Descartes and Pascal on the Eucharist

Vlad Alexandrescu University of Bucharest

Within Descartes’ philosophy, the problem of the Eucharist provides scholars the occasion to investigate a nexus of questions belonging to different domains of his thought. In taking up this problem, about which there has been much written in the past few decades (see the bibliography below), I hope ªrst of all to discern some order in the texts themselves, as well also as in their various interpretations, and then, from there, to propose a new perspective.

Historians of ideas have seen in the explanation of the Eucharist a problem that preoccupied Descartes as early as 1630 and that continued to be treated by him until very late in his correspondence, as the last mention of the question dates from 1648. I will start by giving here a brief historical sketch of the places in the Cartesian corpus that take up this question di- rectly or that are related to it in some way or another.

1) A ªrst mention of the Eucharist, in the context of developing a theory of colors; a) a letter to Marin Mersenne, 25 novembre 1630, AT I, 179 2) A “dossier” in Descartes’ correspondence at the time of the debate that followed the publication of the Discourse on Method and of the Essays, where one can ªnd a rather general and allusive concern with the fact that Cartesian philosophy is in fact capable of “supporting” faith and of “explaining” Transubstantiation, and therefore capable of furnishing arguments against the Calvinists.

I would like to express my gratitude to Justin E. H. Smith and to Lucian Petrescu for having translated this paper from the French.

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a) a letter to François Fournet, October 1636, AT I, 456 b) a letter to Antoine Vatier, February 1638, AT I, 564 3) A few records of ongoing work, after the publication of the Medita- tions and during the writing of the Principles of philosophy, in 1641 a) a letter to Mersenne, January 1641, AT III, 296 4) The “dossier” of the Replies, 1641–1642 a) a letter to Mersenne of 18 March 1641, AT III, 340 b) a letter to Mersenne of 31 March 1641, AT III, 349 c) the Fourth Replies, entirely published only by the Latin edition of 1642 and by Claude Clerselier’s translation into French from 1647 d) the Sixth Replies, starting with the edition of 1641 5) The “Mesland ªle,” that is, the correspondence of Descartes with the Jesuit Father Denis Mesland in 1644–1646 a) to Mesland, 2 May 1644, AT IV, 119–120 b) to Mesland, 8 (9?) February 1645, letter not sent, AT IV, 169 c) to Mesland, May 1645?, AT IV, 216 6) A subsequent ªle, composed of some other letters dated from 1646– 1648: a) to Clerselier, 2 March 1646, AT IV, 372–373 b) to an unknown correspondent, AT IV, 374–375 c) to Clerselier? AT IV, 741–747, see Pierre Costabel’s note, pp. 744–747 d) to Arnauld, 1648, AT V, 184. Some scholars have suggested that Descartes’ returning to the problem at various times is an indication of variability in Descartes’ treatment of the Eucharist (Watson 1987). For my part, it seems that we may take for granted that Descartes formulated early enough a theory of the Eucharist that would be in simultaneous agreement with both his physics and his metaphysics.1 It has often been said that in the seventeenth century the explanation of the Eucharist was a validation test of the metaphysics of an author.2 However, it also seems clear to me that Descartes used this theory at three different and distinct points in the elaboration of his philosophy.

1. Ariew (1999b, 153) thinks Descartes would have elaborated this theory prior to the Replies to Arnauld. 2. Redondi 1985. In Descartes’ case: “The only point to which I must reply concerns the publication of my Physics and Metaphysics. I can tell you brieºy that I desire it as much or more than anyone, but only under certain conditions, without which I would be foolish to desire it. I will say also that I do not fear at all, basically, that they contain anything against faith. On the contrary, I am vain enough to think that faith has never been so strongly supported by human arguments as it may be if my principles are adopted. Tran-

