Leibniz, Monadology With Guide PDF

Leibniz’s
Monadology
A New Translation
and Guide
Lloyd Strickland
Leibniz’s
Monadology
A New Translation and Guide
LLOYD STRICKLAND
For Dan Cook and Vernon Pratt,
for all of the help and support over the years: thank you
© Lloyd Strickland, 2014
Edinburgh University Press Ltd

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Contents
Acknowledgementsiv
Keyvi
Abbreviationsvii
Introduction1
About the Text and Translation 13
The Monadology 14
The Structure of the Monadology 34
The Monadology: Text with Running Commentary 39
Appendix162
1. Theodicy 162
2. The Principles of Nature and Grace, Founded on Reason 270
3. Leibniz to Nicole Remond: Appendix on Monads 278
Glossary of Terms 280

Questions for Further Study 283
Further Reading 285
Index292
Acknowledgements
I would like to extend my warmest thanks to an anonymous reviewer for

Edinburgh University Press for feedback on the entire manuscript.
Parts of the commentary were incorporated into a talk given to members
of the Oxford Philosophical Society in November 2013. I would like to
thank everyone present for their comments, and especially Julia Weckend
for her insightful discussion on a number of topics, and for feedback on
parts of the commentary.
A draft of the whole commentary was used as the basis of discussion
for a reading group on monadologies at the University of Edinburgh in
January and February 2014. The feedback I received was very helpful, and
I would like to thank the members of that group for their careful reading
of the commentary: Reiko Goto-Collins, Emily Brady, Anna Ortin, Brian
Smith, James Henry Collin, Peter Fosl, Alasdair Isaac, Jeremy Dunham,
and Pauline Phemister.
My thanks are also due to Daniel J. Cook for helpful feedback on a draft
of the introductory essay, and to R. R. Rockingham-Gill for comments and
guidance on the Structure of the Monadology.
Thanks also to Sean Greenberg and R. C. Sleigh Jr, who allowed me
to consult a draft of parts of their new translation of the Theodicy (forth
coming with the Oxford University Press). The exercise of comparing
their translation with mine was very beneficial, and allowed me to improve
my translation of some of the sections of the Theodicy included in this
volume.
I acknowledge with gratitude the permission granted by the Gottfried
Wilhelm Leibniz Bibliothek, Hanover, to use a scan of the first page of the
manuscript of the Monadology on the cover of this volume.
iv
Acknowledgements
At Edinburgh University Press, I would like to thank Carol MacDonald,
who commissioned the project, and Rebecca Mackenzie, who managed it,
and Michelle Houston. Thanks also to Tim Clark, who copy edited the
typescript.
v
Key
In the translation of the Monadology and the Principles of Nature and Grace,
text enclosed within square brackets [ . . . ] was present in one or more
of the earlier drafts, but subsequently deleted. I have not indicated all of
Leibniz’s deletions, only those likely to be of philosophical interest.
In the commentary, when referring to translated material contained
within this volume, the following abbreviations are used:
M =
Monadology (for example, M35 = section 35 of the
Monadology)
PNG =
Principles of Nature and Grace (for example,
PNG4 = section 4 of Principles of Nature and Grace)
T = Theodicy (for example, T189 = section 189 of the Theodicy)
References to the ‘Appendix on Monads’ are given simply by citing the
relevant page number of this volume.
vi
Abbreviations
In the notes, commonly cited editions of Leibniz’s writings are referred to

using the following conventions:
A = Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe, ed. Deutsche Akademie der

Wissenschaften, 8 series, each divided into multiple volumes
(Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1923–).
DSR = De summa rerum, trans. and ed. G. H. R. Parkinson (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 1992).
G = Die Philosophischen Schriften, ed. C. I. Gerhardt, 7 vols
(Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1978).
H = Theodicy, trans. E. M. Huggard (Chicago: Open Court, 1990).
LDB = The Leibniz-Des Bosses Correspondence, trans. and ed. Brandon
Look and Donald Rutherford (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 2007).
LDV = The Leibniz-de Volder Correspondence, trans. and ed. Paul
Lodge (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013).
LNS = Leibniz’s ‘New System’ and Associated Contemporary Texts,
trans. and ed. R. S. Woolhouse and Richard Francks
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997).
LPW = Philosophical Writings, trans. and ed. Mary Morris and
G. H. R. Parkinson (London: Everyman, 1973).
LTS = Leibniz and the Two Sophies, trans. and ed. Lloyd Strickland
(Toronto: CRRS, 2011).
NE = New Essays on Human Understanding, 2nd edn, trans. and ed.
Jonathan Bennett and Peter Remnant (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1996).
vii
Acknowledgements
MPE = Monadology and Other Philosophical Essays, trans. and ed.
Paul Schrecker and Anne Martin Schrecker (Indianapolis:
Bobbs-Merrill, 1965).
MPW = The Monadology and Other Philosophical Writings, trans. and
ed. Robert Latta (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1898).
PE = Philosophical Essays, trans. Roger Ariew and Daniel Garber
(Indianapolis: Hackett, 1989).
PPL = Philosophical Papers and Letters, trans. and ed. Leroy Loemker,
2nd edn (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1969).
SLT = Shorter Leibniz Texts, trans. and ed. Lloyd Strickland
(London: Continuum, 2006).
TI = Textes inédits, ed. Gaston Grua, 2 volumes with successive
pagination (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1948).
Introduction
Few works of philosophy can rival Leibniz’s Monadology in terms of

sweep: it begins with an account of the most basic substances, monads, and
ends with God’s intimate relation to the most exalted of these substances,
namely minds, and in between it covers (among other things) the natures
of perception, sensation, and thought, the principles of reasoning, the
existence and nature of God, the creation of the best possible world, and
the organic structure of bodies. In covering all of this ground, and more,
not only does the Monadology seek to present many of the key elements of
Leibniz’s mature philosophy and mount a defence of them, it does so in the
space of ninety short sections, amounting to approximately 6,000 words.
It is difficult not be struck by both its scope and its size, and in particular
the apparent disparity between the two. In the entire history of philosophy
there is little else like it. Great philosophers, as a rule, have sought to
present their thought to the public through the medium of books, often
ones of great length: think of Plato’s Republic, Kant’s Critique of Pure
Reason, and Sartre’s Being and Nothingness. Among the great philosophers
Leibniz is the most notable exception to this rule, if not the only one;
indeed, many of Leibniz’s most enduring and well-known philosophical
writings, such as the Discourse on Metaphysics (1686), New System (1695),
Monadology (1714), and Principles of Nature and Grace (1714) are about as
long as an average journal article or book chapter. While Leibniz did write
book-length works of philosophy, he was not a natural book writer, and
preferred to capture and disseminate his thought via shorter writings. To
understand why this should be, we need to acquaint ourselves with some
of the details of Leibniz’s life.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was born in Leipzig on 1 July 1646 to
Catherine Schmuck and Frederick Leibniz, professor of moral philosophy
1
Leibniz’s Monadology
at the University of Leipzig. Leibniz claimed to be largely self-taught, and
his thirst for learning was such that he supplemented his formal school-
ing by withdrawing himself into his father’s study to read the classical
authors. These became so familiar to him that even in later life he was
said to be able to recite the poems of Virgil from memory. He entered
the University of Leipzig at the age of fifteen, and obtained the degree
of Bachelor of Philosophy in 1663, at the age of seventeen, and a Masters
degree a year later. Thereafter Leibniz engaged in several years of legal
studies, his efforts eventually culminating in a dissertation, ‘On difficult
cases in the law’, for which he was awarded a Doctorate in Law from the
University of Altdorf in 1667.1 After turning down the offer of a profes-
sorship at the University of Jena, Leibniz accepted a post working for
the Elector of Mainz, working on legal reform. In 1672, in an attempt
to divert war between France and the Netherlands, Leibniz wrote a
lengthy memoire recommending that the King of France, Louis XIV,
commit himself instead to an invasion of Egypt, presenting the plan as a
seventeenth-century crusade against the Turks.2 The Elector despatched
Leibniz to Paris to promote the plan in person to the French court, but
his efforts were unsuccessful. Due to the opportunities afforded by what
was at the time the intellectual capital of Europe, Leibniz chose to remain
in Paris for almost four years. There he met Antoine Arnauld and Nicolas
Malebranche, two of Europe’s greatest philosophers at the time, as well as
mathematician-physicist Christiaan Huygens. Under Huygens’ tutelage,
Leibniz devoted himself to an intensive study of mathematics, which led
him to the discovery of the infinitesimal calculus in 1675, though this
was not made public until 1684. In late 1676 Leibniz accepted a post
as Court Councillor at Hanover, the capital town of the principality of
Brunswick-Lüneburg in northern Germany, which brought his time in
France to an end. Leibniz’s route back to Germany was not a straight-
forward one, however, and involved stops in England, to visit the Royal
Society, which later elected him a fellow, and the Netherlands, where he
sought out Spinoza, already well known as a philosopher, and Antony van
Leeuwenhoek, one of the first microscopists.
In Hanover, Leibniz was initially appointed a Court Councillor,
though his duties were various. He served as librarian, political advisor,
1
An English translation of Leibniz’s dissertation can be found in G. W. Leibniz, Logico-
Philosophical Puzzles in the Law, trans. and ed. Alberto Artosi, Bernardo Pieri, and
Giovanni Sartor (Dordrecht: Springer, 2013).
2
An English translation of parts of this document can be found in A Summary Account
of Leibnitz’s Memoir Addressed to Lewis the Fourteenth, Recommending to that Monarch,
the Conquest of Egypt as Conducive to the Establishing a Supreme Authority Over the
Governments of Europe (London, 1803).
2
Introduction
technical consultant, and even as unofficial diplomat. At his own sugges-
tion, in 1686 he was given the task of writing a history of the House of
Guelph (or Welf) in order to enhance his employer’s dynastic ambitions.
Leibniz initially hoped that the history could be completed relatively
quickly, within a couple of years, but it soon got away from him: despite
a great deal of research in various European archives, which enabled
Leibniz to unearth and publish many volumes of ancient documents
pertaining to the Guelph line, he was unable to complete the history itself
in the remaining thirty years of his life. As the years wore on, the project
became a millstone around Leibniz’s neck, and he frequently complained
that it kept him from other projects that were much closer to his heart. Yet
he did still find time for such projects. He was tenacious in his efforts to
facilitate a reunion between the Catholic and Protestant churches, and –
later – a reunion of the various Protestant sects. He lobbied tirelessly
for the establishment of scientific academies, and in 1700 was rewarded
for his efforts with the foundation of the Berlin Academy of Sciences
(of which Leibniz was subsequently made president for life). He created
calculating machines, drew up plans for the development of a universal
encyclopaedia that would contain everything that was so far known, wrote
Latin poetry, funded alchemical research, and undertook studies on the
origin of languages. That Leibniz managed to find the time for such an
astonishing number and range of intellectual projects may in part be
due to his not having the demands of family life (he never married, but
was said – by some of his earliest biographers at least – to have fathered
a son in his youth).3 More importantly than that, however, was his own
industry, which was legendary even in his own time. According to an early
biographer, ‘He frequently spent a great part of the night, as well as the
day, in reading; and has been known to pass whole months in his study
without allowing himself any unnecessary avocations.’4 This devotion
to research enabled Leibniz to become eminent in many fields of study:
during his lifetime he made original contributions to physics, mathemat-
ics, logic, geology, law, politics, economics, and linguistics, as well as
philosophy. The final years of Leibniz’s life were mostly spent working on
the never-to-be-completed history of the Guelph House, and attempting
to popularise his philosophical views through papers circulated to well-
placed acquaintances and ‘popular’ writings for the educated public, the
most notable of which was the Theodicy (1710). Following a short illness,
he died in Hanover on 14 November 1716 at the age of seventy.
3
See Benjamin Martin, Biographia philosophica (London, 1764), p. 389.
4
Johann Brucker, The History of Philosophy, 2 vols (Dublin, 1792), II, p. 560.
3
As should be clear from this brief history, philosophy was never Leibniz’s
official profession. Consequently, his philosophising (along with his other
intellectual endeavours) had to be carried out in his spare time, around his
official duties. This no doubt goes some way towards explaining Leibniz’s
fondness for writing short papers: his work duties did not afford him the
time to produce a whole suite of books. But pressures of time aside, by his
own confession, he simply did not have the inclination to write a lengthy
treatise that brought all the parts of his philosophical system together: the
lengthy philosophical works that he did eventually find the time to write,
namely the New Essays on Human Understanding (written 1703–5 though
not published until 1765) and the aforementioned Theodicy (1710), were not
expositions of his system as such, but rather detailed responses to the work
of John Locke and Pierre Bayle respectively, and intended as correctives to
what Leibniz considered to be the errors in their work.
Without the time or inclination to lay out his philosophy in books,
Leibniz instead took full advantage of alternative means of circulating
and publicising his ideas, in particular the letter and the journal article.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries it was common for thinkers
to communicate their ideas to others via letters, which were at the time
semi-public documents that were often copied and distributed to other
scholars, or even published (with or without the writer’s permission), and
Leibniz often disseminated his philosophical ideas this way. To facilitate
this, he built up a vast network of correspondents, which reads as a ‘who’s
who’ of early modern philosophy: Thomas Hobbes, Nicolas Malebranche,
Antoine Arnauld, Christian Wolff, Pierre Bayle, Bernard le Bovier de
Fontenelle, and Samuel Clarke, to name just a few. Leibniz’s philosophical
correspondence fills many volumes, and is so rich in its content that no
serious student of Leibniz can afford to ignore it.
In addition to letters, Leibniz also sought to promulgate his ideas
through short articles in learned journals. That he was one of the first
of the great philosophers to publish this way is not surprising, since the
learned journal first emerged in Leibniz’s lifetime, with the first two
European journals, the Journal des sçavans of France, and the Philosophical
Transactions of the Royal Society of England, both appearing in 1665,
when Leibniz was still at university. This gave Leibniz the opportunity
to disseminate his ideas in a way that had not been available to earlier
philosophers. So keen was Leibniz on the very idea of the learned journal
that he proposed the establishment of one in Germany. Although his own
plans did not come to fruition, a German journal – entitled Acta eruditorum
(Chronicles of the Learned) – was nevertheless established in 1682 by two
of his university friends. Leibniz supported the journal by filling its pages
with a number of important papers, including ‘A new method for maxima
4
Introduction
and minima’,5 which made public his discovery of infinitesimal calcu-
lus. Leibniz also put his weight behind another journal, the Miscellanea
Berolinensia (Miscellaneous matters from Berlin), which was the journal of
the Berlin Academy of Sciences: its first volume, published in 1710, con-
tained no fewer than twelve articles authored by Leibniz. Over the course of
his career Leibniz published well over a hundred articles, on a kaleidoscope
of subjects: in addition to papers detailing his mathematical discoveries and
philosophical views, he published articles about the accuracy of watches,6
the separation of salt and water,7 the health records of Paris,8 the discovery
of phosphorous,9 the cause of the aurora borealis,10 and many other topics
besides. Leibniz fully embraced the format of the journal article: it suited his
working patterns, and preference for short, punchy pieces rather than long,
bloated ones. Such was Leibniz’s fondness for the short paper that when he
did eventually decide to write an account of his philosophical system, it was
almost inevitable that he would choose to do so as a short paper rather than
as a book. Despite the challenges presented by the restricted length, it was
the format with which Leibniz was most comfortable.
THE ORIGINS AND FATE OF THE MONADOLOGY

Yet although the Monadology has the look and feel of a journal article, it
was not written for a journal at all, but apparently for one of Leibniz’s cor-
respondents, Nicole Remond, councillor to the Duke of Orleans. It may
have been intended simply to give Remond greater insight into Leibniz’s
philosophy, or it may have had a more exotic purpose, to serve as a frame-
work for a Latin poem about Leibniz’s philosophy that Abbé Fraguier, one
of Remond’s acquaintances in Paris, wished to write. These two possible
aims are suggested by two apparently unrelated threads that run through
some of Leibniz’s correspondence in the first half of 1714, while he was
stationed in Vienna. The beginnings of the first thread are to be found in
5
G. W. Leibniz, ‘Nova methodus pro maximis et minimis’, Acta eruditorum 3 (1684),
pp. 467–73.
6
G. W. Leibniz, ‘Extrait d’une lettre de Mr Leibniz à l’auteur du Journal, touchant le
principe de justesse des horloges portatives de son invention’, Journal des sçavans (1675),
pp. 93–6.
7
G. W. Leibniz, ‘Meditatio de separatione salis & aqua dultis, novoque separationum
chymicarum genere’, Acta eruditorum 1 (1682), pp. 386–8.
8
G. W. Leibniz, ‘Extrait d’une letter de Mr Leibnitz’, Journal des sçavans (1694),
pp. 338–40.
9
G. W. Leibniz, ‘Historia inventionis phosphori’, Miscellanea Berolinensia 1 (1710),
pp. 91–8.
10
G. W. Leibniz, ‘Annotatio de luce quam quidam auroram borealem vocant’, Miscellanea
Berolinensia 1 (1710), pp. 137–8.
5
Leibniz’s letter to Remond of 10 January 1714. Leibniz there explains his
approach to philosophy, and offers a very brief (and possibly apocryphal)
account of his philosophical development:
I have tried to uncover and unite the truth buried and scattered in the opin-
ions of different philosophical sects, and I believe I have added something of
my own to take a few steps forward. The circumstances of my studies, from
my earliest youth, have given me some facility in this. I learned Aristotle as
a lad, and even the Scholastics did not put me off; I am not at all regretful of
this even now. But at that time Plato too, and Plotinus, gave me some satis-
faction, not to mention other ancient thinkers whom I consulted later. After
leaving the trivial schools, I fell upon the moderns, and I remember at the age
of fifteen taking a walk by myself in a grove on the outskirts of Leipzig, called
the Rosental, in order to deliberate about whether I should retain substantial
forms. Mechanism finally prevailed and led me to apply myself to mathemat-
ics. It is true that I did not enter into its depths until after I had conversed with
Mr Huygens in Paris. But when I looked for the ultimate reasons for mecha-
nism, and for the laws of motion themselves, I was very surprised to see that it
was impossible to find them in mathematics, and that I should have to return to
metaphysics. This is what led me back to entelechies, and from the material to
the formal, and ultimately brought me to understand, after a number of correc-
tions and improvements to my notions, that monads, or simple substances, are
the only true substances, and that material things are only phenomena, albeit
well-founded and well-connected.11
Remond’s curiosity was piqued by Leibniz’s talk of monads (at the
time, references to monads in Leibniz’s published works were few and
far between),12 and on 11 February 1714, Charles Hugony, a mutual
acquaintance of both Leibniz and Remond, wrote to Leibniz explain-
ing that Remond would like some clarification of Leibniz’s doctrine of
monads. In his (undated) response, Leibniz advised Hugony that he
would need more detail about what exactly Remond wanted clarified,
explaining that ‘To provide clarifications on monads, I would need
difficulties raised about them, in order not to speak aimlessly and to
say anything other than what is asked for.’13 In his reply to Leibniz of
17 April 1714, Hugony wrote: ‘Before raising difficulties about monads, I
would like to have a greater knowledge of your system. This is exercising
Mr Remond.’ Presumably with his tongue firmly in his cheek, Hugony
then proceeded to spell out just how exercised Remond was by not having
sufficient knowledge of Leibniz’s system: ‘You are endangering his health,
11
PPL, pp. 654–5 (translation modified).
12
For example, see PPL, p. 504; T396.
13
G III, p. 682.
6
Introduction
which is poor.’14 Despite the apparent risk to Remond’s health, Leibniz
made no immediate attempt to produce the desired clarification or exposi-
tion of his system, and appears not to have made a start even by 11 July,
when he wrote the following to Louis Bourguet:
Mr Remond, councillor of His Royal Highness the Duke of Orleans, thinks
very highly of my Theodicy, and is asking me for clarifications. It would be
easier for me to give them if difficulties, objections, comments or questions
were raised about it, for without that passages are sometimes clarified in which
others find no difficulties.15
The second thread to the Monadology begins on 17 February 1714: in a
letter written to Leibniz on that date, Remond enclosed a Latin poem
about Homer that had been composed by a friend, Abbé Fraguier. The
poem evidently made an impact on Leibniz, who was inspired to compose
one of his own, appending it to his letter to Remond of 14 March. Leibniz’s
poem consists of sixty hexameters, almost a third of which are devoted to
summarising some of his key doctrines; the ‘Leibnizian’ part of the poem
begins with God, the ‘greatest author’, who scatters his rays onto the Earth
and into the stars, creating minds in his image, as well as all souls, which
enclose all things. Leibniz then claims that monads alone subsist, and the
harmony between them is a testimony to God’s omnipotence; that the
natural laws, fashioned in such a way that better ones cannot be imagined,
are in harmony with final causes; and that atoms do not exist, and instead
particles are divisible into ever smaller worlds, with nothing left empty.
The Leibnizian part of the poem ends with the claim that God, the ruler of
the best world, has arranged things in such a way that actions bring about
their own punishments and rewards.16 In his next letter, written almost
two months later, on 7 May, Remond began by telling Leibniz that both
he and Fraguier were delighted by Leibniz’s Latin poem. It then became
clear that he had discussed the possibility of Fraguier putting Leibniz’s
philosophy into verse himself. However, as Remond explained,
Abbé Fraguier said to me just yesterday that he was not in fact sufficiently
instructed in your system to dare to speak about it, but that if he ever were to
have a clearer idea of it, it would be a pleasure to treat a subject so uncommon
and grand.
Remond continued to explain Fraguier’s belief that poets had succeeded in

treating ‘sensible things’ (that is, things of the senses), which were familiar
14
Quoted in Enrico Pasini, ‘La monadologie: histoire de naissance’, in La Monadologie de
Leibniz: genèse et contexte, ed. Enrico Pasini (Paris: Mimesis, 2005), pp. 101–2.
15
G III, pp. 571–2.
16
G III, pp. 613–15.
7
to almost everyone, by making them even more sensible, but that they had
struggled with more sublime matters which were not encountered through
the senses. According to Fraguier, in order to treat such matters success-
fully, it would be necessary for the poet to have a mastery of the sublime
material that was so thorough that he would be able to present it in verse
as clearly as he could sensible things. Remond then related to Leibniz
Fraguier’s view as to how a poet such as himself could acquire this mastery:
For that, he would have to have each proposition expressed with the utmost
precision, without metaphor, and like the axioms of geometers; he would have
to have the most immediate and most indirect consequences of these proposi-
tions, and he would have to use them to explain the passions and the natural
effects. But I am some way from being in that position, and my mind furnishes
me almost only with objections that I cannot resolve, because I do not yet
know the points well enough. He [Fraguier] finally got me to agree that he
had spoken fairly when he compared the knowledge we have of your system of
monads to the knowledge that we would have of the sun just from single rays
escaping from the clouds covering it.17
The two separate threads – Remond’s request for ‘clarification’ of monads,

and Fraguier’s desire to have a systematic presentation of Leibniz’s phi-
losophy – were both discussed in Leibniz’s next letter to Remond, written
in July 1714. He began the letter with this apology:
I hoped to enclose with this letter some clarification on monads that you appar-
ently requested, but it has grown under my hand, and many distractions have
prevented me from finishing it already. And you know, Sir, that these sorts of
considerations require contemplation.18
After discussing a variety of other matters, Leibniz ended the letter with a
reference to Fraguier’s plan to put his philosophy into verse:
As Abbé Fraguier gives some relief to thoughts as mediocre as mine through
verses of exceptional beauty, what would he not do if he treated an important
subject and lofty matters? If through some clarifications I could contribute to
encouraging him to implement the fine plan he apparently has, to give sub-
stance and colour to thoughts about the most sublime philosophy, I would
have rendered a great service to mankind.19
17
G III, p. 616. Fraguier had in fact made a different but presumably related request of
Leibniz the previous year, again through a third party. On 7 May 1713, Pierre Coste
wrote to Leibniz to say that Fraguier ‘admires, as does his friend [Remond], everything
that issues from your pen, and has charged me to implore you in his name to collect
together in a single book all these loose pieces which have escaped from you at various
times’. G III, p. 434.
18
G III, p. 618.
19
G III, p. 621.
8
Introduction
For his July 1714 letter to Remond, Leibniz had in fact composed a short
appendix featuring a summary of his doctrine of monads (a full transla-
tion can be found in pp. 278–9 of this volume), but ultimately he did not
enclose the appendix when sending the letter. Nevertheless, around this
time Leibniz was crafting a much longer and more detailed ‘clarification’;
this is the text we now know as the Monadology. Whether this was intended
simply as the ‘clarification’ of the doctrine of monads that Remond had
wanted, or as the basis for Fraguier’s projected poem, is unclear. Leibniz
certainly seems to have conceived these as two distinct requests: the fact
that he discussed one of them at the very start of his July 1714 letter to
Remond, and the other at the very end, strongly suggests that he thought
of them as unconnected. Nevertheless it is possible that the ‘clarifica-
tion’ that he put together was designed to serve both ends, since it has
a style and structure not dissimilar to that which Fraguier had wanted.
Whatever Leibniz had in mind, from the extant manuscripts it is clear
that he devoted a great deal of time and energy to the text, but ultimately,
for reasons at which we can only speculate, he decided not to send it to
Remond. Instead, on 26 August 1714 Leibniz sent him a different work,
the Principles of Nature and Grace, which had been written for Prince
Eugene of Savoy.20 While Leibniz worked on both the Principles of Nature
and Grace and the Monadology during the summer of 1714, the former was
completed first, with the latter likely being completed only after Leibniz
returned to Hanover, in mid-September of that year.21 Despite the work
he had put into the Monadology, which included the addition of copious
cross-references to his Theodicy for the benefit of any reader looking for
a greater explanation of certain doctrines, Leibniz did not send it to the
person for whom it had apparently been written, Remond, nor did he seek
to publish it. Whatever the reason for this might have been – and again,
we can do little more than speculate – Leibniz appears not to have been so
dissatisfied with the text as to keep it from everyone, as he allowed certain
of his confidantes in Vienna to have access to early drafts of the text.
Unlike most of the 50,000 or so writings that comprise Leibniz’s
Nachlass, the Monadology was published relatively quickly after Leibniz’s
death, at least in translation: although Leibniz had composed the piece
20
Daniel Garber has suggested that Leibniz’s unsent appendix to his July 1714 letter to
Remond ‘was probably the common ancestor of what was to become two finished essays,
the “Principes de la nature et de la grâce fondés en raison,” and the “Monadologie.”’
Daniel Garber, Leibniz: Body, Substance, Monad (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2009), p. 353.
21
See G. W. Leibniz, Principes de la nature et de la grace fondés en raison – Principes de la
philosophie ou Monadologie, ed. André Robinet (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France,
1954), pp. 2, 12–13.
9
in French (which by the dawn of the eighteenth century had overtaken
Latin as the chief language of European scholarship), German and Latin
translations appeared long before the original French was published. The
Monadology was first published by Heinrich Köhler in 1720, in a German
translation made not from Leibniz’s final draft but from an earlier one
that Köhler may have obtained from Leibniz in person in the summer of
1714.22 The title ‘Monadology’ was coined by Köhler. Leibniz seems not
to have given the piece a title, though on one of the surviving manuscripts
a copyist wrote ‘The principles of philosophy, by Mr Leibniz’; whether
this title would have met with Leibniz’s approval is difficult to say, though
its appropriateness is beyond question. ‘The principles of philosophy’
was used as the title of the Latin translation of the text that appeared in
1721 in a supplement to the Acta eruditorum journal. The source used
for this translation was a different early draft of the text, which is now
lost.23 The Latin translation from the Acta eruditorum appeared in several
other publications throughout the eighteenth century, most notably in
a six-volume anthology of Leibniz’s writings edited by Ludovic Dutens
in 1768.24 Each time, the title used was ‘The principles of philosophy’.
The title by which we now know it, the Monadology, devised by Köhler
in 1720, became popular only much later, following the first publication
of the original French text in an anthology of Leibniz’s writings edited by
Johann Eduard Erdman in 1840.25 For reasons that are not known, Erdman
elected to use Köhler’s title ‘Monadology’, and in so doing he relegated
‘The principles of philosophy’ to a mere subtitle. This decision caught the
imagination of later editors of Leibniz’s works, such as Jacques (1842),26
Janet (1866),27 and Gerhardt (1885),28 each of whom not only elected to use
the title of ‘Monadology’ for the text, but also deemed it sufficient in itself,
22
G. W. Leibniz, Lehr-Sätze über die Monadologie: ingleichen von Gott und seiner Existentz,
seinen Eigenschaften und von der Seele des Menschen (1720). The copy of the Monadology
from which Köhler made his translation is now lost. Evidently it consisted of ninety-two
sections rather than the ninety found in all surviving manuscript copies of the text, but
is otherwise very similar to one of the surviving early draft manuscripts.
23
‘Principia philosophiæ, autore G. G. Leibnitio’, Acta eruditorum supplementa tomus VII
(1721), pp. 500–14. The copy of the Monadology used for this translation consisted
of ninety-three sections, but is otherwise similar to one of the surviving early draft
manuscripts.
24
G. W. Leibniz, Opera omnia, ed. L. Dutens, 6 vols (Geneva, 1768), vol. 2, pp. 20–31.
25
G. W. Leibniz, Opera philosophica omnia, ed. J. E. Erdman (Berlin, 1840), pp. 702–12.
26
G. W. Leibniz, Oeuvres de Leibniz. Deuxième série, ed. A. Jacques, new edn (Paris:
Charpentier, 1842), pp. 391–404.
27
G. W. Leibniz, Oeuvres philosophiques de Leibniz. Tome II, ed. Paul Janet (Paris:
Ladrange, 1866), pp. 594–608.
28
G VI, pp. 607–22.
10
Introduction
thus omitting ‘The principles of philosophy’ altogether. Since Erdman,
the text has become a staple in anthologies of Leibniz’s works, whether in
the original language or in translation to another language, and the title of
‘Monadology’ has stuck.
The Monadology was first translated into English in 1867 by Frederick
Henry Hedge, who published his translation as an article in The Journal
of Speculative Philosophy.29 This made the Monadology one of the first
of Leibniz’s philosophical works to be available in English translation
(although English-language anthologies of Leibniz’s philosophical writ-
ings are commonplace today, they only started to appear in the last decade
of the nineteenth century). Today the number of different English transla-
tions of the text is almost into double figures: a translation of it is included
in most English-language anthologies of Leibniz’s philosophical writings.30
This reflects the fact that of all of Leibniz’s numerous philosophical works,
the Monadology is often considered to be of particular importance, due in
no small part to the wide range of doctrines discussed therein.
But as important as the Monadology is for the student of Leibniz, it is
also a very condensed piece, and accordingly has gained a reputation as
being one of Leibniz’s most difficult works. To address this, this volume
contains not just the Monadology itself, but also a detailed section-by-
section commentary, designed to dispel the clouds of obscurity that hang
over the text. The Monadology has long been seen as a work that benefits
from a commentary: the first commentaries appeared in the nineteenth
century,31 and have since been joined by others.32 As will become clear, in
the commentary I have sought not just to clarify the claims Leibniz makes,
but also identify his grounds and reasoning. This involves identifying his
assumptions, detailing his arguments, and highlighting his inferences. In
so doing, I remain neutral on the question of whether Leibniz wrote the
Monadology for Fraguier, or according to the prescription laid down by
Fraguier, which called for Leibniz to identify the axioms of his philosophy,
to make apparent his conclusions and inferences, and so on. Nevertheless,
29
F. H. Hedge, ‘The Monadology’, The Journal of Speculative Philosophy 1:3 (1867),
pp. 129–37.
30
In addition to LPW, MPE, MPW, PPL, and PE, translations can be found in: The
Philosophical Works of Leibnitz, 2nd edn, trans. and ed. George Martin Duncan
(The Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor Company, 1908); Leibniz Selections, trans. and
ed. Philip P. Wiener (New York: Scribner, 1951); Philosophical Texts, trans. and ed.
R. S. Woolhouse and Richard Francks (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998).
31
Th. Desdouits, La Monadologie (Paris: Delalain, 1880); Alexis Bertrand, La Monadologie
(Paris: Belin, 1886); MPW.
32
For example, Nicholas Rescher, G. W. Leibniz’s Monadology: An Edition for Students
(London: Routledge, 1992).
11
whether Leibniz wrote the Monadology with Fraguier in mind or not, the
fact is that he did write it in a highly systematic way: ideas and doctrines
are developed very precisely and explicitly connected together, and from
them implications are drawn and inferences followed. The Monadology is
not, to be sure, one long piece of deductive reasoning; while Leibniz does
make many deductions, he also offers a posteriori arguments, makes appeals
to the science of his day, and develops similes to make certain ideas easier
to understand. Moreover, the Monadology is not written in the geometric
manner, à la Spinoza’s Ethics: aside from utilising arguments based on
experience, it lacks the formal apparatus of definitions, axioms, postulates,
and so on, as well as a suite of rigorous demonstrations flowing from these.
Yet even though Leibniz does not make use of this formal apparatus,
throughout the Monadology he nevertheless does put forward defini-
tions, lay down axioms, make postulates, offer demonstrations, and so on.
Moreover, long stretches of the Monadology consist of arguments and
inferences, and Leibniz’s choice of language (for example, we find numer-
ous uses of phrases such as ‘for this reason’, ‘it follows that . . .’, ‘from
this we see’, and so on) shows his systematic ambitions. The Structure of
the Monadology (pp. 34–8 of this volume) shows the logical connection
between sections and the flow of the argumentation across the text. It
shows very clearly that in writing the Monadology Leibniz clearly wanted
not just to summarise a number of his doctrines, but to make a case for
them as well. In other words, he wanted the reader not just to understand
what he believed, but also to be persuaded by it.33 We honour his wishes if
we read it with that in mind.
33
This feature of the Monadology is sometimes overlooked, or played down. For example,
Nicholas Jolley writes: ‘Some of the most famous brief expositions of his [Leibniz’s]
thought, such as the Monadology and the Principles of Nature and Grace (1714), serve
up his metaphysics in a “take it or leave it” manner; indeed, they even come close to
dispensing with deductive argument altogether.’ Nicholas Jolley, Leibniz (London:
Routledge, 2005), p. 9. And Franklin Perkins writes, in a similar vein: ‘the Monadology
and the Principles of Nature and Grace, Based on Reason . . . were written near the end
of his life and represent his philosophy in its most mature form. These works, though,
are more like outlines than full arguments or explanations.’ Franklin Perkins, Leibniz:
A Guide for the Perplexed (London: Continuum, 2007), p. 7.
12
About the Text and Translation
Even with the benefit of a commentary, the Monadology is a difficult text to

read in isolation. Leibniz himself appears to have been aware of this, for
on one of his handwritten drafts of the piece he inserted at the end of some
of the ninety sections various references to particular sections or pages of
his book Theodicy (1710), so that a reader desiring further illumination
would know where to find it. All of the passages from the Theodicy to which
Leibniz refers can be found in the appendix to this volume. For ease of use,
each passage from the Theodicy is keyed to the particular section(s) of the
Monadology in which Leibniz refers to it. In addition, the appendix contains
two further texts which shed light on the Monadology and its doctrines, namely:
• The Principles of Nature and Grace, which was written for Prince
Eugene of Savoy around the same time as the Monadology, but com-
pleted first. While very similar (but not identical) in terms of doctrine,
the two texts have a very different style: the Principles is written in a
‘popular’ and accessible style, while the Monadology is more technical
and formal, being aimed squarely at the ‘serious metaphysician’.1
• The ‘Appendix on Monads’, a brief clarification of his doctrine of
monads that Leibniz wrote as a supplement to his letter to Nicole
Remond of July 1714, but ultimately did not send.
The translations of the Monadology and of all of the texts in the appendix
are my own. In translating the Monadology and the Principles of Nature and
Grace I have used the text in André Robinet’s excellent edition, Principes
de la nature et de la grace fondés en raison – Principes de la philosophie ou
Monadologie (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1954).
1
The phrase is from Garber, Leibniz: Body, Substance, Monad, p. 353.
13
The Monadology 1
1. The monad, about which we shall speak here, is nothing other than
a simple substance which enters into compounds, ‘simple’ meaning
‘without parts’.
Theodicy, preliminary discourse §10.2
2. And there must be simple substances, because there are compounds;

for the compound is nothing but an accumulation or aggregate of
simples.
3. Now where there are no parts, neither extension, nor shape, nor divis-
ibility is possible. And these monads are the true atoms of nature and,
in a word, the elements of things.
4. There is also no dissolution to fear, and there is no conceivable way in

which a simple substance could perish naturally.
5. For the same reason there is no way in which a simple substance could
begin naturally, since it cannot be formed by composition.
1
Source: Leibniz, Principes de la Nature, pp. 68–127.
2
Leibniz here omitted ‘preliminary discourse’ although the reference is in fact to that part
of the Theodicy.
14
The Monadology
6. Thus it may be said that monads can only begin and end at once,
that is, they can only begin by creation and only end by annihilation,
whereas that which is composite begins or ends by parts.
7. There is also no way of explaining how a monad could be internally

altered or changed by any other created thing, since it is not possible
to rearrange anything in it or to conceive in it any internal motion that
could be started, directed, increased, or diminished within it, as can
occur in compounds, where there is change among the parts. Monads
have no windows through which anything could enter them or depart
from them. Accidents cannot become detached, or wander about
outside of substances, as the sensible species of the Scholastics once did.
Thus neither substance nor accident can enter a monad from outside.
8. [Monads are not mathematical points, for these points are only
extremities and the line cannot be composed of points.] Yet monads
must have some qualities [and some changes], otherwise they would
not be beings at all [and if simple substances were non-entities, com-
pounds also would be reduced to nothing]. And if simple substances
did not differ qualitatively, there would be no way of perceiving any
change in things, since what is in the compound can only come from
its simple constituents, and if monads were without different qualities
they would be indistinguishable from one another, since they do not
differ quantitatively either. And consequently, supposing the existence
of the plenum, each place would always receive, in any motion, only
the equivalent of what it already had, and one state of things would be
indistinguishable from another.
Theodicy. Preface ****2b3
9. It must also be that every monad is different from every other. For
in nature there are never two beings which are perfectly alike, and in
which it is not possible to find a difference which is internal, or based
on an intrinsic denomination.
3
Leibniz actually wrote ‘Preface ***2b’ but this would appear to be a mistake, as the
material on that page does not relate to M8 at all. For an explanation of Leibniz’s use of
asterisks, numbers and ‘a’ or ‘b’ when referring to the preface of the Theodicy, see p. 162,
note 2.
15
10. I also take it for granted that every created being is subject to change,
and consequently the created monad also, and even that this change is
continual in each one.
11. It follows from what we have just said that the natural changes of
monads come from an internal principle [that may be called active
force], since an external cause would not be able to influence a
monad’s interior.
Theodicy §396. §400.
12. [And generally it may be said that force is nothing other than the prin-
ciple of change.] But besides the principle of change, there must also
be a complete specification of that which undergoes the change, which
constitutes so to speak the specific determination and variety of simple
substances.
13. This complete specification must encompass a plurality within the

unity or the simple. For as every natural change takes place by degrees,
something changes and something remains; and consequently in the
simple substance there must be a plurality of affections and relations,
even though it has no parts.
14. The passing state, which encompasses and represents a plurality within
the unity (or simple substance) is nothing other than what is called
perception, which must be distinguished from apperception, or con-
sciousness, as will be apparent in what follows. And it is here that the
Cartesians have fallen far short, as they have given no thought to percep-
tions which are not apperceived. This also is what made them believe
that minds alone are monads and that there are no souls of beasts or
other entelechies, and also led them to make the common mistake of
confusing a long stupor with death, in the rigorous sense of the term,
which has made them fall in with the Scholastic p rejudice of souls
entirely separate from bodies, and has even confirmed some twisted
minds in the belief of the mortality of souls.
15. The action of the internal principle which brings about the change or
passage from one perception to another may be called appetition. It
16
The Monadology
is true that the appetite cannot always completely reach the whole
perception it aims for, but it always attains something of it, and reaches
new perceptions.
16. We ourselves experience a plurality within a simple substance when

we find that the least thought which we apperceive encompasses a
variety in its object. So all those who acknowledge that the soul is a
simple substance must acknowledge this plurality within the monad,
and Mr Bayle ought not to have found the difficulty in it which he did
in his Dictionary article ‘Rorarius’.
17. Moreover, we are obliged to admit that perception and that which
depends on it cannot be explained mechanically, that is, by means of
shapes and motions. And if we suppose that there were a machine
whose structure makes it think, feel, and have perception, we could
imagine it increased in size while keeping the same proportions, so
that one could enter it as one does with a mill. If we were then to
go around inside it, we would see only parts pushing one another,
and never anything which would explain a perception. This must
therefore be sought in the simple substance, and not in the compound
or machine. Moreover, this is the only thing that can be found in
the simple substance, that is, perceptions and their changes. It is also in
this alone that all the internal actions of simple substances can consist.
18. The name ‘entelechies’ could be given to all simple substances, or

created monads, for they have in themselves a certain perfection
(ἔχουσι τὸ ἐντελές). There is a self-sufficiency (ἀυτάρχεια) which
makes them the sources of their internal actions and incorporeal
automata, so to speak.
Theodicy §87.
19. If we wish to call ‘soul’ everything which has perceptions and

appetites in the general sense I have just explained, all simple substances
or created monads could be called souls. But as sensation is some-
thing more than a simple perception, I hold that the general name of
‘monads’ and ‘entelechies’ is sufficient for simple substances which only
have perceptions, and that only those whose perception is more
distinct and is accompanied by memory should be called souls.
17
20. For we experience within ourselves a state in which we remember
nothing and have no distinct perception, such as when we faint, or
when we are overcome by a deep, dreamless sleep. In this state the
soul does not appreciably differ from a simple monad, but as this state
does not last, and as the soul emerges from it, the soul is something
more.
Theodicy §64.
21. And it in no way follows that the simple substance is without any per-
ception when in that state. That is not even possible, for the aforemen-
tioned reasons; for it cannot perish, nor can it subsist without some
affection, which is nothing other than its perception. But when there
are a vast number of little perceptions in which there is nothing distinct,
we are stupefied, as happens when we continuously spin around in the
same direction several times: this makes us dizzy, which can make us
faint and prevent us from distinguishing anything at all. And death can
put animals into this state for a time.
22. And as every present state of a simple substance is naturally a conse-

quence of its preceding state, in such a way that its present state is big
with the future. . .
Theodicy §360.
23. therefore, since we apperceive our perceptions when we come

around from our stupor, it must be the case that we had perceptions
immediately beforehand, although we did not apperceive them; for a
perception cannot arise naturally except from another perception, just
as one motion can only arise naturally from another motion.
Theodicy §401–3.
24. From this it is clear that if we had nothing in our perceptions which was
distinct and which stood out, so to speak, and which was of a sharper
flavour, we would always be in a stupor. And this is the state of bare
monads.
25. We see also that nature has given heightened perceptions to animals
from the care she has taken to furnish them with organs which gather
18
The Monadology
together a number of light rays or air waves in order to make them
have a greater effect through their union. There is something similar
in smell, taste, and touch, and perhaps in many other senses which
are unknown to us. I will shortly explain how what occurs in the soul
represents what occurs in the organs.
26. Memory provides souls with a kind of ability to make connections, which
imitates reason but must be distinguished from it. We see that when
animals have a perception of something which strikes them, and they
have had a similar perception previously, they come to expect – by the
representation of their memory – what was connected to this previous
perception, and are led to feelings similar to those they had before. For
example, when dogs are shown a stick, they remember the pain it has
caused them in the past, and yelp and run away.
27. And a vivid imagination, which strikes and stirs them, arises either from
the magnitude or from the number of the preceding perceptions.
For often a vivid impression has all at once the same effect as a long-
formed habit, or as the repetition of many moderate perceptions.
28. Men act like beasts insofar as the sequences of their perceptions arise
only through the principle of memory, like empirical physicians who
have just practice without theory. And we are nothing but empiricists
in three-quarters of our actions. For example, when we expect that
there will be daylight tomorrow, we act as empiricists, because until
now it has always happened that way. It is only the astronomer who
draws this conclusion rationally.
Preliminary discourse §65.
29. But it is the knowledge of necessary and eternal truths which distin-
guishes us from simple animals, and gives us reason and the sciences, by
raising us to knowledge of ourselves and God. And this is what is called
in us the rational soul or mind.
30. It is also through the knowledge of necessary truths and their abstrac-
tions that we are raised to reflexive acts, which make us think of what
is called the self, and consider that this or that is within us. And it is
19
thus that in thinking of ourselves, we think of being, of substance, of
the simple and the compound, of the immaterial and of God himself,
by conceiving that what is limited in us is boundless in him. And these
reflexive acts provide the main objects of our reasonings.
Theodicy. Preface *4a
31. Our reasonings are based on two great principles: first, the principle of
contradiction, in virtue of which we judge false that which includes a
contradiction, and true that which is opposed or contradictory to the
false;
32. and second, the principle of sufficient reason, in virtue of which we con-
sider that there can be found no fact that is true or existent, or any
true assertion, unless there is a sufficient reason why it is thus and not
otherwise, even though most often these reasons cannot be known to
us.
33. There are two kinds of truths: truths of reasoning and truths of fact.
Truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposite is impossible, and
truths of fact are contingent and their opposite is possible. When a
truth is necessary, the reason for it can be found by analysis, by resolv-
ing it into simpler ideas and truths until we come to the primary ones.
§189. §280–2.
§367. Abridgement, objection 3.
34. This is how the speculative theorems and practical canons of

mathematicians are reduced by analysis to definitions, axioms, and
postulates.
35. And finally there are simple ideas of which no definition can be given.
There are also axioms and postulates, or in a word primary princi-
ples, which cannot be proved and also have no need of proof. And
these are identical propositions, whose opposite contains an explicit
contradiction.
20
The Monadology
36. But a sufficient reason must also be found in contingent truths, or truths
of fact, that is, in the series of things spread throughout the universe
of created things, where resolution into particular reasons could go on
into endless detail because of the immense variety of things in nature
and the division of bodies to infinity. There is an infinity of shapes and
motions, both present and past, which enter into the efficient cause of
my present writing, and there is an infinity of minute inclinations and
dispositions of my soul, both present and past, which enter into its final
cause.
Theodicy §36. §37. §44. §45. §49.
§52. §121. §122.
§337. §340. §344.
37. And as all this intricate detail includes nothing except other contingents
which are earlier or even more detailed, each of which in turn needs
a similar analysis in order to explain it, we are no further forward, and
so it must be that the sufficient or ultimate reason lies outside the
succession or series of this detail of contingencies, however infinite it
may be.
38. And thus it is that the ultimate reason of things must lie in a necessary
substance, in which the intricate detail of changes exist only eminently,
in the source as it were, and this is what we call God.
Theodicy §7.
39. Now since this substance is a sufficient reason for all this intricate
detail, which is also interconnected throughout, there is only one God,
and this God is sufficient.
40. We may also conclude that since this supreme substance – which is
unique, universal, and necessary – has nothing outside of it which is
independent of it, and is a simple consequence of possible being, it must
be incapable of limits, and contain just as much reality as is possible.
41. From which it follows that God is absolutely perfect, since perfection
is nothing other than magnitude of positive reality, taken in the strict
sense by setting aside the limits or boundaries in the things which have
21
it. And there, where there are no limits, that is, in God, perfection is
absolutely infinite.
Theodicy §22
42. It also follows that created things owe their perfections to the influence
of God, but that they owe their imperfections to their own nature,
which is incapable of being without limits. For it is in this that they are
distinguished from God. [This original imperfection of created things is
observable in the natural inertia of bodies.]
Theodicy §20. §27–31.
§[154]153. §167. §377 onwards.
§30. §380. Abridgement, objection 5.
43. It is also true that in God is not only the source of existences but also
the source of essences, insofar as they are real, or of what is real in
possibility. This is because God’s understanding is the region of eternal
truths, or of the ideas on which they depend, and because without
him there would be nothing real in possibilities, and not only nothing
existent, but also nothing possible.
Theodicy §20.
44. For if there is a reality in essences or possibilities, or indeed in eternal

truths, it must be the case that this reality be grounded in something
existent and actual, and consequently in the existence of the necessary
being, in whom essence includes existence, or in whom it is enough to
be possible in order to be actual.
Theodicy §184. §189. §335.
45. Thus God alone (or the necessary being) has this privilege, that he
must exist if he is possible. And as nothing can prevent the possibility
of that which possesses no limits, no negation, and consequently no
contradiction, this alone is sufficient for the existence of God to be
known a priori. We have proved it through the reality of eternal truths
also.
But we have now just proved it a posteriori too, since contingent
beings exist, and they cannot have their ultimate or sufficient reason
22
The Monadology
except in the necessary being, who has the reason for his existence in
himself.
46. Yet we must not imagine, as some do, that the eternal truths, being
dependent on God, are arbitrary and depend on his will, as Descartes,
and afterwards Mr Poiret, seem to have supposed. This is true only
of contingent truths, whose principle is fittingness or the choice of the
best, whereas necessary truths depend solely on his understanding, and
are its internal object.
Theodicy §180–4. §185. §335.
§351. §380.
47. Thus God alone is [the primitive simple substance or monad] the
primitive unity, or original simple substance, which produces all

created or derivative monads, which are born, so to speak, by con-
tinual fulgurations of the divinity from moment to moment, limited by
the receptivity of their created nature, the essence of which is to be
limited.
Theodicy §382–91. §398. §395.
48. There is in God power, which is the source of everything, then knowl-
edge, which contains the detail of ideas, and finally will, which brings
about changes and products in accordance with the principle of the
best.
Theodicy §7. §149. §150.
And these correspond to what there is in created monads: the subject

or basis, the perceptive faculty, and the appetitive faculty. But in God
these attributes are absolutely infinite or perfect, and in created
monads or in entelechies (or perfectihabies, as Hermolaus Barbarus
translated this word) there are only limitations4 of them, in proportion
to the perfection that they have.
Theodicy [§48] §87.
4
The final draft has ‘imitations’, but this looks to be a copying error as previous drafts had
‘limitations’ instead.
23
49. The created thing is said to act outwardly insofar as it has perfection,
and to be acted upon by another insofar as it is imperfect. Thus action
is attributed to the monad insofar as it has distinct perceptions and
passion insofar as it has confused perceptions.
Theodicy §32. §66. §386.
50. And one created thing is more perfect than another when what is
found in it serves to explain a priori what happens in the other; and this
is why we say that it acts upon the other.
51. But in simple substances, the influence of one monad over another
is merely ideal: it can have its effect only through the intervention of
God, inasmuch as in the ideas of God a monad rightly demands that
God have consideration for it when organising the others from the
beginning of things. For since a created monad cannot have a physical
influence on the interior of another, this is the only way that one can
be dependent on another.
Theodicy §9. §54. §65. §66.
52. And this is why actions and passions are mutual between created
things. For when he compares two simple substances, God finds in
each the reasons which oblige him to accommodate the other to it,
and consequently what is active in certain respects is passive from
another point of view: a created thing is active insofar as what is known
distinctly in it serves to explain what happens in another, and passive
insofar as the reason for what happens in it is found in what is known
distinctly in another.5
53. Now as there is an infinity of possible universes in the ideas of God,

and as only one of them can exist, there must be a sufficient reason for
God’s choice, determining him to one rather than to another.
Theodicy [§7.] §8. §10.
§44. §173. §196 onwards.
§225. §414–16.
5
Some transcriptions of the Monadology include a reference to Theodicy §66 here (for
example, G VI, p. 615), but there is no such reference in the manuscript.
24
The Monadology
54. And this reason can only be found in the fittingness, or in the degrees
of perfection, which these worlds contain, each possible world having
the right to claim existence in proportion to the perfection it contains.
[Thus there is nothing which is wholly arbitrary.]
Theodicy §74. [§78] §167. §350.
§201. §130. §352[–354]. §345 onwards.
§354.
55. And this is the cause of the existence of the best, which God’s wisdom
makes him know, his goodness makes him choose, and his power
makes him produce.
Theodicy §8. §78. §80.
[§81.] §84. §119. §204 [and onwards].
§206. §208. Abridgement, objection 1, objection 8.
56. Now this interconnection, or this accommodation of all created things

to each other and of each to all the rest, means that each simple sub-
stance has relations which express all the others, and that consequently
it is a perpetual living mirror of the universe.
57. The same town, when looked at from different places, appears quite
different and is, as it were, multiplied in perspectives. In the same way
it happens that, because of the infinite multitude of simple substances,
there are just as many different universes, which are nevertheless
merely perspectives of a single universe according to the different
points of view of each monad.
Theodicy §147.
58. And this is the means of obtaining as much variety as possible, but with
the greatest order possible; that is, it is the means of obtaining as much
perfection as possible.
Theodicy §120. §124. §241 and onwards.
§214. §243. §275.
59. Also, this hypothesis (which I dare to say has been demonstrated) is
the only one which properly exalts the greatness of God. Mr Bayle
25
recognised this, when in his Dictionary (article ‘Rorarius’) he made
objections to it, in which he was even tempted to believe that I
ascribed too much to God, and more than is possible. But he could not
put forward any reason why this universal harmony, which ensures that
each substance expresses exactly all the others through the relations it
has to them, should be impossible.
60. Moreover, evident in what I have just said are the a priori reasons
why things could not happen in a different way. For since God, in
organising the whole, had regard for each part, and particularly for
each monad, and since a monad’s nature is to represent, nothing can
limit it to representing just a part of things. However, it is true that its
representation is merely confused as to the detail of the whole uni-
verse, and can be distinct only for a small part of things, that is, those
which are either the nearest or the largest in relation to each of the
monads, otherwise each monad would be a divinity. It is not in the
object, but in the modification of the knowledge of the object, that
monads are limited. They all go confusedly to infinity, to the whole,
but they are limited and distinguished by the degrees of their distinct
perceptions.
61. And in this, compounds are analogous to simples. For the whole is
a plenum, which makes all matter interconnected, and in a plenum
every movement has some effect on distant bodies in proportion to
their distance, such that each body is affected not only by those which
touch it, and in some way feels the effect of everything that happens to
them, but also by means of them it is affected by those which touch the
former ones, the ones which directly touch it. From this it follows that
this communication extends indefinitely. Consequently every body is
affected by everything that happens in the universe, so much so that
the one who sees all could read in each body what is happening every-
where, and even what has happened or will happen, by observing in
the present that which is remote both in time and space: σὕμπνοια
πάντα, as Hippocrates said.6 But a soul can read in itself only what
is distinctly represented there; it cannot unfold all at once all that is
folded within it, for this proceeds to infinity.
6
‘all things conspire’.
26
The Monadology
62. Thus although each created monad represents the whole universe, it
represents more distinctly the body which is particularly affected by it,
and whose entelechy it is. And because this body expresses the whole
universe through the interconnection of all matter in the plenum, the
soul also represents the whole universe by representing this body,
which belongs to it in a particular way.
Theodicy §400.
63. The body belonging to a monad, which is its entelechy or soul,

constitutes together with the entelechy what may be called a living
thing, and with the soul what is called an animal. Now this body of
a living thing or animal is always organic; for since every monad is
in its way a mirror of the universe, and the universe is regulated in
a perfect order, it must be the case that there is also an order in
whatever represents it, that is, in the perceptions of the soul, and
consequently in the body, in accordance with which the universe is
represented in it.
Theodicy §403.
64. Thus each organic body of a living thing is a kind of divine machine,
or natural automaton, which infinitely surpasses all artificial automata,
because a machine which is made by the art of man is not a machine in
each of its parts; for example, the tooth of a brass wheel has parts or
fragments which are no longer artificial as far as we are concerned, and
no longer have anything about them to indicate the machine for whose
use the wheel was intended. But the machines of nature, that is, living
bodies, are still machines in their smallest parts, to infinity. It is in this
that the difference between nature and art consists, that is, between
divine art and ours.
Theodicy §134. §146. §194. §483.
65. And the author of nature was able to practise this divine and infinitely
marvellous craftsmanship because each portion of matter is not
only divisible to infinity, as the ancients recognised, but also actually
subdivided without end, each part into further parts, each of which one
has some motion of its own: otherwise it would be impossible for each
portion of matter to be able to express the whole universe.
Theodicy §195.
27
66. From this it is evident that there is a world of created things – living
things, animals, entelechies, souls – in the least part of matter.
67. Each portion of matter may be conceived as a garden full of plants, and
as a pond full of fish. But each branch of a plant, each limb of an animal,
each drop of its humours, is also such a garden or such a pond.
68. And although the earth and the air interspersed between the plants in
the garden, or the water interspersed between the fish in the pond,
are not themselves plant or fish, yet they still contain them, though
more often than not of a subtlety imperceptible to us.
69. Thus there is nothing uncultivated, nothing sterile, nothing dead in

the universe, no chaos, no confusions, except in appearance. This is
somewhat like what is apparent with a pond viewed from a distance,
in which we see a confused motion and swarming of the pond’s fish
without making out the fish themselves.
Theodicy. Preface ***5b, ****b
70. From this we see that each living body has a dominant entelechy, which
in the animal is the soul; but the limbs of this living body are full of other
living things – plants, animals – each of which also has its dominant
entelechy or soul.
71. But there is no need to suppose, as have some who have misunder-
stood my thought, that each soul has a mass or portion of matter of
its own, or allotted to it forever, and that it consequently possesses
other inferior living things which are forever destined to serve it. For
all bodies are in a perpetual flux, like rivers, and parts are continually
entering and leaving them.
72. Thus the soul only changes body bit by bit and by degrees, so that it
is never stripped of all its organs all at once. In animals there is often
metamorphosis, but never metempsychosis or transmigration of souls;
neither are there any entirely separate souls, nor genies without bodies.
God alone is entirely detached from body.
28
The Monadology
73. It is also on account of this that there is never true generation, nor perfect
death, taken in the rigorous sense of the term as consisting in the separa-
tion of the soul from the body. And what we call generation is develop-
ment and growth, just as what we call death is enfolding and diminishing.
74. Philosophers have been greatly puzzled about the origin of forms,
entelechies, or souls. But today, when detailed studies of plants, insects,
and animals have shown that the organic bodies of nature are never
produced from chaos or from putrefaction but always through seeds,
in which there was doubtless some preformation, it has been concluded
not only that the organic body was already there before conception,
but also that there was a soul in this body. In a word, it has been con-
cluded that the animal itself was already there, and that by means of
conception this animal has been merely made ready for a great trans-
formation in order to become an animal of another kind. Even outside
generation, something similar is observed when maggots become flies,
and caterpillars become butterflies.
Preface ***5b and following pages.
§90. §187. §188. §403.
§86. §397.
75. Animals, some of which are raised by means of conception to the level
of larger animals, may be called spermatic. But those of them which
remain in their own kind, namely the majority of them, are born,
multiply, and are destroyed like the large animals, and there are only a
chosen few which pass through to a greater stage.
76. But this is only half the truth. I have therefore concluded that if the
animal never begins naturally, neither does it end naturally, and that not
only will there be no generation, but also no complete destruction, or
death, in the rigorous sense of the word. And these arguments, which
are a posteriori and drawn from experience, agree perfectly with the
principles I deduced a priori above.
Theodicy §90.
77. Thus it may be said not only that the soul (mirror of an indestruct-
ible universe) is indestructible, but also the animal itself, although its
29
machine may often perish in part, and cast off or put on organic integu-
ments.
78. These principles have given me a way of naturally explaining the

union, or rather the agreement, of the soul and the organic body.
The soul follows its own laws, and the body likewise follows its own,
and they coincide by virtue of the pre-established harmony between
all substances, since they are all representations of one and the same
universe.
Preface ***6
Theodicy §340. §352. §353. §358.
79. Souls act according to the laws of final causes through appetitions,
ends, and means. Bodies act according to the laws of efficient causes,
or laws of motion. And the two kingdoms, that of efficient and that of
final causes, are in harmony with each another.
80. Descartes recognised that souls cannot impart force to bodies because
there is always the same quantity of force in matter. However, he
believed that the soul could change the direction of bodies. But this
is because the law of nature which also affirms the conservation of
the same total direction in matter was not known in his day. If he had
noticed this, he would have come across my system of pre-established
harmony.
Preface ****
Theodicy §22. §59. §60. §61.
§63. §66.
§345. §346 onwards. §354. §355.
81. This system means that bodies act as if there were no souls (although
this is impossible), and souls act as if there were no bodies, and both
act as if each influenced the other.
82. As for minds or rational souls, although I find that, fundamentally, what
we have just said holds good of all living things and animals (namely
that the animal and the soul only begin with the world, and no more
30
The Monadology
come to an end than the world does), nevertheless rational animals
are distinctive in that their little spermatic animals, for as long as they
are only spermatic animals, have only ordinary or sensitive souls; but
as soon as those which are chosen (so to speak) attain human nature
through an actual conception, their sensitive souls are raised to the
rank of reason and to the privilege of minds.
83. Among other differences which exist between ordinary souls and
minds, some of which I have already pointed out, there is also this
one: that souls in general are living mirrors or images of the universe
of created things, whereas minds are also images of the divinity itself,
or of the very author of nature, capable of knowing the system of the
universe, and of imitating something of it through their own smaller-
scale constructions, each mind being like a little divinity in its own
sphere.
Theodicy §147.
84. It is for this reason that minds are capable of entering into a kind of
society with God, and that his relation to them is not only that of an
inventor to his machine (which is God’s relation to other created
things) but also that of a prince to his subjects, and even of a father to
his children.
85. From this it is easy to conclude that the assemblage of all minds must
make up the City of God, that is, the most perfect possible state under
the most perfect of monarchs.
Theodicy §146.
Abridgement, objection 2.
86. This City of God, this truly universal monarchy, is a moral world in the
natural world, and is the most exalted and the most divine of God’s
works, and it is in this that God’s glory truly consists, since there would
be no glory if his greatness and his goodness were not known and
admired by minds. It is also in relation to this divine city that he may
properly be said to have goodness, whereas his wisdom and his power
are apparent everywhere.
31
87. As we have established above a perfect harmony between two natural
kingdoms, the one of efficient causes, the other of final causes, we
ought here to point out yet another harmony between the physical
kingdom of nature and the moral kingdom of grace; that is, between
God as architect of the machine of the universe, and God considered
as monarch of the divine city of minds.
Theodicy §62. §74. §118. §248.
§112. §130. §247.
88. This harmony means that things lead to grace by the very ways of
nature, and that for example this globe must be destroyed and repaired
by natural ways at the times the government of minds demand it for
the punishment of some and the reward of others.
Theodicy §18 and onwards. §110.
§244. §245. §340.
89. It can also be said that God as architect satisfies in every way God as
legislator, and that sins must therefore carry their punishment with
them by the order of nature, and by virtue of the mechanical structure
of things itself, and that likewise good actions will receive their rewards
by ways which are mechanical with regard to bodies, although this
cannot and need not always happen immediately.
90. Finally, under this perfect government there will be no good action
without reward, no bad action without punishment, and everything
must turn out right for the good, that is, those who are not malcon-
tents in this great state, who trust in providence after they have done
their duty, and who love and imitate the author of all good as they
ought to, delighting in the consideration of his perfections in accord-
ance with the nature of true pure love, which makes us take pleasure
in the felicity of the beloved. This it is which makes the wise and virtu-
ous work for everything that seems to conform to the presumptive or
antecedent divine will, and yet leaves them contented with what God
actually makes happen by his secret, consequent or decisive will. For
they recognise that if we could understand the order of the universe
well enough, we would find that it surpasses all the wishes of the
wisest people, and that it is impossible to make it better than it is, not
only for the whole in general, but also for ourselves in particular, if we
cleave to the author of all as we ought to, not merely as the architect
32
The Monadology
and efficient cause of our being, but also as our master and the final
cause which must constitute the whole aim of our will, and can alone
constitute our happiness.
Theodicy §134 end.
Preface *4ab
Theodicy §278.
Preface *4b
33
The Structure of the Monadology
The contents of almost all of the ninety sections of the Monadology can be
categorised as follows:
Definition – gives the essence or nature of a thing

Axiom – a general principle or truth, typically taken to be self-
evident and so not requiring further proof
Corollary – a truth that follows from what has already been proved
or supposed
Argument – a set of statements or other evidence put forward as
grounds to accept a particular conclusion
Postulate – a statement assumed to be true, that is, asserted
without any supporting evidence (sometimes the evidence for a
postulate will be provided after the postulate)
Scholium – explanatory note
This yields the following structure:

1. Definition of monad: simple substance
2. Argument: there must exist simple substances
3. Argument: monads have no extension or shape, and are not divisible
4. Corollary of 1: monads cannot end naturally
5. Corollary of 1: monads cannot begin naturally
6. Corollary of 4 and 5: monads can only begin and end supernaturally
7. Argument: monads are causally independent
8. Argument: monads must have some qualities
Argument: monads must have different qualities
34
9. Axiom: no two beings are exactly alike (the identity of indiscernibles)
Corollary: each monad must differ from every other
10. Postulate: every monad is subject to change, and change is continual
11. Corollary of 7 and 10: every change must come from an internal prin-
ciple
12. Postulate: monads contain a complete specification of changes, as well
as a principle of change
13. Argument: a monad’s complete specification always includes a plural-
ity within the unity
14. Definition of perception: representation of a plurality within the unity
Corollary of 13: perception is the basic state of every monad
15. Definition of appetite: the action of the internal principle which brings
about change
16. Example of plurality in unity
17. Argument: simple substances are the only source of perceptions
Postulate: perceptions and their changes are all there are in simple
substances
18. Argument: simple substances are entelechies
19. Definition of soul
Scholium: bare monads have only perceptions, whereas souls have
sensation (understood as distinct perceptions accompanied by
memory)
20. Argument: some perceptions are not distinct
Postulate: bare monads have no distinct perceptions
21. Corollary of 4, 8 and 14: monads always have perceptions
Scholium: when a monad has only little perceptions, it is stupefied
(unconscious)
22. Corollary of 7 and 12: each state of a monad is naturally a consequence
of its preceding state
23. (with 22) Argument: some perceptions are not distinct
24. Repeat of 20, and 21: when a monad has only little perceptions, it is
stupefied (unconscious); bare monads have no distinct perceptions
25. Argument: animals have heightened perceptions
26. Argument: animals make inductive inferences, and possess memory
27. Scholium of 26: how different perceptions make inductive inferences
possible
28. Corollary of 26: when the perceptions of men arise on the basis of
memory, they act as beasts do
Postulate: And this happens three quarters of the time
29. Axiom: men differ from animals by having knowledge of necessary
truths through reason
Definition of mind
35
30. Postulate: through their knowledge of necessary truths, minds are led
to acts of self-reflection, which provide materials for their reasonings
31. Axiom: the principle of contradiction is one of the two principles on
which reasonings are based
32. Axiom: the principle of sufficient reason is the other
33. Axiom: there are two kinds of truths, those of reasoning, and those of
fact
34. Scholium of 33: mathematical truths are resolved to definitions,
axioms, and postulates
35. Axiom: there are simple ideas and primary principles which cannot be
proved
36. Scholium of 33: there is a sufficient reason for contingent truths (that
is, truths of fact), and it is infinite in its detail
37. Argument: the sufficient reason for any contingent thing must lie
outside the series of contingent things
38. Corollary of 37: the sufficient reason must lie in a necessary substance,
God (37 and 38 together form a cosmological argument for the exist-
ence of God)
39. Argument: there is only one God
40. Argument: God contains as much reality as possible
41. Corollary of 40: God is absolutely perfect
42. Corollary of 39 and 40: the perfections of created things come from
God, the imperfections from their own nature
43. Argument: the source of the reality of essences or possibilities or
eternal truths is God
44. Argument: the source of the reality of essences or possibilities or
eternal truths is the necessary being, whose essence includes exist-
ence
45. Corollary of 44: if God is possible then he must exist
Argument: God is possible
46. Scholium of 43 and 44: eternal truths depend on God’s understand-
ing, but not his will; contingent truths, however, do depend on his
will
47. Corollary of 46: God produces all other monads
48: Corollary of 17, 42, 43, 46, and 47: the attributes of God (power,
knowledge, and will) correspond to those of created monads (the
subject, perception, appetite)
49. Argument: a monad is said to act insofar as it has distinct perceptions,
and be acted upon insofar as it has confused perceptions
50. Scholium of 49: one monad is more perfect than another when what is
found in it explains a priori what is found in another
51. Argument: monads influence each other only ideally
36
52. Corollary of 51: in monads, actions and passions are mutual
53. Argument: there must be a sufficient reason for God’s choice of uni-
verse
54. Postulate: this sufficient reason is to be found in the degrees of perfec-
tion in each possible universe
55. Corollary of 54: God chooses the best possible universe
56. Argument: simple substances are perpetual living mirrors of the uni-
verse
57: Corollary of 9 and 56: each monad mirrors the universe from its own
unique perspective
58. Scholium of 57: and this maximises perfection
59. Scholium of 56: only the hypothesis of substances being unique
mirrors of the same universe does justice to God’s greatness
60. Argument: every monad represents the whole universe
Scholium: created monads represent only a small part of the universe
distinctly; the rest is represented confusedly
61. Postulate: There exists the plenum
Corollary: every compound (body) is affected by every other, the
effect diminishing with distance
62. Corollary of 61: each monad represents more distinctly the (monads of
the) body with which it is associated
63. Definition: living thing
Definition: animal
Argument: the body of a living thing or animal is always organic
64. Scholium of 63: while living things are organic, manmade things
are not
65. Argument: matter is infinitely subdivided
66. Corollary of 65: there is a world of created beings in the least part of
matter
67. Simile of 66
68. Corollary of 66 and 67: the matter in between living things itself con-
tains living things
69. Corollary of 66 and 68: there is nothing dead in the universe
70. Corollary of 62: each living body has a dominant entelechy
Corollary of 63 and 65–6: the limbs of this living body are full of other
living things
71. Scholium of 70: a soul does not retain the same body forever
72. Corollary of 13 and 71: a soul changes its body gradually, but is never
without one
73. Corollary of 72: there is no true generation or death
74. Scholium of 73: empirical findings show that there is no true genera-
tion, with organic bodies being present before birth in seeds
37
75. Scholium of 74: most seed animals remain in their own kind, but a
small number do not, and go on to enjoy a higher status
76. Argument: the animal does not end naturally
77. Corollary of 73 and 76: the animal itself is indestructible
78. Corollary of 56: there is a pre-established harmony between soul and
body
79. Scholium of 78: souls act according to the laws of final causes, bodies
according to the laws of efficient causes
80. Argument: Descartes’ doctrine of causal interaction between body and
soul is false
81. Scholium of 78: bodies act as if there were no souls, and souls act as if
there were no bodies
82. Postulate: before conception, the seed-animals of humans do not differ
in kind from those of other animals, and are supplemented with reason
at conception
83. Corollary of 29 and 56: in addition to being a mirror of the universe,
minds are also images of God
84. Corollary of 83: minds are capable of entering into society with God
85. Corollary of 48, 83, and 84: together, minds form the most perfect pos-
sible state under the most perfect possible monarch, the City of God
86. Scholium of 85: God’s glory consists in the City of God
87. Postulate: there is a harmony between the kingdoms of nature and
grace
88. Corollary of 87: God’s aims in the kingdom of grace are brought about
through the workings of the kingdom of nature
89. Corollary of 87: sins are punishments naturally, and rewards are
bestowed naturally (though in neither case does this necessarily
happen immediately)
90. Corollary of 89: everything will turn out well for the good for those
who love God
38
The Monadology: Text with Running
Commentary
1. The monad, about which we shall speak here, is nothing other than
a simple substance which enters into compounds, ‘simple’ meaning
‘without parts’.
Theodicy, preliminary discourse §10.1
Leibniz begins with a definition of the monad: a simple substance which

enters into compounds. The notion of substance is a very rich m etaphysical
category which has its roots in the writings of Aristotle (384–22 bce), and
was employed by a number of Leibniz’s predecessors such as Descartes
(1596–1650) and Spinoza (1632–77). For Aristotle, ‘substance’ was the
answer to the question ‘what is being?’, or, ‘what is most truly real?’ As
such, the term ‘substance’ was applied to the fundamental constituents of
reality. To determine which things qualified, Aristotle identified various
criteria: for example, substances are those things which are the ultimate
subjects of predication, being the subject of predicates but not the predicate
of anything else;2 substances are those things which do not depend for
their existence on other things (that is, they are self-sufficient);3 and they
are the source of change, being capable of acting and not just being acted
upon.4 What satisfied these criteria, he claimed, were individual living
creatures, that is, individual plants, animals, and humans. By the Middle
Ages, Aristotle’s doctrine of substance, as filtered through the teachings
1
Leibniz here omitted ‘preliminary discourse’ although the reference is in fact to that
part of the Theodicy.
2
Aristotle, Metaphysics 1028b36, in The Complete Works of Aristotle, 2 vols, ed. Jonathan
Barnes (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), II, p. 1624.
3
Aristotle, Metaphysics 1029a28, in The Complete Works, II, p. 1625.
4
Aristotle, Categories 4a17–20, in The Complete Works, I, p. 7.
39
of Aquinas and others, had become the conventional wisdom, and by the
seventeenth century it was part of the Scholastic tradition that was widely
taught and accepted throughout Europe. In writings from his youth and
middle period Leibniz characterised substance in recognisably Aristotelian
ways, for example as the ultimate subject of predicates,5 and as the source
of actions,6 and in addition to endorsing much of Aristotle’s criteria for
substances he also agreed with Aristotle that the criteria were satisfied by
individual living things. As his career progressed, however, Leibniz placed
increasing stress on indivisibility as a mark of substance, insisting that a
substance was something that was truly one being. He adopted the term
‘unity’ to capture this essential aspect of substance, and often identified
substances as unities. In the 1690s Leibniz came to attribute this unity
(oneness) of substance to its simplicity, that is, to its lacking parts, on the
basis that whatever has parts cannot be one thing, and hence a true indi-
vidual, simply because it is composed of several parts.
It should be noted that in other writings Leibniz offers what look to
be alternative characterisations of substance. For example, in some texts
he draws a strong connection between substance and force, claiming ‘I
consider it [force] to be what constitutes substance, since it is the principle
of action, which is its characteristic feature’,7 where force is understood
as ‘something midway between power and action’ rather than a faculty
for action. Similarly, in PNG1 Leibniz claims that ‘Substance is a being
capable of action.’ Elsewhere, Leibniz characterises substance in terms
of perception and the representation of composites: ‘Your Electoral
Highness asks me what a simple substance is. I reply that its nature is
to have perception, and consequently to represent composite things.’
While it is tempting to see these as alternative, and perhaps even com-
peting accounts of substance, Leibniz does not see it that way. As will
become clear as we proceed, Leibniz thinks of substance in all of the ways
outlined, namely as a unity, consisting of force, having perceptions, and
representing external things. Arguably, however, in his later writings,
unity is the feature that Leibniz most commonly stresses as a mark of a
true substance, a monad.
In PNG1 Leibniz explains that the term monad derives from the Greek
word monas, meaning ‘unity’, that is, that which is one. Leibniz was not
the first to use it by any means: Pythagoras had used the term in the sixth
century bce to refer to God, and it was often found in the work of neo-
Platonic writers, both ancient and modern. For example, it can be found
5
See PPL, p. 307.
6
See SLT, p. 73.
7
LNS, p. 22; cf. PPL, p. 502.
40
Text with Running Commentary
in the work of a number of Leibniz’s contemporaries, such as Henry More
(1614–87), Anne Conway (1631–78),8 Francis Mercury van Helmont
(1614–98),9 and Ralph Cudworth (1617–88).10 They each used the term
in a different way; for example, while More wrote of the monad as ‘a
Symbole of the immaterial nature’,11 Conway saw it as something physical
(the smallest physical unit, divisible mathematically but not physically).12
Leibniz’s familiarity with the work of Anne Conway has led to claims that
he appropriated the word ‘monad’ from her,13 and similar claims have
been made in favour of van Helmont14 and Cudworth.15 Without a doubt
Leibniz encountered the term in the work of all of these writers, as well as
in the work of others, but since it was part of the (neo-)Platonic tradition to
which Leibniz himself arguably belonged, it is therefore more likely that he
appropriated the term from the tradition rather than from any one of those
associated with it.16 In any case, the term is definitely not ‘Leibniz’s own
invention’, as some have claimed.17 Indeed, Leibniz very probably added
‘monad’ to his philosophical vocabulary only because it already had some
currency among philosophers.
Leibniz began to use the term ‘monad’ in his work only in the last
two decades of his life. He appears to have first used it in a letter to the
Marquis de l’Hospital written on 12/22 July 1695, where it is used simply
as an alternative to ‘real unity’.18 This accords with later usage, with
Leibniz tending to use ‘monad’ interchangeably with ‘unity’, itself just an
8
Anne Conway, The Principles of the Most Ancient and Modern Philosophy (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 20.
9
Francis Mercury van Helmont, A Cabbalistical Dialogue (London, 1682), p. 4.
10
Ralph Cudworth, The True Intellectual System of the Universe (London, 1678).
11
Henry More, Conjectura cabbalistica (1653), in A Collection of Several Writings of
Dr Henry More, 4th edn (London, 1712), p. 12; cf. p. 170.
12
Conway, The Principles of the Most Ancient and Modern Philosophy, p. 20.
13
See Carolyn Merchant, ‘The vitalism of Anne Conway: its impact on Leibniz’s concept
of the monad’, Journal of the History of Philosophy 17:3 (1979), pp. 255–69.
14
Allison P. Coudert, ‘Leibniz and the Kabbalah’, in Allison P. Coudert, Richard
H. Popkin, and Gordon M. Weiner (eds), Leibniz, Mysticism and Religion (Dordrecht:
Kluwer, 1998), p. 71.
15
Catherine Wilson, Leibniz’s Metaphysics (Manchester: Manchester University Press,
1989), p. 188.
16
See Stuart Brown, ‘Leibniz and More’s Cabbalistic circle’, in Sarah Hutton (ed.), Henry
More (1614–1687) Tercentenary Studies (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1990), pp. 83ff.
17
See Douglas Burnham, ‘G. W. Leibniz, Monadology’, in John Shand (ed.), Central
Works of Philosophy 2 (London: Acumen, 2005), p. 63.
18
A III, 6, p. 451. Earlier dates have sometimes been suggested, but have not stood up
to scrutiny: for example, Nicholas Rescher claims that ‘Leibniz began to use the term
monad only in 1690 (in a letter to Fardella)’. In fact Leibniz did not even write to
Fardella in 1690. See Rescher, G. W. Leibniz’s Monadology, p. 46.
41
a lternative way of referring to something that is one, that is, a simple sub-
stance. Although monads are quantitatively simple, in the sense that they
have no parts, this does not mean that they are simple in other senses, for
example in terms of the qualities that they have. Later in the Monadology
(M13) Leibniz will claim that monads are actually qualitatively complex
(that is, they have many qualities) despite being quantitatively simple.
2. And there must be simple substances, because there are compounds;

for the compound is nothing but an accumulation or aggregate of
simples.
Leibniz now gives an argument for simple substances. The argument

Leibniz makes can be put into form thus:
Premise 1: There are compounds.

