreover, I will argue that although the issues in question here may seem either not familiar or not central to Leibniz’s thought, they are in fact absolutely central to Leibniz’s natural theology and also important for his philosophy, at least in the following sense, that they turn up repeatedly at critical junctures in his theological and philosophical battles with leading contemporaries. If these points – particular the latter point -- are even roughly on target, the concepts involved need to be brought out from the shadows and studied more seriously. This paper makes a start in this project. There are certain limitations of this paper that should be made clear at the outset. One is that the basic focus of the paper is on Leibniz, so that despite the fact that a number of other philosophers will make an appearance in this paper, the focus will almost invariably be on Leibniz’s views of these other philosophers rather than the precise views of the other philosophers themselves. This is true whether Leibniz’s contemporaries or philosophers of antiquity are being discussed.5 The most notable The Leibniz Review, Vol. 18, 2008 NEWTON, SPINOZA, STOICS, AND OTHERS consequence of this is that the present paper will not generally address the question whether such criticisms as the two given above against Newton and Spinoza, are in fact fair criticisms of their targets. The same point applies for criticisms Leibniz raises against the Stoics, Malebranche and Descartes. Second, the large majority of Leibniz’s texts discussed in this paper are ones drawn from polemical contexts (as befits a paper on “wars of (natural) religion”). Since a considerable number of equivalences claimed by Leibniz are drawn from these texts, a question is likely to rise, at least sometimes, whether the equivalences hold up philosophically, or whether the polemical contexts are perhaps leading Leibniz to be a bit less subtle and fine in his distinctions than he is capable of being. In general, the plan of this paper is to follow these equivalences wherever they lead in Leibniz’s thought, leaving more detailed investigation of such problems to a later stage of research. To be sure, some of what is brought to light in this paper should aid greatly in any ultimate evaluation of the linkages claimed by Leibniz. But such ultimate evaluation is not a main project of this paper; rather, presenting a (preliminary) map of new territory is our focus. Third, although the clash with Newton over the question whether God is the soul of the world is perhaps the best known appearance of this concept in Leibniz’s philosophy, it is also a complicated one. I use it in this paper to introduce the concept and its relatives and, at some points, it is hoped, also to provide some insight into it. But the firmest points arise from other contexts, leaving the question of Leibniz, Newton and the soul of the world still open for future research. I offer some suggestions in this regard, but not final pronouncements. Finally, this paper does not try to follow up the complexities of Leibniz’s theological views over the whole period of his development. In fact, there are some interesting early views of Leibniz, ones that have been explored elsewhere,6 that are directly related to the main topic of this paper but that seem to diverge significantly from the Leibnizian views highlighted in this paper. Again, these are not discussed here. The sections of this paper are as follows. In section one, starting with the formulation, “God is the nature of things,” equivalent formulations in Leibniz’s writings are traced up to and including the formulation, “God is the soul of the world.” After this a preliminary statement of support for the paper’s two theses are given. In section two, a deeper look at the meaning of the equivalent formulas, in particular, “God is the soul of the world,” is undertaken. In the third section, Leibniz’s arguments against God as the soul of the world are presented and some The Leibniz Review, Vol. 18, 2008 MARK A. KULStaD are evaluated. In the fourth section, a theory about the unity of the “battle line” discussed in this paper is presented. And in the final section, the paper’s two theses are revisited and some thoughts about possible future research are offered. 1. “God is the nature of things” In order to gain a better understanding of Leibniz’s criticism of Spinoza -- that the author of the TTP makes God the nature of things -- we first consider the appearance of the relevant formula, or the appearance of formulas related to it, in a variety of Leibnizian writings. Our aim in part is to get a better grip on this rather unfamiliar locution by seeing how it is in fact linked in Leibniz’s mind to a number of others, some of them obviously important in his philosophical thinking. To begin then: in a writing that the Academy editors tentatively date as composed in 1686-87, “De Religione Magnorum Virorum,” Leibniz says of Spinoza that the latter “thought that God was nothing other than the nature or substance of the world” (A VI.iv����������������������������������������������������������������� ����������������������������������������������������������������C 2460). This is interesting in two ways. First, this quotation, from the time of the composition of the Discourse on Metaphysics and the early correspondence with Arnauld, shows that Leibniz has retained his view of Spinoza as holding that God is the nature of things -- or the nature of the world, as he puts it here – into his maturity.7 As we will show below, he in fact retains this view for years after the Discourse as well.
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