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The ªrst point, connected with the theory of colors, is the conclusion that consists in saying that secondary qualities do not have their basis in the physical body, but rather in human perception of this body. Color, in particular, no longer belongs to bodies as a secondary quality, but is rather produced by the various ways in which bodies receive light and reºect it through the medium of subtle matter towards our eyes (Dioptrique, I, AT VI, 85, Météores, AT VI, 233). From this point of view, the persistence of “the whiteness of the bread in the Blessed Sacrament,” seems to be used as an argument in support of Descartes’ new theory of colors (Descartes to Mersenne, 25 November 1630, AT I, 179). The second point is a theory of the perception that we have of physical bodies, whether the body in question is an inanimate body or the body of a man is considered as an external body. It is here that Descartes develops his distinction between the body and the surface of the body, a distinction that permits him to develop a theory of the individuation and the identity of physical bodies. Surfaces are the forms through which bodies can be separated the one from the other, but they do not in any way guarantee the identity of any one body through time. At the moment of consecration, the host becomes the body of Christ; at the moment of death, the body of a human individual becomes a simple inanimate body. In the two cases, the surface remains the same, but the identity of the body changes. To the question of identity—which we might formulate as follows: what is it that makes one body the same from one moment to the next?—we might offer the two following responses: from an ontological point of view, it is God who sees to the body’s conservation, but from the point of view of knowledge of this body, it is the perception of the body as the same body by the thinking subject.3 In this connection, the explanation of the Eucha- rist, like the explanation of the piece of wax, serves as a tool by means of which Descartes relativizes knowledge of the world through the senses, and proposes a sort of metaphysical ‘insurance’ for physics, as well as a mo- dus operandi that is geometrical.4 The third point is what I have elsewhere called as a theory of the union of the soul and the body in general (Alexandrescu 2003a). Formulated in

substantiation, in particular, which the Calvinists regard as impossible to explain by the ordinary philosophy, is very easily explained by mine,” Descartes to Vatier, 22 February 1638, AT I, 564; “. . . but if there is ever any question of that, I am conªdent I can show that none of the tenets of their philosophy accords with the Faith so well as my doctrines,” Descartes to Mersenne, 31 March 1641, AT III, 349, etc. 3. Besides the well known exemple of the wax from the Meditatio II, see also the end of Descartes’ letter to Xxxx, AT IV, 375. 4. For my account of individuation in Descartes, see Alexandrescu 2003b.

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the most comprehensive way, this theory would take into account the manner in which the thinking substance is united to the extended substance. The union of the soul and the body in general depends on one of the attributes of mind, namely the power that makes the mind exercises its functions5 in matter. We easily recognize in this exercise a form of action that ºows from the fundamentally active character of the mind. This operation of the mind in matter can take forms as different the one from the other as creation, conservation (for God), the motion of bodies according to the laws of nature, the motion of the soul communicated to the body itself according to the speciªcally human faculty of sensation or passions (which is different from the faculty of animals), according to the faculty of memory or of imagination, or, ªnally, according to the faculty of the intellect, which, through will, dictates to the body itself the manner of its motion in the course of its quest for the sovereign good. But nothing prevents us from thinking, in certain cases, of the action of the mind upon matter in a still broader sense, as a union, without the pineal gland, and thus without sensation, passions, even without memory or imagination, according as the pure understanding requires, which in a very strict way imposes its rule for the motion of any body to which it is united. But this is another subject, which Descartes takes up only rarely. The Eucharist constitutes a particular case of this theory, for it compels us to reºect upon the manner in which the soul of Christ is joined to the host that becomes his body. Thus, for Descartes, we cannot speak of a human individual if his body is not joined to a soul. To put it more precisely, Christ’s body descending from the Cross as painted by Caravaggio is not a human body at all, but merely a corpse—a piece of matter. This point drives us into distinguish- ing a particular case, and a purely hypothetical one also: the case in which the Eucharist would be celebrated during the three days of Christ’s death, from Good Friday to the Resurrection Sunday—a question which will be touched upon by Descartes at the request of Mesland, following Saint Thomas (Descartes to Mesland, 1645 or 1646, AT, IV 347–348). Now, we ªnd that the order of the three points I mentioned is at the same time a chronological order (these three points being treated succes- sively in the Cartesian corpus, even if one may discern some overlapping) and that it respects the division of philosophical matters Descartes made: physics, psychology, morals—even if, naturally, these three matters are

5. Lat. exerere, as Descartes put it in his correspondence with More; ibid., in particular, 105–115.

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branches departing from the same common trunk, as Descartes’ famous metaphor from the Preface to the French translation of the Principles states.