Premise 2: Compounds are nothing other than accumulations or
aggregates of simple substances.
Conclusion: Therefore there are simple substances.
The argument is straightforward enough. The assertion that there are

compounds seems uncontroversial. (In some writings, Leibniz uses
‘multitude’19 or ‘plurality’20 in place of ‘compound’, but they all mean
the same thing.) Indeed, there are many examples of compound things,
for example a pile of rocks. The second premise states that a compound
is an a ccumulation of simples. So if there are compounds then there must
be simple substances. So stated, the weight of the argument is carried
by the second premise, which describes compounds as aggregates of
simples. But why should it be thought that compounds are aggregates
of simple substances rather than aggregates of other compounds, which
are in turn aggregates of other compounds, and so on and so on? Either
seems possible. Consider the example of a pile of rocks: the pile itself is a
compound of various individual rocks, but none of these component rocks
qualifies as a simple substance because they are all in turn compounds
of various minerals; these minerals in turn are compounds of various
molecules, which are themselves compounds of various atoms, and so on.
On the face of it, then, it is not clear why compounds should be defined
as aggregates of simple substances, rather than as aggregates of aggregates
and so on.
19
For example SLT, p. 69.
20
For example PNG1.
42
In other writings Leibniz offers a slightly different – and arguably
stronger – formulation of the argument for simple substances. For example,
in a text from 1692/3 Leibniz claims ‘it is evident that there could not be
composites without simples, nor pluralities without unities’,21 and in PNG1
he writes: ‘there must be simple substances everywhere, because without
simples there would be no compounds’. The argument is this:
Premise 1: Without simple substances there could be no compounds.

Premise 2: There are compounds.
Conclusion: Therefore there are simple substances.
Here the weight of the argument rests on the first premise, that without
simple substances there could be no compounds. In other words, not
everything can be a compound: there can’t be compounds that are built
out of compounds that are built of compounds and so on forever. At some
point there has to be something that isn’t compound, and as this some-
thing isn’t compound then it must be simple. Hence there must be simple
substances. It might be asked why there can’t be compounds built out of
compounds forever. To this Leibniz offers a further argument, sometimes
known as the ‘argument from borrowed reality’:
I had undertaken to prove that these unities exist from the fact that there
would otherwise be nothing in bodies. I gave the following argument: First,
that which can be divided into many is constituted, i.e., aggregated, from
many. Second, things that are aggregated from many are not one thing except
from a mind, and they have no reality except that which is borrowed, i.e.,
that is from the things from which they are aggregated. Therefore, third,
things that can be divided into parts have no reality unless there are things in
them that cannot be divided into parts. Indeed, they have no reality other than
that which is from the unities that are in them.22
The thinking here is that a compound thing gets whatever reality it has
from its parts, and is therefore real only insofar as its parts are real. But the
same must be true of the parts, that is, they are real only insofar as their
parts are real. And so on, with each compound thing ‘borrowing’ its reality
from that possessed by the parts of which it is composed. But this cannot
go on forever; there has to be something non-compound that grounds the
reality of the parts of the compound, that is, simple things, which are real
in themselves, and not because they borrow their reality from parts (which
of course, being simple, they do not have).
21
LTS, p. 100.
22
LDV, pp. 285–7.
43
Much the same kind of argument has historically been used to support
the view that there must be some kind of ultimate, basic kind of particle
out of which everything else in the universe is made.23 It is still in use by
some modern physicists. In the later decades of the twentieth century
many physicists held that quarks were the most basic kind of particle,
and thus the building blocks of absolutely everything in the universe.
It is now believed that quarks are in fact composed of other things, for
example preons or strings. It has even been hypothesised that preons and
strings will turn out to be made up of even more fundamental elements,
but some physicists argue that there must ultimately be something that
is truly fundamental which isn’t made up of anything else, and there-
fore qualifies as a true building block of the universe. These physicists
suppose that if there are fundamental elements then they will be material
in nature.24 Leibniz will challenge this assumption, as we shall see in M3.
But the idea that there are fundamental elements, and ones which are
material in nature, has great philosophical pedigree, and was resurgent
in Leibniz’s day in the form of atomism. In its classic formulation this
doctrine holds that there are little lumps of matter without any parts, and
these little lumps of matter compose everything else in the universe. The
word ‘atom’ is Greek, and it means ‘uncuttable’ or ‘unsplittable’, and
accordingly true atoms were thought to be bits of matter that could not
be divided. There is a clear distinction between true atoms and the atoms
that physicists postulate today. Modern physics holds that atoms are
made up of protons, neutrons, and electrons, and can actually be divided
into those parts. So in a sense, the atoms of modern physics are not true
atoms at all, because they can be divided, whereas a true atom would be
something that cannot be divided. The belief that the world was ultimately
composed of unsplittable atoms goes back to the ancient Greek thinkers
Leucippus and Democritus (fifth century bce), both of whom postulated
that atoms moved about randomly in the void, sometimes joining together
(on account of having ‘hooks’) and sometimes breaking apart (on account
of random motion). The doctrine was endorsed by Epicurus (third
century bce), amongst others, and then resurrected in the seventeenth
23
See for example Epicurus’ letter to Herodotus, in The Epicurus Reader: Selected Writings
and Testimonia, ed. and trans. Brad Inwood and L. P. Gershon (Indianapolis: Hackett,
1994), p. 7.
24
For details and references, see Jonathan Schaffer, ‘Is there a fundamental level?’, Noûs
37:3 (2003), pp. 498–517, especially pp. 498–506. Other physicists eschew talk of
‘fundamental elements’ and ‘material things’ as being inappropriate in light of modern
scientific thinking with regard to field theory, for example. See James Ladyman and
Don Ross, Every Thing Must Go: Metaphysics Naturalized (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2009), especially chapter 1.
44
century by Pierre Gassendi (1592–1655). By the end of the seventeenth
century, it was a very popular doctrine; some referred to it under its origi-
nal name of atomism, while others opted to refer to it under the name of
corpuscularianism (from ‘corpuscle’, meaning ‘tiny part’). Robert Boyle
(1627–91) and John Locke (1632–1704), for example, are often considered
to be adherents of the corpuscular philosophy. Leibniz was an outspoken
opponent of it, as we shall see.
3. Now where there are no parts, neither extension, nor shape, nor divis-
ibility is possible. And these monads are the true atoms of nature and,
in a word, the elements of things.
Here Leibniz argues that by virtue of having no parts, monads cannot be

extended, nor be shaped, nor be divisible. The argument is very com-
pressed, however, and makes more sense once a key assumption is identi-
fied. The assumption is that only that which has extension has shape, and
only that which has shape is divisible, and only that which is divisible has
parts. Consequently monads, which have no parts, cannot be divisible, and
hence cannot have shape, nor be extended. Although Leibniz does not say
so explicitly, what this ultimately means is that monads cannot be material
things, at least in Descartes’ sense of ‘material’. The dominant theory of
matter in Leibniz’s day was that developed by Descartes, who identified
matter with extension, that is, having the three dimensions of length,
breadth, and width.25 It follows from this characterisation of matter that
any material thing will, by virtue of being extended, have shape, and con-
sequently be divisible. Since monads do not have any of these features they
cannot be material in nature. In other texts, Leibniz affirms the immaterial-
ity of monads explicitly; for example, in a 1702 letter to Varignon he insists
that ‘simple substances are truly indivisible, but they are immaterial, and
are only principles of action’.26
Leibniz’s description of monads as ‘the true atoms of nature’ is an
attempt to reclaim the name ‘atom’ from the atomists. In his eyes, it is fair
to describe monads as atoms because they are by definition simple, that is,
they have no parts and are hence genuinely indivisible (because what could
they be divided into?). According to Leibniz, however, the atomists applied
25
See René Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, John Cottingham, Robert
Stoothoff, Dugald Murdoch and Anthony Kenny (eds), 3 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1984–91), I, p. 210.
26
G. W. Leibniz, Leibnizens mathematische Schriften, ed. C. I. Gerhardt (Halle: Schmidt,
1859), IV, p. 110.
45
the name ‘atom’ to something which is at least in principle divisible, namely
a material atom. To understand Leibniz’s concern, suppose that there were
material atoms such as the atomists postulated, that is, very small indivis-
ible lumps of matter. Leibniz holds that on account of being material these
atoms would be extended, and so have some shape and size, and as a result
they would also be divisible, that is, each one of them could be divided into
two, into a left part and a right part. (Bear in mind that for a thing to be
‘divisible’, all that is required is that it be possible for it to be divided. That
doesn’t mean that it will be possible for humans to divide it, whether now
or in the future. The issue is whether it is possible in principle for a thing
to be divided, not whether it is possible for this or that species at this or
that time to divide it.) Now if these material atoms are divisible into parts,
as Leibniz maintains, then they cannot be atoms, understood as material
things without parts! Hence there looks to be a fundamental inconsistency
between extension (the defining feature of matter) on the one hand, and
indivisibility (the defining feature of simple substances) on the other. The
atomist, of course, held that material atoms have shape and size but denied
that they are divisible. But this just raises the question, often not addressed
by atomists, of how a material thing could take up space and have shape and
size and yet be incapable of division. Leibniz often claims that no answer is
possible here; for example, in a text from 1689 he writes ‘no reason can be
given why bodies of a certain smallness should not be further divisible’.27
In other words, there is no reason why a body of (for example) a millionth
of an inch across could not be divided into two bodies each two-millionths
of an inch across, and so on, ad infinitum. If this is right, then any material
object, no matter how small, will be infinitely divisible, in which case there
will be nothing that answers to the description of a material atom.
Although Leibniz does not explicitly say as much, by insisting that
his simple substances are not material in nature (because they are not
extended, nor shaped, nor divisible), while compounds are, he has now
27
SLT, p. 52. Leibniz sometimes assumes (on the atomist’s behalf) that the atomist’s
position must be that material atoms are composed of parts, but ones which are held
together by some miraculous force: ‘To say that atoms are indivisible in themselves is
to say that two masses A and B, parts of an atom which touch each on their surfaces,
are inseparable in themselves, and to claim that it is absurd to look for a reason for this
A B . . . God cannot create natural atoms, or bodies that are indivisible by an
explicable and unknowable quality, which is to say he cannot create things that are
absurd and without reason. If he wants two masses or parts of matter to be inseparably
attached to each other, without there being in them or their surroundings any reason for
their inseparability, he must prevent their separation by a perpetual miracle. And then
they will not be natural atoms, or rather they will be atoms which are indivisible by a
certain occult quality lodged in them.’ G III, p. 506.
46
effectively divided reality into two distinct realms. On the one hand there
is the (physical) realm of compounds, or bodies, while on the other there
is the (metaphysical) realm of monads, which are without shape, size, and
extension. On the basis of what Leibniz has said thus far we can mean-
ingfully talk of these two realms as being different levels of reality, with
monads being the fundamental or base level from which the secondary
level of compounds is derived.28 Leibniz’s recognition of two levels of
reality brings with it a problem for his readers inasmuch as he does not
always make it clear which level he is referring to. In the Monadology,
as well as other writings, Leibniz sometimes moves from discussing one
level to the other without any warning, sometimes in the same sentence.
Moreover, terms and expressions appropriate to one level of reality are
sometimes applied to the other.29 We are less likely to be misled by what
Leibniz says if we keep in mind that he recognises two levels of reality
which, while apparently very different, are certainly not separate.
What is not yet clear, however, is how the two levels are connected, that
is, how compounds are derived from monads. In M2 Leibniz seems to offer
a straightforward explanation through his statement that a compound ‘is
nothing but an accumulation . . . of simples’, which if taken at face value
might suggest that a compound is literally a grouping or massing together
of a number of simples. But we also know (from M3) that a simple has
no shape or size, from which it follows that the grouping of any number
of simples would fail to produce something which does have shape and
size, as the compounds of our experience invariably do. The problem is
neatly summarised by Leibniz’s near-contemporary Henry More, who
wrote: ‘Magnitudes cannot arise out of mere Non-Magnitudes. For multiply
Nothing ten thousand millions of times into nothing, the Product will be
still Nothing.’30 How, then, do compounds result from monads? An answer
28
Leibniz explains that with matter, or bodies, as well as with other real things, there is a
priority of parts to whole, whereby the whole is a result of the parts. This contrasts with
ideal things (that is, entities of the mind), in which the whole is prior to any parts that
may be taken from it. Leibniz identifies space and time as ideal. See LTS, p. 336. For
further details, see Pauline Phemister, Leibniz and the Natural World: Activity, Passivity
and Corporeal Substances in Leibniz’s Philosophy (Dordrecht: Springer, 2005), pp. 106–9.
29
For further details, and some examples, see Homer H. Dubs, ‘The misleading nature of
Leibniz’s Monadology’, The Philosophical Review 50:5 (1941), pp. 508–16.
30
Henry More, The Immortality of the Soul (London, 1659), p. 31. The publication date of
More’s book shows that he made this point some decades before Leibniz developed his
theory of monads. This does not affect the validity of his point, however. Interestingly,
upon reading this book Leibniz made a similar point against More, whom he believed
had tried to compose the world of extended things out of points; Leibniz urged that
‘extension is not composed of points, because it would be composed of extended nothings’. A VI
4, p. 1678.
47
to this question cannot be found in the Monadology itself, and even in other
writings Leibniz does not offer a single, definitive answer, but seems to
entertain different possible answers, which have been termed by some of
his commentators ‘phenomenalism’ and ‘the aggregate thesis’:31
(a) In the version of phenomenalism that Leibniz sometimes e ntertains,
bodies are phenomenal, that is, existing in appearance rather than as
something real in their own right. There are a number of writings in which
Leibniz endorses such a view. For example, in a letter written in 1705,
Leibniz writes:
I do not really do away with body, but reduce it to what it is. For I show that
a corporeal mass that is believed to have something besides simple substances
is not a substance but a phenomenon resulting from simple substances, which
alone have unity and absolute reality.32
And in another letter, written shortly before his death in 1716, Leibniz
writes: ‘I believe that there are only monads in nature, everything else
being only phenomena that result from them.’33 However, while there
are a number of writings in which Leibniz does incline towards a kind of
phenomenalism, there is no hint of any such inclination in the Monadology
itself, which does not even contain the word ‘phenomenon’, let alone apply
it to bodies or compounds.
(b) In what looks to be a sharp contrast with phenomenalism, which
treats bodies as phenomena, the so-called ‘aggregate thesis’ holds that
bodies are ‘in some way’ aggregations or accumulations of monads. This
is another strand of thought often found in Leibniz’s mature writings,
and it is the position adopted in the Monadology, with Leibniz stating in
M2 that ‘the compound is nothing but an accumulation or aggregate of
simples’. How monads can be aggregated into bodies is not addressed in
the Monadology, and often not in other texts in which the aggregate thesis
is advanced. Leibniz often talks as though extended bodies just are an
aggregation of unextended monads, while in other writings he urges that
bodies result from monads or are founded in them,34 though whether this
means anything different from saying that bodies are aggregates of monads
is uncertain.35 This is because, for Leibniz, an aggregate is not a simple
31
The terms are from Nicholas Jolley, ‘Leibniz and phenomenalism’, Studia Leibnitiana
18 (1986), pp. 38–51. Reprinted in Nicholas Jolley, Causality and Mind: Essays on Early
Modern Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 183–98.
32
LDV, p. 319, cf. p. 303.
33
SLT, p. 54.
34
For example, see LDV, p. 303.
35
See Donald Rutherford, ‘Phenomenalism and the reality of body in Leibniz’s later
philosophy’, Studia Leibnitiana 22:1 (1990), pp. 11–38.
48
grouping or cluster of things, but rather the outcome of a mental process
in which various things, understood to agree in some way, are construed
or treated as a whole: ‘an aggregate is nothing other than all the things
from which it results taken together, which clearly have their unity only
from a mind, on account of those things that they have in common, like a
flock of sheep’.36 Hence on the aggregate thesis, bodies are not mereologi-
cal aggregates, that is, merely a mind-independent group of monads,37 as
aggregation is a mental operation such that, without minds there would
be no aggregates, just individuals. It is important to note, however, that
while the aggregation of monads into a body is something that occurs in
the mind, the monads being aggregated exist outside of the mind which
aggregates them. Moreover, Leibniz explains that the process of aggrega-
tion is more appropriate in some cases than in others; for example, the
more connections or agreements there are between individual things, the
more appropriate it is for a mind to aggregate them, that is, to treat them
as constituting a whole.38 So while aggregation may be a mental process,
aggregates themselves are grounded in the reality of their constituent
parts, and the connections between them. Parallel to this, we find Leibniz
saying something very similar when endorsing phenomenalism, as on
such occasions he often describes bodies as ‘well-founded phenomena’, to
emphasise that they are not mere appearance, as would be an illusion or
something imaginary, but rather that they do have an underlying reality
which grounds them, namely the reality of monads.
Although phenomenalism and the aggregate thesis can appear to be
mutually exclusive hypotheses, there are some writings in which Leibniz
explicitly endorses them both. One such is the brief ‘Appendix on Monads’
penned for Remond in July 1714 but not sent to him. At the start of the text
Leibniz claims that bodies are aggregates of monads:
I believe that the whole universe of creatures consists only in simple substances
or monads, and in their combinations. These simple substances are what are
called ‘mind’ in us and in genies, and ‘soul’ in animals. They all have percep-
tion . . . and appetite . . . One cannot even conceive of there being anything
other than that in simple substances, and consequently in all nature. The com-
binations are what we call bodies. (appendix p. 278)
While just a few lines further on, Leibniz asserts that bodies are pheno-
menal:
36
LDV, p. 275.
37
For further details, see Paul Lodge, ‘Leibniz’s notion of an aggregate’, British Journal
for the History of Philosophy 9:3 (2001), pp. 467–86, especially pp. 479–84.
38
G. W. Leibniz, Philosophical Essays, trans. Roger Ariew and Daniel Garber (Indianapolis:
Hackett, 1989), pp. 88–9.
49
all these bodies, and all that is ascribed to them, are not substances, but only
well-founded phenomena, or the foundation of appearances, which are dif-
ferent in different observers, but which are related and come from the same
foundation, just like different views of the same city seen from various places
. . . [T]he Academics have questioned whether material things exist outside
of us, which may be given a reasonable explanation by saying that they are
nothing but perceptions, and that they obtain their reality from the congruence
of perceptions of apperceiving substances. (appendix, pp. 278–9)
(By ‘apperceiving substances’ Leibniz means self-conscious substances, in
other words, minds such as those of humans and angels; for a discussion of
apperception, see M14.) This is not the only text in which Leibniz explic-
itly endorses both phenomenalism and the aggregate thesis.39 Evidently he
considered both to be compatible,40 though he does not divulge his reasons
for thinking so. In any case, in the Monadology itself Leibniz does not even
raise the question of how compounds relate to monads, let alone advance
an answer to it; consequently, if there is an answer to that question, it is one
that cannot be settled by a study of the Monadology.
4. There is also no dissolution to fear, and there is no conceivable way in

which a simple substance could perish naturally.
Leibniz now draws out another corollary of M1: as monads are without
parts, they must be naturally indestructible. Leibniz endorses the view,
passed down from the ancient Greeks,41 that natural destruction involves
a thing being broken down into its component parts (in one text,
for example, he asserts that ‘every natural destruction consists in the
dissolution of parts’).42 But monads of course are simple and so don’t have
any component parts. Consequently a monad can’t be destroyed by break-
ing it into parts because there are no parts into which it can be broken
39
For example, see also LDV, pp. 301, 303, and 307.
40
Some scholars have claimed that there are in fact inconsistent strands within Leibniz’s
metaphysics, and that when Leibniz discusses them they are best interpreted not as
truth-claims that describe the world as it is, but rather alternative theories of the world
(or ways of looking at the world). See Glenn Hartz, Leibniz’s Final System: Monads,
Matter, Animals (London: Routledge, 2007). Other scholars, meanwhile, have sug-
gested that Leibniz’s metaphysics was never complete, and that even at the end of his
life he was flitting between alternative – and incompatible – positions, never settling on
one in particular. See Garber, Leibniz: Body, Substance, Monad.
41
See for example Plato, Phaedo 78c, in Plato: Complete Works, ed. John M. Cooper
(Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997), pp. 68–9.
42
SLT, p. 64.
50
down. And this means that monads are naturally indestructible. Leibniz
uses the phrase ‘naturally’ to indicate that he is referring to natural pro-
cesses, that is, those governed by the laws of nature that are discoverable
by natural science. So tearing up a book would qualify as a natural process
as it occurs in accordance with the laws of nature. But somehow deleting
a book from existence, for example by magic or divine fiat, would be a
supernatural process, as it goes beyond what is possible according to the
laws of nature.
The fact that monads are naturally indestructible does not entail that
they are absolutely indestructible, since they could still be deleted from
existence by some supernatural process, for example by God annihilating
them. Leibniz will later allow for the possibility that God might annihilate
monads (M6), but ultimately he does not think that will ever happen.
5. For the same reason there is no way in which a simple substance could
begin naturally, since it cannot be formed by composition.
The claim here – that simple substances cannot begin naturally – follows
from M1. As Leibniz indicates, the reasoning parallels that found in M4:
there Leibniz showed that a simple substance cannot naturally cease to
be because, being simple, it cannot be subject to dissolution, which was
assumed to be the only form of natural destruction. Now he shows that a
simple substance cannot naturally come to be either, because by virtue of
being simple it cannot be subject to composition, that is, compounding, a
process by which a thing comes to be from the assembly of pre-existing
parts (for example, a car comes to be through the assembly of its various
component parts). Since simple substances have no parts they can no
more come into being through composition than they can go out of being
through dissolution. Since Leibniz assumes that composition is the only
way a thing can naturally come into being, the fact that simple substances
are not subject to it leads him to conclude that simple substances cannot
naturally come into being.
6. Thus it may be said that monads can only begin and end at once, that
is, they can only begin by creation and only end by annihilation, whereas
that which is composite begins or ends by parts.
In M5 Leibniz ruled out monads beginning naturally, and in M4 he ruled

out monads ending naturally, and he now draws the straightforward
corollary that monads must therefore begin and end supernaturally, that
51
is, by creation (an instantaneous coming into being) and annihilation
(an instantaneous going out of being). This contrasts with compounds,
which come into being naturally, through a process of compounding parts,
and go out of being naturally, through the dissolution into component
parts.
Leibniz was generally averse to invoking the supernatural in his phi-
losophy, and the supernatural act of creation that gave rise to monads was
the only instance of it he was prepared to recognise: ‘I admit the super-
natural here only in the beginning of things.’43 Leibniz gives naturalistic
explanations of other events that were often taken to have a supernatural
explanation, such as the miracles recorded in the Bible. This leaves for him
creation as the only event that cannot be explained naturally, that is, that
cannot be explained without invoking the direct operation of God.44 And
there will be no ‘miracle of annihilation’ that parallels the miracle of crea-
tion: Leibniz doesn’t believe that monads will end, only that if they were
to do so then it would have to be by annihilation, there being no other way
that they could end. But according to Leibniz it would be ‘unfitting’ for
God to annihilate anything, on account of his perfect goodness.45
Leibniz’s use of the expression ‘tout d’un coup’, translated here as
‘at once’, is slightly ambiguous, inasmuch as in his day it could mean
‘suddenly’ or ‘all at one time’/‘all in one go’ (the expression still has both
meanings, though the former is rather more common now). Leibniz may
have had both meanings in mind when writing M6. We have already
seen that monads come to exist suddenly, in the act of divine creation.
On top of that, Leibniz also holds that each monad was created sufficient
and complete right from the outset, with all of its determinations. Hence
monads come to exist all in one go. Leibniz will develop this thought
in M7.
7. There is also no way of explaining how a monad could be internally

altered or changed by any other created thing, since it is not possible
to rearrange anything in it or to conceive in it any internal motion that
could be started, directed, increased, or diminished within it, as can
occur in compounds, where there is change among the parts. Monads
have no windows through which anything could enter them or depart
43
H, p. 66.
44
See Daniel J. Cook, ‘Leibniz on creation’, in Marcelo Dascal (ed.), Leibniz: What Kind
of Rationalist? (Dordrecht: Springer, 2008), pp. 449–60.
45
Leibniz, Die Werke von Leibniz, 11 vols, ed. Onno Klopp (Hanover: Klindworth,
1864–84), XI, p. 61.
52
from them. Accidents cannot become detached, or wander about
outside of substances, as the sensible species of the Scholastics once
did. Thus neither substance nor accident can enter a monad from
outside.
Leibniz now argues that there is no inter-substance causality, or transeunt

causation, that is, causation between substances, in which one substance
acts on another. In determining what such causation would involve,
Leibniz takes as his model causation as it apparently occurs between
compound things. He insinuates that when one compound acts on
another, it brings about a change in the latter’s parts, or to the amount or
direction of motion that these parts have. Apparently on the basis of this
model alone, Leibniz supposes that any causality that occurred between
substances would also involve ‘change among the parts’, such that if A
causes a change in B it would do so by virtue of bringing about change of
B’s parts or in B’s parts. But as we know from M1, monads have no parts.
So if inter-substantial causality involves change of/in parts, and monads
have no parts, then there can be no inter-substantial causality. The same
point is captured slightly more esoterically in Leibniz’s claim that monads
have no windows, which means only that nothing can enter them or leave
them.46 To illustrate this claim Leibniz briefly considers a paradigm case
of inter-substance causality, namely the Scholastic theory of perception.
How does one substance perceive another? The answer given by some
Scholastic thinkers, such as Suarez, who Leibniz sometimes mentions
in connection with this theory,47 is that we perceive objects because they
emit ‘sensible species’ or ‘perceptible forms’ (the expressions mean the
same) which travel through the air and enter into us through our sense
organs. There are different types of species – visible, audible, tangible,
and so on – and each needs to be picked up by the right sense organ for
perception to occur. The visible species can be thought of as being very
thin surface layers which evaporate and are released into the air. If they
happen to come into contact with a suitable sense organ (namely the eye)
then the visible species enter through it and from there enter the mind,
producing a visual perception. On this scheme, the mind of one substance
absorbs the surface of another, the process being mediated by the various
sense organs. In the Monadology Leibniz dismisses this theory rather
46
Leibniz’s claim that monads have no windows has its precedents, for example in the
Discourse on Metaphysics (1686): ‘nothing enters naturally into our minds from without,
and it is a bad habit we have of thinking as if our soul received certain species as “mes-
sengers” and as if it had doors and windows’. PPL, p. 320.
47
For example, ‘Suarez . . . defined cause as what flows being into something else, a most
barbarous and obscure expression’. PPL, p. 126.
53
brusquely and dogmatically, because he simply asserts that accidents (that
is, properties which are not part of a substance’s essence) cannot become
detached from a substance, nor wander around outside of them. In the
New Essays (1703–5), however, he explains that if accidents could do
these things then evidently they would be self-subsistent beings in their
own right, because they would be capable of existing by themselves. He
complains, however, that this is a hallmark of substances, not accidents,
which are by definition properties of substances rather than substances
themselves.48 So to suppose free-roaming accidents is to collapse the dis-
tinction between substance and accident. Leibniz was far from alone in his
opposition to the Scholastic theory of perception; Descartes, for example,
sought to undermine it in his Optics (1637).49
Leibniz’s denial of inter-substance causality would not have struck
his readers as odd, accustomed as they were to the views of occasionalist
philosophers such as Nicolas Malebranche (1638–1715). Malebranche
denied not only causality between created substances, as Leibniz did,
but also causality within created substances; in other words, both inter-
substance and intra-substance causality. Hence Malebranche denied
that a created mind can cause an effect in a body, that a body can cause
an effect in a mind, that one body can cause an effect in another body,
and that a mind can cause an effect in a mind. Like other occasionalists,
Malebranche considered God to be the only true causal agent. So on this
account, while it might seem as though I am the cause of my actions, such
as moving my arms, or directing my thoughts, in fact the true cause in
both cases is God. Malebranche does allow, however, that created things
can be occasional causes, from which the doctrine of occasionalism gets its
name. To illustrate what is involved, consider two billiard balls meeting
at speed; according to the occasionalist, that moment the two balls meet,
the moment of impact, gives God the occasion to cause the two balls to
rebound in the way that we see. Their impact is not the true cause of their
rebounding, but it does serve as the occasion for God to cause them to
rebound. So for Malebranche there is a sense in which the collision of the
balls is a cause, but it is an occasional cause rather than a true cause, with
God being the only true cause. Malebranche offered a suite of arguments
for the various claims of occasionalism, though Leibniz’s argument for
the denial of inter-substance causality, in M7, was not among them.50
48
See NE, p. 379.
49
See Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, I, p. 153.
50
For details of all of Malebranche’s arguments, see Steven Nadler, ‘Malebranche on
causation’, in The Cambridge Companion to Malebranche, ed. Steven Nadler (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp. 112–38.
54
One of Malebranche’s arguments concerned the very nature of causality,
which involved, he believed, a necessary connection between the cause
and the effect. He claimed that a true cause ‘is one such that the mind
perceives a necessary connection between it and its effects’.51 (Hobbes
and Spinoza offered similar accounts.)52 But according to Malebranche,
such a connection is found ‘only between the will of an infinitely perfect
being and its effects’.53 For it is impossible that God will a thing and it
not happen, whereas it is possible that a created being will a thing and it
not happen. The thinking here is that God is omnipotent, so when God
wills to do some logically possible action X, necessarily X happens (for
it would be contradictory to suppose that God wills to do X and that X
doesn’t happen). This tells us that God is a true cause, and we can also
see that nothing else can be, for anything other than God would be a
created being, and as created beings are not omnipotent, when they will
to do some logically possible action X, it is not the case that necessar-
ily X happens (for there is no contradiction in supposing that a created
being wills to do X and that X doesn’t happen). From this, Malebranche
concludes that ‘it is only God who is the true cause and who truly has the
power to move bodies’.54 Leibniz was a vocal opponent of occasionalism;
while he agreed with its denial of transeunt or inter-substance causality,
albeit for the reasons given in M7 rather than any of those offered by
occasionalists, he disagreed with its denial of immanent or intra-substance
causality, as we shall see in M10–11.
8. [Monads are not mathematical points, for these points are only extremi-
ties and the line cannot be composed of points.] Yet monads must
have some qualities [and some changes], otherwise they would not be
beings at all [and if simple substances were non-entities, compounds
also would be reduced to nothing]. And if simple substances did not
differ qualitatively, there would be no way of perceiving any change in
things, since what is in the compound can only come from its simple
constituents, and if monads were without different qualities they would
be indistinguishable from one another, since they do not differ quantita-
tively either. And consequently, supposing the existence of the plenum,
51
Nicolas Malebranche, The Search after Truth, trans. and ed. Thomas M. Lennon and
Paul J. Olscamp (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 450.
52
See Thomas Hobbes, Elements of Philosophy (London, 1656), p. 88; Spinoza, Ethics Ia3,
in Spinoza, Complete Works, trans. Samuel Shirley (Indianapolis: Hackett, 2002), p.
218.
53
Malebranche, The Search after Truth, p. 450.
54
Malebranche, The Search after Truth, p. 450.
55
each place would always receive, in any motion, only the equivalent of
what it already had, and one state of things would be indistinguishable
from another.
Theodicy. Preface ****2b55
So far Leibniz hasn’t said a great deal about what monads actually are. He
starts to rectify that here, with a pair of rather abstract arguments. The first
claims that monads must have qualities, the second that monads must have
different qualities. The level of abstraction is such that Leibniz does not
even explain what these qualities are. In PNG2 we are told that a monad’s
qualities are its perceptions and its appetitions. We shall find Leibniz dis-
cussing perceptions in M14, and appetitions in M15.
In claiming that monads must have qualities Leibniz is denying that
monads are (in modern parlance) bare particulars, that is, things with no
qualities at all. A bare particular is simply a substratum, something in
which qualities may inhere but which has no qualities of its own. To get
a sense of what one would be, consider an object and then mentally strip
away its various qualities (shape, colour, sound, texture and so on) until
none of them is left. What remains (if anything does!) is a substratum, a
qualityless subject.56 Leibniz is saying that there are no such things. His
point is that a bare particular would not be a being. (What does this mean?
Probably no more than that it would not be thinkable, as Leibniz defines
‘being’ as ‘that which is distinctly thinkable’.57)
Leibniz then argues that monads must differ in their qualities, oth-
erwise (1) compounds themselves could not be observed to change, and
consequently (2) compounds could not be observed to move (supposing
the existence of the plenum). In both cases the argument is presumably
intended to be in the reductio ad absurdum vein, as it shows that something
untenable follows if it is denied that monads differ in their qualities. First
of all, suppose that monads did not differ qualitatively, that is, that they all
had the same qualities. This would mean that they are indistinguishable,
because the only other way they could be distinguished is quantitatively,
but we already know from M3 that monads do not have any quantitative
characteristics, like size and shape, so distinguishing them quantitatively
is out of the question. Now since the qualities of compounds derive from
55
Leibniz actually wrote ‘Preface ***2b’ but this would appear to be a mistake, as the
material on that page does not relate to M8 at all. For an explanation of Leibniz’s use
of asterisks, numbers and ‘a’ or ‘b’ when referring to the preface of the Theodicy, see
p. 162, note 2.
56
For the classic account, see John Locke, An Essay concerning Human Understanding
(London, 1690), book II, chapter XXIII, sections 1–2.
57
A VI 4, p. 869.
56
the qualities of constituent monads, it follows that if monads are quali-
tatively indistinguishable then compounds would be qualitatively indis-
tinguishable too. Further, Leibniz claims that in such a case it would not
be possible to observe ‘change in things’ either, by which is presumably
meant change in the constituents of compounds. For example, suppose
a compound is composed of three qualitatively identical monads A, B,
and C; if one of these were to be replaced by another qualitatively identi-
cal monad, say D, then there will have been a change in the constitution
of the compound. Now the only way this change could be observed is if
it brought about a change in the qualities of the compound, but clearly
these will not have changed. Consequently there is no way of observing
any change in the constitution of compounds. Since this goes against
the evidence of the senses (since we perceive qualitative change in com-
pounds), it shows that the initial supposition – that monads do not differ
qualitatively – is false.
Leibniz then proceeds to show that the very same supposition leads to
another untenable result, namely that if space were completely full of such
indistinguishable compounds, they could not be observed to move. For if
space were filled with qualitatively identical compounds then the situation
would be like this:
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
(Each ‘1’ represents a compound, and each box represents a part of space.)
Now if there were to be motion, for example two adjacent compounds were
to swap their current positions, how could we tell? We couldn’t. Indeed,
all the compounds could be moved so that they occupy different positions,
and there’s no way anyone would be able to tell. Consequently, if monads
do not differ qualitatively it would not be possible to observe motion of
compounds in the plenum. We can surmise that Leibniz took this to be
an unacceptable result (he would not have made the argument otherwise),
and as before its unacceptability shows that the initial supposition – that
monads do not differ qualitatively – is false. But this time it is not quite
57
so obvious why the result is unacceptable. Does it go against the evidence
of the senses? It is not clear that it does, for while it is uncontroversial to
claim that we do perceive the motion of compounds, it is much more con-
tentious to claim that we perceive the motion of compounds in the plenum.
Such a claim could only be made if there were grounds to think there is a
plenum, that is, that space is indeed full. Unfortunately in the argument of
M8 Leibniz does not offer any such grounds; instead he treats the plenum
as a supposition (‘supposing the existence of the plenum’). Later in the
Monadology Leibniz explicitly endorses the existence of the plenum (see
M61), though no grounds for it are offered. This is not the case in other
texts, however. In a letter to Samuel Clarke, for example, Leibniz argues
that from the fact that God wishes to produce as much perfection as pos-
sible it follows that the universe must be a plenum, because any empty
spaces could potentially be filled with something:
let us fancy a space wholly empty. God could have placed some matter in it
without derogating in any respect from all other things; therefore he hath actu-
ally placed some matter in that space; therefore there is no space wholly empty;
therefore all is full.58
9. It must also be that every monad is different from every other. For
in nature there are never two beings which are perfectly alike, and in
which it is not possible to find a difference which is internal, or based on
an intrinsic denomination.
This goes further than what was said in M8. There the claim was that not
all monads could be the same. Now it is that each one is different from
every other; in other words, that every monad is unique. Leibniz takes
this to follow from his assertion that no two things in nature are exactly
alike, a principle now often referred to as the identity of indiscernibles
(or sometimes Leibniz’s law). The principle states that if everything that
is true of A is also true of B (that is, they are indiscernible), then A and
B are one and the same thing (that is, identical). To illustrate, consider
the morning star and the evening star. If we were to compile two lists,
one containing everything that is true of the morning star, and the other
containing everything that is true of the evening star, we would discover
when putting them side-by-side that the two lists are identical. And that
is because the morning star is the evening star, that is, the planet Venus.
So the indiscernibility between the morning star and evening star is due to
58
PPL, p. 691.
58
their being identical. According to Leibniz’s principle, all indiscernibles
are identical.
It is sometimes suggested that Leibniz believed the principle could be
supported empirically.59 Certainly he was fond of recounting the story of a
friend who tried without success to find two identical leaves:
An ingenious gentleman of my acquaintance, discoursing with me in the
presence of Her Electoral Highness, the Princess Sophia, in the garden of
Herrenhausen, thought he could find two leaves perfectly alike. The princess
defied him to do it, and he ran all over the garden a long time to look for some;
but it was to no purpose.60
However it is by no means certain that Leibniz ever believed such failure
constituted empirical support for the identity of indiscernibles. The prin-
ciple itself cannot possibly follow from the failure to find two identical
leaves, and although such failure would be a natural consequence of the
identity of indiscernibles, that is, it is exactly what we would expect to
happen if the principle were true, other explanations for it are possible (for
example, insufficiently large sample size).
Although in the Monadology Leibniz treats the identity of indiscerni-
bles as axiomatic, in other writings he attempts to support it via argument.
For example, in ‘Logical-metaphysical principles’ (1689) he claims that the
identity of indiscernibles follows from the principle of sufficient reason,
which holds that there must be a reason why things are (or happen) thus
rather than otherwise:61
there is a reason even for eternal things. If we imagine that the world has existed
from eternity, and that there have been only globes in it, a reason must be
given why there should be globes rather than cubes. From this it also follows
that there cannot be in nature two individual things different in number alone. For
it certainly must be possible to give a reason why they are different, which
must be found in some difference in them. And so what St Thomas recognized
about separate intelligences, which he said never differ in number alone, must
be said about other things too; and two eggs, or two leaves or blades of grass,
perfectly similar to each other, will never be found . . . And although gold and
other metals, salts, and many liquids are considered as homogeneous bodies,
that can be admitted only so far as our senses are concerned, and as such it is
not exactly true that they are homogeneous.62
59
See for example Roger Woolhouse, Starting with Leibniz (London: Continuum, 2011),
pp. 102–3.
60
PPL, p. 687. Cf. NE, p. 231; LTS, p. 327.
61
For more details on the principle of sufficient reason, see M32.
62
SLT, p. 49.
59
In claiming that each monad differs from every other, Leibniz stresses
that this difference is to be found in their internal qualities, or ‘intrinsic
denominations’, a term which refers to those qualities or properties intrinsic
to a thing. It is often contrasted with ‘extrinsic denominations’, which
refers to qualities or properties extrinsic to a thing. For example, my being
fair-skinned would qualify as an intrinsic denomination, as it is a property
which is inherent to me, whereas my being thought by my partner to be
impatient would be an extrinsic denomination as what my partner happens
to think of me is not a property intrinsic to me. Extrinsic denominations
are sometimes called relational properties because they involve a relation
between the thing under consideration (in this case me) and something
else (in this case my partner). According to the Port Royal Logic, a very
influential textbook on logic from the latter half of the
seventeenth
century, the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic denominations was
widely employed by Scholastic philosophers:
There are some [modes] which may be termed internal, because they are
conceived in the substance, like ‘round’ and ‘square,’ and others which may
be called external, because they are applied to something which is not in the
substance, like ‘loved,’ ‘seen,’ and ‘desired,’ which are names applied to actions
of another. And these are what are called in the Schools external denomina-
tions.63
10. I also take it for granted that every created being is subject to change,
and consequently the created monad also, and even that this change is
continual in each one.
Leibniz now assumes that monads are subject to continual change, that
is, change which is incessant, without any interruption.64 That this is
an assumption is indicated by his use of the expression ‘I . . . take it for
63
[Antoine Arnauld and Pierre Nicole], La logique, ou de l’art de penser, 2nd edn (Paris,
1664), p. 57.
64
It has been suggested that Leibniz might here mean ‘continuous’ (in the sense of
gradual, or by degrees) rather than ‘continual’ (in the sense of incessant), since the
French word that Leibniz uses, ‘continuel’, means both. See Anthony Savile, The
Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Leibniz and the Monadology (London: Routledge,
2000), p. 95. But while it is correct to say that the French word ‘continuel’ now can
mean either ‘continual’ or ‘continuous’, in Leibniz’s lifetime it only meant ‘continual’;
only later, long after Leibniz’s death, did it also acquire the meaning of ‘continuous’.
Compare the entry for ‘continuel’ in the 1694 and 1762 editions of the Dictionnaire de
l’Académie française with that in Jean-François Féraud’s Dictionnaire critique de la langue
française (1787–88).
60
granted’. Certainly the claim that monads are subject to continual change
does not follow from what has been said already. Elsewhere Leibniz builds
the idea of change into the very concept of substance, for example in PNG1
where he writes: ‘Substance is a being capable of action.’
The connection between substance and change was first made by
Aristotle, who had claimed in the Categories that a distinctive mark of a
substance was not just that it was the subject of properties, but the subject
of different properties at different times, for example at one time Socrates
is sitting, at another he is standing.65 In other words, substances are what
undergo change. In developing this idea, some of Aristotle’s medieval fol-
lowers came to suppose that the notions of change and even activity were
built into the very concept of substance. This is the Scholastic doctrine
of the suppositum, according to which actions belong to (that is, must be
attributed to) a suppositum, that is, a substantial individual. So actions
could not be attributed to aggregates of substances, properties of sub-
stances, or parts of substances, but only to substances themselves. This
was the philosophy Leibniz had been taught at university, and we can find
him adopting it in his very earliest writings,66 as well as in later ones, such
as ‘On nature itself’ (1698):
So far as I have made the concept of action clear to myself, I believe that there
follows from it and is established by it that most widely accepted principle of
philosophy – that actions belong to substances. And hence I hold it also to be
true that this is a reciprocal proposition, so that not only is everything that
acts an individual substance but also every individual substance acts without
interruption, not excepting body itself, in which no absolute rest is ever to be
found.67
Here Leibniz moves from ‘actions belong to substances’ to ‘every sub-

stance acts’ and ‘every substance acts always’, but his rationale for this step
is not clear. Nevertheless, the claim that substances always act is axiomatic
for Leibniz.
11. It follows from what we have just said that the natural changes of
monads come from an internal principle [that may be called active
force], since an external cause would not be able to influence a
monad’s interior.
65
See Aristotle, Categories 4a10, in The Complete Works, I, p. 7.
66
For example, PPL, p. 115.
67
PPL, p. 502.
61
In M10 Leibniz claimed that monads always undergo change. And in
M7 he showed that a monad cannot be affected from without (that is, by
anything external to it), from which it follows that any change a monad
undergoes must originate from within itself. In other words, every monad
contains an internal principle of change (with ‘principle’ here meaning
‘source’ or ‘origin’).
12. [And generally it may be said that force is nothing other than the
principle of change.] But besides the principle of change, there must
also be a complete specification of that which undergoes the change,
which constitutes so to speak the specific determination and [variation]
variety of simple substances.
We now learn that there is more to a monad than simply an internal prin-
ciple of change: it also contains something which dictates what its changes
will be, and when. This ‘something’ contains a monad’s ‘orders’, as it were;
in modern parlance, we would probably call it a script, or programme.
Without it, nothing would happen; there would be the potential for change,
but no actual change (likewise, nothing would happen to a computer that
had internal power but no program to run). The principle of change in a
monad thus needs to be directed if it is to have any effect at all, and Leibniz
here states that it is a monad’s ‘complete specification’ which contains the
directions. He also claims that this complete specification is what individu-
ates each monad, that is, what makes each one unique and so different from
every other one. In other words, each monad has a different set of orders,
its own unique programme.
In a number of logical and metaphysical writings from the 1680s,
Leibniz developed the notion of a complete concept, which is the forerunner
of the ‘complete specification’ described in M12. In these earlier writings,
Leibniz insisted that every substance has a complete concept, that is, a set
of descriptions that detail everything that will ever happen to it throughout
its entire existence. To illustrate, consider the example of Judas (which
is one of Leibniz’s own examples). According to Leibniz, the complete
concept of Judas includes his betrayal of Christ, and it always did and
always will.68 In other words, it was true of Judas that he would betray
Christ not just before it happened, but before Judas was even born. The
same holds for everything else that is true of Judas. Hence an inspection of
Judas’ complete concept would reveal in the most minute detail everything
that Judas would ever do, and have done to him, and when.
68
See PPL, p. 322.
62
Leibniz offers no argument in the Monadology for the assertion that
every substance has a ‘complete specification’: it is simply asserted.
However, in his earlier work, he did attempt to justify the doctrine of
the complete concept (which that of the ‘complete specification’ looks to
have superseded) by claiming that it follows from the nature of truth, that
is, from what it is that makes a truth true. The nature of truth demands,
Leibniz argued, that in all true propositions ‘the concept of the predicate
is always in some way included in that of the subject’.69 To give a simple
example, in the true proposition ‘a mortal man is mortal’ the concept of the
predicate ‘mortal’ is clearly included in the concept of the subject ‘a mortal
man’, and this inclusion explains why the proposition is true. Leibniz
supposed that all truths are ultimately like this: ‘The fact is that in every
true . . . proposition . . ., the concept of the predicate is always in some
way included in that of the subject, praedicatum inest subjecto [the predicate
is included in the subject], or else I do not know what truth is.’70 Hence
the nature of truth demands that everything that is true about a subject,
or substance, be contained in its concept, and that includes all of its past,
present, and future predicates:
The complete or perfect concept of an individual substance contains all of its
predicates, past, present and future. For certainly it is true now that a future
predicate is future, and so is contained in the concept of the thing. And hence
all the things that will happen to Peter or Judas, both necessary and free, are
contained in the perfect individual concept of Peter or Judas.71
Moreover, Leibniz held that each individual substance is defined by its

own complete concept, with each concept being so detailed as to distin-
guish it from every other; in other words, the complete concept picks out a
specific individual substance, and every substance is unique, being distinct
in some way from every other. (A ‘full concept’, on the other hand, would
have much less detail, such that it could pick out abstract types of things
but not concrete individuals. Hence one can have a full concept of a King,
which contains all the defining features of Kings, such as the fact that they
are male, that they are rulers, and so on, but which is not specific enough
to pick out any individual King.)
Leibniz discussed his doctrine of complete concepts with the phi-
losopher and theologian Antoine Arnauld in a series of letters throughout
1686–7. Arnauld initially found the doctrine horrific: in his view, in the
beginning God created Adam, and if Leibniz was right about there being
69
SLT, p. 47.
70
SLT, p. 45.
71
SLT, p. 50.
63
complete concepts then Adam’s complete concept included the fact that he
would have so many children, and their complete concepts included details
of the children they would have, and so on. All the people who would ever
live, and all the things they would ever do and have done to them, would
be fully mapped out in these complete concepts. According to Arnauld,
this meant that everything that ever happens is necessary, that is, fixed and
unalterable, from the very outset. This seems to leave little room for free
will, for if it was true even before a person was born that they would do
X and Y and so on, then they could not do X and Y freely. In his replies,
Leibniz defended his position vigorously, and even managed to go some
way towards assuaging Arnauld’s initial concerns, but ultimately he realised
from Arnauld’s reaction that his doctrine was apt to be (mis)understood
as dangerous. By the early 1690s, Leibniz had largely stopped referring to
complete concepts, and instead started claiming that every substance had
within it a ‘law of progression’ (sometimes referred to as a ‘law of change’
or ‘law of the series’),72 which acted on it from its initial state onwards, and
thus unfolded what was already contained within it virtually. It is this idea
that he is alluding to in M12, albeit under a different name.
13. This complete specification must encompass a plurality within the

unity or the simple. For as every natural change takes place by degrees,
something changes and something remains; and consequently in the
simple substance there must be a plurality of affections and relations,
even though it has no parts.
Leibniz has already argued that a monad must have ‘some qualities’ (M8);
now he goes further, arguing that a monad (the unity or simple referred to
in the first sentence) must have multiple qualities (which is the plurality
referred to again in the first sentence). Although it is not made explicit,
what Leibniz means is that a monad must have multiple qualities at
every moment of its existence. The thrust of the argument is: given that
substances are in constant change (from M10), and that natural change
always occurs in degrees rather than all at once, then it must follow that
substances always have many qualities. To see this, suppose there is a
substance which has only a single quality, which at this moment of its
existence is called quality A. We already know (from M10) that as a sub-
stance it is in constant change, which must mean that in the next moment
of its existence it will lose quality A and in its place gain a d ifferent
quality, say quality B (for monads can never be without any qualities,
72
See for example PPL, p. 360, p. 500; LDV, p. 75.
64
as we already known from M8). Similarly, in the moment of existence
which follows that, it will lose quality B and gain a different one, perhaps
quality C. Since it has only a single quality, the substance can only change
by losing the quality it had the instant before and gaining a different one
in its place. Here, change would happen all at once. But in M13 Leibniz
informs us that natural change does not happen all at once, but rather
gradually. Clearly this is impossible for a substance with only a single
quality, because it would be restricted to all-at-once changes. However, it
is perfectly possible for a substance which has multiple qualities, because
at each and every moment some of these qualities can stay the same while
other ones change. Hence if substances do undergo constant change, and
this change is gradual, then substances must have multiple qualities at any
given time. Consequently, although substances are spatially simple, that
is, have no parts, they are nevertheless qualitatively complex, that is, have
many qualities.
The claim that natural change always takes place continuously, by
degrees, is often called by Leibniz the law of continuity, which is often
summed up as ‘nature makes no leaps’ or ‘no transition is made through a
leap’.73 To illustrate what is involved, think of the difference between ana-
logue and digital clocks. An analogue clock is a clock with moving hands.
As the hands move round the clock face to capture the changes in time,
they do so smoothly, such that when the second hand (for instance) does a
full circuit it passes continuously through all the points in the clock face: it
doesn’t ‘jump’ from one point to another. The same is true of the minute
and hour hands. Compare this with a digital clock, which literally jumps
from one second to another (if it has a second readout), and one minute
to another, that is, when it changes from 10.13 to 10.14 (for example) the
readout just ‘jumps’ from one to another, and from one hour to another.
In the case of nature, the law of continuity holds that all natural changes,
whether from place to place, state to state, or form to form, happen in this
smooth, gradual way, through all intervening points or degrees.
Leibniz often claimed to be the first to formulate the law of continuity,74
though a clear precursor to it can be found in the work of Aristotle.75
Leibniz describes it as an axiom of his philosophy,76 and while he presents
no formal demonstration of it, he does attempt to justify it in two different
ways. First, he insists that the law of continuity is confirmed by experience,
which does not furnish us with an example of a natural change occurring
73
See, for example, PPL, p. 447; LDV, p. 69; SLT, p. 137.
74
See for example SLT, p. 137; H, p. 333.
75
Aristotle, Metaphysics, 1069a5–6, in The Complete Works, II, p. 1688.
76
See LDV, p. 69.
65
by a leap; in other words, we do not see bodies disappearing from one
point of space and time, and appearing at another point without having
passed through all the intervening states.77 Second, Leibniz claims that
the law of continuity follows from the law (or principle) of order. This is
itself a higher order, metaphysical law, which holds that ‘the more things
are analyzed the more they satisfy the intellect’.78 The law of order is thus an
architectonic (architectural) principle that God applies to his creation on
account of his supreme wisdom. Leibniz sometimes claimed that God is a
divine geometrician who employed mathematical principles to construct
the world in an orderly way,79 and the law of continuity, via the law of
order, can be seen as one result of this.
14. The passing state, which encompasses and represents a plurality

within the unity (or simple substance) is nothing other than what is
called perception, which must be distinguished from apperception, or
consciousness, as will be apparent in what follows. And it is here that
the Cartesians have fallen far short, as they have given no thought to
perceptions which are not apperceived. This also is what made them
believe that minds alone are monads and that there are no souls of
beasts or other entelechies, and also led them to make the common
mistake of confusing a long stupor with death, in the rigorous sense
of the term, which has made them fall in with the Scholastic prejudice
of souls entirely separate from bodies, and has even confirmed some
twisted minds in the belief of the mortality of souls.
Leibniz starts by giving a very technical definition of perception as the

representation of a plurality within the unity, which differs somewhat from
how we tend to think of perceptions today, as conscious interpretations
of sensory information. A representation, or expression (Leibniz uses the
terms interchangeably), involves an isomorphic relationship between the
thing doing the expressing and the things expressed. Hence Leibniz claims
that ‘One thing expresses another, in my usage, when there is a constant
and regular relation between what can be said about one and about the
other.’80 A mundane example of this would be a map, the elements of
which share the same order as the geographical features the map repre-
77
See LDV, p. 71.
78
LDV, p. 71.
79
See for example Leibniz, The Labyrinth of the Continuum: Writings on the Continuum
Problem, 1672–1686, trans. and ed. Richard T. W. Arthur (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 2001), p. 305; PPL, pp. 305–6.
80
PPL, p. 339.
66
sents. The perceptions had by substances are likewise representations, or
expressions, of other substances and their aggregates; hence a substance
perceives a pile of books external to it when it is in a state which encom-
passes a representation not just of each individual book, but also of the
relation between them. Accordingly, perception involves a plurality (the
various things represented) within the substance, the unity. By combin-
ing his definition of perception, the representation of a plurality within
the unity, with the claim of M13, that a monad’s complete specification
encompasses a plurality within the unity, Leibniz is able to conclude that
perceptions are the basic states of monads. In other words, not only do all
monads have perceptions, but they always have them.
Leibniz then distinguishes perception from apperception. ‘Apperception’
is a term devised by Leibniz. He defines it in PNG4: ‘apperception . . . is the
consciousness or the reflective knowledge of this internal state’; by ‘internal
state’ Leibniz means one’s perceptual state, that is, the state of represent-
ing a plurality. So apperception is the consciousness of (or reflection upon)
a perception. Later (M20), Leibniz will argue that not all perceptions are
apperceived, but in M15 he merely conceives that it might be this way, that
is, that there might be unconscious perceptions. Indeed, he chides Descartes’
followers for not even entertaining the idea of unconscious perceptions.81
On this point he could have singled out just about any other philosopher
or school for criticism. The notion of unconscious mental states is often
thought to begin with Leibniz, though there are traces of it in Spinoza. In
any case, the idea did not catch on, and we have to wait until the mid-to-late
nineteenth century before it finds any followers of note.
Leibniz then proceeds to show some of the unfortunate consequences
that come from supposing that all perceptions are apperceived. The only
state of the soul that the Cartesians were prepared to recognise (he claims)
was consciousness, and because the Cartesians were not prepared to allow
that animals were conscious, they were forced to deny that animals had
souls. This, Leibniz insinuates, is the wrong result. (It should be noted that
it is a bit misleading of Leibniz to say that Cartesians believed that minds
alone are monads, as ‘monads’ is a Leibnizian term, not a Cartesian one.) In
developing his complaint, Leibniz introduces the term ‘entelechies’, which
will henceforth be used as an alternative for ‘monads’. Leibniz explains
what he means by the term in M18, and elaborates a little more in M48,
where he explains that the Latin translation of the term is ‘perfectihabiae’
81
Scholars have tended to agree that Descartes did not endorse, and in fact could not
have endorsed, a theory of the unconscious. But for a contrary view, see Matthew C.
Eshleman, ‘The Cartesian unconscious’, History of Philosophy Quarterly 24:3 (2007),
pp. 297–315.
67
(perfection-havers). The term itself was coined by Aristotle, and in his
philosophy means the realisation (that is, the full actualisation) of a thing’s
potential.
The second half of M14 prefigures claims that will be developed in
greater detail later in the text. For example, his assertion against the
Cartesians, that death is not the separation of soul and body will be
defended in M21 and M73, and his assertion against the Scholastics, that
souls never exist separate from bodies, will be defended in M72. In making
these assertions, Leibniz alludes to his distinction between three grades of
monad that will be elaborated in M19–M30:
(Bare) monads.
Animal souls (or brute souls).
Minds: humans and angels.
All grades of monad have perceptions, and hence represent external

things. But there are big differences between the three grades, as will
become clear.
15. The action of the internal principle which brings about the change or
passage from one perception to another may be called appetition. It
is true that the appetite cannot always completely reach the whole
perception it aims for, but it always attains something of it, and reaches
new perceptions.
Leibniz established that there must be an internal principle of change in

M11. He now entitles the action of this principle the appetite. The appetite
drives the monad from the set of perceptions it has at one moment to the
set it has at the next.82 Although it is continually striving for a new set of
perceptions, this is not necessarily a conscious striving: at the level of bare
monads it is very much automatic (in much the same way that a computer
script can be said to strive, automatically and unconsciously, to complete
each step of a subroutine). Moreover, such striving would not be random,
since there is a clear hint here of directedness. This is true also of the appe-
tites of animal souls and minds: Leibniz refers to the appetite of animal
souls as ‘passion’, and to the appetite of minds as ‘will’. Passions are sen-
sible inclinations, that is, ones that are felt.83 Hunger and thirst would be
everyday examples of passions, and of course are ones that are experienced
82
See LTS, p. 316.
83
See NE, p. 194.
68
by minds as well as by animal souls. But minds also have what Leibniz calls
‘distinct inclinations’, that is, ones which involve a conscious striving for
an end supplied by reason.84 These appetites Leibniz refers to as the ‘will
where the perception is an intellectual judgement’.85
16. We ourselves experience a plurality within a simple substance when

we find that the least thought which we apperceive encompasses a
variety in its object. So all those who acknowledge that the soul is a
simple substance must acknowledge this plurality within the monad,
and Mr Bayle ought not to have found the difficulty in it which he did
in his Dictionary article ‘Rorarius’.
Leibniz now gives us an everyday example of a simple substance encom-

passing a plurality, namely our own thoughts. Every single one of our
thoughts involves a variety of things (a plurality), and exists in our soul,
which Leibniz insinuates is a simple substance (and hence a unity). It
should be noted that in offering this example Leibniz’s aim is not to estab-
lish that the soul is a simple substance (though of course he thinks that it
is), but rather the more modest one of showing that the idea of plurality-
in-unity is perfectly intelligible. Obviously the example will only p
ersuade
those who are prepared to accept that the soul is simple, though the vast
majority of Leibniz’s contemporaries would have granted him this.
Leibniz felt the need to show the intelligibility of plurality-in-unity
because of an objection raised by one of his chief intellectual opponents,
Pierre Bayle (1647–1706). In his sprawling Dictionnaire historique et cri-
tique (Historical and Critical Dictionary) (1697), Bayle included an article
on ‘Rorarius’, a sixteenth-century thinker who claimed that animals
had reason; in note H of that article, Bayle discussed some of Leibniz’s
doctrines and made a number of criticisms. The last of them concerns
Leibniz’s claim that unities can be the source of their own changes in much
the same way that a clock, once wound up, is the source of its own changes.
Bayle’s objection goes as follows:
It is inconceivable how they [all souls] can be compared to clocks, that is, how
by their original constitution they can diversify their operations by making use
of the spontaneous activity that they receive from their Creator. It is clearly
conceivable that a simple being will always act uniformly if not hindered by
some external cause. If it were composed of several parts, like a machine, it
84
NE, p. 194. Elsewhere, Leibniz calls the will ‘the distinct appetite’, and contrasts it with
the ‘confused and inapperceivable appetites’. G VII, p. 510.
85
See ‘Appendix on Monads’ (p. 278).
69
would act diversely because the particular activity of each piece might change
the course of that of the others at any moment. But in a unified substance,
where can you find the cause of the change of its operation?86
In his response, Leibniz conceded that a simple being would always act in
the same way unless there was some internal diversity that led it to change.
Thus to Bayle he insisted that the plurality of perceptions in the unity had
the same effect as does a plurality of parts in a machine, that is, preceding
perceptions influence succeeding ones in a unity much like the preceding
motion of parts influences the succeeding motion of parts in a machine.87
Leibniz seems to have supposed that, in making his objection, Bayle had
simply overlooked the fact that there could be plurality in unities. Perhaps
because of Bayle’s objection, in later writings Leibniz sought various ways
to make the idea of plurality-in-unity intelligible. Often he resorted to a
mathematical analogy:
It will be asked how the composite can be represented in the simple, or the
multitude in unity. I answer that it is somewhat like when an infinity of radii
converge and form angles in the center, simple and indivisible though it is.88
17. Moreover, we are obliged to admit that perception and that which
depends on it cannot be explained mechanically, that is, by means of
shapes and motions. And if we suppose that there were a machine
whose structure makes it think, feel, and have perception, we could
imagine it increased in size while keeping the same proportions, so
that one could enter it as one does with a mill. If we were then to
go around inside it, we would see only parts pushing one another,
and never anything which would explain a perception. This must
therefore be sought in the simple substance, and not in the compound
or machine. Moreover, this is the only thing that can be found in the
simple substance, that is, perceptions and their changes. It is also in this
alone that all the internal actions of simple substances can consist.
The argument detailed here is often referred to as ‘Leibniz’s Mill’, or the

mill argument. Leibniz deploys it in various texts,89 though the version
here is probably the most well-known. The argument is designed to show
86
Pierre Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique (Rotterdam, 1702, 2nd edn), p. 2608
(article ‘Rorarius’, note H). English translation from Pierre Bayle, Historical and Critical
Dictionary, trans. and ed. Richard H. Popkin (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1991), p. 239.
87
See LNS, p. 84.
88
LTS, p. 346, cf. p. 141.
89
For example, LTS, p. 259, cf. p. 266; LNS, pp. 129–30; NE, pp. 66–7; SLT, pp. 63–4.
70
that perception cannot be explained mechanically, that is, that its origin
cannot be in a material thing, and therefore must lie in simple substances.
But how the argument is supposed to work is a matter of debate.
One way of construing Leibniz’s Mill is as an argument about the
nature of perception.90 In essence, the argument would go like this:
Premise 1. Perception is the representation of the multitude in the

unity.
Premise 2. Material things are not unities.
Conclusion. Therefore perception does not occur in material things.
If this is the argument Leibniz is making then clearly it is not all contained
in M17, as the first premise is to be found in M14: there we were informed
that perception is the representation of the multitude in the unity, which
means that, by definition, perception can occur only in a unity. What
Leibniz adds to this in M17 is the claim that, in material things, there is
in principle no unity to be found, because material things consist of parts
upon parts (and of course we know from M1 that whatever has parts is not
simple, and hence not a unity). The upshot of which is that perception
does not (and could not) occur in material things, in which case, its source
must lie elsewhere: in a simple substance.
A second way of construing Leibniz’s Mill is as an inexplicability
argument for the immateriality of perception.91 This understanding of the
argument runs as follows:
Premise 1. There is no conceivable mechanical explanation for how

material things could perceive.
Premise 2. If there is no conceivable mechanical explanation for
how material things could perceive, then material things could not
perceive.
Conclusion. Material things could not perceive.
If this is the argument Leibniz wants to make in M17, it is perhaps surpris-

ing that he says nothing at all there about conceivability. In spite of this,
90
Paul Lodge and Marc Bobro construe Leibniz’s Mill argument this way; see their
‘Stepping back inside Leibniz’s mill’, The Monist 81:4 (1998), p. 564.
91
One who construes Leibniz’s Mill argument this way is Stewart Duncan; see his
‘Leibniz’s mill arguments against materialism’, Philosophical Quarterly 62:247 (2012),
p. 268.
71
many contemporary philosophers have construed Leibniz’s Mill as an
inexplicability argument, and as such it is still the subject of debates in the
philosophy of mind.92
Of course, while the only material thing Leibniz mentions in M17 is
a mill, what he really has in mind is the brain, and the human brain in
particular.93 The argument, whether conceived in terms of perception or
inexplicability, effectively invites us to suppose the human brain enlarged
to the point where we are able to stroll around inside it and inspect its
materials and workings, as we could with a mill.
Having established through the mill argument that perception is not to
be found in material things, only in simple substances, Leibniz continues
to claim that perceptions and their changes are all that there is to be found
in simple substances. Although no reason is given for this claim, it follows
from it that whatever activity there is in simple substances must involve the
change from one set of perceptions to another.
18. The name ‘entelechies’ could be given to all simple substances, or

created monads, for they have in themselves a certain perfection
(ἔχουσι τὸ ἐντελές). There is a self-sufficiency (ἀυτάρχεια) which
makes them the sources of their internal actions and incorporeal
automata, so to speak.
Theodicy §87.
Leibniz’s claim that monads have ‘a certain perfection’ is significant, and

will arise again in the Monadology, but he will not formally define the term
until M41. Here he insinuates that self-sufficiency is this perfection. That
monads are self-sufficient is known from M11, which established that
each monad is the source of its own changes. This self-sufficiency means
that monads are bearers of perfection, which in turn means that they can
be called ‘entelechies’, since ‘entelechy’ derives from the Greek word for
perfection, ‘enteles’ (as Leibniz notes in T87).
Self-sufficiency is an important concept in the context of substance.
Aristotle thought of substances as those things which were most truly
92
See for example John Searle, Intentionality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1983), p. 268; Charles Landesman, Leibniz’s Mill (Notre Dame: University of Notre
Dame Press, 2011), pp. 20–8. A third interpretation of the argument construes it as
claiming that thoughts and perceptions are not observable in material things, and there-
fore must belong to a different order of reality. See Paul M. Churchland, The Engine of
Reason, The Seat of The Soul (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996), pp. 191–2.
93
This is clearer in other formulations of the argument, such as that in LTS, p. 259, where
Leibniz explicitly mentions the brain.
72
real, and so did not depend for their existence on other things. Leibniz is
clearly recalling that idea here, though he is thinking of self-sufficiency in
a different way. For him, monads are self-sufficient not because they do
not depend on anything else for their existence (for in fact they do: they
depend on God, as he intimates in M40), but because they do not depend
on anything else for the changes in their internal states. In this sense, they
are independent of all other things. However, later on (M51) Leibniz will
claim that there is a sense in which some monads are dependent on other
ones, though it does not conflict with what he has said here.
Leibniz’s description of monads as ‘incorporeal automata’ perfectly
captures his notion of self-sufficiency. An automaton is literally a self-
moving machine. An example of a corporeal automaton would be a robot or
clockwork watch, both corporeal things which contain the source of their
own actions. Similarly, every monad is an incorporeal thing which contains
the source of its own actions, that is, the changes in its perceptual states.
19. If we wish to call ‘soul’ everything which has perceptions and appe-
tites in the general sense I have just explained, all simple substances
or created monads could be called souls. But as sensation is some-
thing more than a simple perception, I hold that the general name
of ‘monads’ and ‘entelechies’ is sufficient for simple substances which
only have perceptions, and that only those whose perception is more
distinct and is accompanied by memory should be called souls.
Leibniz now develops a distinction first alluded to in M14, between souls

on the one hand, and entelechies or monads on the other. In some writings,
he seems to treat ‘soul’ and ‘monad’ as interchangeable terms,94 but in the
Monadology he seeks to treat souls as a subset of monads. So we have (at
the moment) two kinds of monad – one kind just has simple perceptions,
while the other has more distinct perceptions and memory. It is the former
that Leibniz refers to here as entelechies (he will go on to call them ‘bare
monads’ in M24). Here he tells us that he wishes to reserve the term ‘soul’
for the latter kind.
20. For we experience within ourselves a state in which we remember

nothing and have no distinct perception, such as when we faint, or
when we are overcome by a deep, dreamless sleep. In this state the
soul does not appreciably differ from a simple monad, but as this state
94
For example, NE, p. 145.
73
does not last, and as the soul emerges from it, the soul is something
more.
Theodicy §64.
The claim that there are unconscious perceptions, made in M14, stands in
need of defending, and Leibniz finds support for it through the familiar
examples of fainting fits and sleep. Bear in mind that in the preceding
sections of the Monadology, Leibniz has shown that all monads always
have perceptions. Yet in the case of our own souls, which are themselves
monads, we know there to be occasions when there were no distinct
perceptions: fainting fits and sleep are just such occasions. Now if our souls
always have perceptions, but there are times when they do not have distinct
perceptions, then it must be the case that some perceptions are not distinct.
Leibniz claims that this is all bare monads have. Hence their perceptions
are akin to ours when we have fainted or are asleep. But bare monads are
capable of nothing more, whereas souls (a category which includes us) are:
souls have the potential to recover from this state, which is clear enough
from our own experience.
Leibniz’s use of ‘distinct perception’ in M20 is different from that in
M19. There, distinctness was used as a relative term, to make the point
that some perceptions are more distinct than others. But in M20, distinct-
ness looks to be something more absolute, in that some perceptions just do
qualify as ‘distinct’ (which would be true even if there are others that are
more or less distinct than they are). What, then, is a ‘distinct perception’?
In an early writing from the 1670s, Leibniz explains:
We perceive distinctly that whose parts or attributes we perceive as pertaining

to it, for example, when a man is before us, we perceive his face, and at the
same time we think that the face pertains to this man. Otherwise, when we cast
our eyes into a crowd, we perceive individual men and the faces of the indi-
viduals turned toward us, but we do so confusedly. And when we hear a far-off
sound of rushing water, we hear the noise of a great many waves, for there is
no reason why we should hear the sound of one rather than that of another;
and if we did not hear the sound of any, we would not hear anything; but this
perception is confused.95
Hence if a perception is distinct, it is possible to identify the elements of it.