A Little-Known Line of Enquiry: Descartes’ Fragment on Glorious Bodies An observation made by Descartes, recopied by Leibniz in the collection of notes entitled (most likely by a librarian at Hannover) “Cartesius,” remains unstudied: Si mens perfecte esset unita toti corpori ut est ei parti in qua format imagines rerum posset illud reddere penetrativum aliorum corporum, invisibile, sive diaphanum, impassibile et capax similium omnium quae gloriosis corporibus tribuuntur.6 If the soul were perfectly united to the entirety of the body in the way in which it is to the part that forms the images of the things, it could render the body capable of penetrating other bodies, invisible, or diaphanous, impassible and capable of all other properties which are attributed to the glorious bodies. This series of notes, discovered in the nineteenth century, constitutes an enigma for the researcher. Geneviève Rodis-Lewis pleaded strongly for its authenticity (1971, 211–220), a verdict which Pierre Costabel conªrmed without any hesitation (1973, 444–446), whereas Vincent Carraud sees in it an eclectic collection and seems to incline towards judging that it repre- sents just a series of lecture notes Descartes could have taken on other au- thors (1985, 3–19), rather than a collection of genuine ideas belonging to the Cartesian philosophical corpus. I shall limit myself here to an analysis of this fragment, which in my view should be placed within the dossier of Descartes’ texts on the Eucha- rist. This discussion of the attributes of glorious bodies would seem to offer not only a new lead for the reconstruction of the doctrine of the Eucha- rist in Descartes, but also for understanding the rather taxing dossier of Descartes’ Thomist and Scotist allegiances (Ariew 1999a, 39–57). J.-R. Armogathe dedicated a book-length work and a few articles to the explanation of the Eucharist in Descartes and in other Cartesians. He distinguishes two different questions in Descartes’ texts on the Eucharist: 6. I use the edition made following the Hanover manuscript by Vincent Carraud: Des- cartes 1985, 3. 2. Vincent Carraud renders it into French in Carraud 1985: 11: “Si l’esprit était parfaitement uni à tout le corps, comme il l’est à la partie où il forme les images des choses, il pourrait le rendre pénétrable aux autres corps, invisible, ou diaphane, impassible et capable de toutes les choses semblables que l’on attribue aux corps glorieux.” For the expression in italics, I would propose rather: “capable de pénétrer d’autres corps”// “capable of penetrating other bodies.” This is exactly the “subtlety” of glorious bodies, which Saint Thomas, Summa theologiae, qu. 85, deªnes as the ability of penetrating other bodies.

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1) the “mode” of conversion of the bread’s substance into the substance of Christ’s body, and 2) the “mode” of the presence of Christ’s body in the host. This second point would be precisely the one which, although expressed in the few letters to Mesland from 1645–1646, remained esoteric in respect to Descartes’ published texts. Since 1645, the year these texts started circulating as manuscripts and until their ªrst publication in 1811, numerous philosophers tried to reconstruct this theory, taking the matter far beyond Descartes’ own statements. Let us ask ourselves a more particular question now. If one accepts that Descartes really thought that glorious bodies were “capable of penetrating other bodies, invisible, or diaphanous, impassible” and if one examines the Canons of the Council of Trent (which Descartes invokes in a letter to Arnauld—AT V, 184) and the Catechism of the same Council, which both state that Christ is present in the host in the form in which he was raised up to heavens, that is in the form of a glorious body,7 then one could consider that Christ’s presence in the host is brought about through this power of penetrating other bodies which glorious bodies have, that is, the property of occupying the same place in the same time with them. How- ever, such an explanation can be immediately linked to a Lutheran position, for whom Christ’s body is genuinely present into the host, “in pane, cum pane, sub pane [in the bread, with the bread, under the bread].” Thus, one may expect Descartes to defend himself immediately from such a possible accusation of Lutheran sympathy. The theory of natural Transubstantia- tion aims indeed at responding to a possible objection of impanation of this sort:8 a human being may assimilate in his body other bodies, as nour- ishment for instance, bodies which become a part of the human body, informed by the same soul.9 In the same way, Descartes proposes to admit

7. Canon 1: “Si quis negaverit, in sanctissimae eucharistiae sacramento contineri vere, realiter et substantialiter corpus et sanguinem una cum anima et divinitate Domini nostri Jesu Christi, ac proinde totum Christum; sed dixerit tantummodo esse in eo ut signo, vel ªgura, aut virtute, anathema sit.” In the Catechism of the Council of Trent, n. 25, it is stated that “the Eucharist con- tains the body and the blood of Jesus Christ, the same body which is born from the Virgin and sitteth in the heavens at the right side of the Father,” cf. Vacant, Mangenot, Amann 1930–1950, s.v. Eucharistie d’après le Concile de Trente. 8. Council of Trent, session XIII, canon 2: “Si quis dixerit, in sacrosancto eucharistiae sacramento remanere substantiam panis et vini una cum corpore et sanguine Domini nostri Jesu Christi, negaveritque mirabilem illam et singularem conversionem totius substantiae panis in corpus et totius substantiae vini in sanguinem, manentibus dumtaxat speciebus panis et vini, quam quidem conversionem catholica Ecclesia aptissime transsubstantiationem appellat, anathema sit.” 9. “Moreover, Descartes writes, I consider that when we eat bread and drink wine, the small parts of the bread and wine dissolve in our stomach, and pass at once into our veins ; so that they transubstantiate themselves naturally and become parts of our bodies simply

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the fact that Christ’s soul is capable of exercising itself more than into his own particular glorious body, that is into the bread and the wine of the Eucharist—and this is what happens in all the churches in which the mass is celebrated, at the time of the consecration as well as at the time of the division of the host, etc.—and to admit that he may be, in a general manner, at the same time in the whole and in the parts, in one place and in another. Let us summarize the argument: the body of Christ is glorious and, thus, capable of penetrating other bodies, invisible or diaphanous, impassible. This glorious character comes from the resurrection and results in a perfect union of the mind to the entirety of the body, and not only to the pineal gland. From the power of his soul alone, he is able, miraculously, to join himself to other physical bodies by an exercise of the soul in more matter than simply that of the organic and functional body. In the letters to Father Mesland, Descartes sketches out for the human body an individuation criterion10 (the limits of a body’s extension are given by the piece of matter joined with one single soul),11 an identity criterion (the same soul ensures identity in time for a piece of matter which changes) and a completion criterion (the piece of matter for which the union with the same soul is independent from the existence of other pieces of matter).12 Following these criteria, Christ’s body is individuated by the union with one single soul. This individuation oversteps the organic and

by mixing with the blood. However, if we had sharp enough eyesight to distinguish them from the other particles of blood, we would see that they are still numerically the same as those which previously made up the bread and the wine. In this way, if we did not consider their union with the soul, we could still call them bread and wine as before. Now this transubstantiation takes place without any miracle.” Descartes to Mesland, 9 February 1645, AT IV, 168. 10. The Cartesian expression “numerical unity” designates individuation (to Mesland, 1645 or 1646?, AT IV, 346): “I have the same body now as I had ten years ago, although the matter of which it is composed has changed, because the numerical unity of the body of a man does not depend on its matter, but on its form, which is the soul.” The body’s identity (which is designated in the letters to Mesland as “numerical identity”) in time (“the same body as ten years ago”) results simply from the soul’s identity. 11. “But when we speak of the body of a man, we do not mean a determinate part of matter, or one that has a determinate size; we mean simply the whole of the matter which is united with the soul of that man. And so, even though that matter changes, and its quantity increases or decreases, we still believe that it is the same body, numerically the same, so long as it remains joined and substantially united with the same soul”; “Alto- gether then, provided that a body is united with the same rational soul, we always take it as the body of the same man, whatever matter it may be and whatever quantity or shape it may have. . .” Descartes to Mesland, 9 February 1645, AT IV, 166 and 167. 12. “. . . and we think that this body is whole and entire so long as it has in itself all the dispositions required to preserve that union...andwecount it as the whole and entire