A confused perception, on the other hand, is one in which the elements are
not separately identifiable.
95
A VI 4, p. 58: http://www.leibniz-translations.com/perception.htm
74
21. And it in no way follows that the simple substance is without any per-
ception when in that state. That is not even possible, for the aforemen-
tioned reasons; for it cannot perish, nor can it subsist without some
affection, which is nothing other than its perception. But when there
are a vast number of little perceptions in which there is nothing distinct,
we are stupefied, as happens when we continuously spin around in the
same direction several times: this makes us dizzy, which can make us
faint and prevent us from distinguishing anything at all. And death can
put animals into this state for a time.
Here Leibniz starts by repeating some claims already made, that a monad
cannot perish (M4), that it must have some qualities to exist at all (M8),
and that these qualities are called perceptions (M14); taken together, they
entail that monads always have perceptions. So there must still be percep-
tions even when we might think that there aren’t any, such as when a
monad is asleep, or in a swoon.
In M20, Leibniz showed that there could be unconscious perceptions,
that is, perceptions that are not apperceived. These are now given the
name ‘little perceptions’. Strictly speaking, a ‘little perception’ is a percep-
tion that cannot be distinguished. This may be because it is intrinsically
faint, that is, lacking in intensity, or because it occurs alongside a large
number of very similar perceptions from which it cannot be separated
out.96 To illustrate the point, Leibniz often uses the example of the noise
of the sea: in this case, each individual wave produces a perception in us,
but these perceptions are too similar to each other for us to be able to dis-
tinguish any one, that is, to pick out the sound of one specific wave.97 From
the fact that little perceptions cannot be distinguished, Leibniz supposes
that they must lie below the threshold of consciousness, as to be conscious
we have to be conscious of something, and that means we have to be able to
distinguish that thing from other things. So a perception which cannot be
so distinguished is one of which we have no conscious awareness.
Leibniz then notes that there are occasions when we cannot distinguish
anything at all, such as when we faint. On such occasions, all of our per-
ceptions are little perceptions, that is, ones of which we have no conscious
awareness. He then asserts that this is what happens in death. This may
seem highly presumptuous, but bear in mind what Leibniz has just shown:
a monad cannot perish (M4), so what we think of as death cannot be a
true end of the monad, and since a monad always has perceptions (M21),
it must continue to have perceptions even in the state of death. However,
96
See NE, p. 53.
97
See NE, p. 54; LTS, p. 272.
75
the only perceptions it has in death are little perceptions, so it is not con-
sciously aware of them. In line with this, Leibniz often refers to death as
a sleep,98 and of course such a claim is not uncommon in the Christian
tradition to which Leibniz belonged: Jesus is said to have described a dead
person as asleep.99 The final sentence of M21 – ‘death can put animals
into this state for a time’ – seems to imply that death is a state from which
animals can recover. In fact this is precisely what Leibniz holds, as we
shall see (M73). It is worth noting that Leibniz uses the term ‘animals’
quite broadly to include both rational animals, a category which includes
humans, and non-rational animals, a category which covers the rest of
the animal kingdom (see PNG5). Following the conventions of his day,
Leibniz typically referred to non-rational animals as ‘beasts’ or ‘brutes’.
The claim that human beings would recover from death would not have
struck Leibniz’s readers as problematic (as his readers largely belonged to
the Christian tradition, which holds that God will one day bring all human
beings back to life), but the claim that non-human animals would also
recover from death was much more controversial.
22. And as every present state of a simple substance is naturally a conse-

quence of its preceding state, in such a way that its present state is big
with the future. . .
Theodicy §360.
23. therefore, since we apperceive our perceptions when we come

around from our stupor, it must be the case that we had perceptions
immediately beforehand, although we did not apperceive them; for a
perception cannot arise naturally except from another perception, just
as one motion can only arise naturally from another motion.
Theodicy §401–3.
M22 and M23 together constitute a further argument for unconscious

perceptions, to supplement the one given in M20.
Leibniz often claimed of substances that the present is pregnant with
the future, even going so far as to say that ‘it is in the very nature of sub-
stance that the present is pregnant with the future’.100 In the Monadology,
98
For example, ‘death . . . is only a sleep, that is, a state in which perceptions are more
confused’. LTS, p. 348.
99
See Matthew 9.24, Mark 5.39, and Luke 8.52.
100
LDB, p. 349.
76
the claim is founded upon two earlier findings, namely that each monad
contains its own complete specification of changes (M12), and that monads
are causally independent of each other (M7). Taken together, they entail
that each state of a monad is completely determined by the state immedi-
ately preceding it, and in turn completely determines what the next state
will be. So the details of a monad’s future states exist within it virtually
even before the monad reaches those states, such that the details could
in principle be ‘read off’ of the monad in the same way that a physicist
could in principle deduce future states of a closed system by analysing the
present state of its parts and the laws to which they are subject. For the
purposes of the argument in M22 and M23, it is important to remember
that each state of a monad consists of perceptions. This is true even when
the monad is in a stupor; as we know from M21, monads continue to have
perceptions even when stupefied. This is significant, because it means
that when a monad comes around from a stupor it is not starting to have
perceptions again, as its sequence of perceptions was never interrupted by
the stupor in the first place, but that it starts being conscious of its percep-
tions again. And it follows that the first conscious perception it experi-
ences upon waking up must have been caused by a preceding perception
(because there is nothing else inside the monad that could have caused
it, and nothing outside the monad could have done so either); and since
that latter perception wasn’t conscious (because the monad was then in a
stupor), it must have been unconscious. Therefore there are such things
as unconscious perceptions.
The concluding part of M23 can be read as Leibniz’s response to a
hypothetical objection. An opponent may resist Leibniz’s argument for
unconscious perceptions by telling a different story of what happens when
someone comes around from a stupor. The story would go something like
this: a person, consisting of a body and a soul, does not have any percep-
tions at all when in a stupor, and what happens when awaking is that
particular motions in the person’s body or brain cause the person’s soul
to start having perceptions again. If this account is accepted, then there
would be no need to accept Leibniz’s argument for unconscious percep-
tions. Leibniz’s response is to show that this account cannot be accepted
because it violates the principle of causal likeness (an expression Leibniz
himself does not use), which holds that ‘like causes like’, or ‘like can only
be caused by like’. This principle was popular among the Scholastics, and
was often assumed to be true by early modern philosophers as well.101
According to this principle, motion causes motion, and perception causes
101
See Richard Watson, The Breakdown of Cartesian Metaphysics (New Jersey: Humanities
Press International, 1987), pp. 50–1.
77
perception, but there can be no causality across different categories; so for
example, motion cannot cause perception, and perception cannot cause
motion. Consequently, a present perception (such as that of someone who
has just woken up from a stupor) must have been caused by a previous
perception, and could not have been caused by motion in the body or brain,
as the opponent’s account supposes.
24. From this it is clear that if we had nothing in our perceptions which was
distinct and which stood out, so to speak, and which was of a sharper
flavour, we would always be in a stupor. And this is the state of bare
monads.
Here Leibniz revisits claims already made, namely that if we had no dis-
tinct perceptions then we would be stupefied (M21), and that this is the
state of bare monads, which have no distinct perceptions (M20). Leibniz
has now effectively defined a state of unconsciousness as one in which a
monad has only little perceptions, that is, no distinct ones.
25. We see also that nature has given heightened perceptions to animals
from the care she has taken to furnish them with organs which gather
together a number of light rays or air waves in order to make them
have a greater effect through their union. There is something similar
in smell, taste, and touch, and perhaps in many other senses which
are unknown to us. I will shortly explain how what occurs in the soul
represents what occurs in the organs.
Having devoted much of M19–24 to outlining bare monads, Leibniz now

turns his attention to animals (a term which covers beasts and humans), and
begins to elucidate the capacities of their souls, with the aim of showing that
they must be more than bare monads. He has already stated in M19 that the
perceptions of animal souls are ‘more distinct’ than those of bare monads,
and now he finds a posteriori support for the claim in the fact that animals
are endowed with sense organs. On the basis that it is the job of these
organs to collect detailed sensory information, it is reasonable to suppose
that animals experience heightened perceptions, that is, what Leibniz
elsewhere in the Monadology refers to as ‘distinct perceptions’. Note that
these distinct perceptions are not equivalent to ‘sensations’ for Leibniz, as
sensation involves something more. As he explains in another work, ‘sensa-
tion is perception that involves something distinct and is joined with atten-
78
tion and memory’.102 Leibniz has already affirmed that animal souls have
distinct perceptions, and in M26 he will claim that they have memory too.
Consequently we can say that animal souls have sensation.
In M25 Leibniz supposes that if there are other kinds of sense organ
then they will function in much the same way as do our five senses, by col-
lecting relevant data so as to produce a heightened perception. Leibniz’s
willingness to consider the possibility that there may be other senses
beyond the five of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch, seems quite fore-
sighted now. After all, we know that birds can perceive ultraviolet light,
that bats navigate via echolocation, and that catfish and sharks have an
‘electrical sense’ often referred to as electroreception, which is the ability
to perceive or detect electricity. Leibniz did not know any of this, however;
he just speculatively allows for its possibility. This would not have struck
his contemporaries as especially odd. Indeed, speculation that there may be
more than five senses was one often raised in the context of scepticism, to
underscore the point that our knowledge of the world may be incomplete.
The classic discussion is to be found in Michel de Montaigne’s An Apology
for Raymond Sebond (1568):
Now, on the subject of the senses, my first point is that I doubt that Man
is provided with all the natural senses. I note that several creatures live full,
complete lives without sight; others, without hearing. Who can tell whether
we, also, lack one, two, three or more senses? If we do lack any, our reason
cannot even discover that we do so. Our senses are privileged to be the ultimate
frontiers of our perception: beyond them there is nothing which could serve
to reveal the existence of the senses we lack . . . We may all lack some sense or
other; because of that defect, most of the features of objects may be concealed
from us. How can we know that the difficulties we have in understanding many
of the works of Nature do not derive from this, or that several of the actions of
animals which exceed our powers of understanding are produced by a sense-
faculty which we do not possess?103
Montaigne in turn was probably influenced by Sextus Empiricus (c.

160–210 ce), a sceptical philosopher from ancient Greece, who similarly
argued that there may be extra senses that we lack.104 Although Leibniz
102
SLT, p. 65.
103
Michel de Montaigne, An Apology for Raymond Sebond, trans. and ed. M. A. Screech
(London: Penguin, 1987), pp. 171–2.
104
Sextus wrote: ‘That the apple may have more qualities than those apparent to us we
deduce as follows. Let us conceive of someone who from birth has touch, smell and
taste, but who hears and sees nothing. He will suppose that there is absolutely nothing
visible or audible, and that there exist only those three kinds of quality which he is able
to grasp. So it is possible that we too, having only the five senses, grasp from among the
79
is likewise willing to entertain the possibility of extra senses, his doing so
should not be taken as evidence of a sceptical agenda. He is merely wishing
to claim that all senses serve to produce heightened perceptions in the
animal which has them, and this will hold good even if there turn out to be
more senses than the five that are commonly accepted.
M25 ends with a promissory note about the connection between soul
and body, which will be redeemed in M61–2.
26. Memory provides souls with a kind of ability to make connections, which
imitates reason but must be distinguished from it. We see that when
animals have a perception of something which strikes them, and they
have had a similar perception previously, they come to expect – by the
representation of their memory – what was connected to this previous
perception, and are led to feelings similar to those they had before. For
example, when dogs are shown a stick, they remember the pain it has
caused them in the past, and yelp and run away.
Leibniz continues his elucidation of the capacities of animal souls, this

time via a posteriori observation of animal behaviour. Such observation
suggests that animals are capable of making empirical inferences, that is,
they are able to form connections between different perceptions based on
their own experiences. This is sometimes referred to as the principle of
association, though Leibniz does not use that description. The example
of dogs is a good illustration of the principle, as it involves the dogs
associating a past experience (the pain of being beaten with a stick) with a
present one (being shown a stick).105 The principle of association is thus
qualities of the apple only those we are capable of grasping, although other qualities can
exist, impressing other sense-organs in which we have no share, so that we do not grasp
the objects perceptible by them’. Sextus Empiricus, Outlines of Scepticism, trans. and
ed. Julia Annas and Jonathan Barnes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000),
pp. 26–7.
105
The example of a dog shying away from a stick with which it has previously been beaten
was a stock one in early modern philosophy. It appeared often in the context of the
so-called beast-machine debate, that is, the debate about whether animals have souls,
as the example was thought by some to show that dogs have higher-order mental func-
tions, and therefore souls, while others took it to be evidence of mechanistic behaviour.
See for example Jacques Rohault, Entretiens sur la philosophie (Paris, 1671), p. 156;
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, III, p. 2599/Historical and Critical Dictionary:
Selections, p. 215; Christian Wolff, Psychologia rationalis, new edn (Verona, 1737),
p. 380. Leibniz himself employed it in many writings, each time as an illustration of the
claim that beasts act as empiricists. See for example NE, p. 143; SLT, p. 66; and PNG5.
The constant recycling of the same example makes it quite possible that neither Leibniz,
80
a kind of inductive reasoning. Induction involves drawing conclusions
about unknown cases from known cases, for example, about future cases
from past ones. Leibniz does not think that it constitutes true reasoning,
as it merely amounts to an expectation that what has happened before will
happen again.106 However, because induction involves making inferences
(from past to future) Leibniz concedes that it does in some way resemble
reason,107 and on that basis he is even prepared to call it ‘the shadow of
reason’.108
Moreover, the fact that animals are able to act on the basis of past
experiences indicates that they are able to recall this experience in some
way, and hence that they are endowed with memory. Leibniz suggested
that animal souls have memory in M19; now he has evidence for the claim.
27. And a vivid imagination, which strikes and stirs them, arises either from
the magnitude or from the number of the preceding perceptions.
For often a vivid impression has all at once the same effect as a long-
formed habit, or as the repetition of many moderate perceptions.
In order to account for the ability of animals to act on past experiences

(affirmed in M26), Leibniz now appeals to the imagination, which repro-
duces (in a much fainter form) previously experienced perceptions.
Leibniz claims (presumably on the basis of experience or observation,
though he doesn’t say) that the stronger or more frequent the original
perceptions, the more firmly the associations between them will be made
in the animal’s imagination.
28. Men act like beasts insofar as the sequences of their perceptions arise
only through the principle of memory, like empirical physicians who
have just practice without theory. And we are nothing but empiricists
in three-quarters of our actions. For example, when we expect that
there will be daylight tomorrow, we act as empiricists, because until
now it has always happened that way. It is only the astronomer who
draws this conclusion rationally.
nor most (if not all) of those who used it, had actually seen a dog cowering from a stick
with which it had formerly been beaten.
106
See NE, p. 50; LTS, p. 363; SLT, p. 66.
107
For example, H, p. 109.
108
NE, p. 475.
81
Leibniz has already established that acting in accordance with memory
is characteristic of beasts (M26); here he draws the natural corollary that
when humans act that way, they act as beasts do, that is, as empiricists.
His subsequent claim that men are empiricists three-quarters of the time
is presumably an informed guess based on observations and personal expe-
riences.109 It is hard to imagine that Leibniz intended the example at the
end of the section to support his contention that humans act as empiricists
three-quarters of the time, because it quite clearly doesn’t support that
contention at all. Nevertheless it is a good example of a matter in which
the vast majority of humans act as empiricists, because most of us merely
expect the sun to rise tomorrow on the basis of past experience rather than
know (on the basis of astronomical theory) why it will. It is in this that
Leibniz thinks the astronomer differs from the common man: while the
former uses theoretical principles to establish why the sun rises every day,
the latter just expects it to happen on the basis that it has happened every
day before. The astronomer can thus explain the movement of the sun by
its causes, that is, a priori.
Leibniz’s first example of human empiricists, namely ‘empirical physi-
cians’, is a reference to the Alexandrian (Empiric) School of Medicine in
ancient Greece, dating from the third century bce. The School famously
eschewed theory in favour of experience, for example because such an
approach was held to be more in keeping with the origins of medicine,
which had begun by observing which actions had which effects on the ill.
The School also believed that what mattered was what worked (not why it
worked), and one only needed experience to discover that.
29. But it is the knowledge of necessary and eternal truths which distin-
guishes us from simple animals, and gives us reason and the sciences, by
raising us to knowledge of ourselves and God. And this is what is called
in us the rational soul or mind.
Leibniz’s suggestion that humans are distinguished from animals by the

possession of reason is a conventional one, going back at least as far as
Aristotle. Its long history and broad popularity meant that Leibniz would
not have felt any need to justify it.
The faculty of reason was often called (by Leibniz and others) the
‘internal light’, or the ‘natural light’, or the ‘natural light of reason’.
109
The claim is repeated in PNG5, but again without any supporting evidence. In other
writings, Leibniz simply states that empirical inferences are common to humans and
beasts; for example, SLT, p. 66.
82
Leibniz defined reason as ‘the linking together of truths, but especially . . .
of those whereto the human mind can attain naturally without being aided
by the light of faith’.110 There are two distinct abilities referred to here.
The first is what we would now call ‘discursive reason’: this is the ability
to work logically, see connections, make inferences, arrive at conclusions,
and so on. The second alludes to the idea that there are a set of truths
that fall under the domain of the faculty of reason. In other words, a set
of truths that this faculty can access and pronounce upon, but no other
faculty can. These are the necessary truths (sometimes called the eternal
truths or universal truths). Leibniz’s thinking on the latter is as follows:111
there are certain truths we know to be necessary, such as the truths of
arithmetic and geometry. In other words, we know that (to give two exam-
ples) it is necessary that 2 + 2 = 4, and that the sum of a triangle’s internal
angles is 180 degrees. How do we know these to be necessary? It cannot
be through sense experience, as the senses can only inform us of what is
true at a particular place or particular time. Hence the senses furnish us
only with a number of examples of two things being added to two things
and totalling four things. But nothing in these examples tells us that ‘2 +
2 = 4’ is a necessary truth, one that is true in all times and at all places and
could not possibly be otherwise. Yet according to Leibniz we do know
that this is necessary, and we know it via the faculty of reason. Somehow
reason ‘sees’ beyond the world of sense; it reaches into the realm of neces-
sary truths, as it were (the visual metaphor is apt: reason is after all the
natural light, which literally illuminates necessary truths, makes them
visible to us). So reason delivers up necessary truths which otherwise we
wouldn’t be able to know. The idea that reason is a faculty that gives us
direct access to truths that we would not otherwise be able to know goes
back to Plato, who thought that reason enables us to access the Intelligible
World of Forms.
30. It is also through the knowledge of necessary truths and their abstrac-
tions that we are raised to reflexive acts, which make us think of what
is called the self, and consider that this or that is within us. And it is
thus that in thinking of ourselves, we think of being, of substance, of
the simple and the compound, of the immaterial and of God himself,
by conceiving that what is limited in us is boundless in him. And these
reflexive acts provide the main objects of our reasonings.
110
H, p. 73.
111
See for example LTS, pp. 199–200.
83
Here Leibniz claims that our knowledge of necessary truths, and the
abstractions they involve, leads us to acts of self-reflection, acts which in
turn furnish us with ideas that we then use in our reasonings. To get a
better understanding of his thinking, first recall what was said about our
knowledge of necessary truths in the remarks on M29, namely that we
know certain necessary truths, such as those of mathematics, but we do not
know them through experience, which can only inform us of what is true at
particular times and places, but rather through reason. Or as Leibniz puts
it in a text from 1702:
For since the senses and inductions could never teach us truths that are
entirely universal, nor what is absolutely necessary, but only what is, and
what is found in particular examples, and since we nevertheless do know
some n ecessary and universal truths of the sciences, a matter in which we are
privileged over the beasts, it follows that we have derived these truths in part
from what is inside us.112
It would seem to follow that if we were to reflect on these necessary truths,

and then on how we know them to be necessary, we would be led back
to ourselves, that is, to the faculty of reason itself and the self to which
it belongs. In this way, reflection on necessary truths naturally leads to
self-reflection, and Leibniz insists that this in turn furnishes us with new
ideas about which we can reason: ‘intellectual ideas, or ideas of reflection,
are drawn from our mind. I would like to know how we could have the
idea of being if we did not, as beings ourselves, find being within us.’113 In
claiming that self-reflection provides us with such ideas, described in M30
as the main objects of our reasonings, Leibniz is alluding to his doctrine of
innate ideas, which holds that there are ideas that are, as it were, integral
parts of our very selves, and can be extracted by reflection on our selves,
our faculties, and our actions. This runs counter to the empiricist prin-
ciple held by many Scholastics that ‘there is nothing in the understand-
ing which was not previously in the senses’, in other words, that all the
materials for our thoughts and reasonings come from the senses. Leibniz
revised this principle to read ‘there is nothing in the understanding which
was not in the senses except the understanding itself’.114 In other words,
the understanding has more to work with than just the data provided
by the senses – it can also think of itself, its actions, and the subject to
which it belongs. Leibniz held that by reflection upon these we could
derive key metaphysical notions, such as substance, being, one, same,
112
LTS, p. 244.
113
See NE, pp. 85–6.
114
For example, LTS, p. 284; NE, p. 111.
84
cause, perception, reasoning, duration, change, action, pleasure and so
on. Hence:
This thought of myself, who is aware of sensible objects and of my own action
which results from it, adds something to the objects of the senses. To think
of some color and to consider that one thinks about it are two very different
thoughts, as much as color itself differs from the self who thinks about it. And as
I conceive that other beings are also entitled to say ‘I,’ or that it could be said on
their behalf, I thereby conceive what is called substance in general, and it is also
the consideration of myself that provides me with other metaphysical notions,
such as cause, effect, action, similarity, etc., and even those of logic and ethics.
So it can be said that there is nothing in the understanding that did not come
from the senses except the understanding itself, or the one who understands.115
It is contrary to experience that we are not substances, although we may actu-
ally have no acquaintance with substance, except from an innermost experi-
ences of ourselves, although we perceive the ‘I’, and by that example we may
grant the name of substance to God himself and to other monads.116
In addition to sense experience or sense perception, then, we are also

capable of a kind of inner experience or internal perception, that is, self-
reflection. And it is through these acts of self-reflection, that is, reflection
on what one is, does, and is capable of, that we can derive key metaphysi-
cal notions which then serve as material for our reasonings, for example
our reasonings about substances and about God.117 Although Leibniz
calls these notions innate, this does not mean that we are born knowing
them. Rather, because their source is one’s own self, which exists from
the moment of birth onwards (and indeed, from the moment of creation
onwards), the notions are always in us virtually, that is, potentially, waiting
to be discovered, once we start looking inwards.
Given the importance of ‘substance’ in the Monadology, it is notewor-
thy that Leibniz should suppose that the source of our notion of it, and of
our ability to know what things are picked out by it, lies in self-reflection.
This spares him from having to defend the usefulness of the notion, and
from having to justify his identification of ourselves, God, and other
monads as substances.
31. Our reasonings are based on two great principles: first, the principle of
contradiction, in virtue of which we judge false that which includes a
115
LTS, p. 240.
116
TI, p. 558.
117
As Leibniz says in the New Essays, ‘quite often “a consideration of the nature of things”
is nothing but the knowledge of the nature of our mind’. NE, p. 84.
85
contradiction, and true that which is opposed or contradictory to the
false;
Having established that reason separates minds from other (animal)

souls, Leibniz now proceeds to show what it involves. The principle of
contradiction outlined here is intended to be an axiom, as indeed is the
principle of sufficient reason outlined in M32. Leibniz often identified the
principles of contradiction and sufficient reason as the cornerstones of our
thinking.
What Leibniz here terms the principle of contradiction is in fact two
principles rather than just one. The first principle is: a thing cannot be and
not be at the same time; in other words, ‘A is not-A’ is false. So if one were
to say ‘This square is not square’ then that would be false, and it would be
false because the claim contains a clear contradiction. The second princi-
ple mentioned by Leibniz is: that which is not false is true. This is what
we would now call the law of excluded middle. Leibniz often ran the two
principles together under the heading of the ‘principle of contradiction’.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the New Essays:
Stated generally, the principle of contradiction is: a proposition is either true or
false. This contains two assertions: first, that truth and falsity are incompatible
in a single proposition, i.e. that a proposition cannot be both true and false at once;
and second, that the contradictories or negations of the true and the false are
not compatible, i.e. that there is nothing intermediate between the true and the
false, or better that it cannot happen that a proposition is neither true nor false.118
Leibniz sometimes claimed that the principle of contradiction amounted

to the principle of identity, which states that ‘A is A’. Hence to one cor-
respondent he wrote that ‘The great foundation of mathematics is the prin-
ciple of contradiction or identity, that is, that a proposition cannot be true and
false at the same time and that therefore A is A and cannot be non-A.’119
Although Leibniz did not attempt to formally prove the validity of the
principle of contradiction, he did sometimes offer a qualified defence of
it, by showing the undesirable consequences that would follow from its
denial. He insisted that if one were to deny the principle of contradiction,
and thus allow that something can be granted and denied at the same time,
then ‘every inquiry into truth would cease immediately from the start’.120
Hence if we are to reason at all, then
118
NE, p. 362.
119
PPL, p. 677.
120
SLT, p. 41.
86
we have to suppose some truths, or give up all hope of making demonstrations,
for proofs could not go on to infinity. We should not ask for anything that is
impossible, otherwise we would show that we were not serious in searching for
the truth. So I will always boldly suppose that two contradictories could not
be true, and that what implies contradiction could not be the case . . . or else it
is to misuse words. Nothing clearer could be provided to prove these things.
You yourself suppose them in writing and in reasoning, otherwise you could
constantly defend the exact opposite of what you say.121
For Leibniz, the principle of contradiction is what determined necessary
truths: ‘All truths of metaphysics, or all truths that are absolutely neces-
sary, such as those of logic, arithmetic, geometry, and the like, rest on the
former principle [sc. that of contradiction], for someone who denies them
can always be shown that the contrary implies a contradiction.’122 In other
words, a truth is necessary when its negation is contradictory, for example,
‘a bachelor is an unmarried man’ is necessary because its negation (‘a bach-
elor is not an unmarried man’) is contradictory (a bachelor is an unmarried
man, so the negation amounts to saying that an unmarried man is not an
unmarried man).
32. and second, the principle of sufficient reason, in virtue of which we con-
sider that there can be found no fact that is true or existent, or any
true assertion, unless there is a sufficient reason why it is thus and not
otherwise, even though most often these reasons cannot be known to
us.
The principle of sufficient reason is the second of the two great principles
on which reasonings are based. Over the course of his career Leibniz
offered various formulations of this principle:
1. ‘nothing exists without reason, or rather that there is always a reason
why’.123
2. ‘nothing happens without a reason why it should be so rather than
otherwise’.124
3. ‘a reason can be given for every truth’.125
121
A II 2, p. 89: http://www.leibniz-translations.com/foucher1686.htm
122
PE, p. 19.
123
LTS, p. 355.
124
PPL, p. 677.
125
G VII, p. 199.
87
On the surface these do not look to be identical, since the first formulation
applies to things, the second to events (because it refers to happenings), and
the third to truths. Leibniz evidently wanted to apply the principle across
the board, that is, to things, events, and truths. When applied to events, the
principle is usually understood causally, that is, that every event must have
a cause.126 (This is sometimes known as the principle of causation, though
Leibniz does not use that expression.)
The principle of sufficient reason was first explicitly expressed in the
work of Leibniz’s contemporary, Benedict de Spinoza, who asserted in his
Ethics: ‘For every thing a cause or reason must be assigned either for its
existence or for its nonexistence.’127 However Spinoza did not argue for this
claim, nor did he refer to it as the principle of sufficient reason. The grand
name was coined by Leibniz, who was fond of presenting certain of his ideas
as principles.128 As with the principle of contradiction, Leibniz considered
the principle of sufficient reason to be an axiom of his philosophy. He did
not think the principle could plausibly be denied, not least because we all
assume the truth of it everyday, whenever we ask why and expect there to
be an answer. Leibniz sometimes made empirical appeals in favour of the
principle, for example, by claiming that it succeeds in all known cases, and/
or that no exceptions to it have ever been found.129 Such appeals clearly fall
short of justification, but were unlikely to be intended as such anyway. They
do, however, help to increase the intuitive appeal of the principle.
Many philosophers have assumed or even asserted that there must be
reasons for certain things or events, but the principle of sufficient reason
goes further than this, as it says that there must be reasons for all of them.
So stated, many philosophers could not accept it, especially those who
endorse a version of the doctrine of free will which holds that for the
will to be free it must be able to initiate action or suspend action without
any reason or cause for its doing so.130 Such philosophers would exempt
the will (at least) from the principle of sufficient reason, but Leibniz did
not; he insisted that the principle had no exceptions. Consequently, he
believed that everything in the universe is potentially explicable, that is,
amenable to reason. However as Leibniz notes in M32, in many cases
126
See for example SLT, p. 49.
127
Spinoza, Ethics 1p11d2. From Spinoza, Complete Works, p. 222.
128
For example, Leibniz offers the principle of the best, the principle of fittingness, the
principle of the identity of indiscernibles, and the principle of uniformity, among
others.
129
For example, PPL, p. 717.
130
Leibniz calls this a ‘freedom of indifference’, but today it is better known as libertari-
anism. Leibniz advances many reasons against it, chief among them that it involves a
violation of the principle of sufficient reason. See for example SLT, pp. 93ff.
88
we do not know what that reason is; all we know is that there must be
one. The principle does not guarantee in any given case that we can (or
even will) ascertain the reason for this or that thing or event. In fact, in
many cases we simply would not be able to do so. This is because of what
Leibniz understands a sufficient reason to be: it is a full account, a com-
plete explanation, of a thing, event, or state of affairs. To understand what
this involves, consider a mundane example, such as Pete walking across
his kitchen to the fridge to get a drink. What is the reason for this action?
A simple answer might be: because Pete was thirsty. We might think this
answer to be adequate for everyday purposes, but it falls a long way short
of a full account of Pete’s action. To obtain that, we would need to know
many other things, such as why Pete is thirsty at that particular moment,
which in turn would require us to know what Pete had drunk previously,
as well as full details of human physiology in general and Pete’s physiology
in particular; we would also need to know how Pete had come to believe
that there was a drink in the fridge, and the source of his knowledge that
drinking it would quench his thirst, and so on. In short, to put together
a full account of Pete’s action we would have to gather a large amount of
information about Pete and his life, which in turn could only be explained
by broadening the enquiry still further, to encompass Pete’s parents, and
their parents, and so on, the development of human beings, the origins of
life, and even the origin of the universe. A full account, then, potentially
involves the whole world and its entire history, and clearly requires more
detail than we could ever obtain, even for mundane cases such as Pete
getting a drink from a fridge (see M36). Nevertheless, Leibniz’s position
is that we would be right to presume that there is a complete explanation,
or sufficient reason, of Pete’s action, even if it is beyond our abilities to
discern it in all its detail.
33. There are two kinds of truths: truths of reasoning and truths of fact.
Truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposite is impossible, and
truths of fact are contingent and their opposite is possible. When a
truth is necessary, the reason for it can be found by analysis, by resolv-
ing it into simpler ideas and truths until we come to the primary ones.
§189. §280–2.
Leibniz now further elucidates the two principles of reasoning introduced

in M31–2. The division of truths into (necessary) truths of reasoning and
(contingent) truths of fact here looks to be axiomatic.
89
A necessary truth is one whose opposite is impossible. Hence ‘green
grass is green’ would qualify as a necessary truth because its opposite
(‘green grass is not green’) is impossible. Moreover, a necessary truth can
be proved by analysing it further and further, into simpler truths and the
ideas of which they are composed. Although not explicit here, Leibniz
often says that necessary truths ultimately resolve to identities, that is,
tautologies, such as ‘the green grass is green’ where the concept of the
predicate being asserted of a subject (green) is already contained within the
concept of the subject (the green grass). The ‘resolving’ of a truth tends
to involve substituting some or all of its terms for their definitions. So the
resolution of the truth ‘a bachelor is unmarried’ would involve substituting
the definition ‘an unmarried man’ for ‘bachelor’, to give ‘an unmarried
man is unmarried’, which is an identity.
A truth of fact, on the other hand, is one whose opposite is possible.
Hence ‘the grass is wet’ would qualify as a truth of fact because its oppo-
site (‘the grass is not wet’) is possible, in that there is no contradiction in
the notion of the grass not being wet. Truths of fact are sometimes called
particular truths, or contingent truths.131 They concern that which exists
contingently, that is, those things which are not necessary, and so whose
non-existence is/was possible. For this reason, Leibniz sometimes says
that truths of fact depend upon the will of God;132 after all, it is God who
decides which contingent things will exist (see M47–48).
For us (and other finite creatures), truths of fact are established by
experience. This includes sense experience, but is not limited to it, since
Leibniz also allows that we can come to know certain truths of fact by inner
experience, for example:
As for primary truths of fact, these are inner experiences which are immediate
with the immediacy of feeling. This is where the first truth of the Cartesians and
St Augustine belongs: I think, therefore I am. That is, I am a thing which thinks.
But . . . not only is it immediately evident to me that I think, but it is just as
evident that I think various thoughts: at one time I think about A and at another
about B and so on.133
34. This is how the speculative theorems and practical canons of

mathematicians are reduced by analysis to definitions, axioms, and
postulates.
131
See LTS, p. 308.
132
See SLT, p. 43.
133
NE, p. 367.
90
Leibniz now suggests that the method of analysing necessary truths
described at the end of M33 is akin to the mathematical method of resolv-
ing theorems into definitions, axioms, and postulates. In both cases, the
aim is to reduce a proposition down to its primitive parts by means of
reductive analysis.
35. And finally there are simple ideas of which no definition can be given.
There are also axioms and postulates, or in a word primary principles,
which cannot be proved and also have no need of proof. And these
are identical propositions, whose opposite contains an explicit contra-
diction.
The claim that there are simple ideas which cannot be defined, and
primary principles which cannot be proved, is here advanced as an
axiom. Leibniz here supposes that the substitution of terms in conceptual
analysis (that is, replacing one term by its definition) is not a process that
can go on indefinitely, in which case it must reach ‘simple ideas’, that is,
primary concepts that admit of no further analysis. Concrete examples
are hard to come by – Leibniz is often happier making the argument
that analysis must eventually reach simple ideas than he is actually iden-
tifying what these might be. In some early writings he claims that the
simple ideas are the attributes of God (that is, goodness, power, knowl-
edge, and so on), as everything else can be resolved into (some combina-
tion of) them.134
As for primary principles, Leibniz identifies them as identical proposi-
tions, that is, tautologies. Primary principles are therefore of the form ‘A
is A’, or some variation thereof, such as ‘A is not not-A, . . . each thing is
what it is, each thing is like itself or is equal to itself, nothing is greater or less
than itself’.135
35. But a sufficient reason must also be found in contingent truths, or truths
of fact, that is, in the series of things spread throughout the universe
of created things, where resolution into particular reasons could go on
into endless detail because of the immense variety of things in nature
and the division of bodies to infinity. There is an infinity of shapes and
motions, both present and past, which enter into the efficient cause of
my present writing, and there is an infinity of minute inclinations and
134
DSR, p. 79, p. 81; LPW, p. 77.
135
SLT, p. 48.
91
dispositions of my soul, both present and past, which enter into its final
cause.
Theodicy §36. §37. §44. §45. §49.
§52. §121. §122.
§337. §340. §344.
As we have just seen, the sufficient reason for necessary truths is that they
are all ultimately resolvable into identities by a process of reductive analy-
sis. Leibniz now intimates that the sufficient reason for contingent truths
(that is, truths of fact) is that they too are all ultimately resolvable into
identities by a process of reductive analysis, the difference being that nec-
essary truths are resolvable in a finite number of steps, while the resolution
of contingent truths requires an infinite number of steps. In both cases, the
reason the truth is true is that the concept of the predicate is contained in
the concept of the subject. With necessary truths, the number of steps of
analysis required to show this is finite (consider the way that ‘a bachelor is
unmarried’ can be resolved into ‘an unmarried man is unmarried’ in just
one step), whereas with contingent truths it is infinite. Leibniz illustrates
the latter using the truth that he wrote M36, this being a contingent truth
since its opposite, that he did not write M36, is possible. He claims that
the sufficient reason of this truth, that is, the full account of why he wrote
M36, will involve the infinite complexity of the universe, both at the time
of his writing and at all moments prior to that. Accordingly, if we had
access to Leibniz’s complete concept, and were capable of carrying out
infinite steps of analysis, we would be able to show that the concept of the
predicate ‘wrote M36’ is contained in the concept of the subject ‘Leibniz’,
and hence determine the sufficient reason for his writing M36. In practice,
however, we cannot do this, as we do not have access to Leibniz’s complete
concept, nor are we capable of feats of infinite analysis. Consequently,
although we happen to know through experience that it was Leibniz who
wrote M36 and not anybody else, from the information available to us we
cannot determine the sufficient reason for this truth, though we know from
M32 that there must be such a reason.
It might look as though there is a tension between Leibniz’s claim here,
that there is an infinity of external factors that enter into the act of his
writing, and his claim in M7, that there is no causality between substances.
The reason is that Leibniz is treating of different levels or aspects of reality,
which he only really hints at in M36. First, there is the realm of three-
dimensional physical objects in space, and second there is the metaphysical
realm of monads. With regard to objects in space, Leibniz takes there to be
infinite complexity here, because all physical objects relate to – and have
an effect on – all other physical objects. Consequently, the sufficient reason
92
for any particular physical event (like a hand moving a quill over a page)
will involve every other physical thing and event in the entire universe.
Leibniz endorses the doctrine of the plenum, which holds that space is
full (see M61). In such a case, if one thing changes place then the effect of
that change will ripple through to affect everything else, though the effect
diminishes with distance, and the effect of faraway things is for practical
purposes negligible (as we shall see, Leibniz does not think that things
literally push each other, in the sense of exchanging force, but he does
allow that it is acceptable to talk that way; see M49–52, and M61). The
second aspect of reality is the metaphysical realm of monads; this is where
his soul is to be found, along with all other monads. In this realm there is
no influence between monads and so no causality between one thing and
another. Whatever happens to any given monad is determined entirely by
that monad’s own internal principle of activity. In spite of being causally
isolated, Leibniz says that there is an infinity of factors that enter into
his (soul’s) decision to write. He won’t be drawn on what these are as he
holds that the vast majority lie below the threshold of consciousness, and
so cannot be identified. Leibniz has not explicitly drawn this distinction
between different realms, but arguably he should have done as it makes
some of his claims difficult to reconcile otherwise.
Leibniz ends M36 by anticipating an idea he will develop in greater
detail later on (in M79), namely that any event can be given an explanation
in terms of efficient causes and in terms of final causes. Hence his writing
M36 can be explained in terms of physical (efficient) causes, which operate
on his body and led his hand to write, and in terms of psychical (final)
causes, which operate on his soul and led it to formulate and strive for its
own ends.
37. And as all this intricate detail includes nothing except other contingents
which are earlier or even more detailed, each of which in turn needs a
similar analysis in order to explain it, we are no further forward, and so
it must be that the sufficient or ultimate reason lies outside the succes-
sion or series of this detail of contingencies, however infinite it may be.
Leibniz now argues that the sufficient reason for a contingent thing must
be found outside the universe, understood as the series of contingent
things. The crucial part of the argument is the claim that the sufficient
reason for a contingent thing cannot be found in other contingent things.
To understand why this should be so, consider our example of Pete
walking to the fridge to get a drink. A genuinely sufficient reason of this
will be nothing less than an account of his action that is complete, with
93
nothing left unexplained. Now suppose that Pete’s action is part of a
universe consisting entirely of contingent things, and that nothing else
exists besides the universe. Suppose also that the universe has always
existed, that is, that it had no beginning. In such a case, it will not be
possible to give a sufficient reason for Pete’s trip to the fridge, or any
other contingent thing, because the trail of explanations stretches back
without end, which rules out a sufficient (that is, a complete) explanation.
Moreover, it would not help to suppose that the universe had existed
for a finite time, that is, that it began to exist at a definite point in the
past. In such a scenario, it will also not be possible to give a sufficient
reason for Pete’s trip to the fridge, or anything else, because the trail
of explanations will go cold as soon as we reach the very first moment
of the universe, which would be inexplicable (a ‘brute fact’, in modern
parlance). Consequently, there can be no sufficient reason for anything if
all that exists are contingent things. The upshot of Leibniz’s argument is
that a genuinely sufficient reason must ultimately involve something non-
contingent, in other words, something necessary, because only this can
provide the completeness (the sufficiency) of the explanation. This is the
inference he will draw in M38.
38. And thus it is that the ultimate reason of things must lie in a necessary
substance, in which the intricate detail of changes exist only eminently,
in the source as it were, and this is what we call God.
Theodicy §7.
The claim here follows from M37, for if the sufficient (or final) reason for
things cannot be found in the contingent, then it must be found in what
is necessary. Leibniz’s immediate identification of God as this necessary
being is likely to come across as being rather hasty nowadays; after all, he
has not considered whether there might be any other candidates. Also,
at this stage he has shown only that there must be a necessary being: it is
not yet clear whether this being has the attributes traditionally ascribed to
God, such as omnipotence, omniscience, and perfect goodness. Leibniz
will proceed to argue in M40–1 that the necessary being does have these
attributes, and is therefore God.
The one thing we are told about the necessary being in M38 is that it
contains eminently the detail of changes (of contingent things). The adverb
‘eminently’ is a Scholastic term connected with causation, and means ‘in
the cause in a higher or nobler form’.136 For the Scholastics, an effect had to
136
See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, Q.4, Art. 2, ad.
94
be contained in the cause in some way, and there were three ways in which
it could be: formally, virtually, or eminently. To say that an effect is con-
tained formally in a cause is to say that the same nature or form is present
in both cause and effect, for example, a newborn plant or animal is the same
nature as its parents; an effect is contained virtually in a cause if this is not
the case, for example, an architect who causes the building of a house does
not share the same nature as the house; and an effect is contained eminently
in a cause when the cause is more perfect than the effect. Therefore to say
that the intricate detail of contingent changes exists eminently in God, as
Leibniz does in M38, is to say that God is a different, more perfect kind of
thing than these contingent changes.
Taken together, M37 and M38 constitute a version of the cosmological
proof for the existence of God.137 Leibniz presented substantially the same
proof in a number of other writings; the classic, or definitive statement of
it is to be found in a paper entitled ‘On the ultimate origination of things’
(1698):
Let us imagine that the book of the elements of geometry has always existed,
one always copied from another; it is evident that, even if a reason can be
given for the present book from a past one, from which it was copied, never-
theless we shall never come upon a full reason no matter how many past books
we assume, since we would always be right to wonder why such books have
existed from all time, why books existed at all, and why they were written in
this way. What is true of books is also true of the different states of the world;
for a subsequent state is in a way copied from a preceding one (although
according to certain laws of change). And so, however far back you go to
earlier states, you will never find in those states a full reason why there should
be any world rather than none, and why it should be such as it is. Therefore,
even if you should imagine the world eternal, because you still suppose only
a succession of states, and because you will not find a sufficient reason in any
of them, and indeed no matter how many states you assume you will not make
the least progress towards giving a reason, it is evident that the reason must
be sought elsewhere . . . From this it is evident that not even by supposing
the eternity of the world can we escape the ultimate, extramundane reason of
things, i.e. God.138
137
It is worth noting that many of the arguments for God’s existence are traditionally
referred to as ‘proofs’. This does not mean that they are logical demonstrations, or akin
to such (with the possible exception of the ontological proof, which does purport to
offer a logical demonstration for the existence of God), but rather that they constitute
evidence for the existence of God. Hence in this context ‘proof’ should be understood
to mean ‘evidence’ or ‘argument’ (which is the original sense of ‘proof’) rather than
‘demonstration’ (which is the more modern sense).
138
SLT, pp. 31–2. See also LTS, pp. 98–9.
95
39. Now since this substance is a sufficient reason for all this intricate
detail, which is also interconnected throughout, there is only one God,
and this God is sufficient.
Leibniz now offers an argument for the uniqueness of God: because God
(the necessary substance identified in M38) is a sufficient reason for all
contingent things, which are themselves all connected, there is only one
God, which is sufficient. In making this argument, Leibniz assumes that
for any given thing, event, or truth (or set thereof), there will be exactly
one sufficient reason, and hence no overdetermination, that is, no multiple
sufficient reasons for one and the same thing, event, or truth. Why Leibniz
would make this assumption is unclear, however, for the principle of suf-
ficient reason, in all of its various formulations, does not state that there has
to be just one sufficient reason for any given thing, event, or truth (or set
thereof). Perhaps an answer can be found in Leibniz’s reference to a single
God as ‘sufficient’: he can be read here as saying that as the universe can
be explained by a single God, there is no need to posit more than one. This
can be seen as the application of a principle of parsimony, such as Occam’s
razor, which is often formulated as ‘entities are not to be multiplied
beyond necessity’. But of course from the fact that there is no need to posit
more than one God it would not follow that there is actually just one. Yet
Leibniz clearly wishes to make the latter claim too.
It is possible to derive the uniqueness of God from the identity of
indiscernibles (encountered in M9). To see how, consider the traditional
definition of God as a being which is omnipotent, omniscient, and per-
fectly good. Now suppose that there are two Gods, A and B; if they are
genuinely Gods then both would satisfy this definition. But the identity
of indiscernibles holds that if everything that is true of A is also true of B
(that is, they are indiscernible), then A and B are one and the same thing
(that is, identical). In order for there to be two they would have to differ in
some respect, but that would mean one of them not being either omnipo-
tent or omniscient or perfectly good, and of course such a being could not
be called ‘God’ at all because it would fail to satisfy the definition of God.
In a writing from 1685 Leibniz put forward a proof of the uniqueness of
God along these very lines: ‘God is unique. For if there are many, they will
differ, and indeed they will differ in their perfections, because nothing else
is understood in God, and so each one of them is lacking some perfection,
contrary to the definition of God.’139
In other writings, Leibniz offers yet another argument for the unique-
ness of God, in connection with his doctrine of pre-established harmony,
139
A VI 4, p. 2315.
96
which holds that there is a harmony between the states of every single
monad in the entire universe, each one accurately representing in itself all
of the others’ changing states (see M49–52 and M56 for more details). In
the New System (1695), Leibniz claims that ‘this perfect agreement of so
many substances, which have no communication with one another at all,
could come only from a common cause’.140 By ‘a common cause’ Leibniz
means a single being (that is, one God) rather than many of them.
40. We may also conclude that since this supreme substance – which is
unique, universal, and necessary – has nothing outside of it which is
independent of it, and is a simple consequence of possible being, it must
be incapable of limits, and contain just as much reality as is possible.
Having proved the existence of the necessary being in M38, Leibniz now
proceeds to tell us more about it. Here he argues that God, the necessary
being in question, contains as much reality as is possible. In the first part of
the argument, Leibniz claims that God can have no limits, which he takes
to follow from the fact that God has nothing outside of him that is inde-
pendent of him. But what does it mean to say that God can have no limits?
Presumably that none of God’s attributes is limited, that is, he has them in
the ultimate or maximum degree (for example, maximal power, maximal
knowledge, maximal goodness, and so on). From that Leibniz concludes
that God contains as much reality as possible.
We tend to think of ‘reality’ as a binary state, inasmuch as something
either has reality (and thus exists) or does not (in which case it does not
exist). But historically, reality has been understood in a different way.
In Scholastic philosophy, ‘reality’ refers to the state of being a thing, or
‘thingliness’. This state can come in degrees, such that one thing can have
more reality (that is, be more of a thing) than another, despite both being
fully existent. Descartes recognised three degrees of reality – the highest is
enjoyed by God alone, as he alone is independent and self-sufficient (since
his existence depends upon nothing else); the middle rank is enjoyed by
substances (which depend upon God for their existence, but nothing else);
the lowest rank is enjoyed by modes, or properties (which depend for their
existence upon substances, which in turn depend for their existence upon
God). As Descartes wrote:
I have . . . made it quite clear how reality admits of more or less. A substance
is more of a thing than a mode; if there are real qualities or incomplete sub-
stances, they are things to a greater extent than modes, but to a lesser extent
140
SLT, p. 76.
97
than complete substances; and, finally, if there is an infinite and independent
substance, it is more of a thing than a finite and dependent substance.141
Reality, understood in this way, is intimately bound up with the notion of

independence and self-sufficiency, such that the more reality a thing has
the more independent it is from other things and the more self-sufficient it
is. It thus follows that the most independent being is the one with the most
reality. This, then, is Descartes’ understanding of the idea of reality coming
in degrees. Leibniz’s understanding is not the same. What determines a thing’s
degree of reality for Leibniz is not how self-sufficient it is, or the number of
qualities it has, but rather the magnitude of its qualities or attributes, such
as power or knowledge. As there can be infinite degrees of these qualities,
Leibniz holds that there can be infinite degrees of reality, as opposed to just
the three recognised by Descartes. Unfortunately there is nothing at all
about this in the Monadology or in the cognate text The Principles of Nature
and Grace. Leibniz is more forthcoming in other writings, however. For
example, in the New Essays, he draws a connection between a thing’s degree
of reality and its ‘formalities’.142 What are formalities? In another text he
explains that ‘Whatever inheres in a subject can be called a formality.’143
This suggests that the more reality a thing has, the more there is that inheres
in it, that is, the greater the magnitude of its qualities. This is borne out by
still other texts, such as one from the late 1670s in which Leibniz writes that
the being with the highest degree of reality is the one which contains ‘no
limits of presence, of duration, of knowledge or of operation, and p ossesses
as much of these as is possible to be possessed by one being’.144 This
contrasts sharply with nothingness, which has no qualities,145 and hence,
quite literally, no reality whatsoever.146
Leibniz’s various descriptions of God in M40 are worthy of note. His
initial description of God as ‘unique, universal, and necessary’ repeats the
claims made in M38–9: Leibniz determined that God is necessary in M38
and unique in M39. In describing God as ‘universal’, Leibniz most likely
141
Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, II, p. 130.
142
NE, p. 486. The translation by Remnant and Bennett for some reason renders the
French ‘formalités’ as ‘attributes’.
143
G. W. Leibniz, Vorausedition zur Reihe VI (Philosophische Schriften) in der Ausgabe der
Akademie der Wissenschaften der DDR, ed. Leibniz-Forschungstelle der Universität
Münster (Münster, 1991), p. 1084.
144
SLT, p. 190.
145
A VI 4, p. 551.
146
To illustrate the difference between God, who has the highest degree of reality, and
nothingness, which has no reality at all, Leibniz sometimes appealed to the binary
system, which was of his own invention: here we are to take God as the analogue of 1,
and nothingness as the analogue of 0. See for example SLT, p. 39; PPL, p. 368.
98
means not that God is everywhere, that is, omnipresent, but that God
is the cause of all things. Not only does this follow from what has been
said already, in M39, it also corresponds with what he says in other w ritings.
For example in a text from 1685 Leibniz writes of God that ‘his action [is] so
universal that all things depend on him’.147 Finally, Leibniz’s description of
God as ‘a simple consequence of possible being’ anticipates the ontological
proof for God’s existence that he will go on to give in M44.
41. From which it follows that God is absolutely perfect, since perfection
is nothing other than magnitude of positive reality, taken in the strict
sense by setting aside the limits or boundaries in the things which have
it. And there, where there are no limits, that is, in God, perfection is
absolutely infinite.
Theodicy §22
Theodicy Preface *4a
Leibniz often defined perfection as magnitude of positive reality, such that

the more reality a thing has the more perfect it is.148 Since God contains as
much reality as possible (ascertained in M40), it follows that he is as perfect
as possible. Leibniz allows that other things may have some reality, and
hence a share of perfection, but since they are limited they are less real and
hence less perfect. At the end of M41 he refers the reader to the preface of
the Theodicy, in which he writes: ‘The perfections of God are those of our
souls, but he possesses them in boundless measure; he is an ocean, of which
we have received only drops: there is in us some power, some knowledge,
some goodness, but in God they are all complete’ (T pref. *4a). Leibniz
identifies power, knowledge, and will (goodness) as God’s perfections in
M48.
42. It also follows that created things owe their perfections to the influence
of God, but that they owe their imperfections to their own nature,
which is incapable of being without limits. For it is in this that they are
distinguished from God. [This original imperfection of created things is
observable in the natural inertia of bodies.]
Theodicy §20. §27–31.
§[154]153. §167. §377 onwards.
§30. §380. Abridgement, objection 5.
147
A VI 4, p. 2314.
148
See for example SLT, p. 190; A VI 4, p. 867.
99
If created things were to have unlimited (absolute) perfection then they
would be God, but Leibniz has already established that there is only one
God (see M39) so their perfection cannot be unlimited. Hence creatures
are naturally limited (or as he puts it in one text, ‘limits are of the essence
of creatures’).149 However, the perfections they do have must come from
God, since God is the cause of all things (see M40).
Leibniz in fact holds that all created things possess the same properties
as God, but to a limited extent:
there are in him [God] three primacies: power, knowledge and will; the result
of these is the operation or creature, which is varied according to the different
combinations of unity and zero; or rather of the positive with the privative, for
the privative is nothing other than limits, and there are limits everywhere in a
creature, just as there are points everywhere in the line. However, a creature
is something more than limits, because it has received some perfection or
power from God, just as the line is more than points. For ultimately the point
(the end of the line) is nothing more than the negation of the progress beyond
which it ends.150
It is therefore only the presence of limits in created things that distinguishes

them from God. They are not otherwise distinguished, for example, by
having different kinds of properties, or fewer properties.
At the end of M42 Leibniz refers the reader to various passages from
his Theodicy. Most are concerned with the issue of sin, more specifically,
its source in the imperfection of creatures. In one of these passages (T20)
Leibniz asserts that ‘there is an original imperfection in the creature before
sin, because the creature is essentially limited, which means that it cannot
know everything, and that it can be deceived and make other mistakes’.
Hence sin can be traced back to the limitation of creatures, and, as Leibniz
often claims, there is nothing that God could have done about the limita-
tion of creatures because creatures are limited by their very nature. This
position has considerable value in theology, as it entails that God cannot
(meaningfully) be blamed for the sins of created beings.
43. It is also true that in God is not only the source of existences but also
the source of essences, insofar as they are real, or of what is real in
possibility. This is because God’s understanding is the region of eternal
truths, or of the ideas on which they depend, and because without him
149
SLT, p. 38.
150
SLT, p. 39.
100
there would be nothing real in possibilities, and not only nothing exist-
ent, but also nothing possible.
Theodicy §20.
Leibniz now argues that God is the source of essences, or of the reality
that essences have, but his argument is far from straightforward, not least
because he slides from talking about essences, to possibilities, to eternal
truths, to the ideas on which eternal truths depend, without making it
clear how they are connected. An essence is an idea of a possible individual
person or thing, or rather, all the attributes conceived in the idea of that
individual or thing, taken together: ‘An “essence” is everything which is
conceived in a thing through itself, that is, the aggregate of all attributes.’151
For Leibniz, an essence is possible if the concept of it does not contain a
contradiction. So a square triangle is not possible (because the property of
being square contradicts the property of being a triangle), but a circle is
(because there is no contradiction in the concept of a circle). Understood
this way, the realm of the possible would extend not just to simple shapes
and objects but also to people, events, histories, and even worlds. Hence
Leibniz writes: ‘There are as many series of things that can be imagined
not implying contradiction as there are possible worlds . . . [F]or I call
possible that which does not imply contradiction.’152 Facts that hold about
all possible essences and their relations are expressed by the eternal truths,
such as those of logic and mathematics. Hence for Leibniz, essences/ideas,
possibilities, and eternal truths, are all connected.
Now in M43, Leibniz assumes that all essences/ideas (and therefore
possibilities and eternal truths) have some reality. But in making this
assumption Leibniz does not suppose that the essence of a possible-yet-
fictional person such as Macbeth is real in the same way that an actual
flesh-and-blood person is real, because of course it is not. Nevertheless
he thinks the essence of Macbeth, along with that of every other possible
thing, does have some reality, insofar as it possesses certain qualities (recall
from the comments on M40 that to have reality is to have some quali-
ties). Moreover, the thrust of his argument is such that Leibniz must also
suppose that an essence only possesses reality insofar as it is conceived. As
an essence, then, Macbeth can be said to exist ideally, that is, as an idea
in the mind of someone or something, and therefore whatever reality this
essence has must be derived from this mind. Leibniz insists that this is the
case with all essences, possibilities, and eternal truths: they all derive what-
ever reality they possess from being conceived by a mind. In identifying
151
DSR, p. 95.
152
TI, p. 390.
101
this mind as that of God, Leibniz might be appealing to God’s attribute of
omniscience (which would enable him to know all there is to know, includ-
ing all essences, possibilities, and eternal truths), though Leibniz only
establishes that God is omniscient later, in M48.
44. For if there is a reality in essences or possibilities, or indeed in eternal

truths, it must be the case that this reality be grounded in something
existent and actual, and consequently in the existence of the necessary
being, in whom essence includes existence, or in whom it is enough to
be possible in order to be actual.
Theodicy §184. §189. §335.
This continues the theme of M43, but contains a much sharper argument
for the existence of God. The basic argument is this: if essences, pos-
sibilities, or eternal truths have any reality, then this must be grounded in
something that actually exists, and therefore in the necessary being. We
should not be taken in by the use of the hypothetical (‘if’) here; Leibniz is
not seriously entertaining the thought that essences or eternal truths don’t
have any reality: he thinks they do. So the hypothetical is merely a rhetori-
cal device, and what he really means is: given that there is reality in essences
or eternal truths, this must come from something that actually exists.
In making this claim, Leibniz clearly supposes that the reality of a thing
must come from something that itself has reality; in the Monadology this is
merely assumed, though in other texts it is stated explicitly (for example,
in T184 he states: ‘Every reality must be founded on something existent’).
The thinking is that only an already-existing thing is in a position to impart
reality to something else. In M44 Leibniz identifies the already-existing
thing that imparts reality to essence and eternal truths as God. In doing
so, he seems to overlook the possibility that it might be other, finite minds,
such as those of humans. After all, finite minds think about essences and
eternal truths, and these finite minds have reality too: could it not be the
case, then, that essences and eternal truths get whatever reality they have
from finite minds rather than from God? Leibniz would find such a sug-
gestion highly problematic. To see why, suppose that eternal truths were
grounded in finite minds. Now what would happen if, even for a moment,
an eternal truth would cease to be thought by any finite mind? There
are two possible answers. First, that the eternal truth in question would
hang unsupported in the air (so to speak) for however long it remained
unthought of by finite minds. But this would mean that its reality was
ungrounded for that time, which is impossible. The second option is that,
if every finite mind ceased to think about an eternal truth for a time, then
102
for however long it remained unthought of by finite minds the eternal truth
would have no reality at all, that is, it would quite literally be nothing. This
presumably means that it would, for that time, not be true at all. But it is
absurd to suppose that there might be a time when ‘2 + 2 = 4’ (for example)
ceases to be true, no matter how brief that time might be. By definition an
eternal truth is eternal, which means it always subsists, and consequently
the source of its reality must likewise always subsist. This automatically
rules out finite minds as a candidate, and indicates that the source of its
reality must be an eternal mind. And such a mind is the mind of a necessary
being, as a necessary being is one whose non-existence is impossible. It is
therefore eternal inasmuch as it always has existed and always will exist.
M44 concludes with Leibniz offering a version of what has, since the
time of Kant, become known as the ontological proof for the existence
of God. Versions of it can be found in Anselm, Descartes, and Spinoza.
Leibniz spends a lot more time on it in other writings; here it is squashed
into the second half of a single sentence, with key steps omitted. Leibniz
gives a more complete version of the proof elsewhere:
If one’s essence includes necessary existence then one’s essence is

inseparable from existence.
The essence of God (i.e. the necessary being) includes necessary
existence.
Therefore the essence and existence of God are inseparable.153
Usually when discussing this argument, Leibniz claims that it tacitly

assumes that God is possible. Because of that, what he thinks the a rgument
actually shows is that if God is possible then he exists. (This may seem more
obvious once one remembers that, for Leibniz, ‘essence’ just is ‘possible
existence’.) Consequently it falls short of a true demonstration of God’s
existence. To qualify as that, it needs to be shown that the concept of God
is possible, that is, free from contradiction. Leibniz will go on to show
that God is possible in M45. Sometimes when presenting the o ntological
argument, however, he argues that God should be presumed possible until
shown to be otherwise, for example in the New Essays:
We are entitled to assume the possibility of any being, and above all of God,
until someone proves the contrary; and so the foregoing metaphysical argument
does yield a demonstrated moral conclusion, namely that in the present state
of our knowledge we ought to judge that God exists and to act accordingly.154
153
This version is found in SLT, p. 184.
154
NE, p. 438.
103
45. Thus God alone (or the necessary being) has this privilege, that he
must exist if he is possible. And as nothing can prevent the possibility
of that which possesses no limits, no negation, and consequently no
contradiction, this alone is sufficient for the existence of God to be
known a priori. We have proved it through the reality of eternal truths
also.
But we have now just proved it a posteriori too, since contingent
beings exist, and they cannot have their ultimate or sufficient reason
except in the necessary being, who has the reason for his existence in
himself.
The conclusion that God must exist if he is possible follows from what was
said at the end of M44. Having drawn that conclusion, Leibniz proceeds to
offer a proof for the possibility of God. He has already established that God
has no limits (see M40), and here he shows that a corollary of that is that
God is possible. A being without any limits contains no negation, and no
negation means no contradiction, and it is the absence of contradiction that
guarantees a thing’s possibility. Negation is a result of limits – if a thing is
limited in some way then there is some respect in which it is not. And con-
tradictions are derived from negations (since they involve the simultaneous
affirmation and denial of something, that is, a thing is both X and not-X).
Possibility, of course, is determined by the absence of contradictions, and
since there can be none in God, he must be possible.
Leibniz now claims to have given a priori and a posteriori proofs for
the existence of God. Since the time of Immanuel Kant (1724–1804),
a priori has been taken to mean ‘non-empirically’ or ‘independently
of experience’, and a posteriori has been taken to mean ‘empirically’
or ‘through e xperience’. But in Leibniz’s day, the terms had different
meanings. This is apparent enough from a famous seventeenth-century
logic textbook, the Port Royal Logic, which explains that d iscovering and
comprehending truths is done in two ways: ‘either by proving effects
through their causes, which is called demonstrating a priori, or by dem-
onstrating, on the contrary, causes through their effects, which is called
proving a posteriori’.155 If we are demonstrating effects through their
causes we are working our way ‘outward’ from the cause to certain effects
which follow from it; for example, if we start with an understanding of
magnetism (cause), we can work out from that how much attractive power
a magnet of a certain size will have (effect). So a priori explanations run
from cause to effect, in this way. Conversely, a posteriori explanations run
the other way around, from effect to cause, for example by starting with
155
[Arnauld and Nicole], La logique, p. 390.
104
the attractive power of a particular magnet (effect) we can then work our
way back to its cause (magnetism). Leibniz’s a posteriori proof for the
existence of God works this way also, as it starts with the effect (contingent
beings) and p roceeds back to the cause (the necessary being). Conversely,
the proof for the existence of God in M44, as an a priori proof, runs in the
opposite direction, starting with the cause (the essence of the necessary
being) and from that proceeding to prove the effect (the actual existence of
the necessary being). This might suggest that God literally causes himself
to exist,156 but is better understood as meaning that he is self-explanatory,
that is, he explains his own existence.
In all, then, Leibniz has offered three proofs for the existence of God.
The cosmological proof in M37–8, the argument from eternal truths in
M43, and now an ontological proof in M44–5. It might be wondered
whether three proofs is overkill, since if one of them works then there is
no need for any others. But it was not uncommon for early modern think-
ers to multiply proofs for the existence of God; Descartes, for example,
offered three separate proofs in the Meditations (some say four). In any
case, over the course of his career Leibniz put forward more proofs for
the existence of God than just the three found in the Monadology. Most
notably, he argued that God’s existence was established by his doctrine
of pre-established harmony (see comment on M39).157
46. Yet we must not imagine, as some do, that the eternal truths, being
dependent on God, are arbitrary and depend on his will, as Descartes,
and afterwards Mr Poiret, seem to have supposed. This is true only
of contingent truths, whose principle is fittingness or the choice of the
best, whereas necessary truths depend solely on his understanding, and
are its internal object.
Theodicy §180–4. §185. §335.
§351. §380.
It is a Leibnizian mantra that God does not create eternal truths (or indeed,
essences) but rather discovers them in his understanding. This is in direct
opposition to Descartes, who had claimed that God did create eternal
truths:
156
Spinoza very famously referred to God as causa sui (self-caused), though he did not
mean it literally. He claimed ‘By that which is self-caused I mean that whose essence
involves existence; or that whose nature can be conceived only as existing.’ Spinoza,
Ethics, 1d1. The translation is from Spinoza, Complete Works, p. 217.
157
SLT, p. 76.
105
The mathematical truths which you call eternal have been laid down by God
and depend on him entirely no less than the rest of his creatures. Indeed to say
that these truths are independent of God is to talk of him as if he were Jupiter
or Saturn and to subject him to the Styx and the Fates. Please do not hesitate
to assert and proclaim everywhere that it is God who has laid down these laws
in nature just as a king lays down laws in his kingdom.158
Although not a follower of Descartes, Pierre Poiret (1646–1719) endorsed

the same view, finding it absurd to suppose that God could simply dis-
cover eternal truths in his understanding ‘without having any right over
them’.159 The problem, for both, lay in the consideration that unless
God had created these truths they would be independent of him, that
is, not under his control. This can be seen to threaten God’s sufficiency
and perfection. As Poiret put it, ‘if there were ideas and truths different
from those of the divine essence, which God must know necessarily, and,
approve independently of his will, God would not be a God which is suf-
ficient to himself through himself, alone necessary to himself, nor perfect
through himself’.160 The position endorsed by Descartes and Poiret is
often referred to now as theological voluntarism.
Leibniz rejected voluntarism; indeed, he was scathing about the idea
of God creating eternal truths, and railed against it often. That he should
do so is not surprising, since it involves a clear violation of the principle
of sufficient reason: if God had to create eternal truths, such as the truths
of mathematics, then there would be no reason for him to decree (for
example) that 2 + 2 = 4 rather than 2 + 2 = 5. Similarly, if God had to
create the laws of logic, then there would be no reason for him to decree
the law of identity (A = A) as opposed to its opposite (A = not-A). Without
a reason to decree certain truths of mathematics and logic over others, he
would not act, and so would not create any. In the Monadology, however,
Leibniz does not expand on his opposition to voluntarism.
While eternal truths are rooted in God’s understanding, contingent
truths (that is, truths that could have been otherwise) depend on God’s
will. Leibniz holds that as God is perfectly good, his will always chooses the
best.161 This is sometimes encapsulated in what Leibniz calls the principle
158
Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, III, p. 23. Some years later, Descartes
would even claim that notions of truth and goodness depend on God, that is, that he
decided what truth is, and what goodness is, without being guided in his choice by any
prior considerations. See The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, II, pp. 293–4.
159
Pierre Poiret, L’oeconomie divine, ou Systeme universel et démonstré des oeuvres & des des-
seins de Dieu envers les hommes, 7 books (Amsterdam, 1687), I, p. 54.
160
Poiret, L’oeconomie divine, I, p. 54.
161
For example, ‘his [God’s] will is always inexorable and is always directed at the best’ (T
obj. VIII).
106
of the best. As Leibniz will explain later (in M55), God’s adherence to the
principle of the best ultimately leads him to choose for creation the best of
all possible worlds.
47. Thus God alone is [the primitive simple substance or monad] the
primitive unity, or original simple substance, which produces all
created or derivative monads, which are born, so to speak, by con-
tinual fulgurations of the divinity from moment to moment, limited by
the receptivity of their created nature, the essence of which is to be
limited.
Theodicy §382–91. §398. §395.
That God produces all other monads is taken to follow from M46,
inasmuch as their existence is contingent, and therefore depends upon
God’s will. In an earlier draft of M47 Leibniz described God as ‘the
primitive simple substance or monad’, but ultimately changed it to ‘the
primitive unity, or original simple substance’ in the final copy. However,
elsewhere he does identify God as a monad, or primitive monad: in 1711
he informed a correspondent that a monad is either primitive, in which
case it is God, or derivative, in which case it is called a ‘created monad’,
of which there are three kinds, namely minds, souls, and bare monads.162
The primitive monad God differs from created monads not only by being
more perfect (see M41), but also by being the only unembodied monad,
for while God has no body,163 ‘every created monad is endowed with some
organic body’.164
In M47 Leibniz explains how God produces other monads: by ‘fulgura-
tions’, which are literally ‘lightning-flashes’. This is a clear reference to the
ancient doctrine of emanation, though ultimately Leibniz’s understanding
of it is not an orthodox one. In neo-Platonic thought, all existing things
are produced by God not out of choice but as unwilled outpourings (or
overflows) of his own being. Although this is a continual process it does not
involve any loss to God of his own essence, just as the continual emission of
light does not thereby cause the sun to lose any of its own brightness. The
metaphor of light continuously radiating from the sun was a fruitful one
and often used to illustrate key components of the doctrine. For example,
just as light is dependent on the sun for its existence, so do created things
162
G VII, p. 502.
163
See LTS, p. 357.
164
G VII, p. 502.
107
depend for their existence upon God. Leibniz typically uses the language
of emanation to illustrate the process by which he thinks God conserves
or sustains the world, namely continuous creation, which holds that God
continually (re)creates the world at each moment to stop it passing out of
existence: ‘Now it is clear, first of all, that the created substances depend on
God, who conserves them and even produces them continually by a kind of
emanation, as we produce our thoughts.’165 Thus for Leibniz, emanation
involved an ongoing recreation (conservation) of created things rather than
an ongoing generation of things. The use of the lightning-flash metaphor
over the neo-Platonic sun metaphor is intended to capture that. However,
there is no indication in the Monadology as to his grounds for endorsing the
continual fulgurations account.
It might seem that the doctrine of continuous creation takes Leibniz
dangerously close to occasionalism, if not all the way there. After all, if
God continuously (re)creates things at every moment, then he would seem
to be responsible for the existence of these things, and their states, at each
moment, which does not seem to leave room for any causal activity aside
from his own.166 In T386–7, Leibniz outlines objections of this sort, which
seek to show that, under continuous creation, God is the only causal agent.
In his response, Leibniz appeals to the doctrine of concurrence, which holds
that while created beings are causally active, their actions occur only with
the concurrence (that is, the co-operation) of God. Concurrence thus
sees creaturely activity as a joint enterprise, brought about by the causal
activity of the creature itself together with that of God. Leibniz notes that
concurrence applies not to the substance of these creatures, but rather to
165
PPL, p. 311.
166
Malebranche based one of his arguments for occasionalism on the doctrine of con-
tinuous creation, arguing that under that doctrine God alone is responsible for all the
changes in created minds and bodies. To see how the argument works, consider a par-
ticular body, such as a tennis ball. Now when God (re)creates the universe, as he does
at each moment, either he (re)creates that body in exactly the same place it was in at the
previous moment, or he (re)creates it in a different place from the one it was in at the
previous moment. If the body is (re)created in the same place it is said to be at rest; if it
is (re)created in a different place then it is said to be in motion. In effect, then, God has
to (re)create bodies – all bodies – either in motion or at rest. But irrespective of whether
God (re)creates a body in motion or whether he (re)creates it at rest, it is God who has
put it wherever it happens to be. This must be so, according to Malebranche, because
God is the only causal agent in this scenario, and indeed the only causal agent there can
be, for under continuous creation there is just no room at all for the causal activity of
anything other than God. Hence what we think of as motion is just God continuously
(re)creating a thing in successively different places. A parallel argument can be made
for minds and their thoughts. See Nicolas Malebranche, Dialogues on Metaphysics and
on Religion, trans. Nicholas Jolley and David Scott (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1997), p. 115.
108
their modifications. That is, God does not concur in keeping the substance
of these creatures in existence, as he alone is causally responsible for that.
He does, however, concur with the internal operations of these creatures,
in which creatures themselves also have a causal role. Hence Leibniz says
in T391 that a created thing concurs with God ‘for the production of its
internal operation, as would be thought or a volition, things really distinct
from the substance’. Leibniz thus envisages concurrence as leaving space
for the genuine causal activity of substances, notwithstanding God’s con-
tinuous (re)creation of all things at every moment; if successful, it enables
him to resist occasionalism.167
48. There is in God power, which is the source of everything, then knowl-
edge, which contains the detail of ideas, and finally will, which brings
about changes and products in accordance with the principle of the
best.
Theodicy §7. §149. §150.
And these correspond to what there is in created monads: the subject

or basis, the perceptive faculty, and the appetitive faculty. But in God
these attributes are absolutely infinite or perfect, and in created
monads or in entelechies (or perfectihabies, as Hermolaus Barbarus
translated this word) there are only limitations168 of them, in propor-
tion to the perfection that they have.
Theodicy [§48] §87.
Leibniz has already made explicit references to God’s power (M47),

knowledge (M43), and will (M46), but here he briefly notes how each is
involved in the creation of the world. Further information will be given
in M53–5. Leibniz then proceeds to associate these three attributes of
God with three features of created monads, namely the subject or basis,
perception, and appetition. This underscores the point made in M42,
that monads differ from God only in degree: their attributes are those of
God, but whereas his are infinite theirs are always finite. The associations
Leibniz makes are as follows:
167
Not all scholars are convinced that Leibniz does enough to keep his position from col-
lapsing into occasionalism, however. See for example David Scott, ‘Leibniz’s model of
creation and his doctrine of substance’, Animus 3 (1998), pp. 73–88.
168
The final draft has ‘imitations’, but this looks to be a copying error as previous drafts
had ‘limitations’ instead.
109
God Created monads

Power Subject or Basis
Knowledge Perception
Will Appetition
‘Basis’ means the principal foundation of something. A monad’s basis is its

active nature, that is, that which makes it a bearer of causal power. Leibniz
often insisted that created things are by nature active, that is, have causal
powers, even though these powers only operate on themselves (remember
that Leibniz established in M7 that there is no inter-substantial causation).
God’s power, of course, is not so restricted. If the parallel between God’s
attributes and monads is a close one, as Leibniz suggests in M48, then we
would expect him to hold that power is the most basic or fundamental
of the three divine attributes, that is, that it is God’s ‘basis’, as it were.
And this is precisely his view: ‘understanding presupposes the power to
act, whilst will presupposes both the power to act and to understand’.169
The same relationships presumably hold on the monadic side of the table,
namely that perception presupposes activity, or causal power, and appeti-
tion presupposes both perception and activity.170
As for the connection between knowledge and perception – Leibniz
holds that God’s knowledge involves him expressing or representing all
things by their ideas,171 and we know from M14 that monadic perception
involves the representation of a plurality within the unity. The only differ-
ence here seems to be one of degree – God expresses things with perfect
clarity whereas in monads the expressions, or representations, are always
confused to some extent. Similarly, the connection between the will and
appetite is straightforward as both involve an inner desire or striving for
something; God’s will is guided by his perfect wisdom, and so always
aims at the best, whilst the appetite of created monads always aims at the
perceived best. As noted earlier (in the comments on M15), Leibniz also
refers to the appetite of minds as ‘will’, insofar as it involves distinct incli-
nations supplied by reason rather than confused inclinations such as those
of the passions.
169
A VI 4, p. 2292. See also T149.
170
An alternative reading of this passage has been provided by Nicholas Rescher, who takes
Leibniz to be claiming that God’s power corresponds to the ‘reality (being)’ of a created
monad. See Rescher, G. W. Leibniz’s Monadology, p. 168. This goes beyond what
Leibniz says in the text. Also, it doesn’t sound right: for Leibniz, as we know, ‘reality’
means ‘perfection’, and perfection is power, knowledge, and will, not just power.
171
A VI 4, p. 2317.
110
Leibniz again refers to created monads as entelechies (following M14,
M18–19), this time throwing in an apparently approving reference to the
medieval scholar Hermolaus Barbarus (1454–93), who sought to recover
Aristotle’s real philosophy from the various Scholastic (mis)interpretations
of it. There is a story that Barbarus was so dissatisfied by the Latin transla-
tions of Aristotle’s term ‘entelechy’ that he asked the devil to remove the
confusion and provide him with the exact equivalent in Latin. The result
was the coining of the term perfectihabia, which literally means ‘perfection-
havers’.172 To understand the significance of this, consider how the term
‘entelechy’ was used by Aristotle: for him, it indicated the realisation of
potency. Hence Barbarus’ perfectihabia captures the sense of comple-
tion inherent in the term, because ‘perfect’ in its original sense meant
‘complete’ (from the Latin perficio – to complete or do thoroughly; this
is what used to be meant by referring to God as ‘perfect’: it meant he was
complete, lacking nothing). Moreover, Barbarus’ translation also captures
(albeit to a lesser extent) the activity involved in the process of realising
potency; perfection-havers are those things that can realise their own
potency. The fact that activity was central to Aristotle’s notion of entelechy
led some of his earliest translators to translate the term as ‘act’ or ‘action’
(or, in the case of Cicero, ‘a certain continued and perpetual motion’).173
Leibniz alludes to this when he discusses the matter in the Theodicy:
The same philosopher [Aristotle] gave to the soul the generic name of ‘entel-
echy’ or actuality. This word, entelechy, apparently comes from the Greek
word which means ‘perfect’,174 and for that reason the renowned Hermolaus
Barbarus expressed it literally in Latin by perfectihabia, since actuality is a
realization of potency. And in order to learn just that he had no need to consult
the Devil, as he is said to have done. (T87)
Possibly the notion of activity that Barbarus captured in the expression per-
fectihabia is what induced Leibniz to use the term in the Monadology also, as
in the next paragraph he will proceed to determine how created things act.
49. The created thing is said to act outwardly insofar as it has perfection,
and to be acted upon by another insofar as it is imperfect. Thus action
is attributed to the monad insofar as it has distinct perceptions and
passion insofar as it has confused perceptions.
Theodicy §32. §66. §386.
172
Hermolaus Barbarus, Themistii peripatetici lucidissimi paraphrasis in Aristotelis (Venice,
1542), pp. 147–8.
173
Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, I.10.
174
In Greek, ‘perfection’ is ‘enteles’.
111
In M48 there was the barest hint of a link between a monad’s perfection
and its activity (through the reference to Barbarus’ Latin translation of
‘entelechy’), but here Leibniz makes the link explicit, and in so doing ties
the degree of perfection a created thing has to the extent to which it acts
outwardly. Consequently, the more perfect a thing is, the more it acts and
the less it is acted upon. But as we know from M7, created monads do
not really act outwardly at all. This leads Leibniz to construe a monad’s
so-called ‘outward activity’, that is, its effects on other monads, in terms
of the relative distinctness of its perceptions (he will explain why in M50).
To see what is involved in this, take our example of Pete walking to the
fridge to get a drink. The story of this event can be told from the point
of view of Pete’s mind, which is of course a monad, or from the point of
view of any of the monads in Pete’s body. All will have perceptions of
the event, but their perceptions both of the event itself and of what led
up to it will be very d ifferent. The monad that is Pete’s mind will have
a very distinct p erception of the sequence of events involved, from his
acknowledgment of his thirst to his decision to get a drink to putting this
decision into practice, whereby his body moves over to the fridge and
opens it. (Recall from the discussion of M20 that a perception is distinct
when the elements of it can be separately identified, and confused when
the elements are not separately identifiable.) The monads that constitute
Pete’s body, however, will have a very confused perception of the event:
their perceptions of the motion of their own bodies will be the least con-
fused ones they have, but from these it will not be clear why their bodies
are in motion; meanwhile, their perceptions of the motion of Pete’s body
as a whole, along with their p erceptions of Pete’s mind and its states, such
as thirst and the forming of a resolution to get a drink, will be even more
confused, and most likely be no more than little perceptions. Hence in
this example Pete’s mind can be said to be more perfect than any of the
monads in his body, on account of it being more active, which means that
it has more distinct perceptions.
Only God acts without being acted upon (which makes his action
‘pure’, as Leibniz puts it in T32); everything else acts and is acted upon, in
the sense explained here.
50. And one created thing is more perfect than another when what is
found in it serves to explain a priori what happens in the other; and this
is why we say that it acts upon the other.
Leibniz now seeks to explain why he construes a monad’s (causal) activ-

ity in terms of the distinctness of its perceptions, and his answer is: what
112
greater distinctness brings is greater explanatory power. To return to the
example used earlier, if we want an explanation of why Pete went to the
fridge to get a drink, we need to look to the monad that constitutes his
mind rather than to any of those that form his body, and we do so because
of the greater perceptual clarity of the former. The fact that Pete’s mind
contains the more distinct perceptions about the event ‘explains’ what
happens in the same way that a cause ‘explains’ an effect, that is, it offers
an a priori explanation. This permits Leibniz to talk of Pete’s mind ‘acting’
on the body.
If it is difficult to understand Leibniz’s claim that more perfect things
explain a priori what happens in the less perfect, this is likely to be because
we approach it with the modern, post-Kantian sense of a priori in mind.
We saw earlier, in the remarks on M45, that from Kant’s time onwards, a
priori has been taken to mean ‘non-empirically’ or ‘independently of expe-
rience’, and a posteriori has been taken to mean ‘empirically’ or ‘through
experience’, whereas in Leibniz’s day these terms were understood differ-
ently. For Leibniz and his contemporaries, as well as those before him, a
priori demonstrations were those that proved effects through their causes,
while a posteriori demonstrations were those that proved causes through
their effects. If we approach Leibniz’s reference to a priori explanation in
M50 with this in mind, we can see that it is a clear reference to the direction
of illumination, so to speak, that is, the fact that he is looking to the cause
(the monad with the most distinct perceptions) to explain the effect (Pete’s
walking to the fridge), rather than the other way around. And it is for this
reason, Leibniz claims, that ‘we say that’ the one has acted on the other;
for example, ‘we say that’ Pete’s mind has acted on his body. Nevertheless
there is no true action of one on the other, as Leibniz’s carefully chosen
words indicate.
51. But in simple substances, the influence of one monad over another
is merely ideal: it can have its effect only through the intervention of
God, inasmuch as in the ideas of God a monad rightly demands that
God have consideration for it when organising the others from the
beginning of things. For since a created monad cannot have a physical
influence on the interior of another, this is the only way that one can
be dependent on another.
Theodicy §9. §54. §65. §66.
Leibniz here argues that monads can influence each other only ideally. The
argument looks to be a disjunctive syllogism with the following form:
113
Premise 1. The influence of one monad over another is either physi-
cal or ideal.
Premise 2. Monads do not influence each other physically (this was
the conclusion of M7).
Conclusion. Therefore the influence of one monad over another is
ideal.
‘Ideal’ means ‘in idea’, that is, subsisting in the mind of something as
opposed to existing in its own right in the real world. Hence in describ-
ing the influence of one monad on another as ‘ideal’ Leibniz is not merely
reiterating the (negative) point that monads do not causally interact with
each other, but also making the (positive) point that there is nevertheless
still a sense in which one monad can be thought to influence another. We
can see in this a desire to retain some of the language of causality (influence,
dependence) in describing how monads relate to each other. Here Leibniz
explains the relation of monads in terms of the correspondence that holds
between them. Or rather, their coordination, since he holds that God has
actively accommodated monads to each other so that they mutually cor-
respond. Because his understanding is the realm of all possibles, God is
able to inspect monads prior to creation. When he inspected the monad of
Pete’s mind, he saw that it not only contained perceptions of the event of
Pete walking to the fridge, but also ‘explained’ this event by virtue of having
more distinct perceptions of it than the monads of Pete’s body. Thus when
deciding to create the monad that is Pete’s mind, God’s desire for mutual
accommodation ensures that he also creates other monads, such as those
of Pete’s body, which are then so adjusted that they (confusedly) perceive
moving towards the fridge at the same time as Pete’s mind (distinctly) per-
ceives his body doing so. In this way, the less perfect can be said to depend
on the more perfect, that is, because God has chosen to adjust the former to
the latter. This is all Leibniz means when he talks of one monad demanding
that God accommodate others to it; the remark should not be taken literally.
Leibniz’s talk of God ‘organising’ monads also has the potential to
mislead. He does not envisage God as interfering with one monad so as
to adjust it to other monads with which it otherwise would not have cor-
responded. Rather, he is thinking of a process of selection, whereby God
sorts all possible monads into consistent sets, each set being a different
possible world. Hence the set that includes the monad of Pete’s mind
also includes (among others) the monads of his body. God’s ‘mutual
accommodation’ of these monads therefore amounts to little more than
his decision to create the possible world of which they are all a part. This
mutual accommodation of substances is sometimes referred to by Leibniz
as ‘universal harmony’ (see, for example, M59). It is, we learn elsewhere
114
(for example, T7, T8, and T84), a feature of all possible worlds; that is,
every possible world, not just our own, is a set of mutually accommodated
substances.
Leibniz takes the mutual accommodation to be in place right at the point
of creation; it is not something that continually requires God’s interven-
tion. Thus every monad is so adjusted from the outset that its perceptions
will always accord with those of every other created monad, despite there
being no genuine influence or interaction between them. Nevertheless the
mutual adjustment is so precise that it creates the impression of mutual
causal interaction between substances.
52. And this is why actions and passions are mutual between created
things. For when he compares two simple substances, God finds in
each the reasons which oblige him to accommodate the other to it,
and consequently what is active in certain respects is passive from
another point of view: a created thing is active insofar as what is known
distinctly in it serves to explain what happens in another, and passive
insofar as the reason for what happens in it is found in what is known
distinctly in another.175
This expands on M51: we now learn that the ideal influence of one monad
on another described there is not a one-way process. Instead, the influence
is mutual. In other words, all substances, even those with very low degrees
of perfection, have their effect on others, and are active to the extent to
which they do. To illustrate (using an example from physics), if a bullet
hits a clay target it might initially seem as though the bullet is entirely
active and the clay target entirely passive, but a closer consideration reveals
that both are active and passive, albeit to different degrees, for the bullet
and the clay target that it hits act upon each other; the bullet may well cause
serious damage to the clay target, but the target in turn will slow the bullet
down, or change its course, or possibly even fragment it. It would seem to
follow from this that no created thing is so active that it is not acted upon
by other created things, and no created thing is so passive that it does not
act upon other things.
53. Now as there is an infinity of possible universes in the ideas of God,

and as only one of them can exist, there must be a sufficient reason for
175
Some transcriptions of the Monadology include a reference to Theodicy §66 here (for
example, G VI, p. 615), but there is no such reference in the manuscript.
115
God’s choice, determining him to one rather than to another.
Theodicy [§7.] §8. §10.
§44. §173. §196 onwards.
§225. §414–16.
Leibniz now argues that there must be a sufficient reason for God’s choice
of universe, given that he could only choose one out of an infinity of
possible universes. While the argument itself is straightforward, it is not
immediately apparent why Leibniz should hold (a) that there is an infinite
number of possible universes, and (b) that God can create only one of
them. First, then, why is there an infinite number of possible universes?
In a letter from 1712 Leibniz writes ‘When I say that there is an infinity
of possible worlds, I mean those which do not imply a contradiction,
just as one can invent stories that never exist and which are nevertheless
possible.’176 (Note that, for Leibniz, ‘possible world’ means the same as
‘possible universe’, and he sometimes uses the terms interchangeably,
as we shall see in M54.) Hence a universe (= a complete set of possible
monads) is said to be possible if it does not contain a contradiction, and
there seems to be no limit to how many of those there can be because there
is no limit to how many things a universe can contain or the ways in which
they can be arranged.
Why, though, can only one of these possible universes exist? Why can’t
God create them all, or create one universe which includes all possibles?
To this, Leibniz’s answer is: because not all possibles are compossible, that
is, not all possibles are able to exist in the same universe. As far as one can
tell, Leibniz did not advance a reason for this view; in one text from 1680
he even states that it is ‘unknown to men’ why certain things are incom-
possible.177 Despite that, Leibniz consistently maintained that ‘there are
many possible universes, each collection of compossibles making up one
of them’.178
The fact that there is an infinity of possible universes, only one of which
can exist, ensures that God will need to choose which one to create. It
would be difficult to overstate the importance of this for Leibniz. Spinoza
had argued in his Ethics (1677) that God acted not out of choice but rather
the necessity of his own nature, and from that he concluded that what-
ever is logically possible (that is, does not imply a contradiction) must be
176
SLT, pp. 207–8.
177
SLT, p. 30. Of course by this he might have meant that it was unknown to men other
than him!
178
PPL, p. 662.
116
actualised at some time or other.179 For this (and other teachings) he was
vilified, not least by Leibniz himself, who believed that if God acted out of
necessity he would not be good (see T173); after all, it would mean that he
would create without any consideration of the goodness or worthiness of
what it was he was creating.180
It might seem odd that in M53 Leibniz insists that God has a choice
only to proceed to state that there is a sufficient reason ‘determining’ God’s
choice. But ‘determining’ here does not mean ‘forcing’ or ‘necessitating’
but rather something softer like ‘resolving’, that is, the sufficient reason is
what enables God to whittle down the number of available choices to just
one and makes him want to choose it.
In insisting that there must be a sufficient reason for God’s choice of
world, Leibniz thereby denies that God’s choice of world is arbitrary,
or random. In Leibniz’s day it was not uncommon for thinkers to hold
that God chooses what to do by a sheer act of will, unmoved by any prior
reasons. Samuel Clarke (1675–1729) maintained such a view in his corre-
spondence with Leibniz in 1715–16; although he agreed with Leibniz that
God needed a sufficient reason to act, he claimed that ‘this sufficient reason
is ofttimes no other than the mere will of God’.181 Leibniz objected that if
God’s will were moved without a reason, as Clarke maintained, it would
violate the principle of sufficient reason.
54. And this reason can only be found in the fittingness, or in the degrees
of perfection, which these worlds contain, each possible world having
the right to claim existence in proportion to the perfection it contains.
[Thus there is nothing which is wholly arbitrary.]
Theodicy §74. [§78] §167. §350.
§201. §130. §352[–354]. §345 onwards.
§354.
In M53 Leibniz argued that there has to be a sufficient reason for God’s
choice of universe, and now he identifies what that reason is. His answer –
that this reason can only be found in the various degrees of perfection that
these universes contain – is a postulate, for Leibniz merely assumes that
in choosing a universe God’s concern is with degrees of perfection alone,
and not any other feature (such as the relative worthwhileness of the lives
179
See Spinoza, Ethics, Ip16, in Complete Works, p. 227.
180
Leibniz did, however, occasionally flirt with the thought that God acts out of necessity
rather than choice. See PPL, p. 146; TI, p. 336; SLT, p. 114.
181
PPL, p. 680.
117
of its creatures, or the total number of happy beasts it contains, and so on).
But once one supposes that God’s concern is with degrees of perfection,
then it seems safe to say that the greater the degree of perfection a possible
world has, the stronger the reason God has to create it. Leibniz doesn’t
elaborate on what he means by ‘degrees of perfection’ in this context, but
he presumably has in mind the notion of perfection given in M41, which
stated that perfection is magnitude of positive reality. It thus follows that
possible worlds differ in terms of the quantity of positive reality that they
contain.
Leibniz’s use of a legal metaphor, in which possible worlds are described
as having ‘the right to claim existence in proportion to the[ir] perfection’,
betrays his background in law. The same point can be made less prosaically
by saying that the more perfection a possible world contains, the more
attractive it is to God.
55. And this is the cause of the existence of the best, which God’s wisdom
makes him know, his goodness makes him choose, and his power
makes him produce.
Theodicy §8. §78. §80.
[§81.] §84. §119. §204 [and onwards].
§206. §208. Abridgement, objection 1, objection 8.
Leibniz’s language here suggests that he takes God’s choice of the best
possible world to follow from the central claim of M54, that the greater
the degree of perfection a possible world contains, the stronger the reason
God has to create it. His thinking is that as the best possible world is the
one which contains the greatest degree of perfection, God will have more
reason to create it than he would any other possible world.
It seems reasonable to ask why Leibniz is so confident that there is a
single best possible world, as it seems conceivable that there might be two
best (that is, unsurpassable) possible worlds, or three, or even an infinity of
them. Leibniz considers this issue in the Theodicy and argues that ‘among
an infinity of possible worlds there is the best of all, otherwise God would
not have been determined to create any of them’ (T416). Leibniz thus
holds that if there had been two or more possible worlds that were equally
unsurpassable then God would not have had a sufficient reason to choose
one over the other, and without a sufficient reason he would be unable to
make a choice. Consequently he would not have created anything. But of
course we know that he did create (as our world exists), so it must have
been the case that when surveying the range of possible worlds he found a
single best.
118
It might be thought that Leibniz would also be able to deduce that God
would choose the best possible world from the fact (affirmed in M46) that
God’s will operates according to the principle of the best, that is, that it
always aims at the perceived best. But in itself this is not enough to deduce
that God will create the best possible world, as if his wisdom is lacking then
it could be that what he perceives to be the best is not in fact the best, or if his
power is lacking then it could be that he is just not able to create the best. In
M55 Leibniz makes it clear that neither God’s wisdom nor power is lacking:
God’s perfect wisdom ensures that he knows which possible world is best,
and his perfect power ensures that he is able to produce it. Hence God will
have produced the best of all possible worlds. This is a good example of a
priori reasoning, in the sense of reasoning that runs from cause to effect, for
it is from a consideration of the nature of God alone (cause) that Leibniz
infers that this must be the best of all possible worlds (effect). Leibniz did
not think it was possible to argue in reverse, that is, from the fact that this
is the best of all possible worlds (effect) to the supreme perfection of God’s
nature (cause). This is because it is impossible for us to determine, through
experience, that ours is the best of all possible worlds. As Leibniz writes
in the Theodicy: ‘for can I know and can I represent infinities to you and
compare them together? But you must judge with me ab effectu [from the
outcome], since God has chosen this world as it is’ (T10).
God’s will is not unique in operating according to the principle of the
best, as according to Leibniz, all wills, even those of created beings, aim at
the perceived best course. Created beings do not always have a proper and
clear perception of what is truly best, however, which means that they can
and frequently do choose to act in ways that are less than the best. God is
not similarly hampered because his wisdom is perfect; this means that he
can never be ignorant of what is best or more perfect, and consequently
‘God cannot fall into error in choosing, and therefore always chooses what
is most fitting.’182
56. Now this interconnection, or this accommodation of all created things

to each other and of each to all the rest, means that each simple sub-
stance has relations which express all the others, and that consequently
it is a perpetual living mirror of the universe.
With its reference to the mutual adaptation of substances this seems to pick
up the threads from M52. The argument here is as follows: the fact that
182
MPE, p. 117.
119
monads are adapted to each other entails that each one is related to all of
the others; this relation will be expressed through its perceptions, presum-
ably because there is no other way it could be expressed. Consequently
every monad continually expresses every other monad, in such a way that
it is a ‘living mirror of the universe’.
Each monad is a perpetual mirror because it is itself a perpetual being (as
Leibniz established in M4 and M5). However, sometimes Leibniz reaches
this conclusion via a different argument, namely this: as souls (monads) are
by their nature mirrors of the universe, and the universe is perpetual, so
must souls be perpetual: (‘with each soul being a mirror of the universe in
its way, it is easy to conclude that each soul is as imperishable and incor-
ruptible as the universe itself’).183 This argument does not appear in the
Monadology, though in M77 Leibniz appears to have it in mind when he
describes the soul as ‘the mirror of an indestructible universe’. Leibniz was
very fond of the mirror metaphor, and repeated it often, mostly in writings
intended for himself,184 for very limited circulation,185 or letters to sympa-
thetic correspondents such as Electress Sophie,186 Nicole Remond,187 and
Pierre Dangicourt.188
In earlier writings, the claim that every single substance contains
within itself a ‘representation’ or ‘reflection’ of everything else in the
universe was taken to be a consequence of the ‘complete concept’ theory.
For if the concept of every substance is complete, then it will have to
contain predicates that spell out in complete detail the various relations
of that substance to all the other things outside of it. And of course when
any of these other things happens to change, these changes will have to be
reflected in that substance, its predicates changing to keep up with what
was going on outside of it. So with substances, ‘when a change occurs in
one, there follows some corresponding change in all the others’,189 and
consequently the states of one ‘mirror’ or ‘reflect’ the states of all the
others.
183
LTS, p. 347.
184
For example, TI, p. 554f: http://www.leibniz-translations.com/pascal.htm
185
For example, LTS, p. 290.
186
See LTS, p. 152.
187
See ‘Appendix on Monads’ (p. 279).
188
SLT, p. 54. It is interesting that the metaphor should be absent from important works
like the New Essays and the Theodicy, not to mention various journal articles that
Leibniz wrote in the early years of the eighteenth century. However it does appear in
at least one text written for publication, namely ‘Reply to the comments in the second
edition of M. Bayle’s Critical Dictionary, in the article “Rorarius”, concerning the
system of pre-established harmony’ (1702). See LNS, p. 111.
189
SLT, p. 51.
120
57. The same town, when looked at from different places, appears quite
different and is, as it were, multiplied in perspectives. In the same way
it happens that, because of the infinite multitude of simple substances,
there are just as many different universes, which are nevertheless
merely perspectives of a single universe according to the different
points of view of each monad.
Theodicy §147.
Leibniz now claims that each monad mirrors the entire universe from its
own unique perspective. He does not reveal his basis for this claim, but
it would seem to follow from the fact that no two monads are alike (M9)
and that they all mirror the same universe (M56), that each one must
mirror the universe differently. Each monad is thus a microcosm, that is,
the entire world in miniature, with each one perceiving or expressing the
world from its own particular point of view. Ultimately, the differences
in ‘perspective’ or ‘point of view’ enjoyed by each monad are nothing
more than differences in the relative distinctness and confusedness of each
monad’s perceptions of one and the same universe, as Leibniz will go on
to explain in M57. Nevertheless, it seems fair to say that the universe is
multiplied in each monad.
In M57 Leibniz affirms that there are an infinity of monads in the uni-
verse; this looks to be a natural consequence of M36, which established the
division of bodies to infinity and the ‘endless detail’ of the things of nature.
In 1712 a correspondent asked him why he believed there to be an infinity
of monads, and Leibniz offered two different reasons:
you ask why there is an actual infinity of monads. I respond that the possibility
of this will suffice to establish it, since it is obvious how bountiful the works of
God are. But the order of things demands the same thing; otherwise the phe-
nomena would not correspond to all assignable perceivers.190
58. And this is the means of obtaining as much variety as possible, but with
the greatest order possible; that is, it is the means of obtaining as much
perfection as possible.
Theodicy §120. §124. §241 and onwards.
§214. §243. §275.
We already know from M55 that God will choose to create the world with
the greatest amount of perfection, and now we discover that this is in fact
190
LDC, p. 277.
121
the world Leibniz has just described in M57, that is, the world containing
an infinity of monads all expressing the others from its own particular
point of view.
At first sight, Leibniz’s definition of perfection here as maximal variety
and the greatest order seems to sit uneasily with the definition of it that he
gave in M41, where he claimed that perfection is ‘nothing but quantity of
positive reality’. But on closer inspection the two definitions converge, and
are perhaps even alternative ways of saying the same thing. By ‘variety’
Leibniz is referring to things which differ in some way. Given that all
monads are different from each other (established in M9), maximal variety
will be achieved by creating as many monads as possible. As for ‘order’,
elsewhere Leibniz explains that
order is the relation of several things, through which any one of them can be
distinguished from any other.191
order is simply a distinctive relation of several things; confusion is where
several things are present, but there is no way of distinguishing one from
another.192
Order, then, is present in a collection of things where each thing is dis-

tinguishable from everything else. The greatest order would thus seem
to be a natural by-product of creating as many monads as possible, given
that every monad is different from every other. Maximal perfection is thus
obtained by the creation of as many (different) monads as possible; such
an act would also bring into being as much positive reality as possible too,
indicating that Leibniz’s two definitions of ‘perfection’ are not as radically
dissimilar as they may initially appear to be.
M58 suggests that Leibniz has a very ‘metaphysical’ understanding of
what constitutes a world’s perfection. His claim that our world is the most
perfect is easily (and often) derided on the basis that, for many creatures,
life is (in Thomas Hobbes’ famous expression) ‘nasty, brutish and short’.193
But to object to Leibniz this way is to miss his point entirely, as the hard-
ships and travails of the world’s creatures are not obviously inconsistent
with the world being perfect in Leibniz’s sense of the term, as containing
as many different monads as possible. In any case, as it happens Leibniz
also holds that the most perfect world in this metaphysical sense is also
the most perfect in a moral sense, and is that which ultimately offers the
191
Leibniz, Die Leibniz-Handschriften der Königlichen Öffentliche Hannover, ed. Eduard
Bodemann (Hanover: Hahn, 1895), p. 124.
192
LPW, p. 146.
193
Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan parts 1 and 2, revised edn, ed. A. P. Martinich and Brian
Battiste (London: Broadview, 2011), p. 124.
122
greatest advantage to rational creatures such as ourselves (the hardships of
this life notwithstanding). However this claim is made only much later; see
M85 and M90.
59. Also, this hypothesis (which I dare to say has been demonstrated) is
the only one which properly exalts the greatness of God. Mr Bayle rec-
ognised this, when in his Dictionary (article ‘Rorarius’) he made objec-
tions to it, in which he was even tempted to believe that I ascribed too
much to God, and more than is possible. But he could not put forward
any reason why this universal harmony, which ensures that each sub-
stance expresses exactly all the others through the relations it has to
them, should be impossible.
Leibniz is here referring to his theory of pre-established harmony, which

he has outlined in M49–52 and M56 (he will not actually refer to the
theory by that name until M78). Given that he believes his theory has
been demonstrated, it might seem odd that he should refer to it as a
‘hypothesis’, but in Leibniz’s day the French term ‘hypothese’ not only
meant ‘hypothesis’ (in the sense of an unproved theory which fits the facts)
but also ‘system’ (in the sense of a set of principles and doctrines which
one uses to explain phenomena), and it is in this sense that Leibniz uses
the term in M59. His bold claim that his system alone ‘properly exalts the
greatness of God’ has the potential to come across as rather hollow because
he does not identify any rival systems, let alone indicate how they fall
short in this regard. However it is likely that Leibniz has in mind here the
systems developed by Descartes, Malebranche, and Spinoza, as he has a
tendency to see these as his main rivals, and he commonly complains that
each fails to do proper justice to God. He alleges that both Descartes and
Spinoza rob God of justice and goodness, the former by making God act
arbitrarily (a complaint already made in M46), the latter by making him
act out of necessity,194 and complains of Malebranche that he has God
act with less than perfect wisdom, because he supposes that God, as the
only causal agent in Malebranche’s occasionalist system, constantly has to
intervene in the world, with each intervention counting as the performance
of a miracle.195 Leibniz believed that his own system suffered from none
of these flaws, and in fact showed the true extent of God’s greatness. This
was acknowledged (perhaps ironically) by Bayle in the second edition of his
Dictionnaire historique et critique (1702), in which he expanded the article
194
See, for example, A II 1 (2nd edn), p. 786.
195
See, for example, SLT, p. 74.
123
‘Rorarius’, adding a further note (L) devoted entirely to Leibniz’s theory.
There he wrote:
We are indebted to Leibniz for it [sc. the pre-established harmony]; and there
is nothing else we can imagine that gives so exalted an idea of the intelligence
and power of the Author of all things. This . . . would make me prefer this
theory to that of the Cartesians, if I could conceive some possibility in the way
of ‘pre-established harmony.’196
We know that Leibniz was proud of Bayle’s verdict that no other theory
offered such an exalted idea of God because he often enthusiastically
reported it to his correspondents (usually breezing over Bayle’s charge of
impossibility in the process).197 In doing so he clearly believed that Bayle
had identified an attractive feature of the pre-established harmony that
rival theories could not match.
Leibniz’s complaint in M59, that Bayle ‘could not put forward any
reason why this universal harmony . . . should be impossible’, is rather
puzzling because Bayle in fact put forward a number of such reasons. In
the first of these, Bayle claimed that Leibniz’s theory ‘raises the power and
intelligence of divine art above what we can conceive’,198 in other words,
that it demands more of God than he could achieve. Bayle illustrates his
charge using the example of a ship which steers itself successfully for
several years, avoiding rocks and other dangers, despite having no sensa-
tion or knowledge. Bayle claims that ‘the ship’s nature is not capable of
receiving this power [sc. of self-direction] from God. However, what
Leibniz supposes about the mechanisms of the human body is more
wonderful and more surprising than all of this’.199 Bayle then proceeds to
show some of the ‘surprising’ things that, according to Leibniz’s theory,
the human body is able to do. For example, he claims that on Leibniz’s
theory, Caesar’s body would have carried out all of its acts (such as attend-
ing senate at such and such a day and time) even if God had annihilated
Caesar’s soul. This, according to Bayle, is simply incomprehensible.200
Bayle alleges that further problems for Leibniz’s theory emerge when one
focuses on what the theory says about happenings in the soul. Suppose, for
196
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, III, p. 2610 (article ‘Rorarius’, note L)/
Historical and Critical Dictionary, p. 245.
197
For example, see G III, p. 336: http://www.leibniz-translations.com/masham.htm
198
199
200
124
example, that as an infant Caesar had been pricked by a pin immediately
after having been suckled; in such a case, because of the causal independ-
ence of substances, Caesar’s soul would have experienced the sweetness
of milk at one moment and the sensation of pain in the next, despite the
fact that nothing had acted upon it. This, according to Bayle, violates the
principle that a thing always remains in the same state unless something
else acts on it.201 In these cases, and others, Bayle explicitly states that the
objection shows Leibniz’s theory to be impossible. Upon reading these
objections in 1702 Leibniz put together a detailed response (which was
not published until 1716). He was unconvinced by Bayle’s efforts to show
his theory to be impossible, suggesting that Bayle had confused what was
impossible (that is, involved a contradiction) with what was merely sur-
prising: ‘I want to see [from Bayle] some positive argument which leads
me to some contradiction, or the denial of some established truth. It would
be no objection just to say that it is surprising.’202 Given that he had pre-
pared a point-by-point response to Bayle’s objections and therefore clearly
knew that they sought to show his theory to be impossible, it is odd to find
Leibniz claiming in M59 that Bayle ‘could not put forward any reason why
[the pre-established harmony] should be impossible’. The two most likely
explanations are (a) Leibniz had forgotten the substance of Bayle’s objec-
tions in the years between 1702 and 1714, or (b) his remark in M59 means
only that he did not consider Bayle’s objections to be successful in showing
the theory to be impossible.
60. Moreover, evident in what I have just said are the a priori reasons why
things could not happen in a different way. For since God, in organising
the whole, had regard for each part, and particularly for each monad,
and since a monad’s nature is to represent, nothing can limit it to rep-
resenting just a part of things. However, it is true that its representation
is merely confused as to the detail of the whole universe, and can be
distinct only for a small part of things, that is, those which are either
the nearest or the largest in relation to each of the monads, other-
wise each monad would be a divinity. It is not in the object, but in the
modification of the knowledge of the object, that monads are limited.
They all go confusedly to infinity, to the whole, but they are limited and
distinguished by the degrees of their distinct perceptions.
201
202
LNS, p. 118.
125
Leibniz here offers a new argument for the claim that every monad rep-
resents the whole universe. It is, we are told, the nature of the monad to
represent, and so nothing can restrict them from representing everything.
The argument has three distinct steps, the first of which is not made
explicit in M60:
1. If it is in the nature of a monad to represent then it will represent every-
thing unless restricted in some way from doing so.
This is an assumption which Leibniz does not make explicit when
laying out his argument.
2. It is the nature of the monad to represent.
This is what Leibniz established earlier, in M13–14, and is affirmed
elsewhere too.203
3. Nothing can restrict a monad from representing.
If we consider a single monad and ask what could possibly restrict it
from representing everything, there look to be two possible answers.
First, another created monad (or set of monads) might somehow
restrict it from representing; we can rule this out on the basis that
monads do not causally interact (see M7), so there is no way for one
monad to restrict the nature or operation of another. Second, God
might restrict it from representing everything; presumably God, being
omnipotent, can restrict a monad’s natural tendency to represent, but
there is no reason to think that he will do so. Hence this step in the
argument perhaps should be revised to say that ‘Nothing will restrict a
monad from representing.’
The argument leads to the conclusion that each monad represents the
whole universe. The conclusion itself is counter-intuitive, inasmuch as you
and I do not seem to be perceiving the whole universe at all, just a small
part of it, that is, generally whatever is close to us. Leibniz’s response to
this is to say that it seems this way only because we are supposing our per-
ception of the universe to be exhausted by our distinct perceptions. Yet as
Leibniz has already explained, these are only a very tiny percentage of all of
the perceptions we have: many of our perceptions are not distinct at all, but
confused, and the vast majority of our perceptions are so small that they
lie below the threshold of consciousness. Consequently it is not surprising
that it should seem to us as though we are perceiving only a small part of
the universe rather than the whole.
Leibniz then draws a distinction between the object of perception and
203
For example, LTS, p. 346: ‘Your Electoral Highness asks me what a simple substance
is. I reply that its nature is to have perception, and consequently to represent composite
things.’
126
the mode of perception. For any given monad, the object of perception is
every other monad, that is, the entire world of monads. So each monad
perceives the whole. But their mode of perception differs, that is, each
monad differs in how they perceive the whole, or rather in how distinctly
they perceive each of its parts. What distinguishes one monad from another
is the distinctness of perceptions they have (this develops the claim made
in M57). However, being created monads, their perceptions are always
confused to some extent; a created monad never has distinct perceptions
alone, otherwise it would be God. So it is the fact that we have confused
perceptions that distinguishes us from God.
The claim that all monads perceive the whole, albeit confusedly, is
sometimes called the doctrine of confused omniscience. The most well-
known expression of it is to be found in PNG13: ‘Each soul knows the
infinite, knows everything, but confusedly.’
61. And in this, compounds are analogous to simples. For the whole is
a plenum, which makes all matter interconnected, and in a plenum
every movement has some effect on distant bodies in proportion to
their distance, such that each body is affected not only by those which
touch it, and in some way feels the effect of everything that happens to
them, but also by means of them it is affected by those which touch the
former ones, the ones which directly touch it. From this it follows that
this communication extends indefinitely. Consequently every body is
affected by everything that happens in the universe, so much so that
the one who sees all could read in each body what is happening every-
where, and even what has happened or will happen, by observing in
the present that which is remote both in time and space: σὕμπνοια
πάντα, as Hippocrates said.204 But a soul can read in itself only what
is distinctly represented there; it cannot unfold all at once all that is
folded within it, for this proceeds to infinity.
Leibniz’s attention now switches from monads (simples) to compounds, by

which he means the physical things of the world of everyday experience.
As noted earlier, Leibniz’s position in the Monadology is that a compound
‘is nothing but an accumulation or aggregate of simples’ (M2), where an
aggregate is understood not as a mere grouping or cluster of simples,
but as a grouping or cluster of simples which are united, or aggregated,
by a mind, on the basis of the connections between them. With this in
mind, Leibniz now argues that the interconnectedness of all things is not
204
‘all things conspire’.
127
restricted to the level of monads, but is also a feature of the physical world,
there thus being a clear parallel between the two levels of reality. At the
level of the physical world, we are told that this interconnectedness comes
about because the universe is a plenum, that is, full, which means that there
is no empty space between bodies. Hence when one body moves, it pushes
against its neighbours, which in turn push against their neighbours, and
so on, with the motion of the first body rippling through to every other,
like a universe of infinite dominoes. But while all bodies push against each
other, or rather, transmit motion to their neighbours, the effect decreases
with distance, so the further apart any two bodies are the less effect their
changes will have on the other. Of course there is not just a single wave
of motion which ripples through from one body to every other, but many
such waves operating at the same time, in fact an infinite number of them.
There is thus a continuous transmission of motion from one body to the
next, with each body registering the effect of every other body.
While M61 paints a picture of a world of compounds transmitting
motion or exchanging force, it is worth remembering that Leibniz ulti-
mately denied causal interaction between simples (M7), and since com-
pounds are accumulations of simples (M2), it follows that there can be no
causal interaction between compounds either. Yet Leibniz is happy to talk
of interaction at the level of compounds as it fits with appearances, that is,
preserves our ordinary ways of speaking.205 He has already explained (in
M49–52) what he means by terms like ‘action’, and how influence between
monads is only ideal.
62. Thus although each created monad represents the whole universe, it
represents more distinctly the body which is particularly affected by it,
and whose entelechy it is. And because this body expresses the whole
universe through the interconnection of all matter in the plenum, the
soul also represents the whole universe by representing this body,
which belongs to it in a particular way.
Theodicy §400.
The question of how souls relate to bodies is here answered: each soul is
associated with a particular body, which qualifies as its body by virtue of
the fact that the soul represents it more distinctly than it does anything
else. Taking Pete to be a soul, then, what makes Pete’s body his body
is the fact that the monads of which it is composed are more distinctly
represented by his soul than are those of any other body.
205
128
There is some looseness in the language of M62 which could easily
lead to misinterpretations. We should exercise caution about two claims in
particular. The first is that a monad represents more distinctly ‘the body
which is particularly affected by it’. The use of ‘affect’ could suggest causal
interaction between body and soul. Although Leibniz is happy to allow
talk of causality at the level of bodies – consider what he said in M61 about
bodies touching each other and mutually communicating motion – he does
not accept that there is any causality between bodies and souls, that is,
between compounds and simples. So the soul cannot causally interact with
the body, or vice versa. In this context ‘affected’ should be taken to mean
‘connected’ or ‘associated’ (which is in line with the meaning of the verb
‘affecter’ in Leibniz’s day).
The other part of this passage we should be careful of is the final clause:
the phrasing here might lead one to suppose that Leibniz is claiming that
the reason why one monad represents every other is because its body is
affected by every other body. If so, this would reverse the proper order of
explanation, because he holds that bodies (and their properties) are in some
way explained by monads (and their properties), not vice versa.
63. The body belonging to a monad, which is its entelechy or soul, con-
stitutes together with the entelechy what may be called a living thing,
and with the soul what is called an animal. Now this body of a living
thing or animal is always organic; for since every monad is in its way a
mirror of the universe, and the universe is regulated in a perfect order,
it must be the case that there is also an order in whatever represents
it, that is, in the perceptions of the soul, and consequently in the body,
in accordance with which the universe is represented in it.
Theodicy §403.
Leibniz starts with two definitions: (1) the combination of an entelechy

(that is, a bare monad) and its body make a living thing, and (2) the
combination of a soul and its body make an animal. Then follows an argu-
ment that is designed to show that the body of living things and animals
is organic. But what does Leibniz mean by ‘organic’? In his day it was
common for the term to be applied to things which had organs, whether
living or not. Leibniz, however, takes it to refer to something with infi-
nitely structured organs, for example in PNG3 he states that a body is
organic ‘when it forms a kind of automaton or natural machine, which is
a machine not only as a whole, but also in its smallest observable parts’.
In other words, a body is organic when it has organs, and its parts have
organs, and their parts have organs, and so on ad infinitum. In another text,
129
Leibniz refers to an ‘organic machine’ as one ‘having infinite recesses’.206
For Leibniz, then, the term ‘organic’ is applied to that which has nested
organisation, or rather, infinitely nested organisation. Hence his argument
that bodies are always organic is designed to show that bodies have such
infinitely nested organisation. The argument itself is not straightforward.
It starts with Leibniz noting that every monad represents the universe
(established in M56), and then claiming that the universe is regulated in a
perfect order, which in all likelihood is an allusion to Leibniz’s view (estab-
lished in M57) that the universe consists of an infinite series of monads,
each of which differs from every other in terms of perception and therefore
perfection. Because of the representative nature of both soul and body, the
order inherent in this infinite series will be reproduced not just in the per-
ceptions of each soul (established in M60), but also in the structure of each
body, which therefore itself has a nested organisation, in the sense of being
ordered in each of its infinite parts. And this of course makes it organic.
64. Thus each organic body of a living thing is a kind of divine machine,
or natural automaton, which infinitely surpasses all artificial automata,
because a machine which is made by the art of man is not a machine in
each of its parts; for example, the tooth of a brass wheel has parts or
fragments which are no longer artificial as far as we are concerned, and
no longer have anything about them to indicate the machine for whose
use the wheel was intended. But the machines of nature, that is, living
bodies, are still machines in their smallest parts, to infinity. It is in this
that the difference between nature and art consists, that is, between
divine art and ours.
Theodicy §134. §146. §194. §483.
The findings of M63 allow Leibniz to draw a clear distinction between

the productions of God and those of man: God’s machines have infinite
complexity, each part being itself a machine consisting of parts and so on,
whereas manmade machines have only finite complexity. The most organ-
ised of manmade machines will contain some parts which are themselves
machines, but as we work our way down we quickly get to parts which are
not. For example a computer contains parts such as a processor, memory
chips, and a hard drive, which are themselves machines, and these in turn
may contain parts which are also machines, but eventually we get down to
the level of parts which are not machines, such as bits of plastic or metal
or silicon.
206
LTS, p. 274.
130
65. And the author of nature was able to practise this divine and infinitely
marvellous craftsmanship because each portion of matter is not only
divisible to infinity, as the ancients recognised, but also actually subdi-
vided without end, each part into further parts, each of which one has
some motion of its own: otherwise it would be impossible for each
portion of matter to be able to express the whole universe.
Theodicy §195.
The infinite subdivision of matter would follow from the fact that the
bodies composed of matter are organic, that is, have infinitely nested
organisation, which Leibniz established in M64. However here he opts to
establish the infinite subdivision of matter in a different way. The central
claim of his argument is that matter could not express the infinite complex-
ity of the universe (as M61 showed that it does) unless it too were infinitely
complex. And for matter to be infinitely complex means not only that it
be infinitely divisible, but actually subject to infinite subdivision as well.
Hence matter actually is infinitely subdivided.
Leibniz’s remark that ‘the ancients recognised’ the infinite subdivision
of matter is intended as an appeal to authority. He probably had in mind
Aristotle, who claimed in the Physics that matter is infinitely divisible.207 It
is often suggested that philosophers of the early modern period were much
less inclined than their forebears to appeal to the traditional authorities
(such as Aristotle and the Bible) when advancing their theories, preferring
instead to ground their theories in empirical investigation and the use of
reason.208 While it is true that early modern philosophers tended not to
use appeals to authority exclusively, it was nevertheless not uncommon for
them to make such appeals to support a theory that could also boast empir-
ical or rational support. Leibniz certainly saw value in appealing to author-
ity whenever he felt it would enhance his case. Such appeals also serve a
defensive function: in an age which still frowned upon unorthodoxy, and
was suspicious of ‘novelty’ and ‘innovation’ (both pejorative terms at the
time), philosophers wishing to advance new theories often found it benefi-
cial to show how aspects of those theories were in line with the views held
by respected authorities, such as the ancients. In any case, Leibniz’s appeal
to ‘the ancients’ is somewhat disingenuous, as he was well aware that some
of the ancients, such as the atomists Leucippus and Democritus, had denied
207
Aristotle, Physics, 231b10–13, in The Complete Works, I, p. 391.
208
See for example Douglas J. Soccio, Archetypes of Wisdom: An Introduction to Philosophy
(Belmont: Wadsworth, 2010, 7ed), p. 247 and p. 272.
131
the infinite divisibility of matter. Clearly he considered this to be unworthy
of mention.
It is worth noting that the world Leibniz presents us with exemplifies
what Pascal had called a ‘double infinity’,209 that is, an infinity above us and
below us, for whether we consider the macro level or the micro level, what
we are faced with is infinity: ‘all matter is organic everywhere, and that,
however small a portion one takes, it contains representatively, by virtue
of the actual decreasing to infinity that it encloses, the actual increasing to
infinity which is outside it in the universe’.210 While Pascal was humbled
by the contemplation of the infinite above him and below him,211 Leibniz
took great delight in it. Indeed, in one writing on the subject, Leibniz’s
language approaches that of the ecstatic: ‘What an infinity of infinities
infinitely replicated, what a world, what a universe perceptible in any
assignable corpuscle.’212
66. From this it is evident that there is a world of created things – living
things, animals, entelechies, souls – in the least part of matter.
The idea expressed here is sometimes referred to as the ‘worlds within

worlds’ doctrine. Leibniz takes it to follow from the claim in M65 that
matter is infinitely subdivided. However, although he does not mention it
in the Monadology, Leibniz also held that this doctrine could be empirically
corroborated. He writes, for example, that ‘microscopes make us see, in the
smallest atom, a new world of innumerable creatures’.213 This is a reference
to the findings of one of the first microscopists, Antony van Leeuwenhoek
(1632–1723), who discovered in saliva and water droplets a whole world
of microorganisms which he called ‘animalcules’ (which literally means
‘little animals’). Leibniz met Leeuwenhoek in 1676, and very likely became
acquainted with the latter’s research then. In a number of subsequent
writings he claimed that Leeuwenhoek’s findings corroborated the ‘worlds
within worlds’ doctrine, for example, he wrote to one correspondent that
‘Mr. Leewenhoek has shown’ that there is ‘an infinity of small animals in
the least drop of water’.214
209
Pascal, Pensées and Other Writings, trans. Honor Levi, ed. Anthony Levi (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 68.
210
TI, p. 554: http://www.leibniz-translations.com/pascal.htm
211
See Pascal, Pensées, pp. 66–72.
212
TI, p. 554: http://www.leibniz-translations.com/pascal.htm
213
A VI 4, pp. 952–3.
214
PPL, p. 345. Nicolas Malebranche entertained similar ideas, speculating on the basis
of the microscopists’ discoveries that ‘perhaps there are in nature things smaller
132
67. Each portion of matter may be conceived as a garden full of plants, and
as a pond full of fish. But each branch of a plant, each limb of an animal,
each drop of its humours, is also such a garden or such a pond.
This is the same ‘worlds within worlds’ doctrine found in M66, this time
presented as a simile.
68. And although the earth and the air interspersed between the plants in
the garden, or the water interspersed between the fish in the pond,
are not themselves plant or fish, yet they still contain them, though
more often than not of a subtlety imperceptible to us.
This is a consequence of the ‘worlds within worlds’ doctrine presented

in M66–7: even those parts of matter which might at first seem not to be
organic, such as the intervening matter between the plants in a garden
or the fish in a pond, in fact contain living bodies, albeit ones that are so
small that we cannot see them. The implication, which Leibniz goes on to
draw in M69, is that every part of matter is full of living bodies. Future
research, he believed, would reveal this directly: ‘I strongly favour inquiry
into analogies: more and more of them of them are going to be yielded by
plants, insects and the comparative anatomy of animals, especially as the
microscope continues to be used more than it has been.’215
In some texts, Leibniz argues that there is life in every part of matter
via his principle of uniformity, which holds that ‘it is always and everywhere
in all things just as it is here’,216 in other words, that the things we do not
experience are fundamentally like those that we do. Among other things,
this would lead us to suppose that faraway things are like nearby things,
and the microscopic is like the macroscopic, since we should recognise ‘in
substances beyond our sight and observation something parallel to what we
see in those which are within our range’.217 Now our experience reveals to
us bodies possessing life and perception, and on the basis of the principle of
uniformity it follows that ‘this part of matter which composes these bodies
would be too privileged if it alone had this advantage; thus . . . there is life
and perception everywhere’.218
and smaller to infinity, standing in that extreme proportion of man to mite’. This,
Malebranche suggested, would be in keeping with ‘the idea we have of an infinite crafts-
man’. See Malebranche’s The Search after Truth, p. 26.
215
NE, p. 473.
216
LTS, p. 312; cf. LNS, p. 205; PPL, p. 590.
217
LNS, p. 204.
218
LTS, p. 312.
133
69. Thus there is nothing uncultivated, nothing sterile, nothing dead in
the universe, no chaos, no confusions, except in appearance. This is
somewhat like what is apparent with a pond viewed from a distance,
in which we see a confused motion and swarming of the pond’s fish
without making out the fish themselves.
Theodicy. Preface ***5b, ****b
From the existence of life in every part of matter (affirmed in M66 and
M68) it follows both that there is nothing dead in the universe, and that
there is nothing disordered in the universe. Where there seems to be
something inert, or disordered (Leibniz appears to equate the two), it is
only so because our perception of it is confused. If we could get ourselves
into a position where our perception was distinct, we would find that what
seemed dead or disordered it is in fact full of life and fully ordered.
The claim that there is nothing without life in the universe is one that
Leibniz made often,219 and in an early text from 1676 he also argued that
it ‘is the only opinion worthy of the supreme creator of things, who has
bequeathed us nothing sterile, nothing fallow, nothing unadorned’.220 It
is likely that he continued to hold this view when writing the Monadology:
see M64–5.
70. From this we see that each living body has a dominant entelechy, which
in the animal is the soul; but the limbs of this living body are full of other
living things – plants, animals – each of which also has its dominant
entelechy or soul.
The language here (‘From this we see . . .’) would suggest that Leibniz
takes the claims made in M70 to follow from what was said in M69.
However that is implausible. Leibniz’s assertion that ‘each living body has
a dominant entelechy’ follows from M62, which claimed that an animal’s
soul represents its body more distinctly than it does other things. The
connection is not immediately apparent because Leibniz does not explain
what makes an entelechy dominant (this is true not just of the Monadology
but also of many other texts in which he speaks of dominant monads or
entelechies). However, in a letter to Barthélémy des Bosses (1668–1738)
he explains that ‘considered in terms of the monads themselves, domina-
tion and subordination consist only in degrees of perception’.221 Hence a
219
See, for example, PPL, p. 348; PE, p. 171; NE, p. 72.
220
Leibniz, The Labyrinth of the Continuum, p. 211.
221
LDC, p. 257.
134
particular entelechy or soul is dominant in a living body inasmuch as it
possesses perceptions that are more distinct than those enjoyed by all the
other entelechies or souls in that body.
The second claim in M70, namely that the limbs of a living body are
full of other living things, follows from the series of claims made in M63
and M65–6. In M63 Leibniz claimed that a living creature consists of a
monad (entelechy) and a body, and then showed that its body is always
organic, that is, one that has infinitely nested organisation. In M65 he
showed that this was made possible by the infinite subdivision of matter,
and in M66 drew the conclusion that there is a world of creatures in the
smallest parts of matter (the ‘worlds within worlds’ doctrine). From that
it follows that the limbs of a living body, being made of matter, are full
of other living things. Hence we now have a more nuanced account of a
living creature than that given in M63: strictly speaking, a living creature
consists of a dominant entelechy and a body which in turn consists of
other living creatures, each consisting of a dominant entelechy and a
body, and so on. Although it is not immediately apparent, Leibniz takes
the dominant monad to serve as the living creature’s principle of unity,
that is, that which brings together all of the parts of which its body is
composed and makes it one.
71. But there is no need to suppose, as have some who have misunder-
stood my thought, that each soul has a mass or portion of matter of
its own, or allotted to it forever, and that it consequently possesses
other inferior living things which are forever destined to serve it. For
all bodies are in a perpetual flux, like rivers, and parts are continually
entering and leaving them.
Developing the claim of M70, Leibniz now argues that while a dominant
entelechy always remains embodied, its body is subject to continual change
such that no part of the body is permanently united to the entelechy. This
corrects the mistaken view of Bayle: in note H of the Dictionnaire article
‘Rorarius’, Bayle claimed that Leibniz’s theory entailed that each soul
retains the same body forever:
Leibniz’ hypothesis . . . leads us to believe, (1) that God, at the beginning of
the world, created the forms of all bodies and, hence, all the souls of beasts,
(2) that these souls have existed since that time, inseparably united to the first
organized body in which God placed them.222
222
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, III, p. 2607 (article ‘Rorarius’, note H)/
Historical and Critical Dictionary, p. 236. In his private jottings on Bayle’s note H,
135
But why does Leibniz reject the suggestion that an animal retain the same
body throughout its existence? Apparently because he accepts the ancient
doctrine of perpetual flux, often attributed to Heraclitus. According to
Plato, ‘Heraclitus says somewhere that “everything gives way and nothing
stands fast,” and, likening the things that are to the flowing of a river, he
says that “you cannot step into the same river twice”.’223 Leibniz gives no
grounds for his endorsement of the Heraclitean doctrine of perpetual flux,
and it would not seem to follow automatically from his earlier claim that
every substance is subject to constant change (M10).
Although Leibniz here dismisses the thought that a soul may remain
forever united to a particular piece of matter, this was a view he had
endorsed in his youth, in the doctrine of the flos substantiae, or ‘flower of
substance’.224 The doctrine held that a person’s soul was implanted into
a tiny piece of matter no bigger than a mathematical point (the ‘flower of
substance’), which during life was located in the centre of the brain. After
death, the soul remained attached to its flower of substance, and while the
rest of the body would be destroyed – by fire, decomposition, devouring,
and so on – the soul in its flower of substance remained indestructible,
the indestructibility being guaranteed by the fact that the flower of sub-
stance was a mathematical point: ‘a point is indivisible and so cannot be
destroyed. So let the body be burned up and dispersed into all corners of
the world – the mind will persevere safe and sound in its point. For who
will be able to burn a point?’225 Leibniz abandoned the flos substantiae doc-
trine long before he came to write the Monadology; the last mention of it in
his writings is in 1686.226
72. Thus the soul only changes body bit by bit and by degrees, so that it
is never stripped of all its organs all at once. In animals there is often
metamorphosis, but never metempsychosis or transmigration of souls;
neither are there any entirely separate souls, nor genies without bodies.
God alone is entirely detached from body.
Leibniz wrote: ‘It is not that a certain mass always remains inseparable from the animal
or the soul, but rather that certain organs always remain, at least by the substitution of
an equivalent, as happens when a river remains the same, although matter of the same
kind is always entering and leaving it.’ LNS, p. 75.
223
Plato, Cratylus 402a, in Plato: Complete Works, p. 120.
224
See Lloyd Strickland, ‘Leibniz, “the flower of substance,” and the resurrection of the
same body’, The Philosophical Forum 40:3 (2009), pp. 391–410.
225
A II 1 (2nd edn), p. 181.
226
See A VI 4, p. 2454.
136
The claims made here are a straightforward consequence of what has come
before. In M71 we learned that bodies are subject to constant change in
terms of their composition. That this should happen by degrees follows
from Leibniz’s claim in M13 that all natural change happens by degrees.
Leibniz then explains that this gradual change in bodily composition is
consistent with metamorphosis, that is, a change of form, as would occur
in the transformation of caterpillar to butterfly, for example. So even here,
where the overall change is quite dramatic, the living body undergoes a
gradual change of parts. The fact that a soul changes its body by degrees
also rules out the possibility of metempsychosis, that is, the transmigration
of the soul. After all, metempsychosis would involve the soul suddenly
‘jumping’ from one body to another, which is tantamount to saying that
all the parts of a soul’s body are replaced at once. This conflicts with the
conclusion Leibniz has just drawn, namely that a soul changes its body by
degrees.
Leibniz then insists that created souls always retain a body (even though
its constituent parts are constantly changing). So there are no disembodied
souls. This contradicts the position of Aquinas (1225–74), who held that
human souls could exist in a disembodied state following separation from
the body.227 Leibniz does not here reveal his reasons for rejecting this, but
in other texts we can find two distinct arguments. The first states that souls
without bodies would be incomplete.228 For, as created beings, they are
necessarily imperfect, and hence a mixture of active and passive, with the
body serving as its passive principle, that is, its limitation.229 Hence every
created soul is necessarily accompanied by an organic body, and only God
is able to enjoy disembodied existence. A second reason Leibniz sometimes
offers for his rejection of disembodied souls is based on the need for order
and harmony. Souls are connected not just to their own bodies but to
everything else, since the least change in one body ripples through to affect
all of the others (see M62ff); the end result is a perfect order between all the
parts of the created universe. But this would not be the case if there were
disembodied souls, as such souls would cease to be connected to the rest of
the world, and hence not be part of the universal order instituted by God.
As God would not permit such a disharmonious state of affairs to obtain, it
follows that there can be no disembodied souls, except for God, who alone
stands outside of the universal order: ‘God alone is above all matter, since
he is its Author. But creatures free or freed from matter would be at the
227
See Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, Q.75, Art. 2, ad.
228
See for example, LNS, p. 219.
229
See SLT, p. 65.
137
same time detached from the universal connection, and like deserters from
the general order.’230
Often when discussing his rejection of disembodied souls Leibniz
would claim that his thinking was in line with the teaching of the
Church Fathers, who had granted bodies even to angels.231 His appeal
to the authority of the Fathers in this matter may well be due to the fact
that he knew that respected figures such as Aquinas and Descartes had
accepted the existence of disembodied souls: in endorsing the contrary
position, Leibniz felt obliged to offer more than just arguments. By
reminding his readers of the theological pedigree of his own position,
Leibniz hoped it would be taken more seriously than might otherwise
have been the case.
73. It is also on account of this that there is never true generation, nor
perfect death, taken in the rigorous sense of the term as consisting in
the separation of the soul from the body. And what we call generation
is development and growth, just as what we call death is enfolding and
diminishing.
By insisting that souls are never separated from a body (M72), Leibniz
is able to rule out both the true generation and death of a living creature.
Traditionally, death was understood to be the separation of the soul from
the body,232 and clearly if souls are never separated from a body then
they do not die. By parity of argument, absolute generation, understood
as the joining of a soul with a body, does not occur either, because the
soul is always joined to a body. Rather than retire the terms ‘generation’
and ‘death’, Leibniz revises their meaning: generation is now taken to
be the process whereby a soul’s body grows and develops (for example
in childhood), while death is generation in reverse, that is, the process
whereby a soul’s body shrinks and becomes less developed (for example in
decomposition).
74. Philosophers have been greatly puzzled about the origin of forms,
entelechies, or souls. But today, when detailed studies of plants, insects,
and animals have shown that the organic bodies of nature are never
produced from chaos or from putrefaction but always through seeds,
230
PPL, p. 590 (translation modified).
231
See, for example, PE, p. 170; G III, p. 457.
232
See, for example, Plato, Phaedo 64c, in Plato: Complete Works, p. 56.
138
in which there was doubtless some preformation, it has been concluded
not only that the organic body was already there before conception,
but also that there was a soul in this body. In a word, it has been con-
cluded that the animal itself was already there, and that by means of
conception this animal has been merely made ready for a great trans-
formation in order to become an animal of another kind. Even outside
generation, something similar is observed when maggots become flies,
and caterpillars become butterflies.
Preface ***5b and following pages.
§90. §187. §188. §403.
§86. §397.
In the Theodicy Leibniz explains the three traditional theories which

sought to explain the origin of souls: (1) pre-existence, which held that
souls existed elsewhere before being joined to a body and born into this
world; (2) traduction, which held that the souls of children were produced
from the souls of parents, just as one flame is started from another; (3)
eduction, which held that souls are created from the power of matter
alone.233 (We would today term the third theory spontaneous generation.) To
these was added a fourth theory in the seventeenth century: preformation-
ism. This theory held that all living things develop from miniature ver-
sions of themselves which existed in the semen of the parents.234 Birth was
simply the enlargement of these animalcules or homunculi (little humans).
The preformationist theory was boosted by Leeuwenhoek’s discovery of
spermatozoa in 1677, and developed further by the observations of Jan
Swammerdam (1637–80) and Marcello Malpighi (1628–94). Leibniz was
a keen adherent, and on the back of the evidence adduced by the micros-
copists he stated that ‘it is doubtful that an entirely new animal is ever
produced but that living animals as well as plants already exist in miniature
in the seeds before conception’.235 He followed Malebranche in envisioning
all living things as being nested inside each other at the moment of crea-
tion, like Russian dolls, such that all animals (men included) that were to
develop throughout the course of the universe were present as animalcules
in the semen of all previous generations of animals. Aside from the evi-
dence from microscopists, Leibniz also found support for preformationism
233
H, p. 170f.
234
A rival version of the theory – endorsed by Malebranche among others – held that
preformed animals were held in the female ova rather than the male sperm. Leibniz
rejected this on the grounds that ‘the ovaries have not yet shown anything animated’. G
III, p. 564.
235
PPL, p. 589.
139
in the Bible; the theory, he claimed, ‘is sufficiently in accordance with Holy
Scriptures, which insinuate that seeds have existed from the beginning’.236
For Leibniz, then, conception does not mark the beginning of the
animal (or indeed the soul), but rather the start of its development from
animalcule to animal proper, which is merely a particular stage of its exist-
ence rather than the beginning of its existence. Such great transformations
are not limited to conception and birth, however, as we also see caterpillars
transforming into butterflies and worms (presumably larvae) transforming
into flies. Leibniz sometimes suggests that these transformations we can see
should alert us to the existence of those transformations that we cannot see:
‘nature shows us . . . the transformation of caterpillars and other insects
. . . to make us deduce that there are transformations everywhere’.237
75. Animals, some of which are raised by means of conception to the level
of larger animals, may be called spermatic. But those of them which
remain in their own kind, namely the majority of them, are born,
multiply, and are destroyed like the large animals, and there are only a
chosen few which pass through to a greater stage.
In Leibniz’s day, ‘spermatic’ did not mean (as it does now for us) ‘relating
to sperm’ but rather ‘relating to seed’ (indeed, our word ‘sperm’ originally
meant ‘seed’). Hence a spermatic animal is literally a seed animal, that is,
an animal that exists (or once existed) in seed form. Leibniz held that all
animals are seed animals.
A key claim of M75 is that animals have their own lifecycles: they
begin as seeds, many then grow into larger animals after conception, then
reproduce and die (in the sense of becoming smaller again). The process is
the same no matter how large or small the seed animal happens to be. This
is perhaps not such an odd thought, given that the microscopic organisms
recognised today, such as bacteria and viruses, are held to have their own
lifecycles of generation, growth, reproduction, and death.
A second key claim in M75 is that while most seed-animals remain in
their own kind throughout the lifecycle, a small number do not, and go
on to enjoy a higher status. Leibniz’s remarks about this here are rather
cryptic, but seem to foreshadow what he will go on to say in M82 about
human souls. There he will claim that, prior to conception, human souls
are no different from animal souls, but at the moment of conception they
236
LTS, p. 285. Leibniz is presumably thinking here of Genesis 1.11–12, in which God
creates seed-bearing plants.
237
LTS, p. 285.
140
are suddenly elevated to the rank of rational souls (minds). Human souls
thus undergo a change in kind (from animal to human), while all other
souls remain in their own kind.
76. But this is only half the truth. I have therefore concluded that if the
animal never begins naturally, neither does it end naturally, and that not
only will there be no generation, but also no complete destruction, or
death, in the rigorous sense of the word. And these arguments, which
are a posteriori and drawn from experience, agree perfectly with the
principles I deduced a priori above.
Theodicy §90.
In M73 Leibniz gave an a priori argument for the claim that there is no
true generation, and immediately afterwards, in M74, he offered a poste-
riori grounds for it, appealing to the researches of the microscopists and
the theory of preformationism that grew out of their observations. Hence
Leibniz thought it possible to offer a priori and a posteriori grounds for the
claim that animals never begin naturally.
But what about the second claim, that there is no true death, and that
what we think of as death is merely the envelopment and diminution of an
animal? Leibniz offered a priori grounds for this claim in M73, but does
not attempt to give parallel a posteriori grounds for it. This is unsurpris-
ing, given that there was no more observational evidence in its favour in
Leibniz’s day than there is in ours.238 So Leibniz was only able to offer a
priori (M73) grounds for the claim that there is no true death, though in
M76 he also appears to try to infer it from the fact that there is no true
generation. He might be thinking that the fact that there is no true genera-
tion makes it ‘natural’ to think that there is no true death either; certainly
on occasion Leibniz argued this way:
There is nothing more natural than to think that whatever has no beginning
will also never perish. When one recognizes that all generation is but the
238
The reason for this, according to Leibniz, is ‘because generation proceeds in a natural
manner, little by little, so that we have leisure to observe it, but death is a sudden reverse
by a leap [per saltum] a return all at once to parts which are too small for us, because
death ordinarily occurs in too violent a way to permit us to observe the details of the
retrogression’. PPL, p. 345. On the face of it, Leibniz’s characterisation of death here as
involving a leap would seem to conflict with the law of continuity. But the conflict can
no doubt be removed: the law of continuity actually demands that all natural changes
take place continuously, and Leibniz would presumably say that while the change from
life to death is very quick, it is nevertheless continuous, and does not involve an animal
being reduced to a seed-like state in a single instant.
141
increase and development of an animal which is already formed, it is easy
to be persuaded that corruption or death is nothing but the diminution and
involution of an animal which does not cease to subsist and to remain alive and
organized.239
77. Thus it may be said not only that the soul (mirror of an indestruct-
ible universe) is indestructible, but also the animal itself, although its
machine may often perish in part, and cast off or put on organic integu-
ments.
Leibniz established the indestructibility of the soul (along with all other
kinds of monads) in M4–5. His description of the soul here as ‘the mirror
of an indestructible universe’ hints at an argument for the soul’s immor-
tality which is made in other writings (for details, see the comments on
M56).
We are now told that animals are indestructible also. The indestruct-
ibility of animals follows from M73, in which Leibniz established that
animals neither begin nor end naturally. But we have also learned (from
M72) that animals are never without a body, and (from M74) that they
can and do undergo great transformations. Leibniz thus reimagines an
animal’s death not as consisting in the separation of its soul from its body,
but rather as involving a great transformation of its body, that is, the loss of
much of its mass and most of its organs. But even after death, the animal’s
soul always remains attached to some organs, and thus is always embodied.
Although he does not say so explicitly, Leibniz must mean that animals
are naturally indestructible, in that they cannot be destroyed in the course
of nature. This of course leaves open the possibility that they might be
destroyed by a supernatural process, as would happen if God were to
annihilate them.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the body (whether of an
animal or a human) was often referred to as a ‘machine’, especially when
viewed mechanistically, that is, as operating in accordance with natural
laws. As for ‘integuments’, these are coverings, normally in the sense of the
natural coverings of an organism, such as its skin or shell. To say that an
animal’s machine may ‘cast off or put on particular organic integuments’ is
to say that it changes in terms of its composition.
239
PPL, p. 345.
142
78. These principles have given me a way of naturally explaining the
union, or rather the agreement, of the soul and the organic body.
The soul follows its own laws, and the body likewise follows its own,
and they coincide by virtue of the pre-established harmony between
all substances, since they are all representations of one and the same
universe.
Preface ***6
Theodicy §340. §352. §353. §358.
The doctrine espoused here, that of pre-established harmony, is the one

for which Leibniz was most famous in his own lifetime (so much so that
he even signed one of his later articles ‘by the author of the system of the
pre-established harmony’).240 The doctrine holds that God so established
things from the very beginning that the states of the body and the states
of the soul are always in harmony, and are so entirely as a result of body
and soul following their own laws rather than because there is any interac-
tion between them, or because one is constantly adjusted to the other by
an outside agency (such as God). The soul follows its own psychical laws,
while bodies follow the laws of motion, and together these laws ensure
agreement between soul and body. Hence at the moment that the psychical
laws operating on Pete’s soul lead him to decide to raise his hand, the laws
of motion at work on his body make his hand rise. Similarly, when the laws
of motion lead to an object hitting Pete’s leg, the psychical laws bring about
in his soul a feeling of pain. By way of illustration, Leibniz sometimes
used the example of two clocks. Suppose a sufficiently skilled clockmaker
makes two clocks which both keep perfect time of their own accord: their
agreement is thus due to the supreme artisanship of the clockmaker at the
outset, rather than to any influence between the clocks, or on account of
any intervention of the clockmaker.241
The pre-established harmony of soul and body follows from the pre-
established harmony of all monads as detailed in M56. For the soul is a
monad and the body consists of monads, and since all monads agree in
their states, the soul and all of the monads of the body must agree in their
states also. Leibniz holds that the union of the soul and body consists in
nothing more than their mutual agreement;242 they are thus not bound
together in any other way. As he explains in the New System (1695): ‘It
is this mutual relationship, arranged in advance in each substance of the
universe, which produces what we call their communication, and which
240
See PPL, p. 586.
241
See SLT, p. 77.
242
SLT, p. 75.
143
alone constitutes the union of the soul and the body.’243 In 1703, this claim
was challenged by René Joseph de Tournemine (1661–1739), who argued
that
correspondence, or harmony, does not make a union, or essential connection.
Whatever parallels we imagine between two clocks, even if the relation
between them were perfectly exact, we could never say that these clocks were
united just because the movements of the one correspond to the movements of
the other with perfect symmetry.244
In his response (1708), Leibniz claimed that Tournemine had misunder-
stood what he had meant by ‘the union of the soul and the body’. Leibniz
insisted that when he spoke of this union he meant only ‘the relation
we perceive between the soul and the body’, in other words, the mutual
adjustment of the two. Tournemine, on the other hand, took ‘union’ to be
something more than this; specifically, he thought it required some kind
of metaphysical bond or glue that made soul and body into a single thing.
Leibniz claimed that if there was such a ‘metaphysical union’ it was, like the
mysteries of faith, something beyond human understanding, and therefore
he could not explain it.245 Perhaps wary of being misunderstood again, in
M78 Leibniz makes it clear that by ‘the union of the soul and body’ he
means only the agreement between soul and body.
The name ‘pre-established harmony’ was coined only in 1695.246 Prior
to that, Leibniz referred to the doctrine as the ‘hypothesis of concomi-
tance’247 or the ‘hypothesis of agreements’.248
79. Souls act according to the laws of final causes through appetitions,
ends, and means. Bodies act according to the laws of efficient causes,
or laws of motion. And the two kingdoms, that of efficient and that of
final causes, are in harmony with each another.
This section elaborates on the preceding one, which simply stated that
souls and bodies follow their own laws. We are now told what these laws
are. Souls are driven from one state to another by the laws of final causes,
or as Leibniz puts in PNG3, ‘the laws of appetites, or final causes of good
and evil, which consist in the observable perceptions’. More simply, what
243
SLT, p. 75.
244
LNS, p. 249.
245
See LNS, pp. 250–1. See also LDV, p. 331.
246
See A III 6, p. 505.
247
SLT, p. 46.
248
SLT, p. 75.
144
drives the internal changes of souls is their appetite, or will, which forms
volitions to bring about desired ends, namely those which are perceived to
be the best. However, the will itself is inclined by all of a soul’s (infinite)
perceptions taken together at any given moment, the vast majority of
which are confused, which means that the perceived best course is often
not the actual best course. Nevertheless, the form of causality operative in
souls is final causality, because souls are constantly driven to attain desired
ends.
Bodies, on the other hand, are pushed from one state to another by
the natural laws of motion and impact, and are thus affected by efficient
causality only. Efficient causality is ‘blind’ inasmuch as it is not directed by
knowledge and does not work towards an end.
The two kinds of cause – final and efficient – operate strictly within
their own realms: final causes only on souls, efficient causes only on bodies.
Hence one should not explain the states of the soul by means of efficient
causes, nor the movement of bodies by means of final causes. Nevertheless
souls and bodies always agree, because of the pre-established harmony
between them.
80. Descartes recognised that souls cannot impart force to bodies because
there is always the same quantity of force in matter. However, he
believed that the soul could change the direction of bodies. But this
is because the law of nature which also affirms the conservation of
the same total direction in matter was not known in his day. If he had
noticed this, he would have come across my system of pre-established
harmony.
Preface ****
Theodicy §22. §59. §60. §61.
§63. §66.
§345. §346 onwards. §354. §355.
Leibniz now seeks to support his system of pre-established harmony in an

indirect way, by undermining one of its main rivals, namely the ‘way of
influence’ endorsed by Descartes.249 Descartes had recognised the exist-
ence of minds (mental substance), the essence of which is thought, and
body (material substance), the essence of which is extension. He also held
that there was causal interaction between the two, mediated via the pineal
gland at the centre of the brain. Leibniz’s understanding of Descartes’
249
The ‘way of influence’ is Leibniz’s own description of Descartes’ hypothesis, and was
not used by Descartes. See SLT, p. 77.
145
position was that such interaction involves the non-material soul changing
the direction of the pineal gland, which in turn changes the direction of
animal spirits which circulated throughout the nervous system, and thus
leads to physiological changes. Such interventions, Leibniz argues, are
fully consistent with the conservation principle endorsed by Descartes,
which holds that the total quantity of motion in the material world is
always held constant. After all, on the scenario just outlined, the soul only
changes the direction of motion of the pineal gland, and does not add
to or detract from the total quantity of it. However, in his own physics,
Leibniz demonstrated that it was not just motion that was conserved, but
also direction of motion. This led to him ruling out as impossible the sort of
interaction between soul and pineal gland that he thought Descartes had
advanced.250
However it is not entirely certain that Leibniz’s reading of Descartes is
accurate. While there is clear textual evidence that Descartes held the posi-
tion that the soul interacts with the pineal gland by changing the direction
of its motion (he claims that the pineal gland ‘can be pushed to one side by
the soul and to the other side by the animal spirits’),251 it is less clear that
the textual evidence supports the claim that he believed the soul interacts
with the pineal gland only in this way, which is the position Leibniz ascribes
to him. In fact, the textual evidence seems to point in a different direc-
tion. For example, in §34 of The Passions of the Soul, the work in which
Descartes dealt with the topic of interaction at some length, Descartes talks
of the gland being moved ‘in many different ways’ by the soul.252 And in
§41 he writes that ‘the activity of the soul consists entirely in the fact that
simply by willing something it brings it about that the little gland to which
it is closely joined moves in the manner required to produce the effect
corresponding to this volition’.253 Such passages could quite readily be
interpreted as claiming that there are various ways in which the soul affects
the state of the pineal gland; changing the direction of its motion would be
one such way, but perhaps not the only one.
It is interesting to note that in the earliest text in which Leibniz advances
250
Leibniz frequently levelled this objection. See, for example, LNS, pp. 51–2; PPL,
p. 587.
251
Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, I, p. 346.
252
Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, I, p. 341. The point is developed by
Daniel Garber in his Descartes Embodied (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2000), pp. 133–67, especially pp. 144–9. Garber also claims that while Descartes held
that motion is conserved, he may not have treated this as a universal law, and may have
wished to exempt animate (human) bodies from it. See Garber, Descartes Embodied, pp.
150–2.
253
Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, I, p. 343.
146
his reading of Descartes, a letter from 1687, he does so somewhat hesitantly,
as though making a tentative suggestion as to what Descartes may have
believed or may have intended (‘. . . as, it seems, Descartes wishes to say
. . .’).254 However, in later writings, such as the Monadology, this hesitancy
is replaced by a confident assertion that Descartes did in fact believe that
the soul only influenced the pineal gland by changing the direction of its
motion. Why Leibniz became increasingly confident of his interpretation
of Descartes is unclear. One possibility that is difficult to dismiss, especially
given that Leibniz failed to amass any positive textual evidence in favour
of his interpretation, is that his frequent repetition of his interpretation
eventually strengthened his confidence in it.255
81. This system means that bodies act as if there were no souls (although
this is impossible), and souls act as if there were no bodies, and both
act as if each influenced the other.
This is a succinct summary of the pre-established harmony between soul

and body. In some texts Leibniz develops one of the scenarios briefly men-
tioned here, and considers what would happen if all souls were suddenly
removed from the world while the bodies remained: because bodies are
not and never were affected by souls, but only by the laws of motion and
impact, they would continue to behave exactly as before, and so human
bodies would continue to read and write books, though there would be
no souls to understand what was being read or written.256 (The scenario,
Leibniz insists, would never come to pass, though this does not detract
from its usefulness as an illustration of the independence of the realms of
soul and body.)
82. As for minds or rational souls, although I find that, fundamentally, what
we have just said holds good of all living things and animals (namely
254
PE, p. 83.
255
Similar to this, Peter Remnant suggests that Leibniz may have engaged in ‘a piece
of creative elucidation’ in his presentation of Descartes’ position. Peter Remnant,
‘Descartes: body and soul’, in Georges J. D. Moyal (ed.), Descartes: Critical Assessments
Volume III (London: Routledge, 1991), p. 329. Not all scholars think that Leibniz mis-
interpreted Descartes, however; Peter McLaughlin, for instance, claims that Leibniz’s
reading – and criticism – of Descartes, is fair. See Peter McLaughlin, ‘Descartes on
mind-body interaction and the conservation of motion’, The Philosophical Review 102:2
(1993), pp. 155–82.
256
See A VI 4, p. 367: http://www.leibniz-translations.com/howthesoul.htm
147
that the animal and the soul only begin with the world, and no more
come to an end than the world does), nevertheless rational animals
are distinctive in that their little spermatic animals, for as long as they
are only spermatic animals, have only ordinary or sensitive souls; but
as soon as those which are chosen (so to speak) attain human nature
through an actual conception, their sensitive souls are raised to the
rank of reason and to the privilege of minds.
Leibniz now turns his attention to rational souls (minds), which will
remain his focus for the remainder of the text. The claim he makes here
was hinted at earlier, in M75, and is this: before conception, rational souls
are no different from animal souls, but are raised in status (given the spark
of reason) at the moment of conception. This is a view Leibniz adopted in
the 1680s, after writing a series of short texts in which he wrestled with the
problem of the origin of human souls.257 In these texts, Leibniz considers
and rejects various alternative hypotheses, for example:
• that human souls existed from the outset in human seeds (‘if we suggest
that human souls are . . . created in the beginning by God to lie hidden
in seeds and await conception, we fall into [a] paradox, because evi-
dently innumerable human souls may remain unused in seeds and
never come to use reason’.258 Such waste – most sperm do not fertilise
ova and so do not develop into human beings – does not seem consistent
with God’s wisdom).
• that human souls do not exist in seeds, and are instead created at the
point of conception (this ‘makes human seeds inferior to the seeds of
beasts, for who would believe that souls are rather inside the seeds or
eggs of animals, but no souls are in humans alone?’)259
As a result of these considerations, Leibniz reasoned that it is more in
keeping with reason to suppose that each human seed contains an animal
soul which God supplements with reason at the moment of successful
conception. In later years he referred to this process as transcreation.
Leibniz appears to have conceived two different ways in which tran-
screation might take place. In T91 he claims that transcreation involves ‘a
particular operation’, that is, God’s immediate operation, which supports
his claim elsewhere that it is a miraculous process.260 However his discom-
257
See SLT, pp. 61–3.
258
SLT, p. 63.
259
SLT, p. 63.
260
See for example LDB, p. 127.
148
fort with the idea of admitting so many miracles (‘I would prefer to do
without a miracle in the generation of man’ he writes in T397) led him to
develop a naturalistic alternative, in which the rationality of human souls
does pre-exist in human seeds but remains latent until some pre-ordained
time, namely the moment of conception, at which point its powers natu-
rally develop:
either this [sc. elevation to the degree of rationality] is brought about miracu-
lously through a divine superaddition or, in those seminal souls that are
destined for humanity, it is already concealed in a prearranged act. In the
latter case, it will finally be uncovered and reveal itself when the organic body
proper to such a soul, through a final conception, is also partly uncovered
and partly transformed into a human body, for a human organism certainly
has only been pre-established in the bodies of these souls, while an infinity
of other souls and seminal animalcula (if such are acknowledged), or at any
rate preformed living organic bodies, remain within the limits of a sensitive
degree of nature, with respect to both prearranged and exercised acts, as the
schools say.261
Leibniz entertains this idea in T397 also. Leibniz thus offers a miraculous
account and a naturalistic account of how certain animal souls may come to
be elevated to the rank of reason. There is insufficient information in M82
to determine which of these accounts he had in mind at the time of writing
the Monadology.
83. Among other differences which exist between ordinary souls and
minds, some of which I have already pointed out, there is also this
one: that souls in general are living mirrors or images of the universe of
created things, whereas minds are also images of the divinity itself, or
of the very author of nature, capable of knowing the system of the uni-
verse, and of imitating something of it through their own smaller-scale
constructions, each mind being like a little divinity in its own sphere.
Theodicy §147.
The differences between minds and ordinary souls were detailed in M29–30:
minds can know necessary truths through reason, are s elf-conscious, and
have a concept of God. We now learn that while souls are living mirrors of
the universe, minds are also images of God. That every soul and mind is a
living mirror of the universe can be deduced from M56, in which Leibniz
claimed that every monad is a living mirror of the universe. That minds
261
LDB, p. 151.
149
are more than that, being also images of God, is due to their possession of
reason (M29). This enables them to know the system of the universe and
to imitate it, to some extent.
But to imitate it how? Here there is some uncertainty as to what
exactly Leibniz meant. Much of the problem is due to Leibniz’s use of the
obscure phrase ‘echantillons architectoniques’ which literally translates
as ‘architectonic samples’, where ‘architectonic’ means ‘relating to the art
of construction’. Because the literal translation is not very illuminating,
Leibniz’s translators have opted to translate ‘echantillons architectoniques’
in a different way. These are some of the suggestions:
Translator Translation
Robert Latta architectonic patterns262
Roger Ariew and Daniel Garber schematic representations263
Anthony Savile constructive exemplars264
Each translation comes with, or invites, its own interpretation of M83.