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functional natural constitution of a human body, a constitution which the host obviously does not have.13 Christ’s body is identical with itself, although he may be at the same time multiple and changeable, through the union of different pieces of matter with Christ’s soul, in different moments of time—all of which explains the fact that Christ is entirely in the entire host and the fact that, after the breaking of the bread of the Eucharist, he is entirely in every one of the parts resulted.14 Consequently, a body’s identity in time and even its individuation in space do not imply its unique- ness. Every host consecrated in a church, even when there are multiple hosts consecrated at the same time in different churches, is the body of one and the same Christ. One cannot consider a multitude of Christs, but only a plurality of matter joined to the same soul. Seemingly, a host divided and reduced to a collection of crumbs does not imply the fragmentation of Christ’s body, given that the same soul is diversely united to a more or less extended piece of matter. Finally, the completion criterion of the human body is satisªed only if the union of Christ’s soul with the host involves also the union of his soul with his glorious body, “which sitteth at the right hand of the Father.” Following the criterion Descartes establishes, if the glorious body did not exist, the host could not constitute by itself the complete body of Christ— if we are to accept the texts of the Council of Trent, which say that Christ “sitteth at the right side of the Father.” But, on the other hand, Descartes

body, provided that it needs no additional matter in order to remain joined to this soul,” ibid. 13. “No doubt this explanation will be shocking at ªrst to those who are accustomed to believe that for the body of Jesus Christ to be in the Eucharist all its parts must be there with their same quantity and shape, and with numerically the same matter as they were composed of when he ascended into heaven. But they will easily free themselves from these difªculties if they bear in mind that nothing of the kind has been decided by the Church. It is not necessary for the integrity of the human body that it should possess all its external parts with their quantity and matter; such things are in no way useful or ªtting in this Sac- rament, in which the soul of Jesus Christ informs the matter of the host, in order to be re- ceived by men and to be united more closely with them,” ibid., AT IV, 169. 14. “The soul of Jesus Christ could not have remained naturally joined with each of these particles of bread and wine unless thew were assembled with many others to make up all the organs of a human body necessary for life; but in the Sacrament it remains supernat- urally joined with each of them even when they are separated. In this way it is easy to un- derstand how the body of Jesus Christ is present only once in the whole host, when it is un- divided, and yet is whole and entire in each of its parts, when it is divided; because all the matter, however large or small, which as a whole is informed by the same human soul, is taken for a whole and entire human body,” ibid., AT IV, 168. The canon (c. III) of Trent is: “Totus et integer Christus sub panis specie et sub quavis ipsius speciei parte, totus item sub vini specie et sub ejus partibus existit.”

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states explicitly that Christ is entirely “in the whole host” and that after the division of the host, he is “whole and entire in each of its parts.” Now, how can he be entirely there, when he is considered to be in his glorious body? This is where, I believe, one must take into consideration the penetrative capacity of glorious bodies. Indeed, following the Council of Trent, “neither are these things mutually repugnant—that our Saviour Himself always sitteth at the right hand of the Father in heaven, according to the natural mode of existing, and that, nevertheless, He is, in many other places, sacramentally present to us in his own substance,” “by a manner of existing, which is incomprehensible to us.”15 Indeed, following Descartes’ “esoteric” theory, Christ’s soul exercises itself in the host, re- maining at the same time necessarily united to his glorious body, bringing about equally a union at a distance between the species of the Eucharist and the functional body.

The Appeal to Penetrability: A Cartesian Primitive Theory of the Eucharist? The fact that glorious bodies may penetrate other bodies forces Descartes before the horns of a dichotomy: to accept or to deny the possibility that two bodies occupy the same place. As Roger Ariew has shown, this dichotomy is one of the main points that distinguishes the Scotist heritage from the Thomist tradition (Ariew 1999b, 152; see also in the same vol- ume, Ariew 1999a). In this connection precisely, Descartes seems to take the side of Saint Thomas, as Ariew has subtly noted, following Jean- Baptiste de la Grange,16 in afªrming clearly that “the matter whose nature consists simply in its being an extended substance already occupies abso- lutely all the imaginable space...andwecannot ªnd within us an idea of any other sort of matter” (Principles of philosophy, II, art. 22). This argument seems to presuppose the idea of the impenetrability of bodies, since it is the mutual exclusion of two bodies that would prevent them from occupying the same place, and not the mutual exclusion of body and extension. Let us note however that for Descartes impenetrability is not an essential property of bodies. In a letter to More, he simply notes that deªning ‘body’ in terms of impenetrability rather than of extension would be an error of the same sort as deªning ‘man’ as a risible animal rather than as a rational one (Descartes to Morus, 5 février 1649, AT V, 269). In a subsequent letter to More, Descartes delivers a complete analysis of the 15. Session XIII, chap. 1 (trans. J. Waterworth, London: Dolman, 1848). 16. J. B. de la Grange, Les principes de la philosophie contre les nouveaux philosophes, Des- cartes, Rohault, Régius, Gassendi, le P. Maignan, etc., 2 vol., Paris, 1682, apud R. Ariew, 1999b, 152.

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notion of a mediating surface,17 afªrming that in the hypothesis of the penetrability of bodies, that which is destroyed is not the bodies but rather the mediating surface (which is, let us recall, a surface that sepa- rates), and so that impenetrability is not a quality of bodies, but rather an essential property of extension itself (Descartes to Morus, 15 avril 1649, AT V, 342). Even if the texts are far from numerous, it is not out of order to put forth a genetic hypothesis concerning Descartes’ theory of the Eucharist. Descartes would have elaborated, in a ªrst phase of his work, contempo- rary with the fragment taken from ‘Cartesius,’ the idea of a glorious body as a body to which the mind, unlike the case of the human body in its terrestrial phase, is integrally united. Concerning the glorious body thus deªned he would appear to believe, taking up attributes from the Scholas- tic tradition, that it is diaphanous, capable of penetrating other bodies, invisible, impassible, etc. It can thus occupy the same place as another body and, very likely, it can also be in two places at the same time. In line with this conception, Descartes is in the camp of the Scotists. The Eucharist would appear to be explicated as the coincidence of the host and of the glorious body of Christ. However, understood in this way, the glorious body is entirely distinguished from terrestrial inanimate bodies by the fact that these latter can not be deªned in the absence of the extension that they occupy,18 while for the former extension is not sufªcient for its individuation (the soul is also required). Moreover, even if one introduces the criterion of motion, which alone would constitute, according to certain historians, the criterion of the individuation of bodies,19 the penetrability of bodies renders motion indis- cernible, since the notions of proximity (Principles, II, art. 28) and of sepa- rateness (Annotations to the Principles of philosophy, AT XI, 656; Descartes to Clerselier, 17 February 1645, AT IV, 186) are difªcult to maintain for surfaces that are annihilated through commingling.20 If we look more closely at this supposed ªrst stage of the theory, we see that the glorious body, like the mind, would have the power to be united to different portions of matter. What would have distinguished them is that the mind exercises itself in matter without having any proportion to

17. It is the same notion as the one which he considerates in the letter to Mesland from 9 February 1645. 18. On extension as a criterion of the geometrical individuation of physical bodies, see Alexandrescu 2003b. 19. Principles of philosophy, II, art. 25. For movement as a criterion of individuation, see Garber 1992: 176 ; Jalobeanu 2003. 20. For the consequences of the penetrability of bodies for the deªnition of extension, see Descartes to More, 5 February and 15 April 1649, AT V, 270 and 342.