Latta takes Leibniz’s ‘echantillons architectoniques’ to refer to ‘subsidiary
creations or imitative constructions’. He explains: ‘Man can not merely
express in himself the “machine” of the universe, but he can also make
for himself small “machines,” constructed on similar principles.’265 Here,
then, ‘echantillons architectoniques’ are to be understood as manmade
machines, and Leibniz’s point would be that we imitate God by construct-
ing them. Ariew and Garber, on the other hand, take Leibniz’s ‘echantil-
lons architectoniques’ to be ‘schematic representations’; this seems to take
Leibniz to be saying that we imitate God by devising mathematical or
physical accounts of the universe. However, in M83 Leibniz states that
minds are capable of knowing the universe and of imitating something of
it. If this imitation is nothing more than the ability to produce ‘schematic
representations’, it is difficult to see that it amounts to anything more
substantial than knowing the system of the universe (since to devise a
mathematical account of the universe is just a way of coming to know it), in
which case Leibniz would be effectively repeating himself. Lastly, Savile
translates ‘echantillons architectoniques’ as ‘constructive exemplars’, and
in so doing construes Leibniz as saying that
We exert our intellectual powers in the pursuit of knowledge in science, in the
construction of artefacts (engineering and art) and in the devising of politi-
262
MPW, p. 266.
263
PE, p. 223.
264
Savile, The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook, p. 238.
265
MPW, p. 266.
150
cal and social organizations for the orderliness of our lives. In this exercise of
power, knowledge, wisdom and spiritual goodness we imitate God.266
As plausible as this might look at first glance, at its heart is an interpreta-

tion of the French expression ‘echantillons architectoniques’ which looks
to be untenable: ‘architectonique’ refers to construction in the architectural
sense, rather than the devising of political or social structures. This sense
informs my own translation of ‘echantillons architectoniques’ as ‘smaller-
scale constructions’; this translation suggests Leibniz’s point to be that not
only can minds know the system of the universe, they can also construct
little models or machines based on the same principles. This of course is
Latta’s interpretation also. It is worth noting, however, that the matter is far
from clear cut. At the end of M83 Leibniz refers the reader to T147, where
he explains that God allows man to govern his own little world, that is, his
own life, in accordance with reason. If M83 is to be read in light of this,
it suggests a different sense of minds being images of God. To complicate
matters still further, in PNG14 Leibniz claims that minds are images of
the divinity in part because they are able to produce something of God’s
works, which he there takes to mean that they can invent things in dreams,
act freely, and make scientific discoveries.
However it is understood, the claim that minds are images of God has
clear echoes of the common Judeao-Christian motif that humans have been
made in God’s image, asserted in Genesis 1.27–8, 5.1–2, and 9.6. It is one
of the few such motifs to be found in the Monadology (another occurs at
M85), which otherwise largely presents a metaphysician’s account of God
and his activity.267 Note that by claiming that minds are made in God’s
image Leibniz goes beyond what is said in Genesis, which very clearly
states that human beings are made in his image: for Leibniz, the category
of ‘minds’ includes not just human beings but also higher (superhuman)
beings such as genii and angels; this is not very clear in the Monadology
itself (though see M72) but is affirmed in numerous other writings.268
84. It is for this reason that minds are capable of entering into a kind of
society with God, and that his relation to them is not only that of an
inventor to his machine (which is God’s relation to other created
things) but also that of a prince to his subjects, and even of a father to
his children.
266
Savile, The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook, pp. 214–15.
267
This has led one scholar to claim that ‘the Monadology could be read as being compatible
with an eighteenth-century deist perspective’. Peter Loptson, ‘Introduction’, in G. W.
Leibniz, Discourse on Metaphysics and Other Writings (London: Broadview, 2012), p. 26.
268
For example, PNG15; LTS, p. 349.
151
This claim follows directly from M83: because minds are endowed with
reason there is an affinity between them and God, which enables them to
enter into a personal relationship with him. Lesser beings cannot, as they
lack the requisite moral and intellectual capacities. Moreover, because
minds are images of God, his interest in them is not one of curiosity (as
would be the relationship of an inventor to his machine) but rather one of
concern and love (as would be the relationship of a benevolent monarch to
his subjects and of a father to his children).
The belief that God’s relationship to humans is like that of a father to
his children is a common one in Christianity; it is affirmed, for example,
in the opening line of a number of creeds, such as the Apostle’s Creed (‘I
believe in God, the Father Almighty . . .’) and the Nicene Creed (‘We
believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty’).
85. From this it is easy to conclude that the assemblage of all minds must
make up the City of God, that is, the most perfect possible state under
the most perfect of monarchs.
Theodicy §146.
Abridgement, objection 2.
The claim here follows from a number of others. All minds are capable of
entering into society with God (M84), and because of their special status
as images of God (M83) the resulting community will be the best one pos-
sible. Moreover, as God is perfectly good (M48), he will be concerned with
the welfare of all minds, so God will be the most perfect monarch of this
community.
In referring to this community as the ‘City of God’ Leibniz deliber-
ately employs another Christian motif, as the notion is borrowed from
St Augustine (354–430 ce), who wrote a book with that title. However
Leibniz’s understanding of the ‘City of God’ is not the same as Augustine’s:
for Augustine, the City of God is the Christian church, encompassing the
saints, the angels, and the blessed. Moreover, it is a heavenly or celestial
city, which exists on Earth only for a time (as such it is contrasted with the
Earthly City). The idea of such a City Of God is rooted in Scripture, for
example Psalm 87.3, Psalm 48.1, and Psalm 46.4. Leibniz’s City of God,
on the other hand, has two distinct features: it is populated not just by
Christian minds but by all minds (on which basis he sometimes refers to it
as the ‘republic of minds’ or ‘commonwealth of minds’), and it is the best-
governed state of all, on account of it being ruled by God.269
269
Both of these features are affirmed in other texts. See for example T obj. 2, and PNG15.
When discussing the ‘City of God’ Leibniz appears only to have these two features in
mind.
152
86. This City of God, this truly universal monarchy, is a moral world in the
natural world, and is the most exalted and the most divine of God’s
works, and it is in this that God’s glory truly consists, since there would
be no glory if his greatness and his goodness were not known and
admired by minds. It is also in relation to this divine city that he may
properly be said to have goodness, whereas his wisdom and his power
are apparent everywhere.
Leibniz starts by affirming that the City of God has a moral dimension,
which would seem to follow directly from the way it was characterised in
M85. That it should be the most exalted and most divine part of God’s
work is due to the fact that it is an assemblage of all minds: as minds (and
minds alone) are images of God (established in M83), together they must
form the most exalted and divine part of creation. Leibniz then claims that
God’s glory can be found in this City of God. To understand this we need
to know what Leibniz understands by the glory of God. Traditionally,
God’s glory was thought to consist in his own perfect nature, and/or in
his expression of that nature.270 But Leibniz clearly thinks there is more to
glory than this; specifically, he thinks that God’s glory also requires other
beings to recognise his supreme qualities, since he claims in M86 that if
there were no such recognition then God would have no glory. Hence for
Leibniz it would be correct to say that God’s glory requires (a) that God
have a perfect nature, (b) that he express that perfect nature, and (c) that
his perfect nature be recognised by other creatures (that these are individu-
ally necessary for glory should be clear from the fact that (c) is not possible
without (b), which in turn is not possible without (a); taken together, they
are for Leibniz jointly sufficient conditions for glory).271
Lastly, Leibniz claims that whilst God’s wisdom and power are mani-
fested in all parts of creation, his goodness is most apparent in the City of
God. If creation consisted merely in the machine of the universe, with all
parts following only the (efficient) laws of nature, then God’s great wisdom
and power would be evident, but not his goodness. In order to manifest his
goodness, God needs to create minds, rational and moral creatures upon
which he can exercise justice, mercy, forgiveness, and so on.
87. As we have established above a perfect harmony between two natural

kingdoms, the one of efficient causes, the other of final causes, we
ought here to point out yet another harmony between the physical
270
See for example Nicolas Malebranche, Dialogues on Metaphysics and on Religion, p. 153.
271
The position Leibniz adopts here is consistent with that endorsed elsewhere. See for
example SLT, p. 108.
153
kingdom of nature and the moral kingdom of grace; that is, between
God as architect of the machine of the universe, and God considered
as monarch of the divine city of minds.
Theodicy §62. §74. §118. §248.
§112. §130. §247.
Leibniz was very fond of harmonies, and identified them wherever he

could. The harmony between the realms of efficient causes (in bodies) and
final causes (in souls) was affirmed in M78–9, and M81. He is now alert-
ing us to the existence of another harmony, that which holds between the
kingdoms of nature and grace. As he states, the ‘kingdom of nature’ refers
to the machine of the universe, that is, the physical universe subject to laws
of nature, while the ‘kingdom of grace’ refers to the City of God, that is,
the entire community of minds. Leibniz will explain what this harmony
involves in the final three sections of the Monadology.
It is notable that in the Monadology Leibniz offers no reason for his claim
that there is a harmony between the kingdoms of nature and grace. In the
Theodicy he suggests that it follows from God’s wisdom, for ‘it is in accord-
ance with God’s wisdom that everything be harmonic in his works’ (T91).
88. This harmony means that things lead to grace by the very ways of
nature, and that for example this globe must be destroyed and repaired
by natural ways at the times the government of minds demand it for
the punishment of some and the reward of others.
Theodicy §18 and onwards. §110.
§244. §245. §340.
Leibniz starts by explaining what is meant by the harmony of nature

and grace: God’s plans for minds are effected by the normal workings of
nature. Leibniz’s choice of example is of the world being destroyed, and
then subsequently repaired, by natural means, at the very times when such
destruction and repair is morally required. While it is clear enough how
the harmony is supposed to work in practice, Leibniz’s choice of example
may come as a surprise, because it insinuates that there will be a series of
apocalyptic upheavals, which might seem to be more in keeping with Stoic
teachings than with traditional Christian doctrine. The ancient Greek
Stoics held that the world is subject to an eternal cycle of conflagrations
and renewals,272 whereas Christian doctrine has it that the world as we
272
See for example A. A. Long, ‘The Stoics on world-conflagration and everlasting
recurrence’, in From Epicurus to Epictetus: Studies in Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 256–82.
154
know it ends at the time of the Last Judgement, and is then restored so
that the blessed may enjoy eternal life under Christ’s rule. Despite initial
appearances, however, it is unlikely that Leibniz is brazenly endorsing a
heterodox position in M88. Nothing he says is actually inconsistent with
Christian doctrine: he is not, after all, asserting that the cycle of destruc-
tion and renewal will be everlasting, so there is no reason to attribute such
a view to him. Moreover, if we consider Leibniz’s geological work we can
get a good idea of how he envisaged the world being naturally destroyed
and repaired. In the Protogaea (1691–93), for example, Leibniz describes
the formation of the Earth and its subsequent upheavals, including earth-
quakes, great floods, and volcanic eruptions. He believed that some of these
events had been very devastating, for example, he describes floods of such
magnitude that they submerged almost the entire surface of the Earth. But
not only did he think that the deluges responsible for such great floods had
occurred solely through natural processes, he also held that it was through
natural processes alone that the waters had drained away each time.273
(Among these naturally occurring floods Leibniz seems to have included
the great flood described in Genesis 6–9.) He had at his disposal, therefore,
an entirely naturalistic model of how a series of destructions and renewals
might occur. There is some evidence that it was what he had in mind when
composing the Monadology, for at the end of M88 he refers the reader to
T244 and T245, in which he describes some of the (natural) upheavals that
had occurred on the Earth, such as conflagrations and floods.
89. It can also be said that God as architect satisfies in every way God as
legislator, and that sins must therefore carry their punishment with
them by the order of nature, and by virtue of the mechanical structure
of things itself, and that likewise good actions will receive their rewards
by ways which are mechanical with regard to bodies, although this
cannot and need not always happen immediately.
Leibniz here draws out a further corollary of the harmony of nature and
grace: punishments and rewards are administered by the order of nature
rather than by special interventions of God. In M88 Leibniz identifies one
way in which this might happen, namely the natural destruction of the Earth
as a punishment for the sins of its inhabitants. According to Genesis 6, the
great flood was sent by God as punishment for the wickedness of humanity.
Given Leibniz’s inclination to explain that flood naturally, he may have been
inclined to identify the great flood as an example of the harmony of nature
273
See G. W. Leibniz, Protogaea, trans. and ed. Claudine Cohen and Andre Wakefield
(Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2008), pp. 15–19.
155
and grace at work, that is, at the very time when the wickedness of humanity
had reached the point when punishment was warranted, there occurred by
natural means a deluge which flooded the Earth. Although there is evidence
that suggests Leibniz may have thought this way, it is far from conclusive,
and unfortunately Leibniz shies away from providing precise examples of
sins leading naturally to their punishments, and virtues leading naturally to
their rewards. His belief in the natural punishment of sin/reward of virtue
is thus a priori, in the sense of running from cause (God’s instigation of a
harmony between the realms of nature and grace) to effect (such a harmony
involves the natural distribution of desert).
A very different explanation of the natural punishment of sins can be
found in an early work, the Philosopher’s Confession (1672–73), in connec-
tion with the punishment of the damned in the afterlife. Leibniz there
states that the damned are those who are discontented with the world, that
is, God’s work, and with God himself. When such people die, they carry
their hatred with them into the afterlife, and because they no longer have
any sense organs to provide them with new material to think about, their
hatred grows stronger and stronger via a process of positive feedback:
Whoever dies malcontent dies a hater of God . . . And now . . . since access to
his senses has been closed off, he nourishes his soul, which has withdrawn
into itself, with that hatred of things already begun, and with that misery and
disdain, and with indignation, envy, and displeasure, all of them increasing
more and more.274
Leibniz goes on to claim that the hatred, anger, and misery of the damned
person is not eased by the return of his bodily senses in the resurrection,
because by that time he is so twisted that his pain is somehow pleasing to
him. Consequently, after being resurrected, he will deliberately seek out
things which incense him. The upshot is that his hatred of God and the
world continues without end, as does the torment that this hatred brings.
Although Leibniz only offers what we might call a ‘psychology of the
damned’, it is possible to piece together a cognate ‘psychology of the saved’,
as it were. For in the Philosopher’s Confession Leibniz holds that any given
person’s final thoughts (or state of mind) will dominate his posthumous
thoughts (or state of mind), irrespective of whether he is saved or damned:
For since the soul is not open to new external sensations from the moment of
death until its body is restored to it, it concentrates its attention only on its
last thoughts, so that it does not change but rather extends the state it was in
at death.275
274
Leibniz, Confessio Philosophi, trans. and ed. R. Sleigh Jr. (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 2005), p. 91.
275
Leibniz, Confessio Philosophi, pp. 35–7.
156
There thus seems no reason to suppose that this would not hold good of
those who are saved as well as those who are damned. In the case of the
saved, of course, they die loving God and his work. These thoughts of love
are what they will think about between the time of death and resurrection,
and by a similar process of positive feedback they can be expected to inten-
sify to the point where the souls experience a kind of bliss. This would very
much be a natural psychological process, not requiring any special inter-
vention of God, just as the descent into permanent self-punishing madness
experienced by the damned can be seen as a natural psychological process,
in that it is just what happens when an evil and disgruntled will is left to
reflect on its own thoughts in the afterlife. There is certainly no suggestion
in Leibniz’s works that God actively makes the wicked mad. Although
these would qualify as examples of natural punishment of sin/reward of
virtue, it is far from certain that they were what Leibniz had in mind when
composing the Monadology. The crucial claim on which the examples are
based, that the posthumous attention of the dead is focused solely on their
final thoughts, does not seem to appear again in Leibniz’s writings after
1686, almost thirty years before the Monadology was written. Although
Leibniz’s later writings do contain numerous statements about how death
affects human psychological activity, they are much less detailed. The fol-
lowing passage is representative of Leibniz’s later thought:
In death . . . we do not lose life, sensation or reason, but what prevents us from
noticing that for a time is the confusion, that is, the fact that at that time we
have an infinity of little perceptions all at once, in which there is no single one
which is clearly distinguished from the others. That is why in a dream that is
barely distinct, and in a fainting fit, we remember nothing.276
These remarks do not sit easily with the idea that the dead focus their
attention on their final thoughts; indeed, they suggest that death is akin to
a deep state of unconsciousness. This is confirmed elsewhere, with Leibniz
describing the psychological state of the dead as being akin to a ‘stupor’.277
At the time of writing the Monadology, then, Leibniz’s other philosophi-
cal commitments may have prevented him from accepting the naturalistic
process of punishment that he had outlined more than forty years before-
hand, in the Philosopher’s Confession.
Yet in spite of this, it is far from clear that the mature Leibniz entirely
ruled out this psychological account, or at least something like it. For in
an appendix to the Theodicy, Leibniz discusses a similar theory that had
been advanced by William King, and says ‘These thoughts are not to be
276
LTS, p. 296.
277
SLT, p. 65.
157
despised, and I have sometimes had similar ones, though I am careful
not to make a decisive judgement about them.’278 Moreover, he writes to
Rudolf Christian Wagner in 1710:
since this [the Commonwealth of God] is governed with the utmost justice and
beauty, it follows that, by the laws of nature themselves, souls are rendered
more suited for rewards and punishments by the force of their own actions, on
account of the parallelism between the Kingdom of grace and [the Kingdom of]
nature. And in this sense it may be said that virtue brings about its own reward,
and crime its own punishment, because by a sort of natural consequence of the
very last state of the soul, according as it departs expiated or unexpiated, there
arises a sort of natural watershed, preordained in nature by God, and consist-
ent with divine promises and threats, and with grace and justice; and also with
the additional intervention of good and bad genii, according to which side we
have joined. The operations of these genii are undoubtedly natural, although
their nature is more sublime than ours.279
It is possible that Leibniz’s reference here to a ‘natural watershed’ that
arises from ‘a sort of natural consequence of the very last state of the soul’
harks back to the psychological doctrine of posthumous self-punishment
developed almost forty years earlier, or something of that order anyway.
But there is insufficient detail to allow for certainty on the matter. Indeed,
it is possible that in the Wagner letter Leibniz has something rather more
mundane in mind, perhaps nothing more than the thought that it is the
state of one’s soul at death that determines whether one is destined for
rewards or punishments in the afterlife, with the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ souls
thereafter following different paths.280
But the Wagner letter does reveal one way in which rewards and pun-
ishments might be naturally distributed in the future life: by genii, that is,
angels and demons. That Leibniz should have recourse to angels and other
genii to facilitate the harmony between nature and grace is fully consistent
with what he says about their role elsewhere. In the Theodicy, for example,
Leibniz claims that ‘God employs the ministry of angels in order to govern
mankind, without the order of nature suffering thereby’.281 Leibniz is able
to count the actions of angels as part of the natural order, rather than as
278
H, p. 441.
279
Leibniz, Opera omnia, vol. II, 1, p. 229.
280
This of course entails that one’s fate is essentially fixed by the state of one’s soul at
death, such that a soul which is damned (for example) does not become un-damned by
turning over a new leaf in the afterlife. And this is in fact Leibniz’s position; he says in
the Theodicy: ‘there is always in the man who sins, even when he is damned, a freedom
which renders him culpable, and a power, albeit remote, of recovering himself, although
it never passes into action’. H, p. 292.
281
H, p. 439.
158
a deviation from it, because of the sharp distinction he draws between
the nature of created beings (that is, finite substances), and the nature of
God.282 Those actions of created beings which are in accordance with their
own natures are squarely part of the order of nature. This order is dis-
turbed only by those actions of created beings which are beyond their own
natures, for which they must be assisted by God. As this does not apply
to the normal actions of genii, these actions fall within the order of nature,
and so are not genuinely supernatural or miraculous.
90. Finally, under this perfect government there will be no good action
without reward, no bad action without punishment, and everything
must turn out right for the good, that is, those who are not malcon-
tents in this great state, who trust in providence after they have done
their duty, and who love and imitate the author of all good as they
ought to, delighting in the consideration of his perfections in accord-
ance with the nature of true pure love, which makes us take pleasure
in the felicity of the beloved. This it is which makes the wise and virtu-
ous work for everything that seems to conform to the presumptive or
antecedent divine will, and yet leaves them contented with what God
actually makes happen by his secret, consequent or decisive will. For
they recognise that if we could understand the order of the universe
well enough, we would find that it surpasses all the wishes of the
wisest people, and that it is impossible to make it better than it is, not
only for the whole in general, but also for ourselves in particular, if we
cleave to the author of all as we ought to, not merely as the architect
and efficient cause of our being, but also as our master and the final
cause which must constitute the whole aim of our will, and can alone
constitute our happiness.
Theodicy §134 end.
Preface *4ab
Theodicy §278.
Preface *4b
The central claim here is that everything will turn out well for the good
for those who love God, and Leibniz may have intended it as a corollary
of points already made; certainly, from the assertion made in M89, that
God has so established things as to bring about the natural punishment of
sin and reward of virtue, it would seem to follow that no good action will
go unrewarded and no sin unpunished. But as we shall see, this does not
282
See for example LTS, p. 88.
159
adequately capture all that Leibniz means when he claims that everything
will turn out for the good for those who love God. The claim itself very
closely echoes Romans 8.28 (‘all things work together for the good for
those who love God’) which Leibniz sometimes quoted approvingly.283
Alternatively, it can be derived from God’s perfect justice, that is, his
perfect goodness conformed to perfect wisdom.284
What does a love of God involve? As Leibniz notes, it involves taking
pleasure in God’s perfections. But for this to be possible at all, one must
first know his perfections (‘we could not love God without knowing his
perfections or his beauty’).285 One corollary of a true love of God is that
we attempt to imitate God insofar as this is possible for us. We do this by
willing what he wills, that is, we align our will with that of God. Or rather,
we align our will with what we presume God’s will to be, since we cannot
be certain of its detail.286 Leibniz’s distinction between God’s ‘presump-
tive or antecedent will’ on the one hand, and his ‘secret’ or ‘consequent’
or ‘decisive’ will on the other, is important here.287 The distinction was
first made by St John Damascene (c. 676–749),288 and became a staple of
Scholastic theology, being found in the work of Aquinas and others.289 The
antecedent will is God’s desire for the good for each person taken individu-
ally, that is, abstracted from the whole. Hence God antecedently wills that
all live a virtuous life, for example. God’s consequent will, however, is his
overall preference, having taken all things and all circumstances into con-
sideration. Hence God’s consequent will is to permit certain people to lead
unvirtuous lives, because he has determined that this will be for the best of
the whole. Leibniz describes God’s consequent will as ‘secret’ because, as
finite creatures, we are incapable of taking all things into consideration as he
can, which means that we cannot know his consequent will. Since there is
no way we could even attempt to act in accordance with God’s consequent
will, we are therefore left with no option but to act in accordance with his
antecedent will, which desires the good in each specific circumstance for
each individual. Hence we should act so as to procure the good of others
283
284
See for example LTS, p. 124; G. W. Leibniz, Political Writings, 2nd edn, trans. and ed.
Patrick Riley (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 59.
285
SLT, p. 297.
286
‘One of the strongest indications of a love of God which is sincere and disinterested is
being satisfied with what he has already done, in the assurance that it is always the best:
but also trying to make what is yet to happen as good and in keeping with his presump-
tive will as is possible for us.’ LTS, p. 178.
287
In the Theodicy Leibniz also refers to the latter as God’s final will. See H, p. 189.
288
John Damascene, An Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, book II, chapter 30.
289
See Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I.q19a6 ad. 1.
160
as we presume God wills it. But sometimes our actions do not turn out in
the way that we hoped, or things happen which do not seem to contribute
towards the good. We should not be discouraged by this: God will have
permitted such cases by his consequent will, unknown to us in advance, so
all we can do is trust that he has made the best and wisest choice, even if
it might not seem that way to us, from our very limited perspective. If we
were somehow able to see the whole, from God’s perspective, we would see
that everything contributes to the perfection and order of the whole, which
could not be better than it is.
Such a picture has the potential to give the impression that God is
happy to sacrifice the goods of some individuals for the benefits of the
whole. Leibniz, however, flatly denies this, at least with regard to virtuous
individuals. This is what grounds his assertion in M90 that it is impossible
for the universe to be better ‘for ourselves in particular, if we cleave to the
author of all as we ought to’. The virtuous, then, can be confident that
God is concerned not only for the world as a whole, but also for their own
welfare. They will know, for example, that on account of his perfect justice
God will ensure that there will be a balancing of books, involving punish-
ment of the evil and reward of the virtuous. If this does not happen in this
life – and Leibniz conceded that often it did not – then we can be certain
that it will happen in the next. As Leibniz makes clear in PNG16, the
root of this certainty lies in what can be deduced by reason, for ‘although
reason cannot teach us the detail of the great future, which is reserved for
revelation, this same reason assures us that things are accomplished in a
manner which exceeds our desires’. That is, the virtuous can deduce that
everything will turn out well for them from the fact that God is perfect and
always acts for the best (cf. M48, M55). The virtuous thus have grounds to
feel satisfied or contented, for not only has everything been ordered in the
best way possible, but ultimately also in the best way possible for them, and
that no matter what the trials and tribulations of this life, a better future
awaits them.
161
Appendix
1. THEODICY1
Preface *4a and b2 (referenced in M30, M41, and M90)
It is clear that Jesus Christ, completing what Moses had begun, wished
that the Divinity be the object not only of our fear and veneration, but
also of our love and ardour. This was to make men blessed in advance, and
give them here below a foretaste of future felicity. For there is nothing
so agreeable as loving that which is worthy of love. Love is that affection
which makes us take pleasure in the perfections of the beloved, and there
is nothing more perfect than God, nor anything more delightful. To love
him it is sufficient to contemplate his perfections, which is easy since we
find the ideas of these perfections within ourselves. The perfections of
God are those of our souls, but he possesses them in boundless measure;
he is an ocean, of which we have received only drops: there is in us some
power, some knowledge, some goodness, but in God they are all complete.
Order, proportions, harmony, delight us; painting and music are examples
1
Source: G. W. Leibniz, Essais de Theodicée sur la bonté de Dieu, la liberté de l’homme, et
l’origine du mal, 2nd edn (Amsterdam, 1714). Some later editions of the Theodicy, such
as that printed in Gerhardt’s edition of Leibniz’s works (G VI, pp. 1–462), have many
slight differences.
2
In the very early editions of the Theodicy, the pages containing the preface were left
unnumbered. However there were symbols and numbers printed at the bottom of all
of the left-hand pages, and it is to these that Leibniz refers in the Monadology when
citing various passages from the preface of the Theodicy. The opening left-hand page
of the preface is marked with *2, and subsequent left-hand pages are marked by *3, *4,
**, **2, **3 and so on. The right hand pages have no symbols or numbers, but in the
Monadology Leibniz refers to them using ‘a’ (for the left-hand page) and ‘b’ (for the
right-hand page).
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Theodicy
of these. God is all order; he always maintains the accuracy of proportions,
he makes the universal harmony: all beauty is an effusion of his rays.
It manifestly follows that true piety, and even true felicity, consists
in the love of God, but in an enlightened love, the fervour of which is
accompanied by insight. This kind of love arouses that pleasure in good
actions which showcases one’s virtue and, in relating everything to God,
as to the centre-point, transports the human to the divine. For in doing
one’s duty, by obeying reason, one fulfils the orders of supreme reason,
one directs all one’s intentions to the common good, which does not
differ from the glory of God. One finds that there is no greater individual
interest than to espouse the general interest, and one gains satisfaction for
oneself by taking pleasure in procuring real benefits for men. When one is
resigned to God’s will and knows that what he wills is best, one is content
with what happens whether one succeeds or not. But before God declares
his will through the event, one tries to be in accord with it by doing that
which appears to be most in conformity with his commands. When we are
in this state of mind, we are not put off by a lack of success, we regret only
our faults. . .
Preface ***5b (referenced in M69 and M74)

. . . in reality, mechanism is sufficient to produce the organic bodies of
animals, without need of other plastic natures, provided that added to it
is the already completely organic preformation3 in the seeds of bodies that
are born, contained in the seeds of the bodies from which they are born,
all the way back to the first seeds. This could only come from the author
of things, infinitely powerful and infinitely wise, who, making everything
in the beginning in an orderly way, had pre-established there all order and
all future artifice. There is no chaos inside of things, and there is organism
everywhere in a piece of matter, the arrangement of which comes from
God. This is revealed more and more the further we go into the anatomy
of bodies, and it would continue to be observed even if we could carry on
to infinity, as does nature, and continue the subdivision in our mind just as
nature has continued it in fact.
Preface ***6 (referenced in M78)

In order to explain this marvel of the formation of animals, I made use of a
pre-established harmony, that is, of the same means I had used to explain
another marvel, which is the correspondence of the soul with the body, in
which I showed the uniformity and the fruitfulness of the principles I had
employed. It seems that this reminded Mr Bayle of my system, which
3
Reading ‘preformation’ in place of ‘reformation’.
163
Appendix
explains this correspondence, and which he had previously examined. He
declared (in chapter 180 of his Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, page
1253 of book III) that it did not seem to him that God could give to matter
or to any other cause the faculty of organising without communicating
to it the idea and the knowledge of organisation, and that he was not yet
disposed to believe that God, with all his power over nature and with all
the foreknowledge he has of the contingencies that may happen, could
have disposed things in such a way that, by the laws of mechanics alone, a
vessel (for example) should go to its port of destination without being kept
on course by some intelligent guide. I was surprised to see that limits were
being placed on God’s power, without putting forward any proof of them,
and without showing that there was any contradiction to worry about on
the part of the object, or any imperfection on the part of God. Indeed,
I had shown before, in my response, that even humans often produce
through automata something like the movements that come from reason,
and that a finite mind (albeit one far above ours) could itself accomplish
what Mr Bayle thought impossible for the divinity. Besides, as God adjusts
in advance all things at once, the accuracy of the path of this vessel would
be no more strange than that of a fuse which went the length of a cord in
a firework, since all the adjustments of all things have a perfect harmony
with each other, and are mutually determined.
Preface **** (referenced in M80) and ****b (referenced in M69)

It seems to me that I have found the means of demonstrating the contrary,
in a way that is enlightening and at the same time throws light on the
interior of things. For having made new discoveries on the nature of active
force and the laws of motion, I have shown that they are not of an abso-
lutely geometrical necessity, as Spinoza seems to have thought, and they
are not purely arbitrary either, even though this is the opinion shared by
Mr Bayle and some modern philosophers. Instead, the laws of motion are
dependent upon fittingness, as I have already pointed out above, or upon
what I call the principle of the best. And one recognises in that, as in every-
thing else, the marks of the prime substance, whose productions indicate
a supreme wisdom, and form the most perfect of harmonies. I have shown
also that it is this harmony which connects both the future with the past,
and the nearby with what is faraway. The first kind of connection unites
times, and the other unites places. This second connection is apparent in
the union of the soul with the body, and generally in the communication
of true substances with one another and with material phenomena. But the
first connection holds good in the preformation of organic bodies, or rather
of all bodies, since there is organism everywhere, although all masses do
not compose organic bodies, just as a pond may very well be full of fish or
164
Theodicy
other organic bodies, although it is not itself an animal or organic body, but
only a mass which contains them.
Preface ****2b (referenced in M8)

And for this reason it may also be said in a metaphysical sense that the soul
acts upon the body, and the body upon the soul. Also, it is true that the
soul is the entelechy or the active principle, whereas the corporeal alone,
or the mere material, contains only the passive, and that consequently
the principle of action is in souls, as I have explained more than once in
the Leipzig journal,4 but more especially when responding to the late Mr
Sturm, philosopher and mathematician of Altdorf, in which I have even
demonstrated that if there was nothing in bodies except the passive, their
different conditions would be indiscernible.5
Preliminary discourse §10 (referenced in M1)

The annihilation of all that properly belongs to us, carried quite far by the
Quietists, might well be considered by some to be a disguised impiety.
Like, for example, what is related about the Quietism of Foë, originator of
a great Chinese sect: after having preached his religion for forty years, and
sensing death to be near, he declared to his disciples that he had hidden the
truth from them under the veil of metaphors, and that everything reduced
to nothingness, which he said was the first principle of all things. That was
even worse, it seems, than the opinion of the Averroists. Both doctrines are
untenable and even fantastical, yet some moderns have had no difficulty
in adopting this universal and unique soul that engulfs the others. It has
encountered great praise only amongst the so-called freethinkers, and Mr
de Preissac, a soldier and man of learning, who dabbled in philosophy,
paraded it publicly in his discourses. The system of pre-established harmony
is the one most capable of curing this evil. For it shows that there are neces-
sarily substances that are simple and without extension spread throughout
the whole of nature, that these substances must always subsist indepen-
dently of every other except God, and that they are never separated from
all organised body. Those who believe to be mortal those souls capable of
feeling but incapable of reason, or who maintain that only rational souls
can have feeling, hand victory to the Monopsychites.6 For it will always
be difficult to convince men that beasts feel nothing, and once it is granted
4
That is, the Acta eruditorum, which was published out of Leipzig.
5
Leibniz is thinking here of his essay ‘On nature itself’, published in the Acta eruditorum
in September 1698. See PPL, pp. 498–507.
6
Monopsychism is the doctrine that all human beings share a single active intellect. It is
often associated with Averroes (1126–98).
165
Appendix
that what is capable of feeling can perish, it is difficult to maintain through
reason the immortality of our souls.

The external senses, properly speaking, do not deceive us. It is our internal
sense which often makes us go too fast, and that also happens with the beasts,
such as when a dog barks at its reflection in the mirror. For beasts have con-
secutions of perception which imitate reasoning, and which occur also in the
internal sense of humans, when they act merely as empiricists. But beasts do
nothing that obliges us to think that they have what deserves to be prop-
erly called a faculty of reasoning, as I have shown elsewhere. Now when
the understanding uses and follows the false decision of the internal sense
(such as when the famous Galileo thought that Saturn had two handles)7
it is deceived by the judgement it makes upon the effect of appearances,
and it infers from them more than they imply. For the appearances of the
senses do not promise us absolutely the truth of things any more than do
dreams. It is we who deceive ourselves by the use we make of them, that
is, by our consecutions. The fact is that we allow ourselves to be misled
by probable arguments, and we are inclined to think that the phenomena
we have found often connected together are so always. Thus, as it usually
happens that what appears without angles has none, we readily believe that
it is always like this. Such an error is excusable, and sometimes inevitable,
when there is need to act promptly and to choose the most apparent; but
when we have the leisure and the time to gather our thoughts, we are at
fault if we take for certain that which is not. It is therefore true that appear-
ances are often contrary to the truth, but our reasoning never is when it
is carried out accurately and in a way in keeping with the rules of the art
of reasoning. If by reason is meant in general the faculty of reasoning well
or badly, I admit that it might deceive us, and in fact does deceive us, and
that the appearances of our understanding are often as deceptive as those
of the senses; but here it is a matter of the linking together of truths and
objections in good form, and in this sense it is impossible for reason to
deceive us.

It seems that Mr Descartes also concedes, in a passage in his Principles, that
it is impossible to resolve the difficulties about the division of matter to infin-
ity, which he nevertheless recognises as real.8 Arriaga and other Scholastics
make pretty much the same admission, but if they took the trouble to put
7
See Le opere di Galileo Galilei, ed. A Favaro (Florence, 1890–1909), X, pp. 409–10.
8
Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, I, pp. 201–2.
166
Theodicy
the objections into the form that they should have, they would see that there
are mistakes in the conclusion, and sometimes false suppositions which
cause problems. Here is an example of this: a clever man one day made me
this objection: Let the straight line BA be cut into two equal parts at the
point C, and the part CA at the point D, and the part DA at the point E, and
so on to infinity; all the halves, BC, CD, DE, and so on, together make the
whole BA, so there must be a final half, since the straight line BA finishes
at A. But the idea of this final half is absurd, for since it is a line, it will be
possible to cut it into two again. Therefore division to infinity cannot be
admitted. But I pointed out to him that there is no justification for inferring
that there has to be a final half, even though there is a final point A, for this
final point applies to all the halves on its side. And my friend acknowledged
it himself when he tried to prove this inference through a formal argument:
on the contrary, even though the division goes on to infinity, there is no final
half. And although the straight line AB is finite, it does not follow that its
division has any final end. The same problem occurs in the series of numbers
which go on to infinity. One conceives a last term, an infinite or infinitely
small one, but these things are nothing but fictions. Every number is finite
and assignable; every line is like that too, and the infinites or infinitely small
signify only magnitudes that may be taken to be as great or as small as one
wishes, to show that an error is smaller than that which has been assigned,
that is, that there is no error. Alternatively, by the infinitely small is meant
the state of the vanishing point or beginning of a magnitude, conceived
along the lines of already-formed magnitudes.
§7 (referenced in M38 and M48)

God is the first reason of things: for limited things, such as are all the things
we see and experience, are contingent, and have nothing in them that
makes their existence necessary, it being obvious that time, space, and
matter, united and uniform in themselves, and indifferent to everything,
could have received completely different motions and shapes, and in a
different order. One must therefore seek the reason for the existence of the
world, which is the whole assemblage of contingent things, and one must
seek it in the substance which contains within itself the reason for its existence,
and which is consequently necessary and eternal. This cause must also be
intelligent: for as this existing world is contingent, and as an infinity of
other worlds are equally possible, and lay claim to existence, so to speak,
as much as it does, the cause of the world must have had consideration for
or made reference to all these possible worlds in order to decide upon one
of them. And this consideration, or relation of an existent substance to
simple possibilities, cannot be anything other than the understanding that
holds the ideas of them; and deciding upon one of them cannot be anything
167
Appendix
other than the act of the will which chooses. It is the power of this substance
which makes its will efficacious. Power is directed towards being, wisdom
or understanding towards truth, and will towards the good. And this intel-
ligent cause must be infinite in all ways, and absolutely perfect in power,
in wisdom, and in goodness, since it extends to all that is possible. And as
everything is connected, there is no basis for admitting more than one of
them. Its understanding is the source of essences, and its will is the origin of
existences. Here, in a few words, is the proof of a single God together with
his perfections, and through him the origin of things.

Now this supreme wisdom, united to a goodness that is no less infinite,
cannot have failed to choose the best. For as a lesser evil is a kind of good,
likewise a lesser good is a kind of evil if it stands in the way of a greater good:
and there would be something to correct in the actions of God if there were
a way of doing things better. And just as in mathematics, when there is no
maximum or minimum, in a word nothing distinguished, everything is done
equally, or when that is not possible nothing is done at all, the same may be
said with regard to perfect wisdom, which is no less methodical than math-
ematics, that if there were not the best (optimum) among all possible worlds,
God would not have produced any. I call ‘world’ the whole series and the
whole collection of all existent things, in order that it not be said that several
worlds could exist at different times and different places, for they would all
have to be reckoned together as one world, or, if you will, as one universe.
And even if all times and all places were filled, it always remains true that
they could have been filled in an infinity of ways, and that there is an infin-
ity of possible worlds, from which God must have chosen the best, since he
does nothing without acting in accordance with supreme reason.
§9 (referenced in M51)
Some adversary, not being able to respond to this argument, will perhaps
respond to the conclusion with a counter-argument, saying that the world
could have existed without sin and without sufferings: but I deny that then
it would have been better. For it must be known that everything is con-
nected in each of the possible worlds: the universe, whatever it may be, is
all of a piece, like an ocean; the slightest motion extends its effect there to
any distance whatsoever, although this effect becomes less perceptible in
proportion to distance. In this way, God has adjusted everything there in
advance, once and for all, having foreseen prayers, good and bad actions,
and everything else; and each thing has contributed ideally, before its
existence, to the resolution that has been taken about the existence of all
things, such that nothing can be changed in the universe (any more than in
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Theodicy
a number) except its essence or, if you will, except its numerical individual-
ity. Thus, if the smallest evil that occurs in the world were missing in it, it
would no longer be this world, which, all things considered, was found the
best by the creator who chose it.

It is true that one can imagine possible worlds without sin and misfortune,
and one could come up with some, like stories of Utopias or Sevarambias,9
but in any case these same worlds would be very inferior to ours in good-
ness. I cannot show you this in detail, for can I know and can I represent
infinities to you and compare them together? But you must judge with me
ab effectu,10 since God has chosen this world as it is. Besides, we know that
often an evil brings about a good which would not have obtained without
that evil. Indeed, often two evils have made a great good:
Et si fata volunt, bina venena juvant. . .11
It is just as two liquids sometimes produce a solid – consider the spirit of

wine and spirit of urine mixed by Van Helmont;12 or as two cold and dark
bodies produce a great fire – consider an acidic liquid and an aromatic oil
combined by Mr Hoffmann.13 An army general sometimes makes a fortu-
nate mistake which brings about victory in a great battle; and is it not sung
the day before Easter in the churches of the Roman rite,
O certe necessarium Adae peccatum
Quod Christi morte deletum est!
O felix culpa, quae talem ac tantum
Meruit habere Redemptorem!14

There is a learned man who, pushing my principle of harmony to arbitrary
suppositions which do not have my approval, has made for himself a
9
Leibniz is thinking here of Thomas More’s Utopia (1516), and Denis Vairasse’s The
History of the Sevarambians: A Utopian Novel (1675).
10
‘From the outcome’.
11
‘And if the fates wish it, two poisons are a good thing’. This is a slight misquoting of
Ausonius’ epigram 10.
12
See Jean Baptiste van Helmont, Opuscula Medica inaudita (Amsterdam, 1648, 2nd edn),
p. 23.
13
See Leibniz’s letter to Friedrich Hoffman of 25 July 1702, in Opera omnia, II, 1, p. 100.
14
‘O truly necessary sin of Adam, which was erased by the death of Christ! O happy fault,
that merited so great a Redeemer!’ The lines are from the Exsultet, the Easter proclama-
tion of the Catholic Church.
169
Appendix
t heology that is almost astronomical.15 He believes that the present disorder
in this world below began when the Presiding Angel of the globe of the
Earth, which was still a sun (that is, a star that was fixed and self-luminous),
committed a sin with some lesser angels of his ministry, perhaps by rising
inappropriately against an angel of a greater sun; that at the same time,
by the pre-established harmony of the kingdoms of nature and grace, and
consequently by natural causes occurring at the appointed time, our globe
was covered with stains, rendered opaque, and driven from its place, which
made it become a wandering star or planet, that is, a satellite of another sun,
and perhaps of that very one whose superiority its angel did not want to
recognise, and that the fall of Lucifer consists in that. He believes that now,
the leader of the bad angels, whom Holy Scripture calls the prince and even
the god of this world, being envious (along with the angels of his retinue)
of that rational animal which walks on the surface of this globe, and which
God has created there perhaps to compensate for their fall, strives to make
him complicit in their crimes, and a participant in their misfortunes. At
that point, Jesus Christ came to save men. He is the eternal Son of God, as
he is the only son, but (according to some ancient Christians and the author
of this hypothesis) having taken on at the outset, from the beginning of
things, the most excellent nature of creatures in order to perfect them all,
he placed himself among them, and this is the second filiation, whereby
he is the first born of every creature. This is whom the Cabalists called
Adam Kadmon. He had perhaps planted his tabernacle in this great sun
which illuminates us, but he finally came to this globe of ours, he was born
of the virgin and has assumed human nature in order to save men from
the hands of their enemy and his. And when the time of judgement shall
draw near, when the present surface of our globe shall be about to perish,
he will visibly return to it in order to take away the good, by transplanting
them perhaps to the sun, and to punish here the wicked together with the
demons which have seduced them. Then the globe of the Earth will begin
to burn, and will perhaps be a comet. This conflagration will last for who
knows how many aeons. The tail of the comet is designated by the smoke
which will ascend forever, according to the Apocalypse,16 and this fire will
be hell, or the second death of which Holy Scripture speaks.17 But finally
hell will return its dead, death itself will be destroyed; reason and peace
will again start to reign in the minds which had been perverted. They will
15
Leibniz is probably referring to Francis Mercury van Helmont (1614–98), who held
views very similar to those Leibniz goes on to describe. See Francis Mercury van
Helmont’s Sketch of Christian Kabbalism, trans. Sheila A. Spector (Leiden: Brill, 2012).
16
A reference to Apocalypse (that is, the Book of Revelation) 14.11.
17
Apocalypse 20.14.
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Theodicy
be aware of their error, they will adore their creator, and will even begin
to love him all the more since they will see the greatness of the abyss from
which they emerge. At the same time (by virtue of the harmonic parallelism
of the kingdoms of nature and grace) this long and great conflagration will
have purged the Earth’s globe of its stains. It will become a sun again: its
Presiding Angel will take up his place with the angels of his retinue, men
who were damned will be among the good angels, this leader of our globe
will pay homage to the Messiah, leader of created beings. The glory of this
angel reconciled will be greater than it was before his fall.
Inque Deos iterum fatorum lege receptus
Aureus aeternum noster regnabit Apollo.18
The vision seemed pleasant to me, and worthy of an Origenist,19 but we

have no need of such hypotheses or fictions, in which wit plays a greater
part than revelation, and in which even reason cannot find benefit. For
there does not seem to be one principal place in the known universe which
deserves to be, in preference to the others, the seat of the oldest of created
beings, and the sun of our system at least is not it.

So if we keep to the established doctrine, that the number of men damned
eternally will be incomparably greater than that of the saved, we must
say that the evil would not fail to appear almost as nothing in comparison
with the good, when one considers the true magnitude of the City of
God. Coelius Secundus Curio wrote a little book, De Amplitudine Regni
Coelestis, which was reprinted not so long ago;20 but his understanding of
the compass of the kingdom of heaven is lacking. The ancients had meagre
ideas of God’s works, and St Augustine, for want of knowing modern
discoveries, was at a loss when it came to explaining the prevalence of
evil. It seemed to the ancients that only our earth was inhabited, in which
they were even afraid of its antipodes: according to them, the rest of the
world consisted of some shining globes and some crystalline spheres.
Today, whatever limits are given or not given to the universe, it must be
acknowledged that there is an innumerable number of globes, as great as
18
‘And received among the Gods again by the law of the fates, Our golden Apollo will
reign forever.’ These are the last two lines of a verse passage found at the end of book
two of the first edition of Thomas Burnet’s Telluris Theoria Sacra (London, 1681), p.
306. They were not reprinted in later editions of the book. The themes of the passage
recall Virgil’s Eclogue IV, but are not a quotation from it.
19
That is, a follower of the early Church Father Origen (182–254 ce).
20
Coelius Secundus Curio, De amplitudine regni coelestis (Frankfurt, 1617). This was a
reprint of the original 1544 edition.
171
Appendix
and greater than ours, which have as much right as it does to have rational
inhabitants, though it does not follow that these inhabitants would be
human. It is only one planet, that is, one of six principal satellites of our
sun, and as all fixed stars are suns too, it is clear how small our earth is in
relation to visible things, since it is only an appendage of one of them. It
may be that all suns are inhabited only by blessed creatures, and nothing
obliges us to think that many of them are damned, for few instances or
examples are sufficient to show the utility that good derives from evil.
Besides, since there is no reason to believe that there are stars everywhere,
is it not possible that there may be a great space beyond the region of stars?
Whether this is the Empyrean Heaven or not, forever may this immense
space which surrounds the whole of this region be filled with happiness
and glory. It may be conceived like the ocean, into which return the rivers
of all blessed creatures when they have reached their perfection in the
system of stars. What will become of the consideration of our globe and
its inhabitants? Will it not be something incomparably less than a physical
point, since our earth is like a point in comparison with the distance of
some fixed stars? Thus, since the proportion of the part of the universe
known to us is almost lost in nothingness compared with what is unknown
to us and that we nevertheless have grounds to acknowledge, and since all
the evils that may be brought forward against us are only in this virtual
nothingness, it may be that all evils are also only a virtual nothingness in
comparison with the goods in the universe.

But we must also address the more speculative and more metaphysical
difficulties that have been mentioned, and which concern the cause of
evil. First of all, it is asked, from where does evil come? Si Deus est, unde
malum? Si non est, unde bonum?21 The ancients attributed the cause of evil
to matter, which they believed uncreated and independent of God: but
we, who derive all being from God, where shall we find the source of evil?
The answer is that it must be sought in the ideal nature of the creature,
insofar as this nature is contained in the eternal truths that are in God’s
understanding, independently of his will. For we must consider that there
is an original imperfection in the creature before sin, because the creature is
essentially limited, which means that it cannot know everything, and that
it can be deceived and make other mistakes. Plato said in the Timaeus that
the world had its origin in the understanding together with necessity.22
21
‘If God exists, from where comes evil? If he does not exist, from where comes good?’
This is a quotation from Boethius’ The Consolation of Philosophy, book 1, verse 4.
22
Leibniz is here thinking of Plato, Timaeus 48a, in Plato: Complete Works, p. 1250.
172
Theodicy
Others have joined God and Nature.23 This can be given a good sense.
God will be the understanding, and necessity, that is, the essential nature
of things, will be the object of the understanding, insofar as it consists in
the eternal truths. But this object is internal and is found in the divine
understanding. And therein is found not only the primitive form of good,
but also the origin of evil: this is the region of the eternal truths, which must
take the place of matter when it comes to seeking the source of things. This
region is the ideal cause of evil (so to speak) as well as of good: but, strictly
speaking, the formal cause of evil has no efficient cause, for it consists in
privation, as we shall see, that is, in that which the efficient cause does not
produce. This is why the Scholastics are accustomed to call the cause of
evil deficient.

But someone will say to me: why do you speak to us of permitting? Is it not
God who does the evil, and is it not him who wills it? It is here that it will
be necessary to explain what permission is, so that it is clear that this term is
not employed without reason. But before that one must explain the nature
of the will, which has its degrees: and in the general sense it may be said
that the will consists in the inclination to do something in proportion to the
good it contains. This will is called antecedent when it is separated, and is
concerned with each good separately insofar as it is good. In this sense it
may be said that God tends to all good insofar as it is good, ad perfectionem
simpliciter simplicem,24 to speak in a Scholastic way,25 and that happens by
an antecedent will. He has a genuine inclination to sanctify and to save all
men, to exclude sin, and to prevent damnation. It may even be said that
this will is efficacious in itself (per se), that is, in such a way that the effect
would follow if there were not some stronger reason that prevents it: for
this will does not make the ultimate effort (ad summum conatum), otherwise
it would never fail to produce its full effect, since God is the master of all
things. Entire and infallible success belongs only to the consequent will, as
it is called. This will is complete, and it is with respect to it that this rule
holds good, that one never fails to do what one wills to do when one is able
to do it. Now this consequent, final, and decisive will results from the con-
flict of all the antecedent wills, both those which tend towards good as well
as those which reject evil; and from the confluence of all these particular
23
Leibniz is here thinking of Spinoza, and his description of God as ‘God, or Nature’. See
Ethics IV, preface, in Spinoza, Complete Works, p. 321.
24
‘simply to simple perfection’.
25
The phrase can be found, for example, in Alonso Penafiel, Theologia Scholastica
Naturalis (Leiden, 1678), p. 152.
173
Appendix
wills comes the complete will, just as in mechanics, the compound motion
results from all the tendencies that converge in one and the same moving
body, and satisfies each one equally, insofar as it is possible to do at the
same time. And it is as if the moving body were divided among these ten-
dencies, in accordance with what I once showed in one of the Paris Journals
(7 Sept. 1693), when giving the general law of compositions of motion.26 It
is also in this sense that it may be said that the antecedent will is efficacious
in some way, and even successfully effective.

It is indeed beyond doubt that we must refrain from preventing the sin
of others when we cannot do it without sinning ourselves. But someone
will perhaps make the objection that it is God himself who acts, and who
brings about all that is real in the sin of the creature. This objection leads
us to consider the physical concurrence of God with the creature, after we
have examined the moral concurrence, which is the more problematic. Some
have believed, with the renowned Durand of Saint-Pourçain and Cardinal
Aureolus, the famous Scholastic, that the concurrence of God with the
creature (I mean the physical concurrence) is only general and mediate,
and that God creates substances and gives them the force they need, and
that afterwards he leaves them be and does nothing except conserve them,
without assisting them in their actions. This opinion has been refuted by
the majority of Scholastic theologians, and it seems that in the past it met
with disapproval in Pelagius. Nevertheless, around 1630 a Capuchin called
Louis Pereir de Dole wrote a book expressly to revive it, at least in relation
to free actions.27 Some moderns incline thereto, and Mr Bernier supports
it in a little book on the free and the voluntary.28 But with respect to God,
one cannot say what it is to conserve without coming back to the common
view. One must also bear in mind that the conserving action of God should
have some regard to what is conserved, such as it is, and according to the
state it is in; therefore his action cannot be general or indeterminate. These
generalities are abstractions which are not found in the truth of individual
things, and the conservation of a man standing is different from the conser-
vation of a man seated. It would not be this way if conservation consisted
only in the act of preventing and warding off some foreign cause which
could destroy what one wishes to conserve, as often happens when men
26
‘Règle générale de la composition des mouvemens’, Journal des sçavans (7 September
1693), pp. 417–19.
27
Ludovico a Dola, Disputatio quadripartita de modo coniunctionis concursuum Dei et
creaturae (Leiden 1634). Leibniz made notes on this book in the 1680s; see A VI 4,
pp. 1789–92.
28
François Bernier, Traite de libre, et du volontaire (Amsterdam, 1685).
174
Theodicy
conserve something. But aside from the fact that we are obliged sometimes
to nourish what we conserve, we should bear in mind that God’s conserva-
tion consists in this immediate perpetual influence that the dependency
of creatures demands. This dependency applies not only to the substance
but also to the action, and perhaps it cannot be better explained than by
saying, with the common run of theologians and philosophers, that it is a
continued creation.

It will be objected that God therefore now creates man a sinner, he who
created him innocent in the beginning. But it must be said here with
regard to moral concurrence that as God is supremely wise he cannot fail
to observe certain laws, and to act in accordance with the rules, both physi-
cal and moral, that his wisdom led him to choose. And the same reason
that led him to create man innocent, but liable to fall, makes him recreate
man when he falls, since on account of his knowledge the future is like the
present to him, and he cannot retract the resolutions made.

And as for physical concurrence, here is where we must consider this truth
which has already caused such a stir in the schools, since St Augustine
pointed it out, that evil is a privation of being, whereas the action of God
extends to the positive.29 This response is considered somewhat ad-hoc,
and even as something chimerical by the minds of many. But here is a
rather similar example, which will be able to disabuse them.

The renowned Kepler and after him Mr Descartes (in his letters) have
spoken of the natural inertia of bodies,30 and this is something that may
be considered as a perfect resemblance to and even as an example of the
original limitation of creatures, to show that privation constitutes the
formal cause of imperfections and disadvantages in the substance as well
as in its actions. Suppose that the current of one and the same river carries
along a number of boats, which differ from each other only in the cargo,
some being laden with wood, others with stone, and some with more of
these, others with less. That being so, it will happen that the most heavily
laden boats will go more slowly than the others, provided we suppose that
they are not assisted by the wind, or the oar, or some other similar means.
Strictly speaking, it is not weight which is the cause of this arrestment,
29
See Augustine, Enchiridion I.XI.
30
See for example Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, III, p. 135.
175
Appendix
since the boats are going down and not up, but it is the same cause that
also increases the weight in bodies with greater density, that is, which are
less spongy and more filled with matter proper to them: for the matter
which passes through the pores, not receiving the same motion, should
not be taken into account. It is therefore the case that the matter is origi-
nally inclined to slowness, or privation of speed, rather than inclined to
decrease this speed by itself once it has received it, for that would be to
act. Instead, it is inclined to moderate by its receptivity the effect of the
impression when it should receive it. And consequently, since there is
more matter moved by the same force of the current when the boat is more
laden, it must be the case that it goes more slowly. Moreover, experiments
on the impact of bodies show – as does reason – that twice as much force
must be employed to give the same speed to a body which is composed
of the same matter but is twice as large. This would not be necessary if
matter were absolutely indifferent to rest and motion, and if it did not
have this natural inertia, about which we have just spoken, which gives it a
kind of aversion to being moved. Now compare the force that the current
exerts on the boats, and communicates to them, with the action of God,
who produces and conserves whatever is positive in creatures, and gives
them perfection, being, and force. Compare, I say, the inertia of matter
with the natural imperfection of creatures, and the slowness of the laden
boat with the defect found in the qualities and the action of the creature,
and we shall find that there is nothing so apt as this comparison. The
current is the cause of the boat’s motion, but not of its arrestment; God is
the cause of perfection in the nature and the actions of the creature, but
the limitation of the receptivity of the creature is the cause of the defects
that there are in its action. Thus the Platonists, St Augustine, and the
Scholastics were right to say that God is the cause of the material aspect
of evil, which consists in the positive, and not of the formal aspect, which
consists in privation, just as it may be said that the current is the cause
of the material aspect of the arrestment without being the cause of the
formal aspect, that is, it is the cause of the boat’s speed without being the
cause of the limits of this speed. And God is no more the cause of sin than
the river’s current is the cause of the boat’s arrestment. Therefore force
is with regard to matter as spirit is with regard to the flesh: the mind is
willing and the flesh is weak, and minds act
quantum non noxia corpora tardant.31
31
‘to the extent they are not prevented by harmful bodies’. A quotation from Virgil’s The
Aeneid 6.731.
176
Theodicy

Therefore there is a remarkably similar relation between such and such an
action of God, and such and such a passion or reception of the creature,
which in the ordinary course of things is perfected only to the degree per-
mitted by its receptivity, as it is called. And when it is said that the creature
depends upon God insofar as it exists and insofar as it acts, and even that
conservation is a continual creation, the fact is that God always gives to
the creature, and produces continually, whatever in it is positive, good and
perfect, every perfect gift coming from the Father of lights.32 Meanwhile,
the imperfections and the defects in operations come from the original
limitation that the creature could not fail to receive with the first beginning
of its being, on account of the ideal reasons that limit it. For God could not
give it everything without making it a god; therefore there must be differ-
ent degrees in the perfection of things, and also limitations of every kind.

This consideration will also help to satisfy some modern philosophers who
go so far as to say that God is the only agent. It is true that God is the only
one whose action is pure and not adulterated by what is called suffering; but
that does not prevent the creature playing a part in actions too, since the
action of the creature is a modification of its substance, which flows naturally
from it and which contains a variation not only in the perfections that God
has communicated to the creature, but also in the limitations that the crea-
ture brings with it, in order to be what it is. This also shows that there is a
real distinction between the substance and its modifications or accidents,
contrary to the opinion of some moderns, and especially of the late Duke
of Buckingham, who spoke of it in a little discourse on religion recently
reprinted.33 Evil is therefore like darkness, and not only ignorance but also
error and malice consist formally in a certain kind of privation. Here is an
example of error which we have already used: I see a tower which from a
distance appears round although it is square.34 The thought that the tower
is what it appears to be flows naturally from what I see, and when I dwell
on this thought, it is an affirmation, it is a false judgement; but if I continue
the examination, if some reflection makes me aware that appearances
32
An allusion to James 1.17, where God is called the Father of lights.
33
See George, Duke of Buckingham, A Short Discourse upon the Reasonableness of Men’s
having a Religion, or Worship of God (London, 1685), pp. 8ff. The book was reprinted in
1708.
34
This has been used as a stock example of perceptual error throughout the history of
philosophy. See for example Sextus Empiricus, Outlines of Scepticism, p. 31; Descartes,
The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, II, p. 53.
177
Appendix
deceive me, then behold, I recover from the error. To remain in a certain
place, or to go no further, not to catch sight of something noteworthy:
these are privations.

But let us come to the difficulties. Philosophers today acknowledge that
the truth of future contingents is determinate, that is, that future contin-
gents are future, or rather that they will be, that they will happen: for it is
as certain that the future will be just as it is that the past has been. It was
already true a hundred years ago that I would write today, just as it will be
true in a hundred years that I have written. Thus the future contingent,
just because it is future, is no less contingent, and determination, which
would be called certainty if it were known, is not incompatible with con-
tingency. Often the certain and the determinate are taken to be one and the
same thing, because a determinate truth is one that is able to be known,
such that it may be said that the determination is an objective certainty.

This determination comes from the very nature of truth, and is no threat to
freedom: but there are other determinations that are taken from elsewhere,
and in the first place from God’s foreknowledge, which some have thought
contrary to freedom. For they say that what is foreseen cannot fail to exist,
and they speak the truth, but it does not follow that what is foreseen is nec-
essary, for a necessary truth is one whose contrary is impossible, or implies
contradiction. Now this truth, that I shall write tomorrow, is not of that
nature, it is therefore not necessary. But supposing that God foresees it, it
is necessary that it happens, that is, the consequence is necessary, namely,
that it exists, since it has been foreseen, for God is infallible: this is what is
called a hypothetical necessity. But what we are concerned with here is not
this necessity. In order to be able to say that an action is necessary, that it
is not contingent, that it is not the effect of a free choice, an absolute neces-
sity is required. And besides, it is very easy to reach the conclusion that
foreknowledge in itself adds nothing to the determination of the truth of
future contingents, except that this determination is known. This does not
augment the determination or the futurition (as it is called) of these events,
which we acknowledged at the outset.
§44 (referenced in M31, M32, M36, and M53)

Nevertheless, objective certainty or determination does not constitute the
necessity of the determinate truth. All philosophers acknowledge this by
admitting that the truth of future contingents is determinate and that they
nonetheless remain contingent. Contingency consists in it being the case
178
Theodicy
that the thing would imply no contradiction in itself if the effect did not
follow. To better understand this point, we should bear in mind that there
are two great principles of our reasonings. One is the principle of contradic-
tion, which holds that of two contradictory propositions one is true and
the other false; the other principle is that of the determinant reason. This
holds that nothing ever happens without there being a cause or at least a
determinant reason, that is, something that can serve to explain a priori
why it is existent rather than non-existent, and why it is thus rather than
any other way. This great principle holds for all events, and a contrary
example will never be given: and although most often these determinant
reasons are not well known to us, we nonetheless sense that there are
some. Without this great principle we could never prove the existence
of God, and we would lose the countless very good and very profitable
arguments that are founded on it. And this principle does not admit of
any exception, otherwise its force would be weakened. There is nothing so
weak as those systems in which everything is shaky and full of exceptions.
This is not a defect of the system I approve, in which everything proceeds
in accordance with general rules which are, at most, mutually restrictive.

We must therefore not imagine as do some Scholastics, who are somewhat
given to fancies, that future free contingents are privileged over this
general rule of the nature of things. There is always a prevailing reason
which leads the will to its choice, and to preserve freedom of the will it is
sufficient that this reason incline without necessitating. That is also the
opinion of all the ancients, of Plato, of Aristotle, and of St Augustine. The
will is never led to act except by the representation of the good, which pre-
vails over the contrary representations. This is acknowledged even with
regard to God, the good angels, and blessed souls, and it is recognised that
they are no less free for that. God does not fail to choose the best, but he
is not constrained to do so, and there is no necessity in the object of God’s
choice either, since another series of things is equally possible. It is for
that reason that the choice is free and independent of necessity, because
it is made between a number of possibles, and the will is determined only
by the prevailing goodness of the object. It is therefore not a defect with
respect to God and the saints: and on the contrary, it would be a great
defect, or rather a manifest absurdity, if it were otherwise even in men
here on earth, and if they were capable of acting without any inclining
reason. No example of this will ever be found, and even when one takes a
particular side out of caprice, to demonstrate one’s freedom, the pleasure
or advantage one thinks one finds in this foolishness is one of the reasons
which leads one to it.
179
Appendix

This is also what makes the case of Buridan’s ass between two meadows, equally
inclined to both, a fiction that cannot happen in the universe, in the order
of nature, although Mr Bayle is of a different view.35 It is true that, if the
case were possible, it would have to be said that the ass would let itself die of
starvation, but ultimately the question is about the impossible, unless God
make the thing happen on purpose. For the universe cannot be bisected by
a plane drawn through the middle of the ass, cut vertically along its length,
so that everything is equal and alike on both sides, just as an ellipse, and
every plane figure of the kind I call ambidexter, can be bisected in this way,
by any straight line that passes through its centre. For neither the parts of
the universe nor the innards of the animal are alike, nor are they evenly
situated on either side of this vertical plane. Therefore there will always be
many things inside the ass and outside the ass, although not apparent to us,
which will determine it to go to one side rather than the other. And although
man is free, which is not the case for the ass, it is nonetheless true for the
same reason that even in man the case of a perfect equilibrium between two
courses of action is impossible, and that an angel, or God at least, could
always explain the course of action the man has taken, by assigning a cause
or an inclining reason which actually led him to take it. However this reason
would often be very involved and inconceivable for us, because the chain of
causes linked together goes back a long way.

Everything is therefore certain and determined in advance in man, as
everywhere else, and the human soul is a kind of spiritual automaton,
although contingent actions in general and free actions in particular are
not for that reason necessary, that is, of an absolute necessity, which would
be truly incompatible with contingency. Thus this contingency and this
freedom is not destroyed either by futurition in itself, however certain it
is, or the infallible foresight of God, or the predetermination of causes, or
the predetermination of God’s decrees. This is acknowledged in regard to
futurition and foresight, as has already been explained. And since God’s
decree consists merely in the resolution he makes, after having compared
all possible worlds, to choose the one which is the best, and to admit it to
existence along with everything this world contains, by means of the all-
powerful word Fiat,36 it is evident that this decree changes nothing in the
constitution of things, and that it leaves them just as they were in the state
35
See Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, I, p. 742 (article ‘Buridan’, note B).
36
‘Let it be done’.
180
Theodicy
of mere possibility, that is, it changes nothing either in their essence or
nature, or even in their accidents, which are already represented perfectly
in the idea of this possible world. Thus that which is contingent and free
remains no less so under God’s decrees than under foresight.

It will also be said that, if everything is adjusted, then God cannot perform
miracles. But we should be aware that the miracles which happen in the
world were also enfolded and represented as possible in this same world
considered in the state of pure possibility; and God, who has since per-
formed them, had decreed to perform them from the moment he chose this
world. It will still be objected that vows and prayers, merits and demerits,
good and bad actions, are all of no use since nothing can be changed. This
objection is most problematic to ordinary folk, and yet it is a straightfor-
ward sophism. These prayers, these vows, these good or bad actions that
occur today were already before God when he made the resolution to
organise things. Those things which happen in this actual world, along
with their effects and their consequences, were represented in the idea of
this same world, as yet still possible; they were represented there, attract-
ing God’s grace, whether natural or supernatural, requiring punishments,
requiring rewards: everything as it effectively happens in this world after
God chose it. The prayer and the good action were from then on an ideal
cause or condition, that is, an inclining reason, which can contribute to
God’s grace, or to the reward, as it does so now, in an actual way. And as
everything is wisely linked together in the world, it is clear that God, fore-
seeing what would happen freely, organised everything else around that in
advance, or (what is the same thing) he chose that possible world in which
everything was organised in this way.

I have just shown how the action of the will depends upon its causes; that
there is nothing so in keeping with human nature as this dependency of our
actions, and that otherwise one would fall into an absurd and unbearable
fatality, that is, into the Fatum Mahometanum,37 which is the worst of all
because it overthrows foresight and good counsel. Nevertheless it is good
to show how this dependency of voluntary actions does not ultimately
preclude there being in us a wonderful spontaneity, which in a certain sense
makes the soul in its resolutions independent of the physical influence of all
other creatures. This spontaneity, scarcely acknowledged until now, which
extends our sovereignty over our actions to the greatest extent p ossible,
37
‘The fate of Mohammedans’, or ‘Turkish fate’.
181
Appendix
is a consequence of the system of pre-established harmony, of which it is
necessary to give some explanation here. The philosophers of the school
believed that there was a reciprocal physical influence between body and
soul. But since it is rightly noted that thought and extended mass have
no relationship with each other, and that they are created things which
differ in every respect, a number of moderns have recognised that there
is no physical communication between soul and body, even though there
always subsists the metaphysical communication, which makes soul and
body compose one and the same suppositum, or what one calls a person. This
physical communication, if there were such a thing, would cause the soul
to change the degree of speed and the line of direction of some motions in
the body, and vice versa would cause the body to change the sequence of
thoughts in the soul. But this effect cannot be inferred from any notion
conceived in the body and in the soul, even though nothing is better known
to us than the soul, since it is immediate to us, that is, immediate to itself.