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space, while the glorious body is united to matter by means of the destruc- tion of the mediating surface and of the commingling of the extension oc- cupied by the latter. Having at his disposal two such competing tools, it is not foolish to suppose that Descartes would have declined to grant the penetrability of the glorious body in favor of a conception of mind according to which one of its properties is the power to act on bodies, a property of which he speaks from L’homme21 all the way to the correspondence with Elisabeth.22 This abandonment would have coincided with the formulation of a theory of mind as capable of acting in matter, whether in one part only of a body, such as this part in which the mind forms new ideas and which Descartes calls in the Regulae fantasy or imagination (Regulae, XII, AT X 416), or whether in the totality of the body, as the fragment ‘Cartesius’ suggests. There is an echo of this alternative in the Treatise on the passions of the soul, where, after having afªrmed in article 30 that “the soul is united to all the parts of the body conjointly,” Descartes adds in the following article that the soul “exercises its functions” in the pineal gland “more particularly than in all other parts.” Now, beyond the consequences for the theory of the union of the soul and the body in general, the introduction of this notion of the “power of the soul” or of its “exercise” upon bodies also permits him to avoid explicitly adopting the thesis of the Scotists in the medieval disputes concerning the Eucharist according to which two bodies can occupy the same place, while at the same time proposing a doctrine that might present itself as not depending upon a “shaky physics” (Descartes to Mesland, 1645 or 1646, AT IV 347). and hence to pretend to replace, from top to bottom, the ediªce of Scholastic physics.

Pascal’s Criticism If this genetic hypothesis concerning Descartes’ explanation of the Eucha- rist should turn out to be correct, the abandonment of the penetrability of glorious bodies would nonetheless be faced with a corresponding difªculty in accounting for the harmonization of the theory with the texts of the Council of Trent. I have just shown, indeed, that the criterion of com- pleteness put forth by Descartes requires that “we always take it [a body] as the body of the same man...andwecount it as the whole and entire body, provided that it needs no additional matter in order to remain joined to this soul.” There is also the requirement of canon III of the 21. “Now there are two principal causes, without accounting for the power of the soul, that can make it [the pineal gland] move in this way,” L’Homme, AT XI, 180. 22.“...asregards the soul and the body together, we have only the [primitive] notion of their union, on which depends our notion of the soul’s power to move the body...” Descartes to Princess Elisabeth, 21 May 1643, AT III, 665.

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Council of Trent: “Totus et integer Christus sub panis specie et sub quavis ipsius speciei parte, totus item sub vini specie et sub ejus partibus existit.” Even if the penetrability and the invisibility of glorious bodies sufªce in order to account for the real presence of the entirety of Christ in the host, what would seem difªcult to defend is the concomitant presence of the body of Christ at the right hand of the Father. If the functional body of Christ is localized in space, the ubiquity that ºows from the Scotist conception would seem to be compromised. Thus Descartes must take completion into account. He can no longer conceive this completion as ºowing from co-incidence through commingling of the surfaces that delimit the glorious body and the host. The explanation given to Mesland would serve to ªll the gap left by this abandonment. Nonetheless, Descartes implicitly holds onto Scotus’ thesis, according to which the haecceitas or form (1968, Opus Oxoniense II, dist. 3, quaest. 6, apud Ariew 1999a, 46). is the principle of individuation and not, as for Thomas, signate matter. Pascal, as has been fully noted in the secondary literature (Couture 1898, etc.), seems to have made a brief commentary in his Pensées on the letter Descartes send to Father Mesland the 9th February 1645.23 As Roger Ariew suggests in this connection, however, the actual drift of this com-

23. Pascal, Pensées, Br. 512, Laf. 959, translation Roger Ariew, in Pascal 2005: It is, in its idiom, wholly the body of Jesus Christ, but it cannot be said to be the whole body of Jesus Christ. ——— The union of two things without change does not enable us to say that one becomes the other. In this way the soul is united to the body, and the ªre to the wood, without change. But change is needed to make the form of the one become the form of the other. Thus the union of the Word to mankind. ——— Because my body without my soul would not constitute the body of a man, then my soul united to any matter whatsoever will constitute my body. This does not distinguish the necessary condition from the sufªcient condition. The union is necessary, but not sufªcient. The left arm is not the right. ——— Impenetrability is a property of matter. ———

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mentary remains rather obscure.24 Geneviève Rodis-Lewis saw here an objection made against the Cartesian doctrine of numerical identity of the human body as determined by the mere permanence of the soul ([Rodis- ]Lewis 1950, 71). Indeed, Pascal objects to Descartes’ not having distinguished “the necessary condition from the sufªcient condition”—the mind-body union being qualiªed in this respect as only “necessary.” “Identity de numero, says Pascal, with respect to the same time requires the identity of matter.” And Geneviève Rodis-Lewis to summarize: “If the permanence of the soul which informs a body ensures the permanence of the individual, this happens throughout all of the changes that may occur in this body” (Ibid., p. 70). Now, if we are to restore the Eucharist issue to the medieval debate between Thomists and Scotists, then Pascal’s fragment immediately takes on an anti-Scotist meaning. Indeed, one must remark that Pascal, despite the particular vocabulary he uses, is not concerned in this fragment with the question of the identity, but only the individuation of the bodies. This is, I believe, the actual meaning of his expression “numerical identity with respect to the same time” (“identité de numero au regard du même temps”). If one accepts this remark, one must cease to look in Pascal for a discussion of the permanence of Christ’s body: this is to be expected, as the permanence of Christ’s body throughout the successive miracles of the consecration of the species could not in any way be turned into a point of dispute. It is enough to say that during these successive consecrations, Christ’s soul unites itself with different pieces of matter, without preoccupying oneself with the mutual relationships that link these different bodies.25 Consequently, I believe that Pascal’s discussion is aiming only at the individuation of the human body. If the necessary condition, as he puts it, is

Numerical identity with respect to the same time requires the identity of matter. ——— Thus, if God united my soul to a body in China, the same body numerically the same would be in China. ——— The same river that runs there is numerically the same as the one running at the same time in China. 24. See Roger Ariew, “Descartes and Pascal,” above. 25. For St. Thomas, whom, as we will see, Pascal follows, the body of Christ comes to be in the sacrament through a supernatural instantaneous conversion of substance: this is precisely what has been called transubstantiation, Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, III, qu. 75; Summa contra Gentiles, IV, 63. In this way the identity ºows from individuation, in the sense that, once the substance of the species is converted, its permanence in time can be conceived in the same manner as the permanence of any body.

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the union of the same soul to the matter, then the sufªcient condition must be the functional organization of the human body, one that implies a particular material character of this organization. This is, in fact, the sense of the phrase that follows: “The left arm is not the right.” One must also read in this perspective the following phrase: “Thus, if God united my soul to a body in China, the same body idem numero would be in China.” Pascal’s opposition comes from Descartes’ abandonment of matter as a valid principle of individuation for corporeality, at the same place as the soul. At the end of the fragment, as often happens in the Pensées, Pascal pushes his reasoning to the point of absurdity: “The same river that runs there is numerically the same as the one running at the same time in China.” The example he uses this time implies an inanimate body,26 the river, in order to stress the absurdity which the ignorance of matter leads to in regard to the constitution of the individual—while Pascal himself willingly ignores the Cartesian restriction to the mere human body. This particular perspective allows us, I think, to make a determination regarding the nature of Pascal’s opposition to Descartes’ explanation of the Eucharist. This determination consists merely in saying that Pascal defends a Thomist’s position in response to Descartes’ decision, following Scotus, to adopt the form as the only principle of individuation. “Impenetrability is a property of matter,” adds Pascal ingenuously, a phrase which leads us to think that the Port-Royal philosopher, in one of his very particular and genial intu- itions, could have had the presentiment of a possible explanation of the Eucharist which Descartes never openly formulated: that of explaining the presence of Christ’s body in the host in terms of the penetrability of the glorious body into the species of the Eucharist.

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