Mr Descartes wanted to capitulate, and make a part of the body’s action
depend upon the soul. He thought he knew a rule of nature which, accord-
ing to him, holds that the same quantity of motion is conserved in bodies.
He judged that it was not possible for the influence of the soul to violate
this law of bodies, but he believed that the soul could nevertheless have the
power to change the direction of motions occurring in the body, somewhat
as a rider, although not giving any force to the horse he rides, nevertheless
controls the horse by directing its force whichever way he pleases. But as
that occurs by means of the bridle, the bit, the spurs, and other material
aids, we can conceive how it happens; but there are no instruments the
soul can use to have this effect, nothing ultimately either in the soul or in
the body, that is, either in the thought or in the mass, which can serve to
explain this change of the one by the other. In a word, the idea of the soul
changing the quantity of force, and of it changing the line of direction, are
both equally inexplicable.

Moreover, two important truths on this subject have been discovered since
Mr Descartes’ time. The first is that the quantity of absolute force, which
is indeed conserved, is different from the quantity of motion, as I have
demonstrated elsewhere.38 The second discovery is that the same direc-
tion is also conserved in all the bodies together that one supposes to act on
38
See ‘Brevis demonstratio erroris memorabilis Cartesii et aliorum circa legem naturae’,
Acta Eruditorum (March 1686), pp. 161–3. English translation in PPL, pp. 296–8.
182
Theodicy
each other, in whatever way they impact upon each other. If this rule had
been known to Mr Descartes, he would have made the direction of bodies
as independent of the soul as their force, and I think that that would have
led him straight to the hypothesis of pre-established harmony, which is
where these same rules led me. For aside from the fact that the physical
influence of one of these substances on the other is inexplicable, I realised
that without completely upsetting the laws of nature, the soul could not act
physically upon the body. And I did not think that attention should here
be paid to philosophers, very able otherwise, who bring in a God like the
theatre’s Deus ex machina, introduced in order to resolve the play, by main-
taining that God expressly devotes himself to moving bodies in the way
the soul wants and to giving perceptions to the soul in the way the body
requires. The reason being that this system, called that of occasional causes
(because it teaches that God acts on the body on the occasion of the soul,
and vice versa), aside from the fact that it introduces perpetual miracles
in order to bring about the communication of these two substances, does
not stop the perturbation of the natural laws established in each of these
same substances, a perturbation that their mutual influence would cause,
according to common opinion.

Thus I was, on other grounds, convinced of the principle of harmony in
general, and consequently of preformation and the pre-established harmony
of all things between themselves, between nature and grace, between
God’s decrees and our foreseen actions, between all the parts of matter,
and even between the future and the past, the whole in accordance with
the supreme wisdom of God, whose works are the most harmonious it is
possible to conceive. Because of this, I could not fail to come to this system,
which holds that God created the soul from the outset in such a way that it
must produce in itself and represent to itself in an orderly way that which
happens in the body, and the body also in such a way that it should do of
itself that which the soul ordains. So the laws that connect the thoughts of
the soul in the order of final causes and in accordance with the evolution
of perceptions, should produce images that match up and agree with the
impressions of bodies on our organs. Also, the laws of motions in the body,
which follow each other in the order of efficient causes, match up also,
and are so much in agreement with the thoughts of the soul that the body
comes to act at the time the soul wills it.

And far from this system being prejudicial to freedom, nothing could be
more favourable to it. And Mr Jaquelot has shown rather well in his book
183
Appendix
Conformité de la foi avec la raison,39 that it is as if one who knows every-
thing that I shall order a servant to do all day long tomorrow then made
an automaton which perfectly resembles this servant, and which carries
out tomorrow at the appointed time everything that I order. This would
not prevent me freely ordering whatever I like, although there would be
nothing free in the action of the automaton which served me.

Moreover, since everything that happens in the soul depends only upon the
soul, according to this system, and its subsequent state derives only from
it and from its present state, how can it be given a greater independence? It
is true that there still remains some imperfection in the constitution of the
soul. Everything that happens to the soul depends upon it, but this does
not depend always upon its will: that would be too much. These things
are not always even known by its understanding or apperceived distinctly.
For there is in the soul not only an order of distinct perceptions, which
make up its mastery, but also a series of confused perceptions or passions,
which make up its enslavement. And one should not be surprised by that,
as the soul would be a divinity if it had nothing but distinct perceptions. It
nevertheless has some power even over these confused perceptions, albeit
in an indirect way, for although it cannot change its passions right away, it
can work on them from afar successfully enough, and give itself new pas-
sions and even habits. It even has a similar power over the more distinct
perceptions, being able to indirectly give itself opinions and volitions, and
to prevent itself from having such and such other ones, and to suspend or
hasten its judgement. For we can seek the means in advance to stop our-
selves, when the occasion presents itself, on the slippery precipice of a rash
judgement; we can find some excuse to postpone our resolution, even if the
matter appears ready to be judged. And although our opinion and our act
of willing are not directly objects of our will (as I have already noted), one
nonetheless takes measures sometimes to will, and even to believe, as time
goes on, that which one does not presently will or believe. So great is the
depth of the human mind.

Finally, to conclude this point about spontaneity, it must be said that,
strictly speaking, the soul has within it the principle of all its actions, and
even of all its passions, and that the same is true in all the simple substances
scattered throughout nature, although there is freedom only in those which
are intelligent. Yet in the popular sense, when speaking in accordance with
39
Isaac Jaquelot, Conformité de la foi avec la raison (Amsterdam, 1705), p. 388.
184
Theodicy
appearances, we should say that the soul depends in some way on the body
and on the impressions of the senses, somewhat as we speak with Ptolemy
and Tycho in everyday talk, and think with Copernicus when it is a matter
of the rising or setting of the sun.
§66 (referenced in M49, M51, and M80)

However a true and philosophical sense may be given to this mutual
dependence which we conceive between the soul and the body, which is
that one of these substances depends upon the other ideally, insofar as the
reason for what happens in one can be found in what is in the other. This
had already happened in the case of God’s decrees, from the moment when
God organised in advance the harmony that there would be between them.
In the same way, the aforementioned automaton, which would adopt the
role of servant, would depend upon me ideally, by virtue of the knowledge
of one who, foreseeing my future orders, would have made it capable of
serving me at the appointed time for the whole of the following day. The
knowledge of my future wishes would have actuated this great craftsman,
who would have formed the automaton afterwards: my influence would be
objective, and his would be physical. For insofar as the soul has perfection
and distinct thoughts, God has accommodated the body to the soul, and
has arranged in advance that the body is impelled to execute its orders; and
insofar as the soul is imperfect and its perceptions are confused, God has
accommodated the soul to the body, so that the soul is nonetheless inclined
by the passions which arise from corporeal representations. This produces
the same effect, and same appearance, as if the one depended upon the
other immediately, and by means of a physical influence. And strictly
speaking, it is through its confused thoughts that the soul represents the
bodies which surround it. The same thing must be understood of every-
thing we conceive of the actions of simple substances upon one another.
The fact is that each one is supposed to act on the other in proportion to its
perfection, although this happens only ideally, and in the reasons of things,
in that from the outset God adjusted one substance to another according
to the perfection or imperfection there is in each one. Although action and
passion are always mutual in creatures, because a part of the reasons that
serve to explain distinctly what happens, and that served to make it exist, is
in one of these substances, and another part of these reasons is in the other,
with perfections and imperfections always being mixed and shared. This is
what makes us attribute action to one and passion to the other.

Thus it is that the punishments of the damned continue, even when they
no longer serve to turn them away from evil, and that likewise the rewards
185
Appendix
of the blessed continue, even when they no longer serve to strengthen their
commitment to good. Yet it may be said that the damned forever bring
new pains upon themselves through the commission of new sins, and that
the blessed forever bring new joys upon themselves through new progress
in goodness. Both occurrences are founded on the principle of fittingness,
which ensures that things were organised so that the evil action should
bring a punishment upon itself. For there are grounds to think, in accord-
ance with the parallelism of the two kingdoms, that of final causes and that
of efficient causes, that God has established in the universe a connection
between punishment or reward and a bad or good action, such that the
first is always attracted by the second, and virtue and vice get their reward
and their punishment in consequence of the natural series of things, which
contains yet another kind of pre-established harmony than the one appar-
ent in the communication of soul and body. For ultimately, everything
God does is harmonious to perfection, as I have already pointed out. So
perhaps this fittingness would cease to apply to those who act without
true freedom, exempt from absolute necessity, and in that case correc-
tive justice alone would take place, and not vindictive justice. This is the
opinion of the renowned Conring, in a dissertation he published on what
is just.40 And indeed, the arguments Pomponazzi already used in his book
on fate, to prove the usefulness of punishments and rewards even if every-
thing should come to pass in our actions by a fatal necessity, concern only
amendment and not satisfaction, punishment not vengeance.41 Moreover,
it is only for the spectacle that one destroys the animal accomplices of
certain crimes, just as one razes the houses of rebels, that is, to inspire
terror. Thus it is an act of corrective justice, in which vindictive justice has
no part at all.

Some able and well-intentioned authors, wanting to show the force of the
arguments of the two principal parties in order to inspire them to mutual
toleration, think that the whole controversy boils down to this key point,
namely: what was God’s principal aim in making his decrees with regard
to man? Did he make them solely to establish his glory, by manifesting his
attributes and forming the great plan of creation and providence in order
to achieve that? Or did he instead have regard for the voluntary motions of
the intelligent substances he planned to create, by considering what they
40
Hermann Conring, Disputatio philosophica de iure (Helmstadt, 1637).
41
Petrus Pomponazzi, De naturalium effectuum admirandorum causis, seu de incantationibus
Liber. Item de Fato: Libero arbitrio: Praedestinatione: Providentia Dei, Libri V (Basel,
1567).
186
Theodicy
would will and do in the different circumstances and situations in which
he might put them, in order to make a fitting resolution on the matter? It
seems to me that the two answers to this great question, put forward as
being mutually conflicting, are easy to reconcile, and that consequently
the parties would be ultimately in agreement, without need for toleration,
if everything were reduced to this point. In truth, in forming the plan to
create the world, God intended solely to manifest and communicate his
perfections in the way that was most efficacious, and most worthy of his
greatness, his wisdom, and his goodness. But that very intention required
him to consider all the actions of creatures still in the state of pure pos-
sibility, in order to form the most fitting plan. He is like a great architect
who intends as his aim the satisfaction or the glory of having built a
beautiful palace, and who considers everything that should enter into
this construction – the form and the materials, the place, the location, the
means, the workers, the expenditure – before he makes a final resolution.
For when making his plans, a wise person cannot separate the end from
the means: he does not adopt an end without knowing if there are means
of achieving it.

Therefore there will be no controversy to stir up on that point (as I
hope) with people who are even remotely reasonable. But there will
always be much controversy even amongst those called Universalists and
Particularists, with regard to what they teach of the grace and the will
of God. Nevertheless I tend to believe that at least the heated dispute
between them about God’s will to save all men, and about what depends
upon it (keeping separate the dispute about auxiliaries, or the assistance
of grace), consists in expressions rather than in things. For it is sufficient
to consider that God, and every other wise, beneficent mind, is inclined
towards every good which is feasible and that this inclination is propor-
tionate to the excellence of the good; and that comes about (considering
the matter precisely and in itself) through an antecedent will, as it is called,
though it does not always have its entire effect, because this wise mind
must have many other inclinations besides. Thus it is the result of all the
inclinations together that makes his will complete and decretory, as we
have explained above. So it may very rightly be said, with the ancients,
that God wills to save all men according to his antecedent will, and not
according to his consequent will, which never fails to have its effect. And
if those who deny this universal will do not want to permit the antecedent
inclination to be called a will, they trouble themselves only about a ques-
tion of name.
187
Appendix
From that it is clear that, in part, the question between the Supralapsarians
and the Infralapsarians, and then between these and the Evangelicals,
comes back to rightly conceiving the order that exists in God’s decrees.
Perhaps one could bring about a sudden end to this dispute by saying that,
considered aright, all the decrees of God with which we are concerned are
simultaneous, not only with regard to time, about which everyone agrees,
but also in signo rationis, or in the order of nature. And indeed, the Formula
of Concord, following some passages in St Augustine, has included salva-
tion and the means which lead to it in the same Decree of Election.42 To
show this simultaneity of destinations or decrees with which we are con-
cerned, we must come back to the stratagem I have used more than once,
which states that God, before decreeing anything, considered among other
possible series of things the one which he afterwards approved. In the idea
of this possible series is represented how the first parents sin and corrupt
their posterity, how Jesus Christ redeems the human race, how some who
were aided by such and such graces attain final faith and salvation, and how
others, with or without such or other graces, do not attain this, and con-
tinue in sin and are damned. God gives his approval to this series only after
having entered into all its detail, and so he pronounces nothing final about
those who will be saved or damned without having everything weighed up
and even compared with other possible series. Thus what he pronounces
concerns the whole sequence all at once: he just decrees its existence. In
order to save other men, or in a different way, he would have to choose a
completely different general series, since everything is connected in each
series. And on this approach to things, which is the most worthy of the
wisest being, all of whose actions are connected together to the greatest
possible extent, there would be only a single total decree, which is the one
to create such a world. And this total decree includes all the particular
decrees as well, without there being any order between them, although
in any case it may be said that each particular act of the antecedent will,
which enters into the total result, has its value and order in proportion to
the good to which this act inclines. But these acts of the antecedent will are
not called decrees, since they are not yet inevitable, their success depend-
ing on the total result. And all the difficulties that can be raised against this
approach to things amount to the ones that have already been considered
and removed when the origin of evil was examined.
42
The Formula of Concord is the final part of the Book of Concord, the doctrinal statement
of Lutheranism that appeared in 1580. Leibniz is referring to article XI, on Election.
188
Theodicy
The first difficulty with sin and its remedies is how the soul was able to be
infected with original sin, which is the root of actual sins, without there
being any injustice in God for exposing the soul to it. This difficulty has
given rise to three opinions on the origin of the soul itself. The first is the
pre-existence of human souls in another world or in another life, in which they
had sinned and thereby had been condemned to this prison of the human
body. This is the opinion of Platonists, which is attributed to Origen, and
which is still found today among his followers. The English doctor, Henry
More, maintained something of this doctrine in a book written specially
on it.43 Some of those who support this pre-existence have gone as far as
metempsychosis. Mr van Helmont, the son, was of this opinion,44 and
the ingenious author of Méditations sur la métaphysique, published in 1678
under the name of Guillaume Wander, appears to have some fondness for
it.45 The second opinion is that of traduction, as if the soul of children were
engendered (per traducem) from the soul or souls of those from whom the
body is engendered. St Augustine was inclined to this view in order to
better explain original sin.46 This doctrine is also taught by the majority of
theologians of the Augsburg Confession. Nevertheless it is not completely
established among them, since the universities of Jena, Helmstadt, and
others, have been against it for a long time. The third opinion, and the one
most widely received today, is that of creation. It is taught in the majority
of Christian schools, but it suffers from the greatest difficulty in relation to
original sin.

This controversy among theologians about the origin of the human soul has
run into the philosophical dispute about the origin of forms. Aristotle and
the school after him have called ‘form’ that which is a principle of action,
and is found in that which acts. This internal principle is either substantial,
which is called ‘soul’ when it is in an organic body, or accidental, which
is customarily called ‘quality’. The same philosopher gave to the soul the
43
Leibniz is probably referring here to More’s The Immortality of the Soul (London,
1659), in which the pre-existence of the soul was defended.
44
See Francis Mercury van Helmont, Two Hundred Queries moderately propounded con-
cerning the Doctrine of the Revolution of Humane Souls, and its Conformity to the Truths of
Christianity (London, 1684).
45
Leibniz is thinking here of the book Méditations sur la métaphysique (Paris, 1678), which
was credited to Abbé de Lanion, a pseudonym of Guillaume Wander. Leibniz made
notes on this book early in his career. See A VI 4, pp. 1778–83: http://www.leibniz-
translations.com/lanion.htm
46
See Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram libri duodecim, X.18–19.
189
Appendix
generic name of ‘entelechy’ or ‘actuality’. This word, ‘entelechy’, appar-
ently comes from the Greek word which means ‘perfect’,47 and for that
reason the renowned Hermolaus Barbarus expressed it literally in Latin
by perfectihabia, since actuality is a realisation of potency. And in order
to learn just that he had no need to consult the Devil, as he is said to have
done.48 Now the Philosopher of Stagira conceives there being two kinds
of actuality: permanent actuality and successive actuality. Permanent or
enduring actuality is nothing other than the form, substantial or accidental:
the substantial form (like the soul, for example) is completely permanent,
at least in my view, and the accidental is only so for a time. But the entirely
fleeting actuality, whose nature is transitory, consists in action itself. I have
shown elsewhere that the notion of entelechy is not entirely to be scorned,
and that as it is permanent it carries with it not only a simple active faculty,
but also that which is called force, effort, conatus, from which action itself
must follow if nothing prevents it.49 The faculty is only an attribute, or
rather sometimes a mode. But force, when it is not an ingredient of sub-
stance itself (that is, force which is not primitive but derivative), is a quality,
which is distinct and separable from substance. I have also shown how it
may be conceived that the soul is a primitive force which is modified and
varied by derivative forces or qualities, and exercised in actions.

But traduction and eduction are equally inexplicable when it is a question
of finding the origin of the soul. It is not the same with accidental forms,
since they are only modifications of the substance, and their origin can be
explained by eduction, that is, by variation of limitations, as can the origin
of shapes. But it is something else entirely when it is a question of the
origin of a substance, whose beginning and destruction are equally difficult
to explain. Sennert and Sperling have not dared to admit the subsistence
and the indestructibility of the souls of beasts or of other primitive forms,
although they acknowledged them to be indivisible and immaterial.50
But the fact is that they confused indestructibility with immortality, by
which is meant in man’s case that not only the soul but also the personality
47
In Greek, ‘perfection’ is ‘enteles’.
48
Leibniz’s source for the story is Jean Bodin’s Colloquium Heptaplomeres de Abditis rerum
sublimium Arcanis. Leibniz made notes on it in 1668 or 1669, when it was still an unpub-
lished manuscript (it was finally published only in 1857), and jotted down details of the
story about Barbarus and the devil. See A VI 2, p. 128.
49
See PPL, pp. 432–52.
50
Leibniz is referring to Daniel Sennert (1572–1637), a physician and chemist, and
Johann Sperling (1603–58), a physician and academic. See Sennert’s De chymicorum
(Wittenberg, 1619).
190
Theodicy
s ubsists; that is, in saying that man’s soul is immortal one means that there
subsists that which makes him the same person, which retains its moral
qualities by conserving the consciousness, or the reflexive internal feeling
of what it is; this makes it capable of punishment and reward. But this
conservation of personality does not take place in the soul of beasts: this
is why I prefer to say that they are imperishable than to call them immor-
tal. Yet this misunderstanding appears to have been the cause of a great
inconsistency in the doctrine of Thomists and other good philosophers,
who have acknowledged the immateriality or indivisibility of all souls
without wanting to admit their indestructibility, at the great expense of
the immortality of the human soul. John Scottus, that is, the Scot (which
formerly meant Hibernian or Erigene), a famous writer at the time of Louis
the Debonaire and his sons, was in favour of the conservation of all souls:51
and I do not see why it should be less problematic to grant endurance to
the atoms of Epicurus or Gassendi than to affirm the subsistence of all the
truly simple and indivisible substances, which are the sole and true atoms
of nature. And Pythagoras was right to say in general, in Ovid:
Morte carent animae.52

Now as I like maxims which are mutually reinforcing and in which there
are the fewest possible exceptions, this is what seemed to me most reason-
able, in every sense, on this important question: I hold that souls, and
simple substances in general, cannot begin except by creation, or end
except by annihilation. And as the formation of animate organic bodies
seems explicable in the order of nature only when an already-organic pre-
formation is supposed, I have inferred from it that what we call the genera-
tion of an animal is only a transformation and growth. Thus, since the same
body was already organised, presumably it was already animate, and had
the same soul, just as I conclude vice versa, from the conservation of the
soul once it is created, that the animal is conserved too, and that apparent
death is only an enfolding. Nor is there any probability that in the order of
nature there be souls entirely separated from all body, or that what does not
begin naturally can cease through the forces of nature.
51
John Scottus Eriugena was a ninth-century philosopher and theologian known as ‘the
Irishman’ (as Leibniz intimates, the term ‘Scot’ used to mean ‘Irish-born’). Louis the
Debonaire lived 778–840.
52
‘souls are exempt from death’ or ‘souls are deathless’. A saying attributed to Pythagoras
in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, XV.158.
191
Appendix
After having established an order so admirable and rules so general
in regard to animals, it does not seem reasonable that man be wholly
excluded therefrom, and that everything in relation to his soul happen
in him by miracle. Therefore I have pointed out more than once that
it is in accordance with God’s wisdom that everything be harmonic in
his works, and that nature be parallel to grace. Thus I believe that souls
which one day shall be human souls, like those of other species, have
existed in seeds, and in the ancestors all the way back to Adam, and
have consequently existed since the beginning of things, always in a
kind of organised body. In this matter it seems that Mr Swammerdam,
Reverend Father Malebranche, Mr Bayle, Mr Pitcairne, Mr Hartsoeker,
and many other very able persons are of my opinion. And this doc-
trine is confirmed well enough by the microscope observations of Mr
Leeuwenhoek and other good observers. But it also seems fitting to me,
for a number of reasons, that those souls existed then only as sentient
or animal souls, endowed with perception and feeling, and devoid of
reason, and that they remained in this state until the time of the gen-
eration of the man to whom they should belong, at which point they
received reason. Either there is a natural means of elevating a sentient
soul to the degree of rational soul (which I find difficult to conceive), or
God gave reason to this soul through a particular operation, or (if you
will) by a kind of transcreation. This is all the more easy to accept since
revelation teaches a great deal about other immediate operations upon
our souls by God. This explanation seems to remove the difficulties that
arise here in philosophy or in theology, since the difficulty about the
origin of forms disappears entirely, and since it is much more in keeping
with divine justice to give to the soul, already corrupted physically or
animally by the sin of Adam, a new perfection, which is reason, than to
put a rational soul (through creation or otherwise) into a body in which
it must be corrupted morally.

‘II. He made up his mind freely about the production of creatures, and
he chose among an infinity of possible beings those whom it pleased him
to give existence, and composed the universe out of them, and left all the
others in nothingness.’53 As with the preceding proposition, this one is also
very much in keeping with that part of philosophy called natural theology.
We must dwell a little on something that is said here, namely that he chose
53
This is a quotation from Pierre Bayle’s Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, 3 vols
(Rotterdam, 1706), III, p. 815.
192
Theodicy
the possible beings ‘whom it pleased him’ to give existence, for it should be
noted that when I say ‘that pleases me’, it is as if I am saying ‘I find it good’.
Thus it is the ideal goodness of the object which pleases, and which makes
me54 choose it among many others which are not pleasing, or less pleasing,
that is, which contain less of that goodness which affects me. Now only
genuine goods are capable of pleasing God, and consequently that which
pleases God most, and which he chooses, is the best.

‘IV. They ate of the fruit nevertheless, and thenceforth they were con-
demned, they and all their posterity, to the miseries of this life, to temporal
death and eternal damnation, and made subject to such a tendency to sin
that they abandon themselves to it almost endlessly and constantly.’55
There are grounds to think that the forbidden action by itself entailed
these evil effects by virtue of a natural consequence, and that it was for
that very reason, and not by a purely arbitrary decree, that God had
forbidden it, rather as one forbids knives to children. The renowned
Fludd, or de Fluctibus, an Englishman, once wrote a book De Vita, Morte
& Resurrectione, under the name of R. Otreb, wherein he maintained that
the fruit of the forbidden tree was a poison:56 but we cannot go into this
level of depth. It is enough that God forbade a harmful thing. It must not
therefore be imagined that God here simply acted in the character of a
legislator who lays down a purely positive law, or of a judge who imposes
and inflicts a penalty by an order of his will, without there being any con-
nection between the evil of sin and the evil of punishment. And it is not
necessary to imagine that God, being justly annoyed, placed a corruption
expressly into the soul and into the body of man, by an extraordinary
action, in order to punish him, rather as the Athenians gave hemlock to
their criminals. Mr Bayle takes the matter this way: he speaks as if the
original corruption had been placed into the soul of the first man by God’s
order and by God’s operation. This is what makes him object (Réponse aux
Questions d’un Provincial, chap. 178, p. 1218, book III) ‘that reason would
not approve of the monarch who, in order to punish a rebel, condemned
him and his descendants to have a tendency towards rebelling’.57 But this
punishment happens naturally to the wicked, without any order given by
54
Reading ‘me’ in place of ‘le’.
55
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, p. 815.
56
Rudolfo Otreb (pseudonym: Robert Fludd), Tractatus Theologo-Philosophicus
(Oppenheim, 1617).
57
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, p. 1218. Leibniz adjusts the quotation
to make it look as though Bayle is making a straightforward assertion here, whereas in
fact Bayle poses a rhetorical question: ‘Would reason approve of the monarchs who, in
193
Appendix
a legislator, and they develop a taste for evil. If drunkards were to father
children inclined to the same vice by a natural consequence of what takes
place in bodies, it would be a punishment of their progeny but it would not
be a penalty of law. There is something similar to this in the consequences
of the first man’s sin. For the contemplation of divine wisdom leads us
to believe that the kingdom of nature serves that of grace, and that God
as architect has done everything as befitted God considered as monarch.
We do not know well enough the nature of the forbidden fruit, or that of
the action, or its effects, to judge the details of this affair. Nevertheless we
should do God this justice, to believe that it involved something other than
what painters depict for us.

‘III. As an infinite goodness guided the Creator in the production of the
world, all the characteristics of knowledge, skill, power and greatness that
shine forth in his work are intended for the happiness of intelligent crea-
tures. He wished to display his perfections only so that creatures of this
kind should find their felicity in the knowledge, in the admiration and in
the love of the Supreme Being.’58
This maxim does not seem sufficiently accurate to me: I grant that
the happiness of intelligent creatures is the principal part of God’s plans,
for they are most like him, but nevertheless I do not see how one can
prove that this is his sole aim. It is true that the kingdom of nature must
serve the kingdom of grace, but as everything is connected in God’s
great design we must believe that the kingdom of grace is also in some
way adapted to that of nature, so that the latter preserves the utmost
order and beauty in order to render the combination of the two the most
perfect possible. And there is no basis for thinking that God, in order to
achieve some decrease in moral evil, would overturn the whole order of
nature. Each perfection or imperfection in the creature has its value, but
none has an infinite value. Thus the moral or physical good and evil of
rational creatures does not infinitely exceed the good and evil which is
just metaphysical, that is, which consists in the perfection of other crea-
tures; yet we would have to say this if the present maxim were strictly
true. When God explained to the Prophet Jonah the pardon he had
granted to the inhabitants of Nineveh, he even touched upon the interest
of beasts which would have been affected by the overthrowing of this
order to punish a rebel, condemned him and his descendants to have a tendency towards
rebelling?’
58
194
Theodicy
great city.59 No substance is absolutely contemptible or absolutely pre-
cious in the eyes of God. And the abuse or exaggerated extension of the
present maxim seems to be in part the source of the difficulties proposed
by Mr Bayle. It is certain that God attaches greater importance to a man
than a lion, yet I do not know if we can be certain that God prefers, in all
respects, a single man to the entire species of lions. But even if that were
so, it would not follow that the interest of a certain number of men would
prevail over the consideration of a general disorder scattered throughout
an infinite number of creatures. This opinion would be a remnant of the
somewhat discredited ancient maxim that everything is made solely for
man.

‘IV. The benefits he imparts to the creatures capable of felicity tend only to
their happiness. He does not therefore permit these benefits to make them
unhappy, and, if the wrong use that they make of them were capable of
ruining them, he would give them sure means of always making a good use
of them. For without that they would not be true benefits, and his good-
ness would be less extensive than the goodness we can conceive in another
benefactor. (I mean, in a cause that includes with its gifts the sure skill to
use them well.)’60
Here already is the abuse or the negative effect of the preceding maxim.
It is not strictly true (although it appears plausible) that the benefits God
imparts to the creatures capable of felicity tend solely to their happiness.
Everything is connected in nature. And if a skilled artisan, an engineer,
an architect, or a wise politician often makes one and the same thing serve
several ends, if he accomplishes several aims with a single effort, when it
may be done conveniently, it may be said that God, whose wisdom and
power are perfect, does so always. That is making economical use of the
ground, the time, the place, and the material, which together constitute
his expenditure, so to speak. Thus God has more than one intention in
his projects. The felicity of all rational creatures is one of his aims, but
it is not his whole aim, nor even his final aim. This is why the misery of
some of these creatures may come about by concomitance, and as a result
of other, greater goods; I have already explained this above, and Mr Bayle
has in a way acknowledged it. Goods, insofar as they are goods, considered
in themselves, are the object of God’s antecedent will. God will produce
59
An allusion to Jonah 4.11: ‘And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh,
in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell
their right hand from their left – and also many animals?’
60
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, pp. 817–18.
195
Appendix
as much reason and knowledge in the universe as his plan can admit. It is
possible to conceive a middle way between an entirely unadulterated and
primitive antecedent will, and a consequent and final will. The primitive
antecedent will has as its object each good and each evil in itself, detached
from all combination, and inclines towards advancing the good and pre-
venting the evil. The mediate will concerns combinations, such as when a
good is combined with an evil: and then there will be some inclination in
the will towards this combination when the good exceeds the evil therein.
But the final will, the decisive will, results from the consideration of all the
goods and all the evils that enter into our deliberation; it results from a total
combination. This shows that a mediate will, although it may in some way
be taken for a consequent will in relation to an unadulterated and primitive
antecedent will, must be considered as antecedent in relation to the final
and decretory will. God gives reason to humankind; from that, misfor-
tunes arise by concomitance. His unadulterated antecedent will is inclined
towards giving reason, as a great good, and to prevent the evils in question.
But when it is a question of the evils that accompany this gift of reason
given to us by God, the compound, made up of the combination of reason
and these evils, will be the object of a mediate will of God, which will
incline towards producing or preventing this compound according as the
good or the evil prevails therein. But even if it should be the case that reason
would do more harm than good to men (which I do not grant, however), in
which case God’s mediate will would reject it along with its circumstances,
it could nevertheless be the case that it was more in accordance with the
perfection of the universe to give reason to men, notwithstanding all the
evil consequences it could have for them. And consequently, God’s final
will, or decree, resulting from all the considerations he can have, would be
to give them reason. And, far from being blameworthy for doing this, he
would be blameworthy if he did not. Thus the evil, or the mixture of goods
and evils in which the evil prevails, happens only by concomitance, because
it is connected with greater goods that are outside this mixture. Therefore
this mixture, or this compound, should not be considered as a grace, or as a
gift God gives to us, but the good found mixed therein will nonetheless be
good. Such is the gift of reason God gives to those who use it badly; reason
is always a good in itself, but the combination of this good with the evils
that proceed from its abuse is not a good with regard to those who become
wretched as a result. Yet it becomes a good by concomitance, because it
serves a greater good in relation to the universe. And it is doubtless this
that led God to give reason to those who have made it an instrument of
their misery. Or, to speak more precisely, it is in accordance with our
system that God, having found among the possible beings some rational
creatures who abuse their reason, gave existence to those who are included
196
Theodicy
in the best possible plan of the universe. Thus nothing prevents us from
admitting that God bestows goods which turn into evil through the fault of
men, which often happens to them as a just punishment for the abuse they
have made of his graces. Aloysius Novarinus wrote a book De occultis Dei
beneficiis;61 one could write one on De occultis Dei poenis.62 This saying of
Claudian would hold good here for some people:
Tolluntur in altum
Ut lapsu graviore ruant.63
But to say that God should not give a good which he knows will be abused
by a bad will, when the general plan of things requires that he give it; or
even to say that he should give sure means to prevent the abuse, contrary
to this same general order: this is to want (as I have already indicated) God
himself to become blameworthy in order to prevent man from being so. To
object, as is done here, that God’s goodness would be meaner than that of
another benefactor, who would give a more useful gift, is to overlook the
fact that the goodness of a benefactor is not measured by a single benefit.
It could easily happen that a gift from a private individual is greater than
one from a prince, but all the gifts of this private individual will be greatly
inferior to all the gifts of the prince. Thus one can sufficiently appreciate
the goods that God gives only when one considers their full extent, by
relating them to the entire universe. Moreover, it may be said that the gifts
given in the expectation that they will harm are the gifts of an enemy, ‘The
gifts of enemies are no gifts’,64
Hostibus eveniant talia dona meis.65
But that is meant when there is malice or culpability in the one who gives
the gifts, as there was in that Eutrapelus of whom Horace speaks, who did
good to people in order to give them the means to ruin themselves.66 His
intention was evil, but God’s cannot be better than it is: must he spoil his
system, must there be less beauty, perfection and reason in the universe,
because there are people who abuse reason? The common sayings hold
61
Aloysius Novarinius, Deliciae divini amoris. Hoc est: de occultis Dei beneficiis, Dei amori
excitando ac fouendo (Lyon, 1641).
62
Leibniz is contrasting ‘God’s hidden benefits’ (the title he gives to Novarinius’ book)
with ‘God’s hidden punishments’.
63
‘They are raised on high, in order that they should be destroyed by a harder fall.’
Claudian, In Rufinum, I.23.
64
Sophocles, Ajax, 665.
65
‘Such gifts should come to my enemies!’
66
Horace, Epistle XVIII.31ff.
197
Appendix
good here: Abusus non tollit usum,67 there is scandalum datum & scandalum
acceptum.68

‘V. A maleficent being is very capable of showering magnificent gifts upon
his enemies when he knows that they will use them in such a way that will
destroy them. It therefore cannot befit the infinitely good being to give to
creatures a free will when he knows for certain that they would use it in
such a way that would render them wretched. Therefore if he gives them
free will, he combines with it the art of always using it appositely, and does
not permit them to neglect the practice of this art in any encounter, and
if there were no certain way of instilling the good use of this free will, he
would rather take this faculty from them than allow it to be the cause of
their misery. That is all the more obvious since free will is a grace that he
has given them of his own choice and without their asking for it. As such,
he would be more responsible for the misery it would bring them than if he
had granted it only because of the petitioning of their prayers.’69
What was said at the end of the remark on the preceding maxim
ought to be repeated here, and is sufficient to mollify the present maxim.
Moreover, that false maxim, advanced as the third, is still being supposed,
the one which holds that the happiness of rational creatures is God’s sole
aim. If that were so, neither sin nor misery would occur, not even by con-
comitance. God would have chosen a series of possibles in which all these
evils would be excluded. But God would have failed in what is due to the
universe, that is, in what he owes to himself. If there were only minds, they
would exist without the necessary connection, without the order of times
and places. This order requires matter, motion, and its laws; by adjusting
them to minds in the best possible way, one arrives at our world. When
one looks at things only in a broad way, a thousand things are conceived as
feasible that cannot actually take place. To want God not to give free will to
rational creatures is to want these creatures not to exist, and to want God to
prevent them from abusing it is to want there to exist only these creatures
by themselves, along with whatever would be made just for them. If God
had only these creatures in mind, he would doubtless prevent them from
ruining themselves. It can nevertheless be said in a sense that God gave to
these creatures the art of always making good use of their free will, for the
natural light of reason is this art: one would only have to have the will to
do good always, but the means of giving oneself the will that one ought to
67
‘Abuse does not take away use’.
68
‘Scandal given and scandal received’.
69
198
Theodicy
have is often lacking in creatures; and they often lack even the will to make
use of the means that indirectly give a good will, about which I have already
spoken more than once. This failing has to be acknowledged, and it should
even be recognised that God could perhaps have exempted creatures from
it, since nothing, it seems, prevents there from being some creatures whose
nature is always to have a good will. But I respond that it is not necessary,
and was not feasible, that all rational creatures had so great a perfection that
would draw them so close to the divinity. Perhaps even that is possible only
by a special divine grace, but in this case, would it be appropriate for God
to grant it to all, that is, that he always act miraculously with regard to all
rational creatures? Nothing would be less reasonable than these perpetual
miracles. There are degrees in creatures, the general order requires it. And
it seems very fitting to the order of the divine government that the great
privilege of steadfastness in the good be given more readily to those who
have had a good will when they were in a less perfect state, in the state
of struggle and pilgrimage, in Ecclesia militante, in statu viatorum.70 The
good angels themselves were not created with impeccability. Nevertheless
I would not dare to affirm that there are no creatures born blessed, or that
are impeccable and holy by their nature. There are perhaps people who
give this privilege to the holy Virgin, since the Roman church today also
puts her above the angels. But it is enough for us that the universe is very
large and very varied: to wish to limit it is to have little knowledge of it. But
(Mr Bayle continues), God gave free will to creatures capable of sinning
without their asking him for this grace. And the one who would give such
a gift ‘would be more responsible for the misfortune that it would bring
to those who would make use of it than if he had granted it only because
of the petitioning of their prayers’.71 But the petitioning of prayers does
nothing to God: he knows better than us what we need, and he grants only
what is fitting for the whole. It seems that Mr Bayle here makes free will
consist in the power to sin, yet elsewhere he recognises that God and the
saints are free without having this power. Be that as it may, I have already
done enough to show that God, doing what the combination of his wisdom
and his goodness command, is not responsible for the evil that he permits.
Men themselves, when they do their duty, are not responsible for events,
whether they foresee them or whether they don’t.

‘VI. It is as certain a way of taking a man’s life to give him a silk cord
with which it is known with certainty that he will freely use to throttle
70
‘in the church militant, in the state of pilgrims’.
71
199
Appendix
himself, as for someone to stab him.72 One no less desires his death when
one makes use of the first way than when one employs one of the others: it
even seems as though one desires it with a more malicious intention, since
one is inclined to leave to him all of the trouble and all of the guilt of his
destruction.’73
Those who deal with duties (De Officiis) like Cicero, St Ambrose,
Grotius, Opalenius, Sharrok, Rachelius, and Pufendorf, as well as the
casuists, teach that there are cases where one is not obliged to return an
entrusted item to its owner: for example, one will not return a dagger when
one knows that the one who entrusted it desires to stab someone. Let us
pretend that I have in my hands the fatal firebrand that Meleager’s mother
will use to kill him; the magical javelin that Cephalus will unwittingly use
to kill his Procris; the horses of Theseus that will tear his son, Hippolytus,
to pieces: I am asked to return them, and I am right to refuse the request,
knowing the use that will be made of them. But what will happen if a com-
petent judge orders me to restore them, when I cannot prove to him what
I know of the bad consequences that this will have, Apollo having perhaps
given me the gift of prophecy as he did to Cassandra, on the condition that
I shall not be believed? I would then be obliged to make restitution, not
being able to defend myself without perishing. Thus I cannot avoid con-
tributing towards the evil. Another comparison: Jupiter makes a promise to
Semele, the Sun to Phaeton, and Cupid to Psyche, to grant the favour that
the other will ask of them. They swear by the Styx,
Di cujus jurare timent & fallere Numen.74
One would be happy to stop, but too late, the request half heard,
Voluit Deus ora loquentis
Opprimere, exierat jam vox properata
sub auras.75
One would be happy to draw back after the request was made, making
vain remonstrations about it. But they press you, they say to you, ‘Do you
make oaths in order to break them?’76 The law of the Styx is inviolable, one
72
Leibniz here omits, presumably by mistake, part of Bayle’s passage. Instead of ‘as for
someone to stab him’, Bayle writes: ‘as to stab him oneself, or to make someone stab
him’.
73
74
‘By whose divinity the gods dread to swear and violate their oath’. Virgil, The Aeneid,
VI.324.
75
‘The god wanted to stop her mouth as she spoke: but her voice had already rushed into
the air.’ Ovid, Metamorphoses, III, 295–6.
76
This is a line from Molière’s Psyche, act IV, scene III.
200
Theodicy
must submit to it; if one has erred in making the oath, one would err more
in not keeping it; the promise must be kept, however dangerous it may be
for him who demands it. It would be dangerous for you if you did not keep
it. It seems that the moral of these fables implies that a supreme necessity
may oblige one to condescend to evil. In truth, God knows no other judge
who can force him to give what may turn to evil: he is not like Jupiter who
fears the Styx. But his own wisdom is the greatest judge he can find, its
judgements are beyond appeal, they are the decrees of destiny. The eternal
truths, objects of his wisdom, are more inviolable than the Styx. These
laws, this judge, do not constrain: they are stronger, for they persuade.
Wisdom only reveals to God the best possible exercise of his goodness:
after that, the evil that occurs is an essential consequence of the best. I will
add something stronger: to permit the evil, as God permits it, is the great-
est goodness.
Si mala sustulerat, non erat ille bonus.77
After this, one would need to be wrongheaded to say that it is more mali-
cious to leave to a person the full punishment and the full blame of his ruin.
When God does leave that to someone, it belonged to him before his exist-
ence: it was then in the idea of him while still purely possible, before God’s
decree which made him exist: can it be left or given to another? I needn’t
say any more.

‘VII. A true benefactor gives promptly, and does not wait to give while
those he loves suffer long miseries from the privation of what he could
impart to them very easily from the outset, and without causing any incon-
venience to himself. If the limitation of his powers does not permit him
to do good without inflicting pain or some other inconvenience, he takes
that route (see Dictionnaire historique et critique, p. 2261 of the 2nd edition),
but only regretfully, and he never employs this way of helping out when
he can do it without introducing any kind of evil into his favours. If the
profit that could be derived from the evils he would inflict could just as
easily arise from an unadulterated good as from those evils, he would take
the straight path of unadulterated good, and not the meandering path that
would lead from evil to good. If he showers riches and honours, it is not so
that those who have enjoyed them, when they come to lose them, should
be afflicted all the more appreciably in proportion as they were accustomed
to pleasure, and that they should thereby become more wretched than the
persons who have always been deprived of these advantages. A malicious
77
‘If he had removed the evils, he would not be good.’
201
Appendix
being would shower goods with these costs upon the people for whom he
had the greatest hatred. Consider this passage from Aristotle’s Rhetoric
book 2 chap. 23 p.m.446: “e.g. that a gift was given in order to cause pain
by its withdrawal. This notion underlies the lines:
God gives to many great prosperity,
Not of good will towards them, but to make
The ruin of them more conspicuous.”’78
That is: Veluti si quis alicui aliquid det, ut (postea) hoc (ipsi) erepto (ipsum)
afficiat dolore. Unde etiam illud est dictum:
Bona magna multis non amicus dat Deus,
Insigniore ut rursus his privet malo.79
All these objections hinge almost on the same sophism; they twist and
turn the fact, they tell only half the story. God looks after men, he loves
humankind, he wishes it well: nothing so true. Yet he lets men fall, he
often lets them perish, he gives them goods that turn out to be their ruin,
and when he makes someone happy, it is after many sufferings. Where
is his affection, where is his goodness, or indeed where is his power?
Pointless objections, which ignore the main point and overlook that it is
God we are talking about. It seems as though it were about a mother, a
tutor, or a guardian, whose almost sole concern is with the upbringing,
preservation, and happiness of the person in question, and who neglect
their duty. God looks after the universe, he neglects nothing, he chooses
what is best absolutely. If after all that someone is wicked and unhappy,
it is down to him that he is so. God (it is said) could give happiness to
everyone, he could do so promptly and easily, and without inconvenienc-
ing himself in the process, for he can do anything. But should he do that?
Since he does not do so, it is a sign that he had to do things quite differ-
ently. To infer from this either that it is only with regret and owing to lack
of power that God fails to make men happy and fails to give the good from
the outset and without admixture of evil, or else that he lacks the good will
to give it without exception and without reservation: this is to compare
78
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, pp. 819–20. The Aristotle passage is
from the Rhetoric, 1399b21–24. I have used the English translation from The Complete
Works of Aristotle, II, p. 2230.
79
This is Leibniz’s Latin translation of the passage from Aristotle’s Rhetoric that he has
just reproduced in the quoted passage from Bayle. Curiously, Bayle had given his own
Latin translation of the Greek passage in the margin of Réponse aux Questions d’un
Provincial, III, p. 820, but rather than quoting that, Leibniz chose to make his own,
presumably for reasons of accuracy.
202
Theodicy
our true God with the god of Herodotus, who is full of envy,80 or with the
demon of the poet whose iambics are given by Aristotle and we have just
translated into Latin, who gives goods in order to cause greater distress
by taking them away. This is to make light of God through perpetual
anthropomorphisms; it is to represent him as a man who obligates himself
entirely to the business at hand, who must exercise the principal part of
his goodness only upon objects which alone are known to us, and who
lacks either ability or good will. God is not lacking in either: he could do
the good we desire; he even wishes it, when considering it separately, but
he must not do it in preference to other, greater goods which are opposed
to it. Moreover, one has no grounds to complain that one usually attains
salvation only through many sufferings, and by bearing the cross of Jesus
Christ, since these evils serve to make the elect imitators of their master,
and to increase their happiness.

‘IX. The greatest love this master can show for virtue is to make it the case,
if he can, that it be always practised without any mixture of vice. If it is
easy for him to procure this advantage for his subjects, and nevertheless he
permits vice to raise its head, on condition that he finally punishes it after
having tolerated it for a long time, his affection for virtue is not the greatest
that can be conceived; it is therefore not infinite.’81
I am not even halfway through the nineteen maxims and already I am
weary of always refuting and responding to the same thing. Mr Bayle
multiplies without necessity his so-called maxims, set against our dogmas.
When things that are connected together are separated, the parts from
their whole – humankind from the universe, God’s attributes from each
other, power from wisdom – it is permissible to say that God can make it so
that virtue exists in the world without any mixture of vice, and even that
he can do so easily. But since he has permitted vice, it must be that the
order of the universe, found to be preferable to every other plan, required
it. It must be concluded that it is not permissible to do otherwise, since it
is not possible to do better. It is a hypothetical necessity, a moral neces-
sity, which, far from being contrary to freedom, is the effect of its choice.
Quae rationi contraria sunt, ea nec fieri a Sapiente posse credendum est.82 It is
here objected that God’s affection for virtue is therefore not the greatest
that can be conceived, that it is not infinite. The response has already been
80
See for example Herodotus, Histories, I.32.
81
82
‘We should believe that those things which are contrary to reason cannot be done by a
wise man.’
203
Appendix
given, on the second maxim, by saying that God’s affection for any created
thing is proportionate to the value of the thing: virtue is the noblest
quality of created things, but it is not the only good quality of creatures.
There is an infinity of others which attract God’s attention: from all these
inclinations there results the most good possible, and it turns out that if
there were only virtue, if there were only rational creatures, there would
be less good. Midas found himself less rich when he had only gold. And
besides, wisdom must vary. To multiply only the same thing, however
noble it may be, would be superfluity, and poverty too: to have a thousand
well-bound Virgils in one’s library, to sing always the airs from the opera
of Cadmus and Hermione, to break all the china in order only to have cups
of gold, to have only diamond buttons, to eat nothing but partridges, to
drink only Hungarian or Shiraz wine, would one call that reason? Nature
had need of animals, plants, inanimate bodies: in these non-rational
creatures there are wonders which serve for the exercise of reason. What
would an intelligent creature do if there were no non-intelligent things?
What would it think about if there were no motion, matter, or sense? If
it had only distinct thoughts it would be a God, its wisdom would be
without limits: this is one of the results of my meditations. As soon as
there is a mixture of confused thoughts then we have sense, and we have
matter. For these confused thoughts come from the relation of all things
to each other, according to duration and extent. This is why in my phi-
losophy there is no rational creature without some organic body, and no
created mind entirely separate from matter. But these organic bodies do
not differ in perfection any less than do the minds to which they belong.
Therefore, since there had to be, according to God’s wisdom, a world
of bodies, a world of substances capable of perception and incapable of
reason; since, in a word, he had to choose from all things that which
together produced the best effect, and since vice gained entrance through
this door, God would not have been perfectly good and perfectly wise if
he had excluded it.

‘XV. The infinitely powerful being, creator of matter and minds, makes
whatever he wills of this matter and these minds. There is no situation and
shape that he cannot communicate to minds.83 So if he permitted a physical
evil, or a moral evil, it would not be because, without it, some other even
greater physical or moral evil would be absolutely inevitable. None of the
83
Leibniz here omits (presumably by mistake) part of the sentence written by Bayle,
which reads in full: ‘There is no motion, no situation and shape, that he cannot com-
municate to matter, and no thought that he cannot communicate to minds.’
204
Theodicy
reasons for mixing of good and evil which are based on the limitation of the
powers of benefactors can apply to him.’84
It is true that God makes of matter and of minds whatever he wills, but
he is like a good sculptor who wants to make from his block of marble only
what he judges to be best, and who judges this well. God makes of matter
the finest of all possible machines; he makes of minds the most excellent of
all conceivable governments; and on top of all that, he establishes for their
union the most perfect of all harmonies, in accordance with the system I
have proposed. Now since physical evil and moral evil occur in this perfect
work, it must be concluded from that (against the assurance given here by
Mr Bayle) that without that, an even greater evil would have been absolutely
inevitable. This great evil would be that God would have chosen badly if he
had chosen otherwise than he did. It is true that God is infinitely powerful,
but his power is indeterminate: goodness and wisdom combined determine
it to produce the best. Elsewhere Mr Bayle makes an objection which is
peculiar to him, which he derives from the views of modern Cartesians
who say that God could give to souls the thoughts he wanted to give them,
without making these thoughts depend upon any relation to bodies. In this
way, souls would be spared a great number of evils which come only from
the disorder of bodies. More will be said about this below. For now it is
sufficient to note that God cannot establish a system which is poorly con-
nected and full of dissonances. In part, the nature of souls is to represent
bodies.

‘XIX. If out of many remedies capable of curing a patient there were
several which doctors knew full well he would take with pleasure, and the
doctors were to choose precisely the one which they knew he would refuse
to take, their exhortations and pleadings to him not to refuse it would be in
vain; we would nevertheless have just cause for thinking that they had no
desire to cure him, for if they wished to do so they would choose for him
one of those good medicines they knew he would be willing to swallow. But
besides, if they knew that refusal of the remedy they offered him would
worsen his sickness to the point of making it fatal, one could not prevent
oneself from saying that, all their exhortations notwithstanding, they none-
theless wished for the patient’s death.’85
God wants to save all men:86 that means that he would save them if
men did not themselves prevent it, and did not refuse to receive his grace.
84
85
86
An allusion to 1 Timothy 2.3–4.
205
Appendix
And he is not obliged or led by reason to always overcome their evil will.
Yet sometimes he does so, when higher reasons allow it, and when his
consequent and decretory will, which results from all his reasons, resolves
him to the election of a certain number of men. He gives aids to everyone
in order that they might be converted, and persevere, and these aids are
sufficient in those who have good will, but they are not always sufficient
to give good will. Men obtain this good will either through particular aids
or through circumstances which cause the general aids to be successful.
God cannot refrain from offering remedies even when he knows they will
be rejected, which will make a person more guilty. But shall we wish that
God be unjust in order that man may be less criminal? Besides, the acts
of grace which do not help one may help another, and indeed they always
contribute to the integrity of God’s plan, which is the best it is possible to
conceive. Shall God not give the rain because there are low-lying places
which will be inconvenienced by it? Shall the sun not shine as much as it
generally should because there are places which will be too dried up as a
result? In a word, all the comparisons spoken of in these maxims that Mr
Bayle has just given, of a doctor, a benefactor, a minister of state, and a
prince, fall a long way short, because we know their duties, and what can
and should be the object of their cares: they scarcely have more than the
one concern, and they often fail in it through negligence or malice. God’s
object has something of infinity, his cares embrace the universe; we know
almost nothing of that, yet we want to assess his wisdom and his goodness
by what we know? What temerity, or rather, what absurdity! The objec-
tions presume what is false; it is ridiculous to pass a legal judgement when
one does not know the facts. To say with St Paul, O altitudo divitiarum et
sapientiae,87 is not to renounce reason, it is rather to employ the reasons
that we know, for they teach us the immensity of God, about which the
Apostle speaks. But it is to admit our ignorance of the facts; moreover, it is
to acknowledge, before we see it, that God makes everything the best pos-
sible, in accordance with the infinite wisdom which guides his actions. It is
true that we already have before our eyes proofs and tests of this, when we
see among God’s works something in its entirety, some whole complete in
itself, and isolated, so to speak. A plant, an animal, a man, is such a whole,
formed as it were by God’s hand. We cannot admire enough the beauty
and the artifice of its structure. But when we see some broken bone, some
piece of animal flesh, some sprig of a plant, there appears to be nothing
but disorder, unless an excellent anatomist looks at it, and even he would
not recognise anything in it if he had not seen beforehand similar pieces
attached to their whole. It is the same with God’s government: what we are
87
‘Oh, the depth of riches and wisdom’. A slight misquoting of Romans 11.33.
206
Theodicy
able to see of it until now is not a piece large enough to discern the beauty
and order of the whole. Thus the very nature of things implies that this
order of the Divine City, which we do not yet see here on earth, should be
an object of our faith, of our hope, of our confidence in God. If there are
some who think otherwise, so much the worse for them: they are malcon-
tents in the state of the greatest and the best of all monarchs, and they are
wrong not to make the most of the examples of his wisdom and his infinite
goodness that he has given them in order to reveal himself as being not only
admirable, but also worthy of love beyond all things.

‘The heavens and all the rest of the universe’ (adds Mr Bayle) ‘preach the
glory, the power, the unity of God.’88 From that the conclusion should
have been drawn that this is so (as I have already noted above), because
we see in these objects something complete and apart, so to speak. Every
time we see such a work of God we find it so perfect that we have to admire
the artisanship and beauty of it; but when we do not see a work complete,
when we view only scraps and fragments, it is no wonder if the good order
is not apparent there. Our planetary system composes such an isolated
work, and perfect too, when it is considered apart from all else; each plant,
each animal, each man amounts to one such work, up to a certain point of
perfection. The wonderful artisanship of the author is recognised therein.
But the human race, insofar as it is known to us, is only a fragment, only
a small portion of the City of God, or the Republic of Minds. Its extent
is too great for us, and we know too little of it to be able to observe the
wonderful order therein. ‘Man alone’ (says Mr Bayle), ‘that masterpiece
of his creator among visible things; man alone, I say, gives us very great
objections against the unity of God.’89 Claudian made the same remark
when unburdening his heart in these well-known verses:
Saepe mihi dubiam traxit sententia mentem, &c.90
But the harmony that is found in everything else is a good sign that it would
also be found in the government of men, and generally in that of minds, if
the whole of it were known to us. One would have to judge the works of
God as wisely as Socrates judged those of Heraclitus when he said: what I
88
A quotation from Bayle’s Dictionnaire historique et critique, p. 2025 (article ‘Manicheans’,
note D)/Historical and Critical Dictionary, p. 146.
89
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, II, p. 2025 (article ‘Manicheans’, note D)/
90
‘This question has often seized my doubting mind.’ Claudian, In Rufinum, I.1. The rest
of the passage goes: ‘whether those above care about earthly matters or whether there is
no governor, and mortal affairs proceed from uncertain chance’.
207
Appendix
have understood of them pleases me; I think that the rest would not please
me any less if I understood it.91

Here is yet another particular reason for the apparent disorder in what
concerns man, namely that God has bestowed upon him an image of the
divinity by giving him intelligence. God lets man be, in some way, in his
small department, ut Spartam quam nactus est ornet.92 He enters there only
in a secret way, for he provides being, force, life, reason, without showing
himself. It is there that free will plays its game. And God plays (so to speak)
with these little Gods that he thought good to produce, just as we play with
children who involve themselves with activities that we secretly encourage
or obstruct as we please. Therein, man is therefore like a little God in his
own world, or microcosm, which he governs in his own way; he sometimes
performs wonders there, and his art often imitates nature.
When Jove looked down and saw the heavens figured in a sphere of glass
he laughed and said to the other gods:
‘Has the power of mortal effort gone so far?
Is my handiwork now mimicked in a fragile globe?
An old man of Syracuse has imitated on earth the laws of the heavens,
the order of nature, and the ordinances of the gods.
Why should I take umbrage at harmless Salmoneus and his mock thunder?
Here the feeble hand of man has proved Nature’s rival’.93
But he also makes great mistakes, because he abandons himself to the pas-
sions, and because God abandons him to his senses. God also punishes him
for that, sometimes like a father or tutor, training or chastising children,
sometimes like a just judge, punishing those who withdraw from him: and
evil comes about most often when these intelligences, or their small worlds,
impact on each other. Man suffers for it in proportion to how wrong he is,
but God, by a wonderful art, turns all the defects of these little worlds into
the greatest ornament of his great world. It is like in those devices of per-
spective, where certain beautiful designs appear only as confusion until one
brings them back to the right viewing angle or looks at them by means of
a certain glass or mirror. It is by placing and using them properly that one
makes them become a showpiece. Thus the apparent deformities of our
91
This story is recounted in Diogenes Laertius’ Lives of The Eminent Philosophers, II.22.
92
‘so that each person adorn his own Sparta’. An allusion to Euripides’ Telephus (fragment
73).
93
This is part of Claudian’s poem ‘In sphaeram Archimedis’. The English translation
is from Claudian volume II, trans. Maurice Platnauer (Cambridge MA: Harvard
University Press, 1956), pp. 279–81.
208
Theodicy
little worlds join together to create beauties in the great world, and contain
nothing opposed to the unity of an infinitely perfect universal principle:
on the contrary, they increase our wonder at its wisdom, which makes evil
serve the greater good.

Mr Bayle states: ‘that one finds everywhere both moral good and physical
good, some examples of virtue, some examples of happiness, and that this
is what makes the difficulty. For if there were only wicked and wretched
people’ (he says) ‘there would be no need to have recourse to the hypoth-
esis of two principles.’94 I admire the fact that this excellent man could
have revealed so much fondness for this opinion of two principles; and I
am surprised that he did not consider that this story of human life, which
constitutes the universal history of the human race, was found fully laid
out in the divine understanding along with an infinity of others, and that
God’s will decreed its existence alone because this sequence of events was
best suited, along with the rest of things, to achieve the best outcome.
And these apparent defects in the whole world, these spots on a sun, of
which ours is only a ray, far from diminishing its beauty, increase it, and
contribute to it by obtaining a greater good. There really are two princi-
ples, but they are both in God, namely his understanding and his will. The
understanding furnishes the principle of evil, without being tarnished by
it, without being evil; it represents natures as they are in the eternal truths;
it contains within itself the reason why evil is permitted, even though the
will is moved only towards the good. Let us add a third principle, which is
power; it precedes even understanding and will, but it acts according as the
former shows it to and as the latter requires it to.

Some (like Campanella) have called these three perfections of God the
three primordialities.95 Some have even believed that there was in that a
secret connection to the Holy Trinity: that power relates to the Father, that
is, to the source of Divinity; wisdom to the Eternal Word, which is called
94
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, II, p. 2025 (article ‘Manicheans’, note D)/
95
Tommaso Campanella, Atheismus Triumphatus, seu Reductio ad religionem per scientiarum
veritates (Paris, 1636), p. 6. Campanella’s primordialities were power, wisdom, and
love. Leibniz himself used the term, but in a different way; in a late text he explains
that God’s greatness has three components, namely primordiality, omnipotence, and
omniscience. Of the first of these, Leibniz wrote ‘Primordiality has two parts: God’s
independence from other things, and the dependence of all things upon God.’ G III,
p. 29.
209
Appendix
logos by the most sublime of the Evangelists,96 and will, or love, to the Holy
Spirit. Nearly all the expressions or comparisons drawn from the nature of
intelligent substance tend to this.

The explanation of the cause of evil by a particular principle, per principium
maleficum,97 is of the same nature. Evil does not require this kind of explana-
tion any more than do cold and darkness: there is not a primum frigidum98 or
a principle of darkness. Evil itself comes only from privation; the positive
enters into it only by concomitance, just as the active enters into cold by
concomitance. We see that when the water contained within a gun barrel
freezes, it is capable of breaking it;99 and yet cold is a certain privation of
force, it comes only from the diminution of a motion which separates the
particles of fluids. When this separating motion weakens in water because of
cold, the particles of compressed air concealed in the water collect together,
and becoming larger, they become more capable of acting outwards through
their energy. For the resistance that the surfaces of air particles encounter
in the water, and which opposes the efforts of these particles to expand, is
far less, and consequently the effect of the air is greater in large air bubbles
than in small ones, even though these small bubbles combined would make
as much mass as the large ones. This is because the resistances, that is, the
surfaces, increase by the square of the diameter, and the efforts, that is,
the contents, or the solidities of the spheres of compressed air, increase by
the cube of the diameter.100 Thus it is by accident that privation involves
action and force. I have already shown above how privation is sufficient to
cause error and malice, and how God is inclined to allow them even though
there is no malignity in him. Evil comes from privation; the positive and
action arise from it by accident, just as force arises from cold.

At that same time an ingenious satire was composed against the Gomarists,
entitled Fur praedestinatus, de gepredestineerde dief,101 which tells of a thief
96
An allusion to John 1.1: ‘In the beginning was the Word.’
97
‘by an evil principle’.
98
‘first cold’.
99
Leibniz is referring here to an experiment performed by Christiaan Huygens and com-
municated to the Académie des Sciences in 1667. See Christiaan Huygens, Oeuvres
complètes de Christiaan Huygens (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1937), XIX, pp. 336–7.
100
Leibniz is referring here to the square-cube law discovered by Galileo.
101
Henricus Slatius, De gepredestineerde dief, ofte een’t Samensprekinge, gehouden tusschen
een Predicant der Calvinusgesinde, ende een Dief, die verwesen was om te sterben ([no place],
1619).
210
Theodicy
condemned to be hanged, who attributes to God all the bad he has done,
who believes himself predestined to salvation notwithstanding his wicked
actions, who imagines that this belief is sufficient for him, and who attacks
with ad hominem arguments a Counter-Remonstrant minister appointed
to prepare him for death; but this thief is finally converted by a former
pastor who had been deposed for Armenianism, whom the jailer, having
pity for the criminal and for the weakness of the minister, had secretly
brought to him. There were responses to this lampoon, but responses to
satires are never as pleasing as the satires themselves. Mr Bayle (Réponse
aux Questions d’un Provincial, chap. 154, p. 938, book III) says that this
book was printed in England in the time of Cromwell, and he appears not
to have been informed that this version was only a translation of the much
older Flemish original.102 He adds that Dr George Kendall delivered a
refutation of it at Oxford in 1657, under the title of Fur pro Tribunali, and
that the dialogue was contained therein.103 This dialogue presupposes,
contrary to the truth, that the Counter-Remonstrants make God the cause
of evil, and teach a kind of predestination in the Mahommedan manner,
where God is indifferent to doing good or evil, and where it is sufficient
to be predestined to imagine that one is. They take care not to go that far.
Nevertheless it is true that there are among them some Supralapsarians,
and others who find it difficult to explain themselves clearly about the
justice of God and about the principles of piety and morals in man,
because they imagine despotism in God, and demand that man be con-
vinced, without reason, of the absolute certainty of his election, which is
liable to have dangerous consequences. But all those who acknowledge
that God produces the best plan, that he chose it from among all possible
ideas of the universe, that in it he finds man led by the original imperfec-
tion of creatures to misuse his free will and to plunge himself into misery,
that God prevents sin and misery as much as the perfection of the uni-
verse, which is an outpouring of his perfection, may permit it: those, I say,
show more distinctly that God’s intention is the most upright and holy in
the world, that the creature alone is guilty, that its original limitation or
imperfection is the source of its wickedness, that its evil will is the sole
cause of its misery, that one cannot be destined for salvation without also
being destined for the holiness of God’s children, and that any hope one
102
Henricus Slatius, Fur praedestinatus, sive, Dialogismus inter quendam ordinis praedican-
tium Calvinistam & furem ad laqueum damnatum habitus in quo ad vivum representatur
non tantùm quomodo Calvinistrarum dogmata ex seipsis ansam praebent scelera & impietates
quasvis patrandi, sed insuper quomodo eadem maximè impediunt quò minùs peccator ad vitae
emendationem & resipiscentiam reduci possit (London, 1651).
103
George Kendall, Fur pro tribunali. Examen dialogismi cui inscribitur fur praedestinatus
(Oxford, 1657).
211
Appendix
can have of election can only be founded upon the good will that one has
by the grace of God.

The question of the possibility of things that do not happen has already been
examined by the ancients. It appears that Epicurus, to preserve freedom
and to avoid an absolute necessity, maintained, following Aristotle, that
future contingents were not capable of determinate truth. For if it was
true yesterday that I would write today, then it could not fail to happen: it
was already necessary, and, for the same reason, it was necessary from all
eternity. Thus everything that happens is necessary, and it is impossible
for things to go otherwise. But since that is not the case, it would follow,
according to him, that future contingents have no determinate truth. To
support this opinion, Epicurus allowed himself to go so far as to deny the
first and greatest principle of the truths of reason: he denied that every
statement was either true or false. This is how he was pushed into doing so:
‘You deny that it was true yesterday that I would write today; it was there-
fore false.’ The good man, not being able to admit this conclusion, was
obliged to say that it was neither true nor false. After that, he did not need
to be refuted, and Chrysippus might have saved himself the trouble he
took to confirm the great principle of contradictories, according to Cicero’s
report in his book De Fato: ‘Chrysippus directs all his energies to prove
that every proposition is either true or false. For just as Epicurus fears that
if he concedes this, he may have to concede that all things happen by fate
(since if one or other is true from all eternity, then it is also certain, and if
certain it is also necessary; in this way he thinks that necessity and fate are
confirmed), so Chrysippus fears that if he does not concede it, if he does
not maintain that whatever is asserted is either true or false, then he does
not maintain that everything happens by fate, and according to the eternal
causes of all future events.’104 Mr Bayle remarks about this (Dictionnaire,
article ‘Epicurus’, note T, p. 1141) that ‘neither the one nor the other of
these two great philosophers (Epicurus and Chrysippus) understood that
the truth of this maxim, “every proposition is true or false”, is independent
of what is called fate; therefore105 it could not serve as proof of the exist-
ence of fate, as Chrysippus claimed, and as Epicurus feared. Chrysippus
could not admit, without overreaching himself, that there are propositions
that are neither true nor false, but he was no better off establishing the
contrary, for whether there are free causes or not, it is equally true that
104
Cicero, De Fato, X. Leibniz’s quotation contains a number of errors, so I have translated
from Cicero’s text.
105
Reading ‘donc’ in place of ‘dont’.
212
Theodicy
this proposition, “The great Mogul will go hunting tomorrow” is true
or false. It was right to consider this discourse of Tiresias as ridiculous:
“Everything that I will say will happen, or not, for the great Apollo endows
me with the faculty to prophesy.”106 If, though it is impossible, there were
no God, it would nevertheless be certain that everything predicted by
the greatest madman in the world would happen or would not happen.
Neither Chrysippus nor Epicurus took heed of this.’107 In book 1 of De
natura Deorum, Cicero very rightly said of the evasions of the Epicureans
(as Mr Bayle notes near the end of the same page) that it would be much
less shameful to admit that one could not respond to one’s adversary than
to resort to similar responses.108 Nevertheless we shall see that Mr Bayle
himself confused the certain with the necessary, when he claimed that the
choice of the best made things necessary.

Let us come now to the possibility of things that do not take place, and
let us use Mr Bayle’s own words, even if they are somewhat longwinded.
This is how he speaks of the matter in his Dictionnare (article ‘Chrysippus’,
note S, p. 929): ‘The famous dispute about possible things and impossible
things owed its origin to the doctrine of the Stoics concerning fate. At
issue was knowing whether, among the things which never were and never
will be, there are some that are possible, or whether everything that is not,
everything that never was, and everything that never will be, is impossible.
A famous dialectician of the Megaric Sect, called Diodorus, gave a nega-
tive answer to the first of these two questions, and an affirmative answer to
the second; but Chrysippus strongly opposed him. Here are two passages
of Cicero (epistle 4, book 9 of the Epistulae ad Familiares): “You should
know that I hold the doctrine of Diodorus concerning contingencies. And
therefore you should know that if you come here it is necessary that you
come.109 Now see which of the two opinions gives you greater pleasure;
this one, which was too much for our Diodorus” (a Stoic who had lodged
with Cicero for a long time) “or that of Chrysippus?”110 This comes from a
letter that Cicero wrote to Varron. He sets out more comprehensively the
whole state of the question in the little book De Fato. I am going to quote
106
From Horace, Satires, 2.5.
107
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, II, p. 1142 (article ‘Epicurus’, note T).
108
Cicero, De natura Deorum I.69. English translation: Cicero, The Nature of the Gods,
trans. Horace C. P. McGregor (London: Penguin, 1972), p. 97.
109
Leibniz here omits a key sentence: ‘But if you do not come, then it is impossible for you
to come.’ Bayle, whom Leibniz is quoting, did not omit it; it is unclear whether Leibniz
omitted it deliberately or by mistake.
110
Cicero, letter to Varron (May or June 46 ce).
213
Appendix
some passages: “Take care, Chrysippus, that you do not abandon your
cause, about which you will have a great contest with Diodorus, a powerful
logician . . . Therefore everything which is said to be false with regard to
the future, cannot happen. But this, Chrysippus, you will not allow, and
your dispute with Diodorus is chiefly about that. For he says that that
may happen only which either is true or will be true; and whatever will
be, he says that it is necessary; and whatever will not be, he says it cannot
happen. You also say that what is not going to happen, can happen, like
this precious stone can be broken even if it never will be; you also say that
it was not necessary that Cypselus should reign at Corinth, although it was
foretold by Apollo’s oracle a thousand years before . . . Diodorus believes
that that alone can happen which is either true or is going to be true, a
point which gives rise to this problem: that nothing happens except what is
necessary; and whatever can happen either exists now or will do; and that
future things can no more be changed from true to false than past things,
although the immutability is apparent in past things but does not seem to
be present in any future things because they are not visible; so with regard
to one who contracts a fatal disease it may be true that he will die of this
disease, and if the same were to be said about someone in whom the threat
of the disease is not so apparent, it will happen just the same. The result
is that even with regard to future things, there cannot be any change from
true to false.”111 Cicero makes it clear enough that Chrysippus often found
himself in difficulties in this dispute, and that there should be no surprise
about this: for the course he had taken was not connected with his dogma
of fate, and if he had known how or had dared to reason consistently, he
would have willingly adopted Diodorus’ whole hypothesis. We saw above
that the freedom he gave to the soul, and his comparison of the cylinder, did
not prevent all the acts of the human will from ultimately being inevitable
consequences of fate, the result of which is that everything which does not
happen is impossible, and that there is nothing possible except that which
actually happens. Plutarch (De Stoicorum Repugnatiis, pp. 1053, 1054)
lays waste to him on that point as well as on his dispute with Diodorus,
and maintains that his opinion on possibility is completely at odds with
the doctrine of fate. Note that the most renowned Stoics had written on
this matter without following the same path. Arrian (in Epicteti, book 2,
chap. 29, p. m. 166) named four of them, who are Chrysippus, Cleanthes,
Archidemus and Antipater.112 He shows great scorn for this dispute, and
Mr Menage should not have cited him as a writer who had spoken highly
of the work of Chrysippus concerning contingency (“Arrianum cites with
111
Cicero, De Fato, VI, VII, and IX.
112
Flavius Arriano, Epicteti Stoici Philosophi Encheiridion (1595), p. 196.
214
Theodicy
respect”, Menage, In Diogenem Laertium, I.7. p. 341),113 for assuredly these
words, “Chrysippus has written wonderful things on this subject etc.”, are
not in that particular place a eulogy. That is apparent by what precedes
and follows. Dionysius of Halicarnassus (De Collocatione Verborum, chap.
17, p. m. 11) mentions two treatises by Chrysippus, wherein, under a title
that promised different things, much of the ground of the logicians was
covered. The work was entitled De partium orationis collocatione,114 and
treated only propositions that were true and false, possible and impossible,
contingent and ambiguous, etc., matter that our Scholastics have rehearsed
and refined. Note that Chrysippus recognised that past things were neces-
sarily true, which Cleanthes had not wanted to admit. Arrian (as above, p.
m. 165): “Not everything in the past is true of necessity, as is thought by
those who follow Cleanthes”. We saw above (p. 562, column 2) the claim
that Abelard taught a doctrine which resembles that of Diodorus. I think
that the Stoics undertook to give more extent to possible things than to
future things, in order to mitigate the odious and dreadful consequences
which were drawn from their dogma of fatality.’115
It is quite apparent that Cicero, when writing to Varron the afore-
mentioned words (book 9, epistle 4, Epistulae ad Familiares), did not
fully understand the consequence of Diodorus’ opinion, since he found it
preferable. In his book De Fato he presents authors’ opinions well enough,
but it is a pity that he did not always add the arguments they employed.
Both Plutarch, in his treatise on the contradictions of the Stoics, and Mr
Bayle are surprised that Chrysippus was not of Diodorus’ opinion, since
he favours fatality. But on that point, Chrysippus, and even his master
Cleanthes, were more reasonable than is supposed. This will be seen
below. It is a key question whether the past is more necessary than the
future. Cleanthes was of this view: the objection is that it is necessary ex
hypothesi that the future happens, just as it is necessary ex hypothesi that the
past has happened. But there is this difference, that it is not possible to act
on the past state, for that is a contradiction, but it is possible to have some
effect on the future. Yet the hypothetical necessity of both is the same: the
one cannot be changed, the other will not be; and with that laid down, it
will not be possible for it to be changed either.
113
Gilles Menage, In Diogenem Laertium Aegidii Menagii observationes & emendationes, hac
editione plurimum auctae (Amsterdam, 1692), p. 341.
114
The title given is incomplete; in full it is De compositione, seu orationis partium apta inter
se collocatione, ad Rufum.
115
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, I, pp. 929–30 (article ‘Chrysippus’ note S).
215
Appendix
Spinoza went further: he appears to have expressly taught a blind necessity,
having denied understanding and will to the author of things, and imagin-
ing that good and perfection relate only to us, and not to him. It is true that
Spinoza’s view on this subject is somewhat obscure, for he grants thought
to God after having stripped him of understanding, Cogitationem non
Intellectum concedit Deo.116 There are even passages where he is less strict on
the point of necessity. Nevertheless, as far as one can understand him, he
does not recognise any goodness in God, strictly speaking, and he teaches
that all things exist through the necessity of the divine nature, without God
making any choice. We will not amuse ourselves here by refuting an opinion
so bad and indeed so inexplicable. And our opinion is established on the
nature of possibles, that is, of things that do not imply contradiction. I do
not think that a Spinozist would say that all conceivable stories actually do
exist now, or have existed, or will exist even in some part of the universe.
Yet it cannot be denied that stories, like those by Mademoiselle de Scudéry,
or like Octavia, are possible. Let us therefore set against him these words
of Mr Bayle, which are somewhat to my liking, from p. 930.117 ‘It is today’,
he says, ‘a great embarrassment for the Spinozists to see that, according
to their hypothesis, it was as impossible from all eternity that Spinoza, for
instance, not die at The Hague, as it is impossible for two and two to make
six. They know that it is a necessary consequence of their doctrine, and a
consequence which is off-putting, which is alarming, and sickens minds
through the absurdity it involves, diametrically opposed to common sense.
They are not pleased for it to be known that they overturn a maxim as
universal and as evident as this one: everything that implies contradiction is
impossible, and everything that does not imply contradiction is possible.’118

It may be said of Mr Bayle, ubi bene, nemo melius,119 although it cannot be
said of him what was said of Origen, ubi male, nemo pejus.120 I will add only
that what has just been identified as a maxim is also the definition of the
possible and the impossible. Yet Mr Bayle adds here at the end a line which
rather spoils what he has so reasonably said: ‘Now what contradiction
would there be in the idea that Spinoza had died in Leiden? Would nature
116
‘He grants God thought, not understanding.’
117
Leibniz here wrote ‘p. 390’ but this is a mistake.
118
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, I, p. 930 (article ‘Chrysippus’ note S).
119
‘where he has spoken well, no one has spoken better’.
120
‘where badly, none worse’. This and the one before are quotations from Cassiodorus, De
Institutione Divinarum Litterarum, I.i
216
Theodicy
have been less perfect, less wise, less powerful?’121 He confuses here what
is impossible, because it implies contradiction, with what cannot happen
because it is not fit to be chosen. It is true that there would have been no
contradiction in the supposition that Spinoza died in Leiden and not at
The Hague; there would not have been anything so possible, and therefore
the matter was indifferent with regard to the power of God. But it should
not be imagined that any event, however small, can be conceived as indif-
ferent with regard to his wisdom and his goodness. Jesus Christ beautifully
said that everything is numbered, right down to the hairs on our head.122
Thus God’s wisdom did not permit this event, of which Mr Bayle speaks,
to happen otherwise than it did happen, not as if in itself it had been more
worthy of being chosen, but because of its connection with this entire
sequence of the universe which deserved to be given preference. To say
that what has happened was of no concern to God’s wisdom, and to infer
from that that it is therefore not necessary, is to make a false supposition
and to incorrectly infer a true conclusion from it. It is to confuse what is
necessary by a moral necessity, that is, necessary according to the principle
of wisdom and goodness, with what is necessary by a metaphysical and
brute necessity, which occurs when the contrary implies contradiction.
Consequently Spinoza sought a metaphysical necessity in events; he did
not believe that God was determined by his goodness and by his perfection
(which this author treated as chimeras in relation to the universe), but by
the necessity of his nature; just as the semicircle is bound to enclose only
right angles, without having either the knowledge or the desire for this.
For Euclid has shown that all angles enclosed between two straight lines
drawn from the extremities of the diameter towards a point on the circle
are necessarily right angles, and that the contrary implies contradiction.

I find also that Mr Bayle combats very well the opinion of those who
claim that goodness and justice depend solely upon the arbitrary choice
of God, and who imagine that if God had been determined to act by
the goodness of things themselves, he would be an agent entirely neces-
sitated in his actions, which cannot be compatible with freedom. This
is to confuse metaphysical necessity with moral necessity. Here is what
Mr Bayle objects to this error (Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, chap.
89, p. 203): ‘The consequence of this doctrine will be123 that before God
resolved to create the world he saw nothing better in virtue than in vice,
121
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, I, p. 930 (article ‘Chrysippus’, note S).
122
An allusion to Matthew 10.30 and Luke 12.7.
123
Leibniz here adds a ‘ne’ (‘not’) which is not present in Bayle’s book.
217
Appendix
and that his ideas did not show him that virtue was more worthy of his love
than vice. That leaves no distinction between natural right and positive
right; there will no longer be anything immutable or essential in morals;
it will have been just as possible for God to command us to be vicious as
to command us to be virtuous; and it will not be possible to be confident
that the moral laws will not one day be repealed, as were the ceremonial
laws of the Jews. This, in a word, leads us directly to believe that God was
the free author not only of goodness and of virtue, but also of truth and
of the essence of things. That is what a group of Cartesians claim, and I
confess that their opinion (see the Continuation des Pensées sur les Cometes,
p. 554) could be of some use in certain circumstances; but it is overcome
by so many arguments, and subject to consequences so unfortunate (see
chap. 152 of the same Continuation), that there are scarcely any extremes
it would be better not to suffer than to be plunged into that one. It opens
the door to the most exaggerated Pyrrhonism, because it gives grounds to
claim that this proposition, “three & three make six”, is true only where
and for however long it pleases God; that it is perhaps false in some parts
of the universe, and that perhaps it will be so among men in the coming
year. Everything that depends on the free will of God could have been
limited to certain places and certain times, like the Jewish ceremonies.
This consequence will be extended to all the laws of the Decalogue if the
actions they command are by their nature just as lacking in all goodness as
the actions they forbid.’124

And to say that, as God resolved to create man such as he is, he could not
have not demanded of man piety, sobriety, justice, and chastity, because it
is impossible that the disorders capable of disrupting or disturbing his work
can please him, is to come back in effect to the common opinion. Virtues
are virtues only because they contribute to the perfection, or prevent the
imperfection, of those who are virtuous, or even of those who have deal-
ings with them. And virtues have that effect by their nature, and by the
nature of rational creatures before God decrees to create them. To come
to a different judgement would be as if someone were to say that the rules
of proportion and harmony are arbitrary with regard to musicians, because
they hold good in music only when one has resolved to sing or play some
instrument. But this is exactly what is termed essential to a good piece of
music, for the rules are already related to it in the ideal state, even when
no one is thinking of singing, since it is clear that they must necessarily be
related to it as soon as someone sings. And likewise, virtues are related to
124
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, II, pp. 203–4.
218
Theodicy
the ideal state of the rational creature before God decrees to create it, and
for that very reason we maintain that virtues are good by their nature.

Mr Bayle has deliberately included a chapter in his Continuation des Pensées
diverses (it is chap. 152) in which he shows ‘that the Christian Doctors
teach that there are things which are just antecedently to God’s decrees’.125
Some theologians of the Augsburg Confession condemned some of the
Reformed who appeared to be of a different opinion; and this error was
considered as if it were a consequence of the absolute decree, the doctrine
of which seems to exempt the will of God from any kind of reason, ubi
stat pro ratione voluntas.126 But, as I have noted more than once above,
Calvin himself recognised that the decrees of God are in conformity with
justice and wisdom, although the reasons that might show this conformity
in detail are unknown to us. Thus, in his view, the rules of goodness and
justice are anterior to the decrees of God. Mr Bayle, in the same place,
quotes a passage from the renowned Mr Turretin, who distinguishes
natural divine laws and positive divine laws.127 Moral laws are of the first
kind, and ceremonial laws the second. Samuel Desmarests, the renowned
theologian formerly at Groningen, and Mr Strimesius,128 who is still a
theologian at Frankfurt on the Oder, taught the same thing; and I think
that it is the opinion most widely accepted even among the Reformed.
Thomas Aquinas and all the Thomists were of the same opinion, along
with the common run of Scholastics and theologians of the Roman
Church. The casuists are also of that opinion: I count Grotius among the
most eminent of them, and he was followed in this view by his commenta-
tors. Mr Pufendorf appeared to hold a different opinion, which he insisted
on maintaining against the censures of some theologians; but he should
not be taken into account, since he had not made sufficient headway in
these sorts of matters. He protests loudly against the absolute decree in
his Fecialis divinus,129 and yet he approves what is worst in the opinions of
125
Pierre Bayle, Continuation des Pensées diverses, Ecrites à un Docteur de Sorbonne, à
l’occasion de la Comete qui parut au mois de Decembre 1680 (Rotterdam, 1705), p. 767.
126
‘where the will stands in place of reason’. A modified version of the maxim found in
Juvenal, Satires, VI.223.
127
François Turretin, Institutiones theologiae elencticae (Geneva, 1688), p. 257. Bayle erro-
neously cites p. 246.
128
Reading ‘Strimesius’ for ‘Strinesius’. Leibniz is referring to Samuel Strimesius,
Praxiologia apodictica, seu philosophia moralis demonstrativa (Frankfurt on the Oder,
1677), p. 28.
129
Samuel von Pufendorf, Jus feciale divinum sive de consensu et dissensu protestantium exer-
citatio posthuma (Lübeck, 1695), pp. 242–8.
219
Appendix
those who defend this decree, and without which this decree (as others of
the Reformed explain) becomes tolerable. Aristotle was very orthodox on
this matter of justice, and the school followed him: it distinguishes, as do
Cicero and the Jurisconsults, between perpetual right, which is binding on
all and everywhere, and positive right, which is only for certain times and
certain peoples. In the past I read with pleasure the Euthyphro of Plato,
who makes Socrates uphold the truth about that, and Mr Bayle pointed
out the same passage.130

He himself upholds this truth very forcefully in a certain passage, and it
will be good to copy out this passage in its entirety, long though it is (Book
II of the Continuation des Pensées diverses, chap. 152, pp. 771ff): ‘According
to the doctrine held by countless wise writers’, he says, ‘there is in nature
and in the essence of certain things a moral good or evil that precedes the
divine decree. They prove this doctrine principally through the dreadful
consequences of the opposite dogma. For suppose it a fact that to do no
wrong to anyone would be a good action, not in itself but by an arbitrary
disposition of God’s will: from that it would follow that God could have
given to man a law directly opposed in all of its points to the command-
ments of the Decalogue. That is horrifying. But here is a proof that is more
direct and derived from metaphysics. It is a certain thing that the existence
of God is not an effect of his will. He exists not because he wills his exist-
ence, but through the necessity of his infinite nature. His power and his
knowledge exist through the same necessity. He is all-powerful, he knows
all things, not because he wills it that way, but because these are attributes
necessarily identified with him. The dominion of his will concerns only the
exercise of his power, outside himself he brings to actuality only that which
he wills, and he leaves all the rest in mere possibility. From that it follows
that this dominion extends only over the existence of creatures; it does not
extend over their essences as well. God was able to create matter, a man,
a circle, or to leave them in nothingness, but he was not able to produce
them without giving them their essential properties. He must necessar-
ily make man a rational animal and necessarily give the round shape to a
circle, since, according to his ideas, which are eternal and independent of
the free decrees of his will, the essence of man consists in the attributes of
animal and rational, and the essence of the circle consists in a circumfer-
ence equally distant from the centre as to all its parts. This is what made
Christian philosophers admit that the essences of things are eternal, and
that there are propositions that are eternally true, and consequently that
130
Bayle, Continuation des Pensées diverses, p. 770.
220
Theodicy
the essences of things and the truth of first principles are immutable. That
should be understood not only of theoretical first principles, but also of
practical first principles, and of all the propositions that contain the true
definition of creatures. These essences, these truths, emanate from the
same necessity of nature as God’s knowledge. Therefore, as it is through
the nature of things that God exists, that he is all-powerful, and that he
knows everything perfectly, it is also through the nature of things that
matter, the triangle, man, certain actions of man, etc., have such-and-such
attributes essentially. God saw from all eternity and from all necessity the
essential relations of numbers, and the identity of the subject and predicate
of propositions that contain the essence of each thing. He also saw, in the
same way, that the term ‘just’ is included in the following propositions: to
esteem what is estimable, to have gratitude towards one’s benefactor, to
fulfil the conditions of a contract, and so on with various other propositions
about morals. It is therefore right to say that the precepts of natural law
presuppose the uprightness and justice of what is commanded, and that
it would be man’s duty to practise what they contain, even if God would
have indulgently ordered nothing about it. Be mindful, I beg you, that in
going back via our abstract thoughts to that ideal moment when God had
not yet decreed anything, we find in the ideas of God the principles of
morals under terms that imply an obligation. We conceive these maxims as
certain, and derived from the eternal and immutable order: it is worthy of
the rational creature to conform to reason; a rational creature which con-
forms to reason is worthy of praise, but it is worthy of blame when it does
not so conform. You would not dare to say that these truths do not impose
upon man a duty in relation to all acts conforming to right reason, such as
these: one must esteem all that is estimable; render good for good;131 harm
no one;132 honour one’s father;133 render to each his due,134 etc. Now since
the truths of morality impose certain duties upon man by the very nature
of things, and prior to the divine laws, it is evident, as Thomas Aquinas and
Grotius said, that if there were no God, we would nevertheless be obliged
to conform to natural right. Others have said that even if all intelligences
were to perish, true propositions would remain true. Cajetan maintained
that if he were alone in the universe, all other things without any e xception
131
Possibly an allusion to Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, 1133a.
132
A core principle of Roman law. Leibniz adopted it as the first degree of right (‘strict
right’) in his ethics. See SLT, p. 150.
133
This recalls the fourth of the Ten Commandments (which is a command to honour
one’s father and mother).
134
A maxim with a rich history. See for example Plato, Republic, 333e; Justinian, Institutes,
I.I. Leibniz identified it as the second degree of right (‘equity’) in his ethics. See SLT,
p. 150.
221
Appendix
having been annihilated, the knowledge he had of the nature of a rose
would nonetheless subsist.’135

The late Jacob Thomasius, a renowned Professor at Leipzig, has observed
not incorrectly in his elucidations of the philosophical rules of Daniel
Stahl,136 Professor at Jena, that it is not appropriate to go entirely beyond
God, and that it should not be said, as some Scotists do, that the eternal
truths would subsist even if there were no understanding, not even that
of God. For it is, in my view, the divine understanding which constitutes
the reality of eternal truths, although his will has no part in that. Every
reality must be founded upon something existent. It is true that an atheist
can be a geometer, but if there were no God, geometry’s object would
not exist. And without God, not only would there be nothing existent,
but there would not even be anything possible. Yet that does not prevent
those who do not see the connection of all things with each another and
with God from being able to understand certain sciences, without knowing
their first source, which is in God. Aristotle, although he scarcely knew
it either, nevertheless said something very similar and very good when
he acknowledged that the principles of individual sciences depend upon
a superior knowledge which gives the reason for them; and this superior
knowledge must have being, and consequently God, the source of being,
for its object.137 Mr Dreier of Königsberg has aptly noted that the true
metaphysics which Aristotle sought, which he called the sought after, his
desideratum, was theology.

Yet the same Mr Bayle, who said such fine things in order to show that
the rules of goodness and justice, and the eternal truths in general, subsist
by their nature, and not by an arbitrary choice of God, spoke about them
very uncertainly in another passage (Continuation des pensées diverses,
book 2, chap. 114, towards the end). After having related the opinion of
Mr Descartes and a group of his followers, who maintain that God is the
free cause of truths and essences, he adds (p. 554): ‘I have done every-
thing I could to understand this dogma aright and to find the solution of
the difficulties that surround it. I freely confess to you that I still have not
135
Bayle, Continuation des Pensées diverses, pp. 770–3.
136
Jakob Thomasius, Dilucidationes Stahlianae in partem priorem regularum philosophicarum
Danielis Stahlii (Leipzig, 1676). This was an elucidation of Daniel Stahl, Regulae philo-
sophicae (Jena, 1657).
137
Aristotle, Metaphysics, I.1–2.
222
Theodicy
fully achieved this. That does not discourage me; I imagine, as other phi-
losophers in other cases have done, that time will unfold this fine paradox.
I wish Father Malebranche had been able to consent to uphold it, but he
took a different approach.’138 Is it possible that the pleasure of doubting
can have such a hold over an able man as to make him wish and hope for
the power to believe that two contradictories never exist together only
because God forbade them to do so, and that he could have given them an
order which would have made them always occur together? This is a fine
paradox! Father Malebranche was very wise to take a different approach.

Mr Bayle, along with others, understands this to be a freedom of indiffer-
ence, that God had had to establish (for example) the truths of numbers
and to ordain that three times three make nine, whereas he could have
ordered them to make ten, and he conceives in such a strange opinion,
if there were a way to defend it, some kind of advantage against the
Stratonists. Strato was one of the leaders of the School of Aristotle, and
Theophrastus’ successor; he maintained (according to Cicero) that this
world had been formed such as it is by nature, or by a necessary cause
devoid of knowledge.139 I admit that that might have been the case if God
had preformed matter so as to produce such an effect by the laws of motion
alone. But without God there would not even have been any reason for
existence, and even less for this or that existence of things: thus Strato’s
system is not to be feared.

Nevertheless Mr Bayle has problems with this: he will not admit plastic
natures devoid of knowledge, which Mr Cudworth and others had
introduced, for fear that the modern Stratonists, that is, the Spinozists,
take advantage of it.140 This is what has led him into disputes with Mr le
Clerc. And preoccupied with this error, that a non-intelligent cause cannot
produce anything in which artifice is apparent, he is far from granting
me preformation, which produces naturally the organs of animals, and the
system of a harmony that God had pre-established in bodies, to make them
correspond through their own laws to the thoughts and the volitions of
138
Bayle, Continuation des Pensées diverses, p. 554. Bayle is referring to Malebranche’s state-
ment ‘I do not believe that God can make contradictories be true or false at the same
time’ made in the preface of his De la Recherche de la verité (Paris, 1675).
139
A reference to Cicero, De natura deorum, I.35.
140
On the association of Stratonism and Spinozism, see Jonathan I. Israel, Enlightenment
Contested: Philosophy, Modernity, and the Emancipation of Man 1670–1752 (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2006), pp. 444ff.
223
Appendix
souls. But it ought to have been taken into consideration that this non-
intelligent cause, which produces such beautiful things in the grains and
seeds of plants and animals, and which produces the actions of bodies as
the will ordains them, was formed by the hands of God, infinitely more
skilful than a watchmaker, who nevertheless makes machines and automata
capable of producing quite wonderful effects, as if they had intelligence.

Now to come to what worries Mr Bayle about the Stratonists in the event
that we acknowledge truths independent of God’s will: he seems to fear
that they may take advantage against us of the perfect regularity of eternal
truths. For as this regularity comes only from the nature and necessity of
things, without being directed by any knowledge, Mr Bayle fears that one
could infer from it, as Strato did, that the world could also have become
regular through a blind necessity. But it is easy to respond to this. In the
region of eternal truths are found all the possibles, and consequently both
the regular and the irregular. There must be a reason for preferring order
and regularity, and this reason can be found only in the understanding.
Moreover, these very truths do not exist unless there is an understand-
ing which is aware of them, for they would not subsist if there were not a
divine understanding in which they are realised, so to speak. This is why
Strato does not achieve his goal, which is to exclude knowledge from what
enters into the origin of things.

Yet philosophers and theologians dare to dogmatically uphold a similar
judgement, and time and again I am surprised that able and pious persons
have been capable of imposing limits on God’s goodness and perfection.
For to claim that he knows what is best, that he can do it, and that he does
not do it, is to admit that it is entirely up to his will to make the world better
than it is; but we would call that lacking goodness. It is acting against this
axiom already quoted above: Minus bonum habet rationem mali.141 If some
people appeal to experience to prove that God could have done better then
they set themselves up as ridiculous critics of his works. And the response
to them will be the same as to all those who criticise God’s conduct, and
who would want to infer from this same supposition, that is, the alleged
defects of the world, that there is an evil God, or at least a God neutral
141
‘A lesser good has the character of evil.’ The maxim was popular among Scholastics.
See for example Sebastiani Medicis, Summae decretorum, haeresum, peccatorum, virtutum
(Venice, 1587), p. 33; Girolamo Onofri, Aureae disputationes de anima (Venice, 1619), p.
296.
224
Theodicy
between good and evil. And if we make the same judgement as King
Alphonse,142 I say the response to us shall be this: You have known the
world for only three days, you see hardly any further than your nose, and
yet you find fault? Wait until you know more of it, and consider especially
the parts which present a complete whole (as do organic bodies), and you
will find there an artifice and a beauty beyond imagination. Let us draw
conclusions from that about the wisdom and goodness of the author of
things, even in things that we do not know. We find in the universe some
things which are not pleasing to us, but let us be mindful that it is not made
for us alone. It is nevertheless made for us if we are wise: it will be conveni-
ent for us if we conform to it; we shall be happy in it if we want to be.

Someone will say that it is impossible to produce the best, because there
is no perfect creature, and because it is always possible to produce one
which is more perfect. My response is that what can be said of a creature
or of a particular substance, which can always be surpassed by another one,
should not be applied to the universe, which is an infinity as it must extend
through all future eternity. Moreover, there is an infinity of creatures in
the smallest bit of matter, because of the actual division of the continuum
to infinity. And strictly speaking, infinity, that is, the accumulation of an
infinite number of substances, is not a whole any more than the infinite
number itself, of which one cannot say whether it is odd or even. This very
point serves to refute those who make a god of the world, or who conceive
God as the soul of the world: the world or universe cannot be considered as
an animal or as a substance.

It is therefore not a matter of a creature, but the universe, and the adver-
sary will be obliged to maintain that one possible universe may be better
than another to infinity; but he would be mistaken about this, and it is
something he cannot prove. If this opinion were true, it would follow that
God would not have produced any universe, since he is incapable of acting
without reason, and that would even involve acting against reason. It is as
if one were to imagine that God had decreed to make a material sphere,
without any reason to make it this size or that. This decree would be
142
After receiving an account of the Ptolemaic world-system with all its epicycles, the
thirteenth-century King Alphonse of Castille is said to have claimed that God ought to
have consulted him before embarking on creation as he would have advised something
simpler. The story may be apocryphal, though it is reported in Bayle’s Dictionnaire
historique et critique, I, p. 852 (article ‘Castille (Alfonse X du nom roi de)’, note H).
225
Appendix
useless, it would carry with it the very thing that would prevent its effect. It
would be different if God decreed to draw a straight line from a given point
up to another given straight line, without there being any determination of
the angle, either in the decree, or in its circumstances. For in this case the
determination would come from the nature of the thing: the line would
be perpendicular, and the angle would be a right angle, since only that is
determined and distinguishable. The creation of the best of all possible
universes should be conceived in this way, all the more since God not only
decrees to create a universe, but decrees also to create the best of all. For
he decrees nothing unwittingly, and he does not make separate decrees,
which would be nothing but antecedent wills, which we have done enough
to explain and distinguish from genuine decrees.

Mr Diroys, whom I knew in Rome, theologian to Cardinal d’Estrées, wrote
a book entitled Preuves et prejugez pour la Religion Chrestienne et Catholique,
published in Paris in 1683. Mr Bayle (Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial,
chap. 165, p. 1058, book III) relates the objection that he made: ‘There is
still a difficulty’ (he says), ‘which is no less important to resolve than the
preceding ones, since it is more upsetting to those who judge goods and
evils by considerations based on the purest and most lofty maxims. It is
this: as God is the supreme wisdom and goodness, it seems to them that he
should do all things as wise and virtuous persons would wish them to be
done, in accordance with the rules of wisdom and goodness that God has
impressed in them, and as they themselves would be obliged to do these
things if it depended on them. Thus, seeing that the affairs of the world do
not, in their view, go as well as they might go, and as they would go if they
intervened, they conclude that God, who is infinitely better and wiser than
they are, or rather is wisdom and goodness itself, does not intervene.’143

Mr Diroys says some good things about this, which I will not repeat since
we have sufficiently met the objection in more than one passage, and that
has been the main aim of our entire discourse. But I cannot agree with one
thing he puts forward: he claims that the objection proves too much. We
must again give his own words, from p. 1059 of Mr Bayle: ‘If it is not befit-
ting to the supreme wisdom and goodness not to do what is best and most
143
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, pp. 1058–9. The passage is quoted
from François Diroys’ Preuves et prejugez pour la Religion Chrestienne et Catholique
contre les fausses Religions et l’Athéisme (Paris, 1683), p. 30. The book is credited to
Mr F. Duroys.
226
Theodicy
perfect, it follows that all beings are eternally, immutably and essentially
as perfect and as good as they can be, since nothing can change except by
passing either from a less good state to a better one, or from a better one
to one less good. Now that cannot happen if it does not befit God not to
do what is best and most perfect when he can do it: therefore it will have
to be the case that all beings are eternally and essentially filled with a
knowledge and a virtue as perfect as God can give them. Now everything
that is eternally and essentially as perfect as God can make it proceeds
essentially from him; in a word, it is eternally and essentially good, as he
is, and consequently it is God, as he is. See, then, where this maxim goes,
that it is repugnant to supreme justice and goodness not to make things
as good and as perfect as they can be. For it is essential to the essential
wisdom and goodness to forsake anything that is absolutely repugnant to
it. Since it is not repugnant to God that there be other beings besides him,
that is, beings which can be not what they are, and do not do what they
do, or do what they do not, it must therefore be established as a first truth
concerning God’s conduct in relation to creatures that there is nothing
repugnant to this goodness and this wisdom in making things less perfect
than they could be, or in permitting the goods that it has produced either
to completely cease to be or to change and deteriorate.’144

It seems to Mr Bayle (p. 1063) that Mr Diroys has confused two different
propositions. The first is that God must do all things as wise and virtuous
persons would wish they be done, according to the rules of wisdom and
goodness that God has imprinted in them, and as they themselves would
be obliged to do them if those things depended upon them. The second
proposition is that it does not befit the supreme wisdom and goodness not
to do what is best and most perfect. Mr Diroys (in Mr Bayle’s view) objects
to the first proposition but responds to the second. But he is right to do
that, it seems to me, since these two propositions are connected, with the
second being a consequence of the first: to do less good than one could is
to be lacking in wisdom or in goodness. To be the best, and to be desired
by the most virtuous and most wise, is the same thing. And it may be said
that, if we could understand the structure and the economy of the universe,
we would find that it is made and governed as the wisest and most virtuous
could wish it, God not being able to fail to do it thus. Yet this necessity
is only moral necessity, and I admit that if God were necessitated by a
metaphysical necessity to produce what he does, he would produce all the
144
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, pp. 1059–61. The passage is quoted
from Diroys, Preuves et prejugez pour la Religion Chrestienne, p. 31.
227
Appendix
possibles, or nothing, and in this sense Mr Bayle’s conclusion would be
exactly right. But as all the possibles are not compatible together in one and
the same series of universe, for that very reason all the possibles cannot be
produced, and it must be said that God is not necessitated, metaphysically
speaking, to the creation of this world. It may be said that as soon as God
has decreed to create something, there is a struggle between all the possi-
bles, all claiming existence, and that those which, when combined, produce
most reality, most perfection, most intelligibility, win the day. It is true that
this whole struggle can be only an ideal one, that is, it can be only a conflict
of reasons in the most perfect understanding, which cannot fail to act in the
most perfect way and, consequently, to choose the best. Yet God is obliged
by a moral necessity to make things so that there cannot be anything better.
Otherwise, not only would others have grounds to criticise what he makes,
but, what is more, he himself would not be pleased with his work, he would
blame himself for its imperfection, which runs counter to the supreme bliss
of the divine nature. This perpetual feeling of his own fault or imperfection
would be an inevitable source of grief to him, as Mr Bayle says on another
occasion (p. 953).145

The admirable author of De la Recherche de la verité, having passed from
philosophy to theology, finally published a very fine Traité de la Nature
& de la Grace;146 there he showed in his way (as Mr Bayle explained in
his Pensées diverses sur les Cometes, chap. 234) that the events which arise
from the execution of general laws are not the object of a particular will of
God.147 It is true that when one wills a thing, one wills also in some way
everything that is necessarily bound up with it, and consequently God
cannot will general laws without willing also in some way all the particular
effects which must necessarily arise from them. But it is always true that
these particular events are not willed for themselves, and that is what is
meant by saying that they are not willed by a particular and direct will.
There is no doubt that when God resolved to act outwardly, he chose a
manner of action worthy of the supremely perfect being, that is, infinitely
simple and uniform, and nevertheless of an infinite fruitfulness. It may
145
‘What! Is the infinite being prone to wish for something that it does not achieve? Is
that compatible with supreme bliss? And would this not be an inexhaustible source of
grief and a perpetual feeling of its own imperfection?’ Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un
Provincial, III, pp. 952–3.
146
Leibniz is referring here to Nicolas Malebranche, and his De la Recherche de la verité,
and Traité de la Nature & de la Grace (Amsterdam, 1680).
147
Pierre Bayle, Pensées diverses, écrites à un docteur de Sorbonne, A l’occasion de la Cométe qui
parut au mois de Décembre 1680 (Rotterdam, 1683), pp. 703–8.
228
Theodicy
even be imagined that this manner of action by general wills appeared to
him preferable, even though there must result from it some superfluous
events (and even bad ones, when taken separately – this is my addition),
to another manner more composed and more regular, according to this
Father. Nothing is more appropriate than this supposition (according to
Mr Bayle when he wrote his Pensées sur les Cometes) for solving a thousand
difficulties raised against divine providence: ‘To ask God’, he says, ‘why
he has made things which serve to make men more wicked, would be to
ask why God has executed his plan (which can only be infinitely beautiful)
by the simplest and most uniform ways, and why, by a compounding of
decrees that continually interfere with each other, he has not prevented the
ill use of man’s free will.’148 He adds ‘that as miracles are particular wills,
they must have an end worthy of God’.149

It is a great shame that Mr Bayle so soon departed from the path he had
so promisingly begun, of reasoning on behalf of providence: for it would
have been advantageous, and in saying fine things he would have said good
things at the same time. I agree with Reverend Father Malebranche that
God does things in the way most worthy of him. But I go a little further
than he does with regard to general and particular wills. As God cannot do
anything without reason, even when he acts miraculously, it follows that he
does not have any will about individual events which is not a consequence
of a general truth or a general will. Thus I would say that God never has
particular wills, such as this Father understands them, that is to say, par-
ticular primitive wills.

Thus we must conclude that, among the general rules which are not abso-
lutely necessary, God chooses those which are the most natural, which
it is easiest to explain, and also which best serve to explain other things.
That is doubtless the finest and most satisfying doctrine, and even if the
system of pre-established harmony were not necessary otherwise, by banish-
ing superfluous miracles, God would have chosen it because it is the most
harmonic. The ways of God are the most simple and the most uniform:
he chooses rules that least restrict one another. They are also the most
productive in relation to the simplicity of ways. It is as if one said that a house
was the best that could have been erected assuming the same expenditure.
The two conditions of simplicity and productivity can even be reduced to
148
Bayle, Pensées diverses, pp. 706–7.
149
Bayle, Pensées diverses, p. 707.
229
Appendix
a single advantage, which is to produce the most perfection possible; and
in this way, Father Malebranche’s system in this respect amounts to mine.
For if we supposed the effect were greater but the ways less simple, I think
it could be said that, all things considered, the effect itself would be less
great, when considering not only the final effect but also the mediate effect.
For the wisest being acts in such a way that, as far as it is possible, the
means are also ends in some way, that is, desirable not only because of what
they do, but also because of what they are. The more complex ways take up
too much ground, too much space, too much place, too much time, which
could have been better employed.

There is a kind of geometry which Mr Jung of Hamburg, one of worthiest
men of his time, called empiric.150 It makes use of demonstrative experi-
ments and proves various of Euclid’s propositions, but in particular those
which concern the equality of two shapes, by cutting the one in pieces, and
putting these pieces back together again to make the other. In this way, by
cutting carefully into parts the squares of the two sides of the right-angled
triangle, and carefully arranging these parts, one makes from them the
square of the hypotenuse; this empirically demonstrates the 47th propo-
sition of the first book of Euclid.151 Now supposing that some of these
pieces taken from the two smaller squares become lost, something will
be lacking in the large square that should be formed from them, and this
defective combination, far from pleasing, will be objectionably ugly. And
if the pieces which remained, and which compose the faulty combination,
were then taken separately without any regard to the large square, to the
formation of which they are supposed to contribute, one would arrange
them together in a completely different way to make a passable combina-
tion. But as soon as the lost pieces are recovered and the gap in the faulty
combination is filled, there will emerge as a result a fine and regular thing,
which is the complete large square. And this complete combination will
be much more beautiful than the passable combination which had been
made only from the pieces that had not been lost. The complete combina-
tion corresponds to the universe as a whole, and the faulty combination,
which is a part of the complete one, corresponds to some part of the
universe, in which we find defects which the author of things has allowed
because otherwise, if he had wished to refashion this faulty part and make
150
Joachim Jungius, Geometria Empirica (Rostock and Hamburg, 1627).
151
Namely, ‘In right-angled triangles the square on the side subtending the right angle is
equal to the squares on the sides containing the right angle.’ Euclid’s Elements, trans. T.
L. Heath (Ann Arbor: Green Lion Press, 2002), p. 35.
230
Theodicy
a passable combination which includes it, the whole would not have been
so beautiful. For the parts of the faulty combination, arranged better to
make a passable combination, could not have been used properly to form
the whole and perfect combination. Thomas Aquinas caught a glimpse of
these things when he said ‘ad prudentem gubernatorem pertinet, negligere
aliquem defectum bonitatis in parte, ut faciat augmentum bonitatis in
toto’ (Thomas, Contra gentiles, book 3, chap. 71).152 Thomas Gataker, in
his notes on the book of Marcus Aurelius (book 5, chap. 8, according to
Mr Bayle),153 cites also passages from authors who say that the evil of the
parts is often the good of the whole.

The infinity of possibles, however great it may be, is not greater than the
infinity of the wisdom of God, who knows all possibles. It may even be
said that if this wisdom does not go beyond the possibles extensively, since
the objects of the understanding cannot go beyond the possible, which in
a sense is alone intelligible, it goes beyond them intensively, because of the
infinitely infinite combinations it makes out of them, and the equally innu-
merable reflections it makes on them. The wisdom of God, not content
with embracing all the possibles, penetrates them, compares them, weighs
them against each other, to assess the degrees of perfection or imperfec-
tion, the strong and the weak, the good and the evil. His wisdom even goes
beyond finite combinations: it makes out of them an infinity of infinities,
that is, an infinity of possible series of the universe, each of which contains
an infinity of creatures. And in this way, divine wisdom distributes all the
possibles it had already contemplated individually into as many universal
systems which it again compares to each other. And the result of all these
comparisons and reflections is the choice of the best from among all these
possible systems, which wisdom makes in order to fully meet the demands
of goodness; this is precisely the plan of the actual universe. And all these
operations of the divine understanding, although they have an order and a
priority of nature among themselves, always take place together, without
there being any priority of time among them.
152
‘It belongs to a prudent governor to neglect some absence of goodness in the part in
order that he might bring about an increase of goodness in the whole.’ St Thomas
Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, 3.71.7.
153
The citation is to be found in Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, p. 985.
Leibniz introduces errors when he copies the citation from Bayle, because Bayle refers
to the notes on §58 of book 8 of Thomas Gataker, Marci Antonini imperatoris, De rebus
suis, sive de eis quae ad se pertinere censebat, libri 12 (London, 1697), pp. 319–20, whereas
Leibniz has chapter 8 of book 5.
231
Appendix
Behold, we have at last unravelled the moral cause of moral evil. Less trou-
blesome for us will be physical evil, that is, pains, sufferings, and miseries,
these being consequences of moral evil. ‘Poena est malum passionis, quod
infligitur ob malum actionis’,154 according to Grotius. One is acted upon
because one has acted; evil is done to one because one does evil.
Nostrorum causa malorum
Nos sumus.155
It is true that one often suffers on account of the bad actions of others; but
when one has no part in the offence, one must hold it as certain that these
sufferings prepare us for a greater happiness. The question of physical
evil, that is, of the origin of sufferings, has difficulties in common with the
question of the origin of metaphysical evil, examples of which are furnished
by monstrosities and the other apparent irregularities of the universe. But
we should conclude that even sufferings and monstrosities are in keeping
with order. And it is good to consider not only that it was better to admit
these defects and monstrosities than to violate general laws, as Reverend
Father Malebranche sometimes argues, but also that these very monstrosi-
ties are in the rules, and in conformity with general wills, though we are
not capable of teasing out this conformity. It is just as there are sometimes
appearances of irregularity in mathematics, which ultimately end in a great
order when one has finished getting to the bottom of them; this is why I
have already pointed out above that on my principles all individual events,
without exception, are consequences of general wills.

One should not be surprised that I endeavour to clarify these matters by
comparisons drawn from pure mathematics, in which everything goes in
order, and in which there is a way of teasing out this order by a focused
meditation which makes us enjoy, so to speak, the view of God’s ideas.
One may propose a seemingly completely irregular sequence or series of
numbers, in which the numbers increase and diminish variably without
any order being apparent, and yet he who knows the key to the cipher, and
who understands the origin and construction of this sequence of numbers,
will be able to offer a rule which, once understood aright, will show that
154
‘Punishment is an evil of suffering, which is imposed because of the evil of the action.’
A slight misquoting of Hugo Grotius’ De iure belli ac pacis libri tres (Frankfurt, 1626), p.
359.
155
‘We are the cause of our evils.’ Eusebius, De Evangelica praeparatione, libri XIII
(Cologne, 1539), 37C.
232
Theodicy
the series is entirely regular, and that it even has fine properties. This is
even more perceptible in lines: a line may have twists and turns, ups and
downs, points of tucking and points of inflexion, interruptions and other
variations, so that neither rhyme nor reason is evident there, especially
when considering only a part of the line. Nevertheless it is possible to give
its equation and construction, in which a geometer would find the reason
for and the fittingness of all these so-called irregularities. That is how we
should also judge the irregularities of monstrosities and other so-called
defects in the universe.

It is in this sense that one may employ this fine saying of St Bernard (Letter
276, to Eugene, III): Ordinatissimum est, minus interdum ordinate fieri aliq-
uid.156 It is in accordance with the great order that there be some small
disorder; and it may even be said that this small disorder is apparent only
in the whole, and it is not even apparent with regard to the felicity of those
who align themselves to the way of order.

When speaking of monstrosities I also mean many other apparent defects.
We know hardly anything except the surface of our globe, and we hardly
penetrate into its interior beyond several hundred fathoms. That which we
find in this crust of the globe appears to be the effect of some great upheav-
als. It seems that this globe was once on fire, and that the rocks which
constitute the base of this crust of the Earth are scorias remaining from
a great melting. In their entrails are found metal and mineral products,
which very much resemble those which come from our furnaces: and the
entire sea may be a kind of oleum per deliquium,157 just as tartaric oil forms in
a damp place. For when the surface of the Earth was cooled after the great
fire, the moisture that the fire had driven into the air fell back on the Earth,
washed its surface, and dissolved and moistened the fixed salt remaining in
the cinders, and finally filled this great cavity in the surface of our globe to
make the ocean filled with salt water.

But it should be concluded that, after the fire, the earth and the water
have no less brought about destruction. Perhaps the crust formed by the
156
Saint Bernard, Opera Genuina (Paris, 1833), I, p. 232. Leibniz gives a translation in
his next sentence: ‘It is in accordance with the great order that there be some small
disorder.’
157
‘oil produced by deliquescence’.
233
Appendix
cooling, which had great cavities below it, fell in, so that we live only
on ruins, as has been astutely suggested by, among others, Mr Thomas
Burnet, Chaplain to the late King of Great Britain.158 And a number of
deluges and inundations have left sediments, of which traces and remains
are found which show that the sea was in places which are today very far
away from it. But these upheavals finally ceased, and the globe took on
the form we see. Moses hints at these great changes in some passages: the
separation of light from darkness indicates the melting caused by the fire,
and the separation of the moist from the dry marks the effects of inun-
dations.159 But who does not see that these disorders have served to lead
things to the point they are at now, that we owe to them our riches and our
commodities, and that it is because of them that this globe became suit-
able for cultivation by our efforts? These disorders turned into order. The
disorders, real or apparent, that we see from afar are sunspots and comets,
but we do not know the uses they have, nor the regularity within them.
There was a time when the planets were taken for wandering stars; now
their motion is found to be regular. Perhaps it is the same with comets;
posterity will know.

It seems Mr Bayle does not approve of any comparison of the disorders
which can exist in inanimate things with those which disturb the peace
and felicity of rational creatures; nor does he approve of the permission
of vice being partly grounded on the concern to avoid disrupting the laws
of motion. According to him it may be concluded (posthumous Reply
to Mr Jaquelot, p. 183), ‘that God created the world only to display his
infinite knowledge of architecture and mechanics, without his attribute of
goodness, and love of virtue, having had any part in the construction of this
great work. This God would pride himself only on knowledge, he would
prefer to let the whole human race perish rather than endure some atoms
going faster or more slowly than the general laws require.’160 Mr Bayle
would not have made this objection if he had been informed of the system
of general harmony which I conceived, and which holds that the kingdom
of efficient causes and that of final causes are parallel to each other; that
God no less has the quality of the best monarch than that of the greatest
architect; that matter is so disposed that the laws of motion serve the best
government of minds; and that consequently it will be found that he has
158
Leibniz is thinking here of Burnet’s Telluris Theoria Sacra.
159
An allusion to Genesis 1.4 and 1.9.
160
Pierre Bayle, Entretiens de Maxime et de Thémiste, ou Reponse à l’Examen de la Theologie
de Mr Bayle par Mr Jaquelot (Rotterdam, 1707), pp. 182–3.
234
Theodicy
obtained the most good possible, provided one reckon the metaphysical,
physical, and moral goods together.

But (Mr Bayle will say), as God is able to avert an infinity of evils by one
small miracle, why did he not perform it? He gives so much extraordinary
assistance to fallen men, but just a little assistance of this nature given to
Eve would have prevented her fall and rendered the serpent’s temptation
ineffective. We have adequately countered objections of this sort by means
of this general response: that God ought not to choose another universe
since he has chosen the best of them, and has only performed the miracles
which were necessary in it. The response to him was that miracles change
the natural order of the universe: he replies that this is an illusion, and
that the miracle of the wedding at Cana (for example) did not involve any
change in the air of the room except that instead of receiving into its pores
some corpuscles of water, it received corpuscles of wine. But it must be
remembered that, once the best plan of things has been chosen, nothing
can be changed in it.
§275 (referenced in M58)161

It is said in scripture that God hardened (Exodus 4.21 and 7.3; Isaiah
63.17); that God sends a lying spirit (1 Kings 22.23), and a strong delu-
sion to believe a lie (2 Thessalonians 2.11); that he deceived the prophet
(Ezekiel 14.9); that he commanded Shimei to curse (2 Samuel 16.10);
that the children of Eli listened not to the voice of their father, because
God willed to put them to death (1 Samuel 2.25); that God took away
Job’s possessions, although that was done through the malice of brigands
(Job I.21); that he raised up Pharaoh, in order to show his power in him
(Exodus 9.16; Romans 9.17); that he is like a potter who makes a vessel for
dishonour (Romans 9.21); that he hides the truth from the wise and the
understanding (Matthew 11.25); that he speaks in parables so that, with
regard to those who are outside, when seeing they do not perceive, and
when hearing they do not understand, lest they be converted, and their
sins be forgiven them (Mark 4.12; Luke 8.10); that Jesus was delivered by
the definite plan and providence of God (Acts 2.23); that Pontius Pilate
and Herod with the Gentiles and the people of Israel have done what the
hand and the plan of God had determined beforehand (Acts 4.27, 28); that
it came from the Eternal that the enemies hardened their heart in order to
161
Note that the contents of §275 in the 1714 edition of the Theodicy, which I have used,
are included in §276 in some later printings, such as in Gerhardt’s edition: G VI, p. 281.
In the 1714 edition, there is no §276.
235
Appendix
come out in battle against Israel, so that he might destroy them without
granting them any favour (Joshua 11.20); that the Eternal poured a con-
fused spirit in the midst of Egypt, and caused it to stagger in all its works,
like a drunken man (Isaiah 19.14); that Rehoboam listened not to the word
of the people, since this was conducted by the Eternal (1 Kings 12.15); that
he turned the hearts of the Egyptians so that they held his people in hatred
(Psalm 105.25). But all these expressions, and other ones like them, imply
only that the things God has done serve as occasion for ignorance, error,
malice, and bad actions, and contribute to that; God foresees this, and
intends to use it for his ends, since superior reasons of perfect wisdom have
determined him to permit these evils, and even to concur with them. ‘Sed
non sineret bonus fieri male; nisi Omnipotens etiam de malo posset facere
bene’,162 to speak with St Augustine. But we have explained this more fully
in the Second Part.

Let no one say, I am tempted by God, but each person is tempted when
he is lured and enticed by his own desire (James 1.13–14). And Satan con-
tributes to that; he blinds the understandings of unbelievers (2 Corinthians
4.4). But man is delivered to the Devil by his covetousness: the pleasure
he finds in evil is the bait that lures him in. Plato already said as much,
and Cicero repeats it: ‘Plato voluptatem dicebat escam malorum’.163 Grace
opposes it with a greater pleasure, as St Augustine observed. Every pleasure
is a feeling of some perfection; one loves an object in proportion as one feels
its perfections; nothing surpasses the divine perfections. From which it
follows that charity and the love of God give the greatest pleasure that can
be conceived, in proportion as one is penetrated by these feelings, which
are not common to men because they are busy, and focused on objects
concerned with their passions.

The system of those who call themselves disciples of St Augustine is not
far removed from this, provided that one discard certain odious things,
whether in the expressions or in the dogmas themselves. In the expressions,
I find that it is principally the use of terms like ‘necessary’ or ‘contingent’,
‘possible’ or ‘impossible’, which is sometimes unhelpful and which causes
much commotion. That is why, as Mr Löscher the younger aptly observed
162
‘But a good being would not permit evil to be done, unless in its omnipotence it can
make a good from the evil.’ This is a slight misquoting of St Augustine’s Enchiridion ad
Laurentium liber unus, I.100.
163
‘Plato calls pleasure the bait of vice.’ A slight misquoting of Cicero’s De senectute, XIII.
236
Theodicy
in a learned dissertation on the Paroxysms of the Absolute Decree, Luther
wanted, in his book On the Bondage of the Will, to find a word more appro-
priate for what he wished to express than that of necessity.164 Generally
speaking, it appears more reasonable and more fitting to say that obedience
to God’s precepts is always possible, even for the unregenerate, that grace is
always resistible, even in the most holy, and that freedom is exemption not
only from constraint but also from necessity, although it is never without
infallible certainty or without inclining determination.

Yet on the other hand there is a sense in which it would be permitted to
say, in certain situations, that the power to do good is often lacking, even in
the just; that sins are often necessary, even in the regenerate; that it is some-
times impossible for one not to sin; that grace is irresistible; that freedom is
not exemption from necessity. But these expressions are less precise and less
appropriate in the circumstances we find ourselves in today, and absolutely
speaking they are more prone to misuse, and besides they retain something
of the masses, with whom terms are employed with a great deal of latitude.
Nevertheless there are circumstances which make them appropriate and
even useful, and it happens that holy and orthodox authors, and even the
Holy Scriptures, have made use of expressions from both sides without
there being a true opposition, any more than there is between St James
and St Paul, and without there being an error on either side because of the
ambiguity of terms. And these different ways of speaking are so customary
that often it is difficult to say precisely which sense is the most ordinary
and the most natural, and even the most in use (quis sensus magis naturalis,
obvius, intentus),165 as the same author has different views in different pas-
sages, and the same ways of speaking are more or less accepted or accept-
able before or after the decision of some great man or of some authority
that one respects and follows. This means that one may well authorise or
ban certain expressions as the occasion requires, and at certain times, but
that makes no difference to the sense or to faith unless sufficient explana-
tions of the terms are provided.

Therefore one need only understand some distinctions, like the one we
have very often urged between the necessary and the certain, and between
metaphysical necessity and moral necessity. And it is the same with
164
Valentin Ernst Löscher, ‘De paroxismis absoluti decreti’, in Initia academica
(Wittenberg, 1707).
165
‘which sense is the most natural, accessible, intended’.
237
Appendix
ossibility and impossibility, since the event whose opposite is possible
p
is contingent, just as the one whose opposite is impossible is necessary. A
distinction is rightly drawn also between a proximate power and a remote
power; and in accordance with these different senses, at one time we say
that a thing is possible and at another that it is not. It may be said in a
certain sense that it is necessary that the blessed sin not, that the devils
and the damned sin, that God himself choose the best, that man follow
the course of action which after all most impresses itself on him. But this
necessity is not opposed to contingency; it is not the necessity called logical,
geometrical, or metaphysical, whose opposite implies contradiction. Mr
Nicole has made use somewhere of a comparison which is not improper.
It is considered impossible that a wise and serious magistrate, who has not
taken leave of his senses, should perform in public an outrageous action,
as would be, for example, running around the streets completely naked
for a joke.166 In some way it is the same with the blessed: even less are
they capable of sinning, and the necessity that shields them from it is of
the same kind. Ultimately I also think that ‘will’ is a term as equivocal as
‘power’ and ‘necessity’. For I have already observed that those who employ
the axiom that one does not fail to do what one wills when one is able to do
it, and who infer from it that God does not therefore will the salvation of
all, mean a decretory will; and it is only in this sense that one can uphold the
proposition that the wise man never wills what he knows to be among those
things which will not happen. Instead it may be said, when taking ‘will’ in
a more general sense and more in keeping with normal use, that the will
of the wise man is inclined antecedently to all good, although ultimately it
decrees to do only what is most fitting.167 Thus it would be very wrong to
deny to God the serious and strong inclination to save all men, which Holy
Scripture attributes to him, and even to attribute to him a primitive aver-
sion which from the outset deters him from the salvation of some, odium
antecedaneum.168 One should rather maintain that the wise person tends
towards every good insofar as it is good, in proportion to his knowledge
and his power, but that he produces only the best that is feasible. Those
who admit that, and nonetheless deny God the antecedent will to save all
men, fall short only through their misuse of the term, provided that they
acknowledge, moreover, that God gives to all sufficient assistance so that
they can be saved, if they have the will to avail themselves of it.
166
See Pierre Nicole, Continuation des essais de morale. Tome troisième de la première partie
(The Hague, 1700), p. 100.
167
Reading ‘ne . . . que’ in place of ‘ne . . . pas’. Some editions of the text omit these words
altogether; see for example G VI, p. 285.
168
An antecedent hatred.
238
Theodicy
But let us return to the cylinder of Chrysippus. He is right to say that vice
comes from the original constitution of some minds. It was objected to him
that God formed them, and he could reply only by noting the imperfection
of matter, which did not permit God to do better. This reply is worthless,
for matter in itself is indifferent to all forms, and God made it. Evil comes
rather from the forms themselves, but in the abstract, that is, from the
ideas that God has not produced by an act of his will, any more than he
produced numbers and figures and (in a word) all possible essences which
should be taken as eternal and necessary; for they are found in the ideal
region of possibles, that is, in the divine understanding. God is therefore
not the author of essences insofar as they are only possibilities; but there
is nothing actual to which he has not decreed and given existence, and he
has permitted evil because it is included in the best plan which is found in
the region of possibles, which supreme wisdom could not fail to choose.
This notion simultaneously satisfies God’s wisdom, power, and goodness,
and nonetheless results in the entrance of evil. God gives perfection to
creatures insofar as the universe can receive it. The cylinder is pushed,
but any unevenness in its shape serves to limit the swiftness of its motion.
This comparison of Chrysippus’ is not very different from ours, which
was taken from a laden boat that the river current carries along, but more
slowly when the load is greater. These comparisons tend towards the same
end, and that shows that if we were sufficiently informed of ancient phi-
losophers’ opinions, we would find more reason in them than is thought.

The advantage of freedom, which exists in the creature, doubtless exists
eminently in God, but that should be understood insofar as it really is an
advantage and insofar as it does not presuppose an imperfection. For to
be able to make a mistake and to go astray is a disadvantage, and to have a
mastery over the passions is, to tell the truth, an advantage, but one which
presupposes an imperfection, namely passion itself, of which God is inca-
pable. Scotus was right to say that if God were not free and exempt from
necessity, no creature would be so. But God is incapable of being indeter-
minate in anything at all: he cannot be ignorant, he cannot doubt, he cannot
suspend his judgement; his will is always decided, and it can only be so by
the best. God can never have a primitive particular will, that is, independent
of laws or general wills: it would be unreasonable. He cannot decide upon
Adam, Peter, Judas, or any individual, without there being a reason for this
determination, and this reason leads necessarily to some general enuncia-
tion. The wise always act by principles, always by rules, and never through
exceptions, except when the rules compete with each other through contrary
239
Appendix
tendencies, where the strongest wins out; otherwise, either they will stop
each another, or some third course will result from them. And in all of these
cases one rule serves as an exception to another, without there ever being
original exceptions with respect to the one who always acts regularly.

This failing has greatly damaged Mr Bayle’s arguments, and has taken
away his means of escape from many difficulties. That is again apparent in
relation to the laws of the kingdom of nature: he believes them to be arbi-
trary and indifferent, and he objects that God would have been better able
to attain his end in the kingdom of grace if he had not stuck to these laws,
if he had avoided following them more often, or even if he had established
other ones. He believed this especially with regard to the law of the union
of soul and body. For he is convinced, along with the modern Cartesians,
that the ideas of sensible qualities that (according to them) God gives to the
soul on the occasion of movements of the body, have nothing which rep-
resents these movements or which resembles them; as such, it was purely
arbitrary whether God gave us the ideas of heat, cold, light, and other
qualities we experience, or that he give us completely different ones on
the same occasion. Very often have I been surprised that such able people
have been capable of taking a liking to opinions so philosophically lacking
and so contrary to the fundamental maxims of reason. For nothing better
reveals the imperfection of a philosophy than when the philosopher finds it
necessary to admit that something happens in accordance with his system
for which there is no reason, and that applies to the swerving of Epicurus’
atoms.169 Whether God or nature is operating, the operation will always
have its reasons. In the operations of nature, these reasons will depend
either upon necessary truths or upon the laws that God has found the most
reasonable; and in the operations of God, they will depend upon the choice
of the supreme reason, which makes him act.

But Mr Bayle also opposes this through another principle, which is one I
have already mentioned. It seems he thinks that the ideas which the soul
conceives in relation to the feelings of the body are arbitrary. Thus God
might have made it so that incisions in the body gave us pleasure. He
even claims that the laws of motion are entirely arbitrary. ‘I would like to
know’, he says (chap. 166, book III, p. 1080), ‘whether God established
the general laws of the communication of motions, and the particular laws
169
See Letters and Sayings of Epicurus, trans. Odysseus Makridis (New York: Barnes &
Noble Books, 2005), p. 6.
240
Theodicy
of the union of the human soul with an organised body, by an act of his
freedom of indifference. In which case he could have established entirely
different laws, and adopted a system whose effects did not include either
moral evil or physical evil. But if it is said that God was necessitated by
supreme wisdom to establish the laws that he has established, then we
have the fate of the Stoics plain and simple. Wisdom will have shown God
a way, and it will have been as impossible for him to depart from it as to
destroy himself.’170 This objection has been undermined enough: it is only
a moral necessity, and it is always a happy necessity to be obliged to act in
accordance with the rules of perfect wisdom.

Moreover, it seems to me that the reason which makes many people believe
that the laws of motion are arbitrary comes from the fact that few people
have examined them properly. It is now known that Mr Descartes was
quite wrong in his formulation of them. I have shown demonstratively that
conservation of the same quantity of motion cannot happen, but I find that
the same quantity of force is conserved, as much absolute as directive and
respective, total and partial. My principles, which carry this matter as far
as it can go, have not yet been published in their entirety, but I have shared
them with friends very capable of judging them, and they have devel-
oped a strong liking for them, and have converted some other persons of
acknowledged understanding and merit. I discovered at the same time that
the laws of motion which are actually found in nature, and are confirmed
by experiments, are not in truth absolutely demonstrable, as a geometrical
proposition would be, but also that they should not be so. They do not
arise entirely from the principle of necessity, but instead they arise from
the principle of perfection and order; they are an effect of God’s choice and
wisdom. I can demonstrate these laws in various ways, but must always
suppose something which is not of an absolutely geometrical necessity. So
these fine laws are a wonderful proof of an intelligent and free being, in
opposition to Strato or Spinoza’s system of absolute and brute necessity.

I have found that these laws can be explained by supposing that the effect
is always equal in force to its cause, or, which is the same thing, that the
same force is always conserved, though this axiom of higher philosophy
cannot be demonstrated geometrically. Other principles of a similar nature
can also be employed, for example the principle that action is always equal
to reaction, which supposes in things a resistance to external change, and
170
241
Appendix
cannot be derived either from extension or impenetrability. Likewise
that other principle, that a simple motion has the same properties as a
compound movement could have, and which would produce the same phe-
nomena of transfer. These suppositions are very plausible, and fortunately
they succeed in explaining the laws of motion because there is nothing so
fitting, all the more since they are encountered together. But one does not
find in them any absolute necessity which forces us to accept them, in the
way one is forced to admit the rules of logic, arithmetic, and geometry.

When considering the indifference of matter to motion and rest, it seems
that the largest body at rest could be carried along without any resistance
by the smallest body, which would be in motion, in which case there would
be action without reaction and an effect greater than its cause. Also, with
regard to the motion of a ball which rolls freely on an even, horizontal
plane, with a certain degree of speed, called A, there is no necessity to say
that this motion must have the properties of the motion it would have if it
were moving less slowly in a boat that itself moved in the same direction
with the remainder of the speed, to bring it about that the ball, seen from
the shore, advances with the same degree A. For although the same appear-
ance of speed and of direction comes about by virtue of the boat, it is not
the same thing at all. Nevertheless it is found that the effects of the balls’
colliding in the boat, of which the motion in each one separately, combined
with that of the boat, gives the appearance of what happens outside the
boat, also give the appearance of the effects that these same balls would give
when colliding outside the boat. This is beautiful, but it is not clear that
it is absolutely necessary. A motion on the two sides of the right-angled
triangle composes a motion on the hypotenuse, but it does not follow that
a ball moved on the hypotenuse must produce the effect of two balls of
its own size moved on the two sides, yet that is found to be true. There is
nothing so fitting as this outcome, and God has chosen laws which produce
it, but one sees no geometrical necessity in them. Yet it is this very lack of
necessity which enhances the beauty of the laws God has chosen, in which
many fine axioms are brought together, without it being possible for one to
say which is the most primitive one.

This also fully resolves the difficulty raised by Mr Bayle, who fears that if
God is always determined, nature could do without him, and bring about
that same effect, which we attribute to him, through the necessity of the
order of things. That would be true if for example the laws of motion, and
all the rest, had their source in a geometrical necessity of efficient causes,
242
Theodicy
but it is found that in the final analysis one is obliged to have recourse to
something which depends upon final causes, or upon fittingness. This also
undermines the most specious basis of naturalists. Dr Johann Joachim
Becher, a German physician, known for his books on chemistry, wrote a
prayer which got him into trouble. It began: O sancta mater natura, aeterne
rerum ordo.171 And it concluded by saying that this nature ought to forgive
him his failings since she herself was the cause of them. But the nature of
things, taken without intelligence and without choice, has nothing suf-
ficiently determinant in it. Mr Becher did not give sufficient consideration
to the fact that the author of things (natura naturans) must be good and
wise, and that we can be evil without his being complicit in our evil deeds.
When a wicked man exists, God must have found in the region of possibles
the idea of such a man forming part of the sequence of things whose choice
was demanded by the greatest perfection of the universe, and in which
errors and sins are not only punished but also put right with advantage,
and contribute to the greatest good.

Mr Bayle, however, has extended the free choice of God a little too far.
And when speaking of the Peripatetic Strato (Réponse aux Questions d’un
Provincial, chap. 180, p. 1239, book III), who maintained that everything
had been produced by the necessity of a nature devoid of intelligence,
he claims that this philosopher, when asked ‘why a tree does not have
the power to form bones and veins, would have been able to ask in turn,
why does matter have exactly three dimensions, why would two not have
been sufficient for it, why does it not have four? If the answer was that
there cannot be either more or less than three dimensions, he would have
demanded the cause of this impossibility.’172 These words lead us to believe
that Mr Bayle suspected that the number of dimensions of matter depended
upon God’s choice, just as it depended upon him to make or not to make
trees that produce animals. Indeed, how do we know whether there are not
planetary globes or earths situated in some more remote place in the uni-
verse where the fable of Scotland’s Barnacle-geese (birds said to be born of
trees) is true, and whether there are not even countries where one could say:
. . . populos umbrosa creavit
Fraxinus, et foeta viridis puer excidit alno?173
171
‘Oh holy mother nature, eternal order of things’.
172
173
‘the shady ash created people, and from the fertile alder a young boy was plucked?’ A
slight misquoting of Publius Papinius Statius, Thebaid, IV.280–1 (which refers to a
mountain ash rather than an alder).
243
Appendix
But it is not like this with the dimensions of matter: the ternary number is
determined for it not by the reason of the best, but by a geometrical neces-
sity. This is because geometers have been able to demonstrate that there
are only three straight lines perpendicular to each other which can intersect
at the same point. Nothing more appropriate could have been chosen to
show the difference between moral necessity, which constitutes the choice
of the wise, and the brute necessity of Strato and the Spinozists, who deny
God understanding and will, than to consider the difference between the
reason for the laws of motion and the reason for the ternary number of
dimensions: the first consists in the choice of the best, and the second in a
geometrical and blind necessity.

After having spoken of the laws of bodies, that is, of the rules of motion, let
us come to the laws of the union of soul and body, where Mr Bayle again
thinks he finds some vague indifference, something absolutely arbitrary.
This is how he speaks about it in his Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial
(chap. 84, p. 163, book 2): ‘It is a perplexing question whether bodies have
some natural power to do harm or good to man’s soul. If one answers in
the affirmative, one enters a fiendish labyrinth, for since man’s soul is an
immaterial substance, one will have to say that the local motion of certain
bodies is an efficient cause of a mind’s thoughts, which is contrary to the
most evident notions philosophy gives to us. If one answers in the negative,
one will be compelled to admit that the influence of our organs upon our
thoughts depends neither upon the internal qualities of matter, nor upon
the laws of motion, but upon an arbitrary institution of the creator. One will
therefore have to admit that it depended absolutely upon God’s freedom to
link such-and-such thoughts of our soul to such-and-such modifications of
our body, even after having established all the laws of the action of bodies
upon each other. The result of which is that there is in the universe no
portion of matter which can harm us by its proximity, except insofar as
God wills it, and consequently, that the Earth is as capable as some other
place of being the abode of the happy man . . . Ultimately, it is evident that
in order to prevent the bad choices of freedom there is no need to transport
man outside the Earth. With regard to all the acts of the will, God could
do on the Earth what he does regarding the good works of the predestined
when he settles their fate either by efficacious or by sufficient graces,
which, without in any way compromising freedom, are always followed by
the consent of the soul. It would be as easy for him to produce on the Earth
as in heaven the determination of our souls to a good choice.’174
174
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, II, pp. 163–4. The passage concerns the
244
Theodicy
I agree with Mr Bayle that God could have put the bodies and souls on this
globe of earth into such an order, whether by natural ways or by extraor-
dinary graces, that it would have been a perpetual paradise, and a foretaste
of the celestial state of the blessed. And nothing prevents there from being
worlds happier than ours, but God had good reasons for willing that ours
be such as it is. Yet in order to prove that a better state had been possible
here, Mr Bayle had no need to have recourse to the system of occasional
causes, which is full of miracles and suppositions for which their authors
themselves admit that there is no basis; these are the two defects of a
system which do most to distance it from the spirit of true philosophy.
There are grounds to wonder at why, from the outset, Mr Bayle did not
remember the system of pre-established harmony which he had examined
before, and which appeared at just the right moment here. But because in
this system everything is connected and harmonic, everything proceeds by
means of reasons and nothing is left empty or to the rash discretion of pure
and complete indifference, it seems that it did not appeal to Mr Bayle, a
little predisposed here to these indifferences against which he had fought
so well on other occasions. For he readily passed from one extreme to the
other, not with a bad intention or against his own conscience, but because
he had not yet made up his mind on the question at hand. He made do with
whatever suited him for thwarting the opponent he had in mind, his aim
being only to frustrate philosophers, and show the weakness of our reason;
and I think that neither Arcesilaus nor Carneades ever maintained both
sides of an argument with more eloquence and more wit.175 But ultimately
one should not doubt for the sake of doubting: doubts should serve us as
a gangway to get to the truth. That is what I often said to the late Abbé
Foucher; some specimens of his work show that his intention had been to
do for Academicians what Lipsius and Scioppius had done for the Stoics,
and Mr Gassendi for Epicurus, and what Mr Dacier has begun to do so
well for Plato.176 It should not be possible to reproach true philosophers
in the way that the celebrated Casaubon responded to those who, when
work of William King, but in his quotation of the passage Leibniz removes the refer-
ences to King.
175
There is a story related in Lactantius’ Divinae Institutiones, 5.15, that Carneades argued
in favour of justice one day, and then against justice the day after. Both Carneades and
Arcesilaus were Academic sceptics.
176
Simon Foucher (1644–96), with whom Leibniz corresponded for many years, published
a number of works in favour of the Academicians, such as Dissertations sur la recherche de
la verité, Contenant l’histoire et les principes de la philosophie des Académiciens. Avec plus-
ieurs réflexions sur les sentimens de M. Descartes (Paris, 1693). The other authors Leibniz
cites had likewise written works in favour of certain ancient thinkers; for example Justin
245
Appendix
showing him the hall of the Sorbonne, told him that disputations had
occurred there for some centuries: ‘what were their conclusions?’ he said
to them.177

Mr Bayle continues (p166): ‘It is true that since the laws of motion such
as we see in the world were established, it must be an utter necessity that
a hammer which strikes a nut breaks it, and that a stone which falls on a
man’s foot causes some bruise there, or some disorder of its parts. But
this is everything that can follow from the action of this stone on the
human body. If, aside from that, you want it to excite a feeling of pain,
one must suppose the institution of a code different from the one which
regulates the action and reaction of bodies on each other; one must, I
say, have recourse to the particular system of the laws of the union of the
soul with certain bodies. Now as this system is not necessarily connected
with the other, the indifference of God does not cease in relation to the
one at the time he chooses the other. He therefore combined these two
systems with a complete freedom, like two things which did not follow
naturally from each other. It is therefore by an arbitrary institution that
he has ordained that injuries to the body excite pain in the soul united to
this body. Therefore it was up to him to choose another system of union
of soul and body: he was therefore able to choose one in accordance with
which injuries excite only the idea of the remedy and a keen but agreeable
desire to apply it. He was able to establish that all bodies on the verge of
breaking a man’s head or piercing his heart excite a lively idea of peril,
and that this idea would cause the body to promptly move itself out of the
reach of the blow. All that would have happened without miracles, since
there would have been general laws on this subject. The system we know
about through experience teaches us that the determination of the motion
of certain bodies changes in accordance with our desires. It was therefore
possible that a combination be made between our desires and the move-
ment of certain bodies, whereby the nutritive juices were altered in such a
way that the good disposition of our organs was never changed.’178

It is clear that Mr Bayle thinks that everything that comes about through
general laws happens without miracles. But I have shown sufficiently that
Lipsius, Physiologiae Stoicorum libri tres (Antwerp, 1604); Pierre Gassendi, De vita et
moribus Epicuri libri octo (Lyon, 1647).
177
Leibniz was fond of this anecdote and used it elsewhere, for example G III, p. 192.
178
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, II, pp. 166–7.
246
Theodicy
if the law is not founded on reasons and does not serve to explain the
event through the nature of things, it can only be executed by a miracle.
Just as, for example, if God had ordained that bodies should move in
a circular line: to execute this order he would have needed perpetual
miracles, or the ministry of angels, for it is contrary to the nature of
motion, in which the body naturally forsakes the circular line in order to
continue in the tangent straight line if nothing holds it back. Therefore
it is not sufficient that God simply ordain that an injury should excite an
agreeable feeling: natural means must be found for that. The true means
whereby God makes the soul have sensations of what happens in the body
come from the nature of the soul, which is representative of bodies, and
made beforehand so that the representations which arise in it, one from
another, by a natural sequence of thoughts, correspond to the change of
bodies.

Let us include here the remark from the Journal des sçavans of 16th March
1705, which Mr Bayle has inserted into chapter 162 of his Réponse aux
Questions d’un Provincial (book III, p. 1030). It concerns the extract from
a very ingenious modern book on the Origin of Evil, about which we have
spoken above.179 The remark says ‘that the general solution with regard
to physical evil given in this book is that the universe must be regarded as
a work composed of various pieces which make up a whole; that, accord-
ing to the laws established in nature, some parts cannot be better unless
others become worse, and that the result of that would be a system that is
less perfect as a whole. This principle’, it is said, ‘is good; but if nothing
is added to it, it does not seem sufficient. Philosophers who are a little
difficult to please will say: Why has God established laws from which
arise so many misfortunes? Was he not able to establish others which
are not subject to any defects? And not to mince words, how come he
has prescribed laws? How come he does not act without general laws, in
accordance with all his power and all his goodness? The author has not
pushed the problem that far. It is not that by disentangling his ideas one
does not find anything to resolve it, but that there is nothing developed to
that end here.’180
179
The book in question is William King’s De origine mali (London, 1702). Leibniz
included an essay on King’s book, ‘Observations on the book concerning “The origin of
evil” published recently in London’ as an appendix to the Theodicy.
180
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, p. 1030. Bayle is quoting a review
(which he himself may have written) of William King’s book from the Journal des
sçavans (1705), p. 168.
247
Appendix
Now that we have satisfactorily shown that everything happens accord-
ing to determinate reasons, there cannot be any more difficulty about this
foundation of God’s foreknowledge, for although these determinations
do not necessitate, they are nonetheless certain, and enable him to foresee
what will happen. It is true that God sees at once the whole sequence of this
universe when he chooses it, and that thus he has no need of the connection
of effects with causes in order to foresee these effects. But as his wisdom
makes him choose a series which is perfectly connected, he cannot fail to
see one part of the series in another. It is one of the rules of my system of
general harmony that the present is big with the future, and that he who sees
everything sees what shall be in what exists. What is more, I established
in a demonstrative manner that, on account of the perfect connection of
things, God sees the whole universe in each part of the universe. He is infi-
nitely more discerning than Pythagoras, who judged the height of Hercules
by the size of his footprint.181 Therefore there must be no doubt that
effects follow from their causes in a determinate manner, notwithstanding
contingency and even freedom, which nevertheless co-exist with certainty
or determination.

Indeed, confusion most often comes from the ambiguity of terms, and
from a lack of care to ensure one’s notions are distinct. That gives rise to
these endless, and usually misunderstood, disputations on necessity and
contingency, and on the possible and the impossible. But provided that it is
understood that necessity and possibility, taken metaphysically and in the
strict sense, depend solely on the question of whether the object in itself,
or what is opposed to it, implies contradiction or not; and provided that
one bear in mind that contingency accords very well with the inclinations
or reasons which contribute towards making the will determined; provided
also that one knows how to distinguish between necessity and determina-
tion or certainty, between metaphysical necessity, which does not leave
room for any choice, presenting only a single object as possible, and moral
necessity, which obliges the wisest to choose the best; finally, provided
that one gets rid of the fantasy of complete indifference, which can only
be found in the books of philosophers, and on paper (for they cannot even
conceive the notion of it in their heads, or show its reality by any real-world
example), one will easily escape from a labyrinth whose unhappy Daedalus
181
The story is related in Aulus Gellius’ Attic Nights I.1.
248
Theodicy
was the human mind,182 and which has caused an infinity of confusions, as
much with the ancients as with the moderns, even to the point of leading
men into the ridiculous error of the lazy sophism, which hardly differs
from the Turkish idea of destiny. I would not be surprised if ultimately
the Thomists and the Jesuits, and even the Molinists and the Jansenists,
agree with each other on this matter more than is thought. A Thomist
and even a wise Jansenist will content himself with certain determination,
without going on to necessity; and if someone does go that far, the error
will perhaps lie only in the word. A wise Molinist will content himself
with an indifference opposed to necessity, but one which will not exclude
prevailing inclinations.

We have made it sufficiently clear, it seems, that neither the foreknowledge
nor the providence of God could be detrimental either to his justice and
his goodness or to our freedom. There remains only the difficulty that
arises from God’s concurrence with the actions of the creature: this seems
to concern more closely both his goodness, in relation to our evil actions,
and our freedom, in relation to good actions as well as to others. Mr Bayle
has looked into this also, with his usual genius. We shall try to clear up
the difficulties he puts forward, and after that we shall be in a position
to conclude this work. I have already established that God’s concurrence
consists in continually giving us whatever is real in us and in our actions,
insofar as it involves perfection, but that whatever is limited and imperfect
therein is a consequence of preceding limitations which are originally in
the creature. And as every action of the creature is a change of its modifica-
tions, it is evident that the action comes from the creature with regard to
the limitations or negations which it contains, and which are found to vary
by this change.

I have already noted more than once in this work that evil is a consequence
of privation, and I think that I have explained that intelligibly enough. St
Augustine has already pointed out this idea, and St Basil said something
similar in his Hexaemeron, Homily 2, ‘that vice is not a living and animate
substance, but an affection of the soul contrary to virtue, which emerges
from one’s falling away from the good, so there is no need to look for
182
In Greek mythology, Daedalus was held to be the creator of the labyrinth on Crete. It
was constructed so elaborately that Daedalus found his way out of it only with great
difficulty.
249
Appendix
an original evil’.183 Mr Bayle, relating this passage in his Dictionnaire
(article ‘Paulicians’, note E,184 p. 2325), commends the remark made by
Mr Pfanner (whom he calls a German theologian, but he is a Jurisconsult
by profession, Counsellor to the Dukes of Saxony), who criticises St Basil
for not being willing to admit that God is the author of physical evil.185
God is doubtless the author of physical evil, when moral evil is supposed
already existent; but absolutely speaking, one might maintain that God
permitted physical evil as a consequence, by permitting moral evil, which
is the source of it. It appears that the Stoics also knew how slight is the
entity of evil. These words of Epictetus show this: ‘Sicut aberrandi causa
meta non ponitur, sic nec natura mali in mundo existit’.186

Aristotle was right to reject chaos, but it is not always easy to get to the
bottom of Plato’s view, and even less that of some ancient authors whose
works are lost. Kepler, one of the most excellent modern mathemati-
cians, recognised a kind of imperfection in matter, even when there is no
disorderly motion: this is what he calls its natural inertia, which gives it a
resistance to motion,187 whereby a greater mass receives less speed from
one and the same force. There is something sound in this claim, and I have
used it profitably above, in order to have a comparison which shows how
the original imperfection of creatures imposes limits on the action of the
creator, which tends to the good. But as matter is itself an effect of God,
it serves only as a comparison and an example, and cannot be the actual
source of evil and imperfection. We have already shown that this source is
found in the forms or ideas of possibles, for it must be eternal, and matter
is not so. Now as God has made all positive reality which is not eternal, he
183
Leibniz is here quoting Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, p. 2325 (article
‘Paulicians’, note E), who is in turn quoting section 5 of homily 2 of Basil’s Hexaemeron.
184
Leibniz here wrote ‘D’, but this is a mistake as the material in question is in note E.
185
Bayle cites Tobias Pfanner, Systema theologiae gentilis purioris, qua quam prope ad veram
Religionem Gentiles accesserint, per cuncta fere ejus Capita, ex ipsis praecipue illorum scriptus
ostenditur (Basil, 1679), p. 253.
186
‘Just as a goal is not set up in order to be missed, so neither does the nature of evil occur
in the world.’ Epictetus, Enchiridion XXVII.
187
‘Every celestial sphere . . . by reason of its own matter, has a natural inability to move
from place to place, a natural inertia, or rest, whereby it remains in every place where
it is set on its own.’ Johann Kepler, Epitomes astronomiae Copernicanae, usitata forma
quaestionum & Responsionum conscriptae, Liber quartus, Doctrina theoricae primus: quo
Physica Coelestis, hoc est, omnium in coelo magnitudinum, motuum, proportionumq, causa vel
Naturales vel Archetypicae explicantur, et sic Principia doctrinae theoricae demonstrantur:
qui quod vice supplementi librorum Aristotelis de Coelo esset, certo consilio seorsim est editus
(Frankfurt, 1635), p. 510.
250
Theodicy
would have made the source of evil if it did not consist in the possibility of
things or forms, the one thing that God has not made, since he is not the
author of his own understanding.

He [Bayle] places great significance especially on that doctrine, received in
the schools, that conservation is a continued creation. As a consequence of
this doctrine it seems that the creature never exists, and that it is forever
nascent and forever dying, like time, motion, and other successive beings.
Plato believed this of material and sensible things, saying that they are in
a perpetual flux, semper fluunt, nunquam sunt.188 But he judged quite dif-
ferently of immaterial substances, which he considered as the only true
substances, and he was not entirely wrong in that. But continued creation
applies to all creatures without distinction. A number of good philosophers
have been against this dogma, and Mr Bayle relates that David de Rodon, a
philosopher renowned among the French and exiled to Geneva, expressly
refuted it.189 The Armenians do not approve of it either: they are not
much in favour of these metaphysical subtleties. I will say nothing of the
Socinians, who relish them even less.

For a thorough examination as to whether conservation is a continued crea-
tion, one would have to consider the reasons on which this dogma is based.
To prove it, the Cartesians, just like their master, use a principle which is
not sufficiently conclusive. They say that ‘as the moments of time have no
necessary connection with one another, it does not follow that because I
exist at this moment I shall subsist at the moment which will follow, if the
same cause which gives me being for this moment does not also give it to
me for the following instant’.190 The author of the Avis sur le Tableau du
Socinianisme has used this argument, and Mr Bayle (perhaps author of this
same Avis) quotes it (Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, chap. 141, p.
771, book III).191 It may be answered that, in truth, it does not follow neces-
sarily from the fact that I exist that I will exist, but it n
evertheless follows
188
‘They are always flowing, and never are.’ Leibniz may well be thinking of Plato’s
description in the Timaeus of ‘that which becomes, but never is’, which he later applies to
the sensible and material. See Timaeus 27d–28e, in Plato: Complete Works, p. 1234.
189
Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, III, pp. 2587–8 (article ‘Rodon’).
190
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, p. 771. Bayle in turn was quoting Isaac
Jaquelot, Avis sur la Tableau du Socinianisme ([no place], 1690), pp. 36–7.
191
The author of Avis sur la Tableau du Socinianisme was not Bayle, but Isaac Jaquelot,
though the book did not carry his name. Leibniz corresponded with Jaquelot between
1702 and 1706.
251
Appendix
naturally, that is, of itself, per se, if nothing prevents it. It is the distinc-
tion that can be drawn between the essential and the natural; it is just as,
naturally, the same motion endures unless some new cause prevents it or
changes it, because the reason which makes it cease at this instant, if it is
not new, would have already made it cease earlier.

The late Mr Erhard Weigel, a renowned mathematician and philosopher
at Jena, was known for his Analysis Euclidea, his mathematical philosophy,
some well-fashioned mechanical inventions, and finally for the trouble
he took to bring around the Protestant princes of the Empire to the last
reform of the Almanac, the success of which he did not get to see, however.
Mr Weigel, I say, communicated to his friends a certain demonstration
of the existence of God, which in effect boiled down to this continued
creation. And as he was accustomed to draw parallels between count-
ing and reasoning – consider his Arithmetical Ethics (rechenschaftliche
Sittenlehre)192 – he said that the foundation of his demonstration was this
beginning of the Pythagorean Table, once one is one. These repeated unities
were the moments of the existence of things, each of which depends on
God, who resuscitates, so to speak, all things outside himself at each
moment. And as they fall away at each moment there must always be
someone who resuscitates them, which can only be God. But a more exact
proof is needed to call that a demonstration. One would have to prove that
the creature always emerges from nothingness and immediately falls back
into it; and it must be shown in particular that the privilege of enduring
more than a moment by its nature belongs to the necessary being alone.
The difficulties concerning the composition of the continuum also enter
into this matter. For this dogma appears to resolve time into moments,
whereas others regard moments and points as mere modalities of the con-
tinuum, that is, as extremities of the parts that can be assigned to it, and
not as constituent parts. Here is not the place to enter into this labyrinth.

What can be said for certain on the present subject is that the creature
depends continually on the divine operation, and that it depends on that no
less after its beginning than in the beginning. This dependence implies that
it would not continue to exist if God did not continue to act; in a word, that
this action of God is free. For if it were a necessary emanation, as is that of
the properties of the circle, which flow from its essence, it would have to be
said that God, from the outset, produced the creature necessarily, or else it
192
Erhard Weigel, Arithmetische Beschreibung der Moral-Weisheit (Jena, 1674).
252
Theodicy
would have to be shown how, in creating it once, he imposed on himself the
necessity of conserving it. Now there is nothing to prevent this conserving
action from being called production, and even creation, if one wants, for
as the dependence is as great afterwards as in the beginning, the extrinsic
denomination of being new or not does not change the nature of that action.

Therefore let us grant that, in such a sense, conservation is a continued
creation, and let us see what Mr Bayle seems to infer from it (p. 771),
following the author of the Avis sur la Tableau du Socinianisme, against Mr
Jurieu: ‘“It seems to me”’ (says this author) ‘“that it must be concluded
that God does everything, and that in all created beings there are no
primary or secondary or even occasional causes, as it is easy to prove. For at
this moment of my speaking, I am such as I am, with all my circumstances,
with such-and-such thought, such-and-such action, sitting or standing;
but if God creates me in this moment such as I am, as one must necessarily
explain it in this system, he creates me with such-and-such thought, such-
and-such action, such-and-such motion and such-and-such determination.
It cannot be said that God first creates me, and that once I am created he
produces with me my motions and my determinations. That is untenable
for two reasons. The first is that, when God creates me, or conserves me at
this instant, he does not conserve me as a being without form, like a kind,
or another of the universals of logic. I am an individual; he creates me and
conserves me as such, being all that I am in this instant, along with all the
things that depend upon me. The second reason is that with God creat-
ing me in this instant, if it is said that afterwards he produces my actions
along with me, then another instant for action will necessarily have to be
conceived.193 Now this would be two instants, whereas we are assuming
only one. It is therefore certain, on this hypothesis,194 that creatures have
neither more connection nor more relation with their actions than they had
with their production at the first moment of their first creation.”’195 The
author of this Avis draws out very harsh consequences from this, which
one can imagine, and says at the end that a debt of gratitude would be
owed to anyone who could teach supporters of this system how to extract
themselves from these frightful absurdities.
193
Leibniz here omitted a sentence that is present in Jurieu and Bayle: ‘For before acting,
one must exist.’
194
Leibniz here omitted part of the clause that is present in Jurieu and Bayle: ‘in this
hypothesis, that God does everything’.
195
Bayle, Réponse aux Questions d’un Provincial, III, pp. 771–2. This entire passage is in fact
Bayle’s quotation of Jaquelot, Avis sur la Tableau du Socinianisme, pp. 36–7.
253
Appendix
Mr Bayle pushes this even further. ‘You know’, he says (p. 775), ‘that
it is demonstrated in Scholastic works’ (he cites Arriaga, Disputation 9,
Physics, section 6 and especially sub-section 3) ‘that the creature can be
neither the total cause nor the partial cause of its conservation, for if it were,
it would exist before existing, which is contradictory. You know that the
reasoning goes like this: that which conserves itself, acts; now that which
acts, exists, and nothing can act before having its complete existence;
therefore, if a creature conserved itself, it would act before existing. This
argument is not based upon probabilities, but upon the first principles of
metaphysics: non entis nulla sunt accidentia,196 and operari sequitur esse,197
which are as clear as daylight. Let us go further. If creatures concurred
with God (by which is meant an active concurrence and not a concurrence
by a passive instrument) to conserve themselves, they would act before
being: that has been demonstrated. Now if they concurred with God for
the production of some other thing, they would also act before being; it
is therefore as impossible that they concur with God for the production
of some other thing (such as local movement, an affirmation, a volition,
entities really distinct from their substance, it is claimed) as for their own
conservation. And since their conservation is a continued creation, and
since all men in the world must admit that they cannot concur with God
in the first moment of their existence,198 either to produce themselves or
to give themselves any modality, since that would be to act before being
(note that Thomas Aquinas and many other Scholastics teach that if the
angels had sinned at the first moment of their creation then God would
be the author of the sin; see the Feuillant Pierre de St Joseph, p. 318, et
seqq., of the Suavis Concordia Humanae Libertatis:199 it is a sign that they
acknowledge that at the first instant the creature cannot act in any way
whatsoever), it obviously follows that they cannot concur with God in
any of the following moments, either to produce themselves or to produce
some other thing. If they could so concur at the second moment of their
life, nothing would prevent them from being able to concur at the first
moment.’200
196
‘non-being has no accidents’ or ‘a non-entity has no accidents’.
197
‘action follows being’.
198
Leibniz’s quotation of this clause is not accurate; Bayle actually wrote: ‘and since Mr
Jaquelot and all the men in the world who accept the creation must admit that they
cannot concur with God in the first moment of their existence’.
199
Pierre de St Joseph, Suavis concordia humanae libertatis cum immobili certitudine praedes-
tinationis et efficacia auxiliorum gratiae (La Coruña, 1639).
200
254
Theodicy
This is what the response should be to these arguments: let us suppose
that the creature is produced anew at each instant; let us grant also that the
instant excludes all priority of time, being indivisible. But let us note that
it does not exclude priority of nature, or what is called precedence in Signo
rationis,201 and that this is sufficient. The production, or action, whereby
God produces, is anterior by nature to the existence of the creature that
is produced; the creature taken in itself, together with its nature and its
necessary properties, is anterior to its accidental affections and its actions,
and yet all these things are found in the same moment. God produces the
creature in accordance with the demand of the preceding instants, follow-
ing the laws of his wisdom; and the creature operates in accordance with
that nature which he gives it by always creating it. The limitations and
imperfections arise in it through the nature of the subject, which limits
God’s production: this is the consequence of the original imperfection of
creatures. But vice and crime arise in it through the free internal operation
of the creature, insofar as it can happen in the instant, and they become
discernible through repetition.

This precedence of nature is common in philosophy; it is thus that one
says God’s decrees have an order among themselves. And when one
attributes to God (as is reasonable to do) the understanding of the argu-
ments and conclusions of creatures, such that all their demonstrations
and all their syllogisms are known to him, and are found eminently
within him, it is evident that there is an order of nature in the proposi-
tions or truths he knows, without any order or interval of time, which
would make him advance in knowledge, and pass from premises to the
conclusion.

In the arguments we have just related I find nothing which cannot be
satisfied by the following consideration: when God produces the thing
he produces it as an individual, and not as a universal of logic (I admit);
but he produces its essence before its accidents, its nature before its
operations, following the priority of their nature, and in signo anteriore
rationis.202 From that it is evident how the creature can be the true
cause of sin, without being prevented by God’s conservation, which
operates on the preceding state of the same creature, in order to follow
201
‘in the order of nature’.
202
‘in the priority of nature’.
255
Appendix
the laws of his wisdom, notwithstanding the sin, which from the outset
will be produced by the creature. But it is true that God would not have
created the soul in the beginning in a state in which it would have sinned
at the first moment, as the Scholastics have quite rightly observed, for
there is nothing in the laws of his wisdom that could have led him to
do that.

This law of wisdom means also that God reproduces the same substance,
the same soul. And this is the response that could have been given by the
Abbé whom Mr Bayle introduces in his Dictionnaire article on Pyrrho, note
B (p. 2432). This wisdom produces the connection of things. I therefore
grant that the creature does not concur with God in order to conserve itself
(in the manner in which conservation has just been explained), but I do
not see anything to prevent it from concurring with God for the produc-
tion of something else, and particularly for the production of its internal
operation, as would be thought or a volition, things really distinct from the
substance.

As for the so-called creation of accidents, who does not see that no creative
power is needed in order to change place or shape, to form a square or an
oblong, or some other shape assumed by a battalion by the movement of
the soldiers who are taking part in a drill; any more than to form a statue
by removing some pieces from a block of marble, or to make some figure
in relief, by changing, decreasing, or increasing a piece of wax? The
production of modifications has never been called creation, and to say that
it is it is to misuse terms to scare the world. God produces substances
from nothing, and substances produce accidents by the changes of their
limits.

As for souls or substantial forms, Mr Bayle is right to add ‘that there is
nothing more inconvenient for those who accept substantial forms than
the objection that they could not be produced except by a genuine creation,
and that the Scholastics are pitiable when they try to respond to this’.203
But there is nothing more convenient for me and for my system than this
very objection, since I maintain that all souls, entelechies or primitive
forces, substantial forms, simple substances, or monads, no matter what
name they may be called, cannot naturally arise or perish. And I conceive
203
256
Theodicy
the qualities or derivative forces, or what are called accidental forms, as
modifications of the primitive entelechy, in the same way that shapes are
modifications of matter. This is why these modifications are perpetually
changing, while the simple substance remains.

I have shown above (part I, §86 and onwards) that souls cannot arise
naturally, or be derived from one another, and that our soul must either be
created or pre-existent. I have even shown a certain middle way between
a creation and an outright pre-existence by finding it appropriate to say
that the soul that pre-existed in the seeds from the beginning of things
was only sentient, but that it was elevated to the superior level, which
is that of reason, when the man, to whom this soul should belong, was
conceived, and when the organised body, always accompanying this soul
from the beginning, although undergoing many changes, was determined
to form the human body. I have also concluded that this elevation of the
sentient soul (which makes it reach what is essentially a more sublime
level, namely reason) can be attributed to the extraordinary operation of
God. Nevertheless it will be good to add that I would prefer to do without
a miracle in the generation of man, just as I would in the generation of
other animals. And it will be possible to explain the generation of man by
keeping in mind that in this great number of souls and animals, or at least
of living organic bodies which exist in seeds, only those souls destined to
one day attain human nature contain the reason that will one day be appar-
ent in them, and that only the organic bodies of these souls are preformed
and predisposed to one day take on human form; the other small animals
or seminal living beings, in which nothing of this sort is pre-established,
are essentially different from them, and have an inferior constitution. This
production is a kind of traduction, but more tractable than the one com-
monly taught; it does not draw one soul from another soul, but only the
animate from the animate, and it avoids the frequent miracles of a new
creation, which would make a new and pure soul enter into a body which
must corrupt it.

I am, however, of Reverend Father Malebranche’s view that, in general,
creation, properly understood, is not as difficult to admit as might be
thought, and that it is included in some way in the notion of the d
ependence
of creatures. ‘How stupid and ridiculous are Philosophers!’ (he exclaims
in Meditations Chrétiennes et Metaphysiques, IX.III), ‘they imagine that
creation is impossible, because they do not understand that God’s power
is great enough to make something from nothing. But do they understand
257
Appendix
any better how God’s power is capable of moving a straw?’204 He adds,
again very well (IX.V): ‘If matter were uncreated, God could not move it or
form anything out of it. For God cannot move matter, or arrange it wisely,
unless he knows it. Now God cannot know it if he does not give it being,
since he can derive his knowledge only from himself. Nothing can act on
him, or enlighten him.’205

It must be the case that the force of these proofs, which Bayle praises, is
not what he thinks, since they would prove too much: they would make
God the author of sin. I admit that the soul cannot move the organs by a
physical influence, for I believe that the body must have been formed in
advance in such a way that it does in time and place that which corresponds
to the volitions of the soul, although it is nevertheless true that the soul is
the principle of the operation. But to say that the soul does not produce its
thoughts, its sensations, its feelings of pain and pleasure, this is something
for which I see no reason. In my view, every simple substance (that is,
every true substance) must be the true immediate cause of all its internal
actions and passions; and, speaking in metaphysical rigour, it does not have
any others besides the ones it produces. Those who are of a different view,
and who make God the only agent, needlessly burden themselves with
expressions from which they will find it very difficult to distance them-
selves without offending religion, leaving aside the fact that they absolutely
offend reason.

Yet here is the basis of Mr Bayle’s argument: he says that we do not do
that which we know not how it is done. But it is a principle which I do not
grant him. Let us listen to his words (p. 767 and onwards). ‘It is a surpris-
ing thing that nearly all philosophers (one must except the interpreters of
Aristotle, who have admitted a universal intellect, distinct from our soul
and the cause of our intellectual thoughts. See in the Dictionnaire historique
et critique, note E of the article ‘Averroes’) have thought, as common folk
do, that we actively form our ideas. Yet where is the man who does not
know on the one hand that he is absolutely ignorant of how ideas are made,
and on the other hand, that he could not sew two stitches if he were igno-
rant of how one should sew? Is it that sewing two stitches is in itself a task
more difficult than painting a rose in one’s mind from the first moment it
204
Nicolas Malebranche, Meditations Chrétiennes et Metaphysiques (Lyon, 1707, new ed.),
pp. 182–3.
205
Malebranche, Meditations Chrétiennes et Metaphysiques, p. 184.
258
Theodicy
came into view and without ever having learned this kind of painting? On
the contrary, does it not seem that this mental imagery is in itself a work
more difficult than drawing the shape of a flower on canvas, which we
cannot do without having learned how to do it? We are all convinced that a
key would be of no use to us for opening a chest if we were ignorant of how
the key should be used, and yet we imagine that our soul is the efficient
cause of the movement of our arms, even though it does not know either
the whereabouts of the nerves which must be used for this movement, or
where should go the animal spirits which have to flow into these nerves.
Every day we have the experience that the ideas we wish to recall do not
come, and that they present themselves when we are no longer thinking
about it. If that does not stop us thinking that we are the efficient cause,
how will we rely on the proof of feeling, which seems so demonstrative to
Mr Jaquelot? Is not the authority over our ideas more often much weaker
than the authority over our volitions? If we were to count properly, we
would find in the course of our life more velleities than volitions, that
is, more evidence of the servitude of our will than of its rule. How many
times does one and the same man not experience that he cannot carry out
a certain act of will (for example, an act of love for a man who had just
offended him; an act of scorn for a fine sonnet he had composed; an act
of hatred for a mistress; an act of approval for a ridiculous epigram. Note
that I am speaking only of internal acts, expressed by an “I will”, like “I
will scorn”, “I will approve”, etc.) even if there were a hundred pistoles to
be gained immediately, and he ardently wished to gain these hundred pis-
toles, and he were inspired by the ambition to convince himself by a proof
drawn from experience that he is the master in his own house?’206
§403 (cited in M63 and M74)

Here is a strange way of reasoning! What necessity is there that one always
know how what one does is done? Do salts, metals, plants, animals, and a
thousand other animate or inanimate bodies, know how what they do is
done, and do they need to know it? Must a drop of oil or fat understand
geometry in order to become round on the surface of water? Sewing
stitches is something different: as one acts for an end, one must know the
means to it. But we do not form our ideas because we will to do so: they are
formed in us, they are formed by us, not as a consequence of our will, but
in accordance with our nature and the nature of things. The foetus forms
itself into the animal, and a thousand other wonders of nature are produced
by a certain instinct that God has placed there, that is, in accordance with
divine preformation, which has made these admirable automata, a ppropriate
206
259
Appendix
for mechanically producing such beautiful effects; because of this, it is
easy to conclude in the same way that the soul is a spiritual automaton,
even more admirable, and that it is through divine preformation that it
produces these beautiful ideas, in which our will has no part and to which
our art cannot attain. The operation of spiritual automata, that is, of souls,
is not mechanical, but it contains eminently whatever beauty there is in
mechanism. The motions developed inside bodies are concentrated in the
soul by representation, just as in an ideal world, which expresses the laws
of the actual world and their consequences, with this difference from the
perfect ideal world which is in God: that the majority of perceptions in the
others are only confused. For it should be known that every simple sub-
stance embraces the universe through its confused perceptions or feelings,
and that the succession of these perceptions is regulated by the particular
nature of this substance, but in a way which always expresses the whole of
universal nature; and every present perception tends to a new perception,
just as every motion that it represents tends to another motion. But it is
impossible that the soul can know distinctly its whole nature, and apper-
ceive how this innumerable number of little perceptions, piled or rather
concentrated together, is formed from it; for that, it would have to know
perfectly the whole universe which is embraced in it, that is, it would have
to be a God.

Theodorus made a journey to Athens: he was ordered to spend the night in
the temple of the Goddess. While dreaming, he found himself transported
to an unknown land. There was there a palace of incredible magnificence
and immense size. The Goddess Pallas appeared at the gate, surrounded
by rays of dazzling majesty.
Qualisque videri
Coelicolis et quanta solet.207
She touched Theodorus’ face with an olive branch that she held in her
hand. And thereupon he became able to withstand the divine radiance of
the daughter of Jupiter, and of all that she had to show him. Jupiter, who
loves you (she said to him), has commended you to me to be instructed. You
see here the Palace of Fates, over which I have guardianship. There are
here representations not only of what does happen, but also of everything
that is possible. And Jupiter, having surveyed them before the beginning
207
‘As lovely and as tall as she appears whenever she is seen by heaven’s beings’. A quota-
tion from Virgil’s The Aeneid II.590–1. The English translation is from The Aeneid of
Virgil, trans. Allen Mandelbaum (New York: Bantam Books, 1981), p. 48.
260
Theodicy
of the existing world, sorted the possibilities into worlds, and chose the
best of all. He sometimes comes to visit these places in order to give
himself the pleasure of replaying things and of renewing his own choice,
in which he cannot fail to take pleasure. I have only to say the word and
we shall see a whole world that my father could have produced, in which
will be represented everything that can be asked about it; and in this way
it is possible to know even what would happen if such or such a possibility
should exist. And whenever the conditions are not sufficiently determi-
nate, there will be as many such worlds differing from each another as one
would wish, which will answer the same question differently, in as many
ways as possible. You learned geometry when you were still young, like all
well brought up Greeks. Therefore you know that when the conditions of
a required point do not sufficiently determine it, and there is an infinity
of them, they all fall into what the geometers call a locus, and this locus at
least (which is often a line) will be determinate. Thus you can imagine an
ordered series of worlds, which will contain each and every one the matter
in question, and will be varied in its circumstances and consequences. But
if you posit a state of affairs that differs from the actual world only in one
single definite thing, and in the consequences of it, a certain determinate
world will answer you. These worlds are all here, that is, in ideas. I will
show you some, in which will be found not absolutely the same Sextus you
have seen (that is not possible, since he carries with him always that which
he will be) but similar Sextuses, who possess everything you already know
of the true Sextus, but not everything that is already in him without one
noticing it, nor consequently everything that will yet happen to him. You
will find in one world a very happy and exalted Sextus, in another a Sextus
content with a mediocre status, Sextuses of every kind and in an infinity
of ways.

At that point the Goddess led Theodorus into one of the rooms: when he
was there, it was no longer a room, it was a world,
Solemque suum, sua sidera norat.208
At Pallas’ order, Dodona was seen to appear along with the Temple of
Jupiter and Sextus, who came out of it: he was heard to say that he would
obey the god. And then he goes to a city lying between two seas, similar
to Corinth. There he buys a small garden; while cultivating it he finds a
treasure, and becomes a rich man; loved and respected, he dies at a great
age, beloved of the whole city. Theodorus saw the whole of Sextus’ life
208
‘And he knew his own sun and stars’. A slight misquoting of Virgil’s Aeneid VI.641.
261
Appendix
as in a single glance, and as in a theatre performance. There was a great
volume of writings in this room: Theodorus could not prevent himself
from asking what that meant. It is the history of this world which we are
now visiting, the Goddess said to him: it is the book of its fates. You have
seen a number on the forehead of Sextus: look in this book for the passage
it indicates. Theodorus looked for it, and found there the history of Sextus
given more amply than the abbreviated version he had seen. Put your
finger on whichever line you please, Pallas said to him, and you will see
actually represented, in all its detail, that which the line roughly indicates.
He obeyed, and he saw appear all the particularities of a part of this Sextus’
life. They passed into another room, and there was another world, another
book, another Sextus, who, coming out of the temple, and resolved to obey
Jupiter, goes to Thrace. There he marries the daughter of the king, who
had no other children, and succeeds him. He is adored by his subjects.
They went into other chambers, and always saw new scenes.

The rooms were arranged as a pyramid: they became ever more beautiful
the further up one went towards the summit, and they represented more
beautiful worlds. Finally they came to the uppermost one, which was at
the top of the pyramid, and which was the most beautiful of all: for the
pyramid had a beginning, but the end could not be seen. It had an apex,
but no base, which kept on increasing to infinity. That is (as the Goddess
explained) because among an infinity of possible worlds there is the best of
all, otherwise God would not have been determined to create any of them;
but there is not a single one of them which does not have even less perfect
worlds below it: this is why the pyramid descends to infinity. Theodorus,
entering this uppermost room, found himself in raptures, and he needed
the Goddess to come to his aid, a drop of a divine liquid placed on his
tongue restored him. He was beside himself with joy. We are in the true
actual world (said the Goddess), and you are at the source of happiness.
Here is what Jupiter has in store for you, if you continue to serve him
faithfully. Here is Sextus, such as he is and actually will be. He comes out
of the temple full of anger, he scorns the counsel of the gods. You see him
going to Rome, putting everything into confusion, violating the wife of
his friend. There he is chased out with his father, beaten, wretched.209 If
Jupiter had placed here a Sextus happy in Corinth or King in Thrace, it
would be no longer this world. And yet he could not have failed to choose
this world, which surpasses all the others in perfection, which forms the
apex of the pyramid; otherwise Jupiter would have renounced his wisdom,
209
These are events related in Livy’s Ab urbe condita, I.53, I.58.
262
Theodicy
he would have banished me, me his daughter. You see that my father has
not made Sextus wicked: he was so from all eternity, he was so always
freely. My father has only granted Sextus the existence which his wisdom
could not refuse to the world in which Sextus is included; he made Sextus
pass from the region of possibles to that of actual beings. Sextus’ crime
serves for great things: it makes Rome free, there will arise from it a great
empire, which will set great examples. But that is nothing in relation to
the whole of this world, whose beauty you will admire when, after a happy
passage from this mortal state to another, better one, the Gods will have
made you capable of knowing it.
Abridgement, objection 1 (referenced in M55)
First objection
Whoever does not take the best course is lacking in power, or knowl-
edge, or goodness.
God has not taken the best course in creating this world.
Therefore God was lacking in power, or knowledge, or goodness.
Response
The minor is here denied, that is, the second premise of this syllogism, and
the opponent proves it by this
Prosyllogism
Whoever makes things in which there is evil, which could be made
without any evil, or whose production could be omitted, does not take the
best course.
God has made a world in which there is evil; a world, I say, which
could be made without any evil, or whose production could be omitted
absolutely.
Therefore God has not taken the best course.
Response
The minor of this prosyllogism is granted, for it must be admitted that
there is evil in the world God has made, and that it was possible to make
a world without evil, or even not to create a world, since its creation
depended on the free will of God. But the major is denied, that is, the first
of the prosyllogism’s two premises. One could be content with asking for
its proof. But in order to bring more clarification to the matter, this denial
is justified by pointing out that the best course is not always the one which
tends to avoid evil, since it may be the case that the evil is accompanied by a
greater good. For example, an army general will prefer a great victory with
263
Appendix
a minor injury to an outcome without injury and without victory. That
has been shown in greater detail in this work by making it clear, through
instances taken from mathematics and elsewhere, that an imperfection
in the part may be required for a greater perfection in the whole. This
follows the opinion of St Augustine, who said a hundred times that God
has permitted evil in order to derive a good from it, that is, a greater good,
and the opinion of Thomas Aquinas (In quattuor libros sententiarum, book
2, distinction 32, q1a1) that the permission of evil tends towards the good
of the universe. It has been shown that among the ancients Adam’s Fall
was called felix culpa, a happy sin, because it had been atoned for with
enormous benefit by the incarnation of the Son of God, who gave to the
universe something more noble than anything there would have been
among created beings if the Fall had not occurred. And to make this better
understood, it was added, following a number of fine authors, that it was
in accordance with order and the general good that God gave certain
creatures the opportunity to exercise their freedom, even when he foresaw
that they would turn to evil, which he could put right very easily; because
it was not fitting to prevent sin, God always acts in an extraordinary way.
Therefore, to destroy the objection it is sufficient to show that a world with
evil could be better than a world without evil. But in the work this has been
pushed even further, and it has even been shown that this universe must
actually be better than every other possible universe.
Second objection
If there is more evil than good in intelligent creatures, there is more evil
than good in the whole of God’s work.
Now there is more evil than good in intelligent creatures.
Therefore there is more evil than good in the whole of God’s work.
Response
The major and the minor of this conditional syllogism are denied. As for the
major, it is not granted, because this supposed inference from part to whole,
from intelligent creatures to all creatures, supposes tacitly and without
proof that creatures devoid of reason cannot be compared with those that
have it, or be taken into account. But why may it not be the case that the
surplus of good in the non-intelligent creatures, which fill the world,
balance out and even incomparably surpass the surplus of evil in rational
creatures? It is true that the value of the latter is greater, but on the other
hand the others exist in incomparably greater numbers, and it may be that
the proportion of number and quantity surpasses that of value and quality.
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Theodicy
As for the minor, this should not be granted either, that is, it should not be
granted that there is more evil than good in intelligent creatures. There is no
need even to admit that there is more evil than good in humankind, because it
may be the case, and it is even very reasonable, that the glory and the perfec-
tion of the blessed be incomparably greater than the misery and imperfection
of the damned, and that here the excellence of the total good in the smaller
number exceeds the total evil in the greater number. Insofar as it is proper
to these creatures, the blessed draw near to divinity by means of a Divine
Mediator, and make progress in good that is impossible for the damned to
make in evil, even if they should come as near as is possible to the nature of
demons. God is infinite, and the demon is limited; good can go and does go to
infinity, whereas evil has its limits. Therefore, it may be – and this is credible
– that in the comparison between the blessed and the damned, the opposite
happens of what we said could happen in the comparison between intel-
ligent and non-intelligent creatures, that is, it may be that in the comparison
between the happy and the wretched, the proportion of degrees surpasses
that of numbers, and in the comparison between intelligent and non-intelli-
gent creatures the proportion of numbers is greater than that of values. One
is entitled to suppose that a thing is possible as long as it is not proved to be
impossible, and indeed what is put forward here surpasses supposition.
But in the second place, even if it were granted that there is more evil
than good in humankind, there is still every reason not to grant that there
is more evil than good in all intelligent creatures. For there is an inconceiv-
able number of genies, and perhaps also of other rational creatures, and an
opponent cannot prove that in the whole City of God, composed both of
genies and rational animals without number and of an infinity of kinds, the
evil exceeds the good. And although, in order to respond to an objection,
one does not need to prove that a thing exists when its possibility alone is
sufficient, in this present work it is nevertheless shown that it is a conse-
quence of the supreme perfection of the sovereign of the universe that the
kingdom of God be the most perfect of all possible states or governments,
and that consequently the little evil that there is must be required for the
full complement of the immense good found there.
Abridgement, objection 3 (referenced in M33 and M51)
Third objection
If it is always impossible not to sin, it is always unjust to punish.
Now it is always impossible not to sin, or, all sin is necessary.
Therefore it is always unjust to punish.
The minor of this is proved thus:

265
Appendix
First prosyllogism
Everything predetermined is necessary.
Every event is predetermined.
Therefore every event (and consequently every sin too) is necessary.
This second minor is also proved like this:
Second prosyllogism
That which is future, which is foreseen, which is involved in causes, is
predetermined.
Every event is such.
Therefore every event is predetermined.
Response
The conclusion of the second prosyllogism, which is the minor of the
first, is granted in a certain sense; but the major of the first prosyllogism
will be denied, that is, that everything predetermined is necessary;
understanding by the necessity to sin, for example, or by the impossibility
of not sinning, or of not doing some action, the necessity with which we
are concerned, that is, the necessity which is essential and absolute, and
which destroys the morality of action and the justice of punishments. For
if someone meant a different necessity or impossibility, that is, a necessity
which is only moral or only hypothetical (which will be explained shortly)
it is evident that one would deny him the major of the objection itself.
One might content oneself with this response, and demand the proof
of the proposition denied, but in this work there has been an attempt to
explain the procedure adopted in order to better clarify the issue and to
throw more light on this whole matter, by explaining the necessity that
must be rejected and the determination that must take place. The fact is
that the necessity contrary to morality, which must be avoided, and which
would make punishment unjust, is an insuperable necessity, which would
render all opposition useless, even if one wished with all one’s heart to
avoid the necessary action, and made all possible efforts to achieve that.
Now it is evident that this is not applicable to voluntary actions, since
one would not do them if one did not want to do so. Thus their previ-
sion and predetermination is not absolute, but it presupposes the will: if
it is certain that one will do them, it is no less certain that one will wish
to do them. These voluntary actions and their outcomes will not happen
no matter what one does, or whether one wills them or not, but because
one will do, and because one will want to do, that which leads to them.
And that is contained in prevision and predetermination, and even forms
the reason for them. The necessity of such events is called conditional or
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Theodicy
hypothetical, or even necessity of consequence, because it presupposes
the will and the other requisites. Whereas the necessity which destroys
morality, and which makes punishment unjust and reward useless, is in
things which will be so no matter what one does and wills to do; and in a
word, it is in what is essential, and this is what is called an absolute neces-
sity. Therefore with regard to what is absolutely necessary, it is useless to
pass injunctions or make commandments, to propose penalties or prizes,
or to blame or to praise, since it will be the case either way. Whereas in
voluntary actions, and in what depends on them, precepts backed with the
power to punish and reward are very often effective, and are included in
the order of causes which bring the action into existence. And it is for this
reason that not only pains and effort but also prayers are useful, as God
even had these prayers in mind before he organised things, having had the
proper regard for them. This is why the precept that says ora & labora
(pray and work) persists intact.210 And not only those who claim, under
the vain pretext of the necessity of events, that one can neglect the cares
that affairs demand, but also those who argue against prayers, fall into
what the ancients already referred to as the lazy sophism. Thus the prede-
termination of events by their causes is precisely that which contributes
to morality rather than destroying it, and causes incline the will without
necessitating it. This is why the determination under consideration here is
not a necessitation: it is certain (to the one who knows everything) that
the effect will follow this inclination, but this effect does not follow it by
a necessary consequence, that is, one whose contrary implies contradic-
tion; and it is also by means of such an internal inclination that the will is
determined, without there being any necessity. Suppose that one had the
greatest passion in the world (for example, a raging thirst): you will grant
me that the soul can find some reason for resisting it, even if it were only
that of showing its power. Thus, even though one is never in a perfect
indifference of equilibrium, and there is always a prevalence of inclina-
tion for the course one takes, this prevalence nonetheless never makes the
resolution taken absolutely necessary.
Objection V
Whoever produces everything that is real in a thing, is its cause.
God produces everything that is real in sin.
Therefore God is the cause of sin.
210
The expression ‘ora et labora’ is attributed to St Benedict, and is still the slogan of the
Benedictine order.
267
Appendix
Response
One might be content to deny the major or the minor, because the term
real allows for interpretations that can make these propositions false. But
in order to better explain, a distinction will be made. Real means either
that which is only positive, or else it also includes privative beings; in the
first case, the major is denied, and the minor is granted; in the second case,
then the opposite. It would be possible to limit oneself to that, but it is
good to go further in order to explain this distinction. It has therefore been
a pleasure to point out that every purely positive, or absolute, reality is a
perfection, and that imperfection comes from limitation, that is, from the
privative: for to limit is to block progress, or the further continuation. Now
God is the cause of all perfections, and consequently of all realities, when
they are considered as purely positive. But limitations or privations result
from the original imperfection of creatures which limits their receptivity.
It is as with a laden boat, which the river moves along more slowly or less
slowly in relation to the weight it carries: thus its speed comes from the
river, but the arrestment which limits this speed comes from the load. It
has also been shown in the present work how the creature, in causing sin, is
a deficient cause; how errors and evil inclinations arise from privation; and
how privation is efficacious by accident. And I have justified the opinion of
St Augustine (book 1, Ad. Simplicianum, q. 2) who explains (for example)
how God hardens the soul, not by giving it something evil, but because the
effect of his good impression is limited by the resistance of the soul, and
by the circumstances which contribute to this resistance, so that he does
not give it all the good that would overcome its evil.211 ‘Nec’ (he says) ‘ab
illo erogatur aliquid quo homo fit deterior, sed tantum quo fit melior non
erogatur’.212 But if God had willed to do more here, either he would have
had to produce other natures of creatures or he would have had to perform
other miracles to change their natures, which the best plan could not
admit. It is as though the current of the river would have to be more rapid
than its slope permits, or the boats less laden, if the boats should be made
to go faster. And the original limitation or imperfection of creatures means
that even the best plan of the universe cannot213 be exempt from certain
evils, albeit ones which must be turned to a greater good there. There are
some disorders in the parts which wonderfully accentuate the beauty of
211
Augustine, De diversis quaestionibus ad Simplicianum libri duo, I.2.14.
212
Leibniz’s quotation is inexact; the line should be ‘ut non ab illo irrogetur aliquid quo sit
homo deterior, sed tantum quo sit melior non erogetur’ (‘not that anything is imposed
by him whereby a man is made worse, but only that he provides nothing whereby he
becomes better’). Augustine, De diversis quaestionibus ad Simplicianum libri duo, I.2.15.
213
In some later editions of the Theodicy, the sentence has some extra words here: ‘admit
more goods, and cannot’. See G VI, p. 384.
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Theodicy
the whole, just as certain dissonances, when appropriately used, render
harmony more beautiful. But that depends on what has already been said
in reply to the first objection.
Objection VIII
Whoever cannot fail to choose the best is not free.
God cannot fail to choose the best.
Therefore God is not free.
Response
The major of this argument is denied. It is rather true freedom, and the
most perfect, to be able to make the best use of one’s free choice, and to
exercise this power always, without being diverted away from it either by
external force or by internal passions, of which the former constitutes the
slavery of bodies and the latter the slavery of souls. There is nothing less
servile than to be always led to the good, and always by one’s own inclina-
tion, without any constraint and without any displeasure. And it is nothing
but a sophism to object that God therefore had need of external things. He
creates them freely, but after he had proposed an end, which is to exercise
his goodness, his wisdom determined him to choose the most appropriate
means for obtaining this end. To call that a need is to take the term in an
unusual sense, which purges it of all imperfection, somewhat as one does
when one speaks of God’s anger.
Seneca says somewhere that God commanded only once, but that he
obeys always, because he obeys the laws that he willed to prescribe: semel
jussit, semper paret.214 But it would have been better if he had said that God
always commands, and that he is always obeyed, for in willing he always
follows the tendency of his own nature, and all other things always follow
his will. And as this will is always the same, it cannot be said that he obeys
only the will he had in the past. Nevertheless, although his will is always
inexorable and is always directed at the best, the evil or the lesser good
that he rejects is nonetheless possible in itself. Otherwise, the necessity
of good would be geometrical (so to speak) or metaphysical, and entirely
absolute, the contingency of things would be destroyed, and there would
be no choice. But this kind of necessity, which does not destroy the pos-
sibility of the contrary, has this name only by analogy: it becomes real not
through the essence of things alone, but through that which is outside
214
‘He has commanded only once, but always obeys.’ A misquoting of Seneca’s De
Providentia 5.8.
269
Appendix
them and above them, namely through the will of God. This necessity is
called moral necessity, because for the wise, what is necessary and what is
due are equivalent things. And when this necessity always has its effect, as
it truly has in the perfectly wise, that is, in God, it can be said that it is a
happy necessity. The more that creatures approach this, the nearer they
come to perfect bliss. Therefore this kind of necessity is not the kind one
tries to avoid, and which destroys morality, rewards, and praises, because
what it brings forth does not happen no matter what one does and wills,
but because one wills it. And a will for which it is natural to choose well,
most deserves to be praised; also, it brings its own reward with it, which
is supreme happiness. And as this constitution of the divine nature gives
a complete satisfaction to whomever possesses it, it is also the best and the
most desirable for creatures which depend totally upon God. If God’s will
did not have as its rule the principle of the best, it would tend towards
evil, which would be the worst, or else it would be in some way indifferent
to good and evil, and guided by chance. But a will that would always let
itself be guided by chance would hardly be better for the government of
the universe than the fortuitous concourse of corpuscles, without there
being any divinity. And even if God were to abandon himself to chance
only in some cases, and in a certain way (as he would if he did not always
tend entirely towards the best, and if he were capable of preferring a lesser
good to a greater good, that is, an evil to a good, since that which prevents
a greater good is an evil), he would be imperfect, as would be the object of
his choice; he would not deserve our complete confidence; he would act
without reason in such a case, and the government of the universe would
be like certain games that make equal use of reason and chance. And all
that shows that this objection made against the choice of the best perverts
the notions of free and necessary, and represents the best itself to us as evil,
which is malicious or ridiculous.
2. THE PRINCIPLES OF NATURE AND GRACE, FOUNDED ON

REASON (1714)215
(1) Substance is a being capable of action. It is simple or compound.
Simple substance is that which has no parts. Compound substance is the
combination of simple substances or monads. Monas is a Greek word which
means unity, or that which is one.
Compounds or bodies are pluralities, and simple substances – lives,
souls, minds – are unities. And there must be simple substances every-
215
Source: Leibniz, Principes de la Nature, pp. 26–65.
270
The Principles of Nature and Grace
where, because without simples there would be no compounds. And
consequently, the whole of nature is full of life.
(2) As monads have no parts, they cannot be put together or come apart.
They can neither begin nor end naturally, and consequently they last as
long as the universe, which will change but will not be destroyed. They
cannot have shapes, otherwise they would have parts, and as a result one
monad, in itself and at a single moment, can be distinguished from another
only by internal qualities and actions, which can be nothing other than its
perceptions (that is, [a multitude of modifications in the unity produced by
external things] the representations of the compound, or of that which is
outside, in the simple), and its appetitions (that is, its tendencies to pass
from one perception to another), which are the principles of change. For
the simplicity of substance does not preclude a multiplicity of modifica-
tions, which must be found together in this same simple substance; and
these modifications must consist in the variety of its relations to external
things. Similarly, in a centre or point, although completely simple, there is
an infinity of angles formed by the lines which meet in it.
(3) The whole of nature is a plenum. There are simple substances
everywhere, effectively separated from each another by their own actions
which continually change their relations. And each simple substance, or
superior monad, which forms the centre of a compound substance (for
example, an animal) and the principle of its unity, is surrounded by a mass
composed of an infinity of other monads which constitute the body belong-
ing to this central monad, corresponding to the states of the body by which
it represents the things which are outside of it, in the manner of a centre.
And this body is organic, when it forms a kind of automaton or natural
machine, which is a machine not only as a whole, but also in its smallest
observable parts. And as everything is connected because of the plenitude
of the world, and as each body acts on every other body, more or less
according to distance, and is affected by it through reaction, it follows that
each monad is a living mirror, or a mirror that is endowed with internal
action, representing the universe from its own point of view, and is as well-
ordered as the universe itself. And the perceptions in the monad arise from
one another by means of the laws of appetites, or final causes of good and
evil, which consist in the observable perceptions, ordered or disordered;
in the same way, the changes of bodies and of external phenomena arise
from one another by means of the laws of efficient causes, that is, the laws
of motion. Thus there is a perfect harmony between the perceptions of the
monad and the motions of bodies, pre-established at the outset between
the system of efficient causes and the system of final causes. And in this
consists the agreement and the physical union of the soul and the body,
with one being unable to change the laws of the other.
271
Appendix
(4) Each monad, together with a particular body, makes a living sub-
stance. Thus not only is there life everywhere, joined to limbs or organs,
but there are also infinite degrees of it in monads, some dominating more
or less over others. But when the monad has organs adjusted in such a way
that, through them, there is some contrast and distinction in the impres-
sions they receive, and consequently in the perceptions which represent
them (as, for example, when rays of light are concentrated and act with
greater force because of the shape of the humours of the eye), this may
amount to sensation, that is, to a perception accompanied by memory – in
other words, a perception of which there remains for a long time a certain
echo which makes itself heard on occasion. Such a living thing is called
an animal, as its monad is called a soul [which is, so to speak, a dominant
monad]. And when this soul is raised to the level of reason, it is something
more sublime, and is counted as a mind, as will soon be explained.
It is true that animals are sometimes in the condition of simple living
things and their souls in the condition of simple monads, namely when
their perceptions are not distinguished enough to be remembered, as
happens in a deep, dreamless sleep, or in a fainting spell [and may happen
in the state called death]. But in animals, perceptions which have become
entirely confused must be recovered, for reasons I shall soon give [oth-
erwise they would not be in keeping with order, and consequently they
would not represent the universe, or all proceed with all possible order]
(§12). Thus it is good to draw a distinction between perception, which is the
internal state of the monad representing external things, and apperception,
which is the consciousness or the reflective knowledge of this internal state,
which is not given to all souls, nor at all times to the same soul. And it is
for want of this distinction that the Cartesians have fallen short, by giving
no thought to perceptions which are not apperceived, just as common folk
give no thought to insensible bodies. This is also what has made these same
Cartesians believe that minds alone are monads and that there are no souls
in beasts, let alone other principles of life. And while they have strayed too
far from the common opinion of men by denying sensation to animals, they
have, on the other hand, too much indulged the prejudices of the vulgar, by
confusing a long stupor, which arises from a great confusion of perceptions,
with a death, in the rigorous sense of the term, in which all perception
would cease. This has confirmed the ill-founded belief in the destruction
of some souls, and the pernicious view of some so-called free-thinkers, who
have disputed the immortality of ours.
(5) In the perceptions of animals there is a connection which has some
resemblance to reason, but it is based only in the memory of facts or effects,
and not at all in the knowledge of causes. It is for this reason that a dog
runs away from the stick with which he has been beaten, because memory
272
represents to him the pain that the stick has caused him. And men, insofar
as they are empiricists, that is, in three-quarters of their actions, act only as
beasts do. For example, we expect day to dawn tomorrow because we have
always experienced it to be this way: it is only an astronomer who antici-
pates it through reason, and even this prediction will ultimately fail, when
the cause of daylight, which is by no means eternal, ceases.
But true reasoning depends on necessary or eternal truths, as are the
truths of logic, [metaphysics,] numbers, and geometry, which make the
connection of ideas indubitable and the inferences infallible. Animals in
which these inferences are not observed are called beasts; but those which
know these necessary truths are properly called rational animals, and their
souls are called minds. These souls are capable of performing acts of reflec-
tion, and of thinking about what is called I, substance, soul, mind: in short,
things and truths which are immaterial. And it is this which makes us
capable of the sciences, or of demonstrative knowledge.
(6) The researches of the moderns have taught us – and reason confirms
this – that the living things whose organs are known to us, that is, plants
and animals, do not come from a putrefaction or chaos, as the ancients
believed, but from pre-formed seeds, and consequently from the transfor-
mation of pre-existing living things.
There are little animals in the seeds of large ones, and by means of con-
ception they take on a new integument, which they appropriate, and which
gives them the means to nourish themselves and to grow, in order to move
on to a larger stage, and bring about the propagation of the large animal.
It is true that the souls of human spermatic animals are not rational and
become so only when conception determines that these animals are to have
human nature. And as animals generally are not born entirely in concep-
tion, or generation, neither do they perish entirely in what we call death. For
it is reasonable that, in the order of nature, what does not begin naturally
does not end naturally either. Thus, casting off their mask or their rags,
they merely return to a smaller stage, on which, however, they can be as
sensible and as well-ordered as on the greater one. And what has just been
said about large animals also holds good in the generation and death of
spermatic animals themselves; that is, they are the enlargements of other,
smaller spermatic animals, in relation to which they may be considered
large; for in nature, everything proceeds to infinity.
Thus not only souls but animals too are ingenerable and imperishable:
they are only developed, enveloped, reclothed, unclothed, transformed.
Souls never leave their body entirely, and do not pass from one body
into another body which is entirely new to them. There is no metem
psychosis, but there is metamorphosis. Animals change, acquiring and losing
only parts. In nutrition this happens gradually, and by small insensible
273
Appendix
particles, though continually, while in conception and in death, which
make animals acquire or lose a great deal all at once, it happens suddenly,
noticeably, though rarely.
(7)216 Until now we have spoken only as physicists; now we must rise
to metaphysics, by making use of the great principle, not commonly used,
which holds that nothing takes place without sufficient reason, that is, that
nothing happens without it being possible for one who has enough knowl-
edge of things to give a reason which is sufficient to determine why it is
thus and not otherwise. With this principle in place, the first question we
are entitled to ask will be: why is there something rather than nothing? For
nothing is simpler and easier than something. Moreover, supposing that
things must exist, it must be possible to give a reason why they must exist in
this way and not otherwise.
(8) Now this sufficient reason for the existence of the universe cannot
be found in the series of contingent things, that is, of bodies, and of their
representations in souls. For since matter is in itself indifferent to motion
and to rest, and to one motion rather than another, there cannot be found
in it the reason for motion, let alone the reason for a particular motion. And
although the present motion in matter arises from the preceding one, and
that one from a preceding one also, we are no further forward no matter
how far back we go, for the same question always remains. Thus it must be
the case that the sufficient reason, which has no need for any other reason,
lies outside this series of contingent things, and is found in a substance
which is the cause of this series, and which is a necessary being, bearing
the reason for its existence within itself. Otherwise we would not yet have
a sufficient reason, whereby we could stop. And this final reason of things
is called God.
(9) [This supreme substance must be simple] [This simple, primitive
substance must be wise] This simple original substance must include
eminently the perfections contained in the derivative substances which are
effects of it. Thus it will have perfect power, knowledge, and will; that is,
it will have omnipotence, omniscience, and a supreme goodness. And as
justice, taken very generally, is nothing other than goodness in conformity
with wisdom, it must clearly be the case that there is also a supreme justice
in God. The reason which has made things exist through him also makes
them depend on him for their existence and operation; and they are con-
tinually receiving from him that which endows them with some perfection,
though whatever imperfection remains in them comes from the essential
and original limitation of the created thing.
216
In the original drafts, the entire text was divided into just two chapters rather than
separate numbered sections, with the second chapter starting here.
274
(10) It follows from the supreme perfection of God that he has chosen
the best possible plan in producing the universe, in which there is the
greatest variety together with the greatest order; the best arranged situ-
ation, place, and time; the greatest effect produced by the simplest ways;
the most power, the most knowledge, the most happiness and goodness in
creatures which the universe could allow. For as all possible things claim
existence in God’s understanding in proportion to their perfections, the
result of all these claims must be the most perfect actual world which is
possible. If this were not so, it would not be possible to explain why things
have turned out this way rather than otherwise.
(11) The supreme wisdom of God has made him choose above all
the laws of motion that are best adjusted and most fitted to abstract or
metaphysical reasons. There is conserved the same quantity of total and
absolute force, or action, the same quantity of relative force, or reaction,
and finally, the same quantity of directive force.217 Moreover, action is
always equal to reaction, and the whole effect is always equivalent to its full
cause. And it is surprising that these laws of motion discovered in our day,
some of which I have discovered, cannot be explained by the consideration
of efficient causes or of matter alone. For I have found that we must have
recourse to final causes, and that these laws do not depend upon the princi-
ple of necessity, as do logical, arithmetical, and geometrical truths, but upon
the principle of fittingness, that is, on the choice of wisdom. And this is one
of the most effective and evident proofs of the existence of God, for those
who are able to go further into these matters.
(12) From the perfection of the supreme author it also follows that not
only is the order of the whole universe the most perfect possible, but also
that each living mirror which represents the universe according to its own
point of view, that is, each monad, each substantial centre, must have its per-
ceptions and its appetites regulated in the best way which is compatible with
all the rest. From which it also follows that souls, that is, the most dominant
monads, or rather animals themselves, cannot fail to wake up from the state
of stupor in which death or some other accident may put them.
(13) For everything is regulated in things once and for all with as much
order and agreement as is possible, since supreme wisdom and goodness
can act only with a perfect harmony. The present is big with the future; the
future can be read in the past; the distant is expressed in the nearby. One
could learn the beauty of the universe from each soul, if one could unravel
all its folds which develop perceptibly only with time. But as each distinct
perception of the soul includes an infinity of confused perceptions which
embrace the whole universe, the soul itself knows the things it perceives
217
For details, see PPL, pp. 432–52.
275
Appendix
only inasmuch as it has distinct and heightened perceptions of them, and
it has perfection to the extent that it has distinct perceptions. Each soul
knows the infinite, knows everything, but confusedly. It is just like when,
wandering along the shore of the sea and hearing the great noise it makes, I
hear the separate sounds of each wave (which together make up the whole
sound) but without distinguishing them.
But confused perceptions are the result of the impressions which the
whole universe makes on us. It is the same with each monad. God alone has
a distinct knowledge of everything, for he is its source. It has been very well
said that he is like a centre which is everywhere, but that his circumference
is nowhere, since everything is immediately present to him, without any
distance from this centre.
(14) As for the rational soul or mind, there is something more in it than
in monads, or even in simple souls. It is not only a mirror of the universe
of created things, but also an image of the divinity. The mind not only has
a perception of God’s works, but is even capable of producing something
which resembles them, although on a smaller scale. For, to say nothing
about the wonders of dreams, in which we effortlessly (but also involun-
tarily) invent things which could be discovered only after much thinking
when awake, our soul is architectonic even in its voluntary actions: and so,
discovering the sciences in accordance with which God had ordered things
(by weight, measure, number, etc.),218 it imitates in its own sphere, and
in its little world in which it is allowed to act, that which God does in the
great world.
(15) This is why all minds, whether of men or genies, enter into a kind
of society with God by virtue of reason and eternal truths, and are thus
members of the City of God, that is, the most perfect state, formed and
governed by the greatest and best of monarchs, in which there is no crime
without punishment, no good actions without proportionate reward, and
finally as much virtue and happiness as is possible. And this comes to pass
not by any disruption of nature, as if what God has in store for souls might
disturb the laws of bodies, but by the very order of natural things, in virtue
of the harmony pre-established from all time between the kingdoms of
nature and grace, between God as architect and God as monarch, in such
a way that nature itself leads to grace, and grace perfects nature by making
use of it.
(16) Thus although reason cannot teach us the detail of the great future,
which is reserved for revelation, this same reason assures us that things
are accomplished in a manner which exceeds our desires. Also, as God is
the most perfect and the most happy and consequently the most lovable
218
An allusion to Wisdom 11.21.
276
of substances, and as genuinely pure love consists in the state which causes
pleasure to be taken in the perfections and felicity of the beloved, this love
must give us the greatest pleasure of which we are capable, when God is
the object of it.
(17) And if we know him in the way I have just described, it is easy to
love him as we ought to. For although God is not detectable by our external
senses, he is nonetheless very lovable, and gives a very great pleasure. We
see the extent to which honours give pleasure to men, even though they do
not consist in the qualities of the external senses.
Martyrs and fanatics (although the affection of the latter is ill-regulated)
show what the pleasure of the mind can do. And what is more, the very
pleasures of the senses boil down to intellectual pleasures which are con-
fusedly known.
Music charms us, although its beauty consists only in the agreement of
numbers and in the counting (which we are not aware of but which the soul
nonetheless carries out) of the beats or vibrations of sounding bodies which
are encountered at certain intervals. The pleasures which the eye finds in
proportions are of the same nature, and those caused by the other senses
amount to something similar, although we may not be able to explain them
so distinctly.
(18) It may even be said that love of God gives us, here and now, a fore-
taste of future felicity. And although it is disinterested love, it constitutes
by itself our greatest good and interest, even though we do not seek them in
it, and we consider only the pleasure it gives, without regard to the utility
it produces. For it gives us a perfect confidence in the goodness of our
author and master, which produces a true tranquillity of mind, not as in
the Stoics, who resolved themselves to patience by force, but by a present
contentment, which itself assures us of a future happiness. And aside from
the present pleasure, nothing could be more useful for the future, for the
love of God also fulfils our hopes, and leads us down the path of supreme
happiness, because in virtue of the perfect order established in the uni-
verse, everything is done in the best possible way, as much for the general
good as also for the greatest particular good of those who are convinced of
this, and who are content with the divine government, which cannot fail
to be the case with those who know how to love the source of all good. It
is true that supreme felicity (with whatever beatific vision, or knowledge of
God, it may be accompanied) can never be complete, because God, being
infinite, cannot be entirely known.
Thus our happiness will never consist, and ought not to consist, in a
complete joy, in which there would no longer be anything to desire, and
which would dull our mind, but in a perpetual progress to new pleasures
and new perfections.
277
Appendix
3. LEIBNIZ TO NICOLE REMOND: APPENDIX ON MONADS

(JULY 1714)219
I have learned from Mr Hugony that you are having some difficulty
with my unities, or monads. I would like to know what this involves. I
will try nevertheless to explain myself. I believe that the whole universe
of creatures consists only in simple substances or monads, and in their
combinations. These simple substances are what are called ‘mind’ in us
and in genies, and ‘soul’ in animals. They all have perception (which is
nothing other than the representation of multitude in unity), and appetite
(which is nothing other than the tendency of one perception to another),
which is called passion in animals and will where the perception is an
intellectual judgement. One cannot even conceive of there being anything
other than that in simple substances, and consequently in all nature. The
combinations are what we call bodies. In this mass, one calls ‘matter’ or
rather ‘passive force’ or ‘primitive resistance’ what in bodies is consid-
ered as passive and as uniform throughout; however, the primitive active
force is what one may call ‘entelechy’, and in that the mass is varied. Yet
all these bodies, and all that is ascribed to them, are not substances, but
only well-founded phenomena, or the foundation of appearances, which
are different in different observers, but which are related and come from
the same foundation, just like different views of the same city seen from
various places. Far from being a substance, space is not even an existent. It
is an order, like time, an order of co-existents, as time is an order between
existents which are not contemporaneous. Continuity is not an ideal thing,
but that which is real is found in this order of continuity. In the ideal or
continuum, the whole is antecedent to the parts, just as arithmetical unity
is antecedent to the fractions which divide it, and which can be attributed
arbitrarily to it, the parts existing only potentially; but in the real, the
simple is antecedent to the combinations, and the parts are actual, existing
prior to the whole. These reflections raise problems concerning the [notion
of the] continuum, which supposes that the continuum is something real,
has parts prior to any division, and that matter is a substance. Thus there
is no need to conceive extension as a real, continuous space, strewn with
points. These fictions are suitable for pleasing the imagination, but reason
finds no value in them. Nor is there any need to conceive monads as points
in a real space, moving, pushing or touching each another. It is sufficient
that the phenomena make it appear such, and this appearance is veridical
insofar as these phenomena are founded, that is, are in agreement. Motions
and interactions are only appearance, but well-founded appearance which
219
Source: G III, pp. 622–4.
278
Appendix on Monads
is never refuted, and like regular and long-lasting dreams. Motion is the
phenomenon of change according to place and time; body is the phenom-
enon which changes. The laws of motion, being founded in the perceptions
of simple substances, originate from final causes (or fittingness) which are
immaterial and in each monad. But if matter were substance, they would
originate from brute causes or from a geometrical necessity, and would be
very different. Perceptions and appetites are the only actions of substances;
all other actions are phenomena, as are all other acting things. Plato would
appear to have understood something of this, as he considered material
things as scarcely real, and the Academics have questioned whether mate-
rial things exist outside of us, which may be given a reasonable explanation
by saying that they are nothing but perceptions, and that they obtain their
reality from the congruence of perceptions of apperceiving substances.
This congruence originates from the pre-established harmony of these
substances, since each simple substance is a mirror of the same universe,
as enduring and as all-encompassing as it is, although only a small number
of these perceptions of creatures can be distinct at once. The perceptions
are differentiated by the relations or, so to speak, by the perspectives of the
mirrors, which brings it about that one and the same universe is multiplied
in an infinity of ways by just as many living mirrors, each representing
it220 in its own way. It may thus be said that each simple substance is an
image of the universe, but that each mind is, on top of that, an image of
God, having knowledge not only of facts and of the empirical connections
between them, as do non-rational souls, which are only empiricists, but
also possessing knowledge of the necessity of eternal truths, understand-
ing the reasons of facts and imitating the architecture of God, and thereby
also being capable of entering into fellowship with Him and of becoming a
member of the city of God, the best governed state that is possible, just as
the world is likewise the most perfect of all structures, and the best-framed
physically, and the best-framed morally.
But I fear that this letter, full of thoughts so abstract and far removed
from received opinions, will put you off. I would not even like you to think
too much at once about the above; it’s better to return to it. Nevertheless I
wanted to show you how much I value and respect you, by writing to you
what I could not easily write to others. Thus this letter should be only for
your eyes. Many others would find it either absurd or unintelligible.
220
Reading ‘le’ in place of ‘se’.
279
Glossary of Terms
Accident A quality of a substance which is not part of its essence (M7).

Animal A corporeal substance, endowed with sense organs that give it
distinct perceptions (M25). Animals are also endowed with memory (M26)
and imagination (M27). Non-rational animals are referred to as beasts;
rational animals are human beings.
Annihilation A supernatural process whereby substances are eliminated
from existence (M6). The opposite of creation.
A posteriori Proof or knowledge involving reasoning from effect to cause
(M45).
Apperception The consciousness of a perception (M14).
Appetite The action of the internal principle of change within each
monad, which drives it from one set of perceptions to another (M15).
A priori Proof or knowledge involving reasoning from cause to effect
(M50).
Beast A non-rational animal, endowed with memory and sensation (M14).
City of God The moral community of all minds, including those of
humans and genii, under the rule of God (M85).
Compound An aggregate of monads (M2).
Corporeal substance Organic body consisting of an aggregate of monads
unified by a dominant entelechy or soul (PNG1).
Creation A supernatural process whereby substances are brought into
existence (M6). The opposite of annihilation.
Death In animals, the process of the enfolding and diminishment of the
body (M73), resulting in a state in which the soul has only little perceptions
(M21).
Distinct perception A perception whose parts can be distinguished from
each other (M19).
280
Glossary of Terms
Entelechy A bearer of perfection (M18). A bare monad (M19).
Generation The development and growth of an animal’s body from a
preformed state (M73).
Genie A super-human mind such as an angel (M72).
Ideal Existing in idea (M50).
Identical proposition A tautology (M35).
Intrinsic denomination A quality intrinsic to a substance (M9).
Kingdom of grace The moral world or City of God, that is, the com-
munity of all minds (M87).
Kingdom of nature The physical world of objects operating in accord-
ance with the laws of nature, such as the laws of motion (M87).
Little perception A perception that cannot be distinguished, whether
due to its faintness, or because it occurs together with others that are very
similar (M21).
Metempsychosis The transfer of a soul from one body to another (M72).
Mind A soul which possesses reason and a moral identity (M29).
Monad Literally: that which is one; a simple substance (M1). Monads
are either primitive or derivative (that is, created). The primitive monad
is God. There are various grades of derivative monads: bare monads, or
entelechies; animal souls; minds.
Organic Possessing infinitely structured organs (M63).
Perception The representation of a plurality in a unity, or monad (M14). A
representation involves an isomorphic relationship between the represent-
ing thing and the represented thing. Perception is the basic state of a monad.
Perfection Magnitude of positive reality (M41).
Plenum Space which is entirely full of matter (M8).
Pre-established harmony The perfect correspondence between the
states of the body and the states of the soul, brought about by body and
soul following their own laws (M78).
Principle of contradiction A hybrid of two principles: (1) that that
which contains a contradiction is false, and (2) that the true is that which
is not false (M31).
Principle of sufficient reason The principle that for every fact (or truth)
there is a sufficient (complete) reason why it is thus rather than otherwise
(M32).
Rational soul See Mind (M29).
Reality The state of possessing qualities; the more qualities, or the greater
the degree of their expression, the greater the degree of reality (M40).
Simple idea A primary concept not susceptible to further analysis (M35).
Simple substance A substance without parts (M1).
Soul A simple substance which enjoys distinct perceptions, and possesses
memory (M19). Those souls also endowed with reason are minds.
281
Glossary of Terms
Transmigration of souls See Metempsychosis.
Truth of fact (or contingent truth) A truth whose opposite is possible
(M33).
Truth of reasoning (or necessary truth) A truth whose opposite is impos-
sible (M33).
Unity See Monad.
Universal harmony The mutual accommodation of all substances (M59).
282
Questions for Further Study
1. How do Leibniz’s ‘true atoms of nature’ differ from (a) the atoms of
Democritus, and (b) the atoms of modern science?
2. Identify Leibniz’s reason(s) for thinking that substances do not causally inter-
act. How strong are they?
3. Is appetite the same thing as will?
4. How does Leibniz’s notion of ‘little perceptions’ compare with the modern
understanding of the unconscious?
5. What does Leibniz mean when he calls human souls ‘incorporeal automata’
(M18)? Would it leave any room for free will?
6. How might a critic respond to Leibniz’s argument for unconscious percep-
tions in M22–3?
7. What faculties or abilities does a human mind have that an animal soul does
not?
8. How reasonable is it to suppose that there is a sufficient reason for every single
thing, event, or fact?
9. Does Leibniz do enough to show that, if God exists, then there is only a single
God?
10. How does Leibniz characterise the process of divine creation in the
Monadology? Identify a rival account: how do the two compare?
11. Why should it be that optimism, that is, the claim that ours is the best possible
world, can only be established a priori?
12. Does Leibniz’s optimism allow for meliorism? (Meliorism is the belief that the
world gets better over time.)
13. How does Leibniz explain action at the level of monads?
14. What does it mean to say that a monad is a living mirror of the universe?
15. What is the significance of the plenum (see M61) for the pre-established
harmony?
16. How fair is it to describe Leibniz’s philosophy as animistic?
283
Questions Monadology
Leibniz’s for Further Study
17. How important to the argument of the Monadology is the (now-discredited)
theory of preformation?
18. How does Leibniz’s notion of ‘organic’ compare with our own?
19. In what way is the kingdom of nature in harmony with the kingdom of grace?
20. Why does Leibniz believe that rewards and punishments are administered
naturally rather than through particular interventions by God?
284
Further Reading
WRITINGS OF LEIBNIZ IN ENGLISH

Confessio Philosophi, trans. and ed. R. Sleigh Jr. (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 2005).
De summa rerum, trans. and ed. G. H. R. Parkinson (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1992).
The Labyrinth of the Continuum: Writings on the Continuum Problem, 1672–1686,
trans. and ed. Richard T. W. Arthur (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001).
Leibniz and the Two Sophies, trans. and ed. Lloyd Strickland (Toronto: CRRS, 2011).
The Leibniz-Arnauld Correspondence, trans. and ed. H. T. Mason (Manchester:
Manchester University Press, 1967).
The Leibniz-Des Bosses Correspondence, trans. and ed. Brandon C. Look and
Donald Rutherford (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007).
The Leibniz-de Volder Correspondence, trans. and ed. Paul Lodge (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 2013).
Leibniz’s ‘New System’ and associated Contemporary Texts, trans. and ed. R. S.
Woolhouse and Richard Francks (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997).
Logical Papers, trans. and ed. G. H. R. Parkinson (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1966).
Monadology and other Philosophical Essays, trans. and ed. Paul Schrecker and Anne
Martin Schrecker (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1965).
The Monadology and Other Philosophical Writings, trans. and ed. Robert Latta
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1898).
New Essays on Human Understanding, 2nd edn, trans. and ed. Jonathan Bennett
and Peter Remnant (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
Philosophical Essays, trans. and ed. Roger Ariew and Daniel Garber (Indianapolis:
Hackett, 1989).
Philosophical Papers and Letters, 2nd edn, trans. and ed. Leroy Loemker
(Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1969).
285
Further Reading
Philosophical Texts, trans. and ed. R. S. Woolhouse and Richard Francks (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1998).
Philosophical Writings, trans. and ed. Mary Morris and G. H. R. Parkinson
(London: Everyman, 1973).
Political Writings, 2nd edn, trans. and ed. Patrick Riley (Cambridge: Cambridge
Protogaea, trans. and ed. Claudine Cohen and Andre Wakefield (Chicago: Chicago
Shorter Leibniz Texts, trans. and ed. Lloyd Strickland (London: Continuum,
2006).
Theodicy, trans. E. M. Huggard, ed. Austin Farrar (Chicago: Open Court, 1990).
Writings on China, trans. and ed. Daniel J. Cook and Henry Rosemont Jr.
(Chicago: Open Court, 1994).
GENERAL INTRODUCTIONS TO LEIBNIZ AND HIS

PHILOSOPHY
E. J. Aiton, Leibniz: A Biography (Bristol: Adam Hilger Ltd, 1985).
Maria Rosa Antognazza, Leibniz: An Intellectual Biography (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2008).
Richard T. W. Arthur, Leibniz (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2014).
Stuart Brown and N. J. Fox (eds), Historical Dictionary of Leibniz’s Philosophy
(Oxford: Scarecrow Press, 2006).
Nicholas Jolley, Leibniz (London: Routledge, 2005).
Brandon C. Look (ed.), The Continuum Companion to Leibniz (London: Continuum,
2011).
Franklin Perkins, Leibniz: A Guide for the Perplexed (London: Continuum, 2007).
George MacDonald Ross, Leibniz (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984).
Roger Woolhouse, Starting with Leibniz (London: Continuum, 2011).
MORE ADVANCED WORKS ON LEIBNIZ’S PHILOSOPHY

Robert Adams, Leibniz: Determinist, Theist, Idealist (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1994).
Marc Elliot Bobro, Self and Substance in Leibniz (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2010).
Daniel Garber, Leibniz: Body, Substance, Monad (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2009).
Glenn A. Hartz, Leibniz’s Final System: Monads, Matter, Animals (London:
Routledge, 2007).
Hide Ishiguro, Leibniz’s Philosophy of Logic and Language, 2nd edn (Cambridge:
Nicholas Jolley, Leibniz and Locke (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984).
Nicholas Jolley (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Leibniz (Cambridge: Cambridge
286
The Principles
FurtherofReading
Nature and Grace
Larry M. Jorgensen and Samuel Newlands (eds), New Essays on Leibniz’s Theodicy
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014).
Mark A. Kulstad, Leibniz on Apperception, Consciousness and Reflection (Munich:
Philosophia, 1990).
Paul Lodge (ed.), Leibniz and His Correspondents (Cambridge: Cambridge
Benson Mates, The Philosophy of Leibniz: Metaphysics and Language (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1986).
Ohad Nachtomy, Possibility, Agency, and Individuality in Leibniz’s Metaphysics
(Dordrecht: Springer, 2007).
Pauline Phemister, Leibniz and the Natural World: Activity, Passivity and Corporeal
Substances in Leibniz’s Philosophy (Dordrecht: Springer, 2005).
Pauline Phemister and Stuart Brown (eds), Leibniz and the English-Speaking World
(Dordrecht: Springer, 2007).
Nicholas Rescher, On Leibniz, expanded edn (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh
Press, 2012).
Donald Rutherford, Leibniz and the Rational Order of Nature (Cambridge:
Donald Rutherford and J. A. Cover (eds), Leibniz and Freedom (Oxford: Oxford
Justin E. H. Smith, Divine Machines: Leibniz and the Sciences of Life (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 2011).
Lloyd Strickland, Leibniz Reinterpreted (London: Continuum, 2006).
Catherine Wilson, Leibniz’s Metaphysics (Manchester: Manchester University
Press, 1989).
Roger Woolhouse, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz: The Concept of Substance in
Seventeenth-Century Metaphysics (London: Routledge, 1993).
ON THE MONADOLOGY
Robert Latta, Leibniz: The Monadology and Other Philosophical Writings (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1898).
Nicholas Rescher, G. W. Leibniz’s Monadology: An Edition for Students (London:
Routledge, 1992).
Anthony Savile, The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Leibniz and the Monadology
(London: Routledge, 2000).
A SELECTION OF ARTICLES AND CHAPTERS ON SPECIFIC

ASPECTS OF THE MONADOLOGY
Causation
Laurence Carlin, ‘Leibniz on final causes’, Journal of the History of Philosophy 44:2
(2006), pp. 217–33.
287
Further Reading
Michael J. Futch, ‘Leibnizian causation’, British Journal for the Philosophy of
Science 56:3 (2005), pp. 451–67.
Jeffrey K. McDonough, ‘Leibniz’s two realms revisited’, Noûs 42:4 (2008), pp.
673–96.
Robert C. Sleigh Jr., ‘Leibniz on Malebranche on causality’, in J. A. Cover and
Mark Kulstad (eds), Central Themes in Early Modern Philosophy (Indianapolis:
Hackett, 1990), pp. 161–94.
David Scott, ‘Leibniz’s model of creation and his doctrine of substance’, Animus
3 (1998), pp. 73–88.
Chris Swoyer, ‘Leibnizian expression’, Journal of the History of Philosophy 33:1
(1995), pp. 65–99.
Catherine Wilson, ‘Monads, forces, causes (§80)’, in Hubertus Busche (ed.),
Monadologie (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2009), pp. 211–21.
R. S. Woolhouse, ‘Leibniz’s reaction to Cartesian interaction’, Proceedings of the
Aristotelian Society, New Series 86 (1985–86), pp. 69–82.
Compossibility
Gregory Brown, ‘Compossibility, harmony, and perfection in Leibniz’, The
Philosophical Review 96:2 (1987), pp. 173–203.
Olli Koistinen and Arto Repo, ‘Compossibility and being in the same world in
Leibniz’s metaphysics’, Studia Leibnitiana 31:2 (1999), pp. 196–214.
Jeffrey K. McDonough, ‘Leibniz and the puzzle of incompossibility: The packing
strategy’, Philosophical Review 119:2 (2010), pp. 135–63.
James Messina and Donald Rutherford, ‘Leibniz on compossibility’, Philosophy
Compass 4:6 (2009), pp. 962–77.
Catherine Wilson, ‘Plenitude and compossibility in Leibniz’, The Leibniz Review
10 (2000), pp. 1–20.
Expression and representation

Mark Kulstad, ‘Leibniz’s concept of expression’, Studia Leibnitiana 9:2 (1977),
pp. 55–76.
Ari Maunu, ‘Leibniz’s theory of universal expression explicated’, Canadian
Journal of Philosophy 38:2 (2008), pp. 247–67.
Alan Nelson, ‘Leibniz on modality, cognition, and expression’, in Alan Nelson
(ed.), A Companion to Rationalism (Oxford: Blackwell, 2005), pp. 282–301.
Margaret D. Wilson, ‘Confused vs. distinct perception in Leibniz: Consciousness,
representation, and God’s mind’, in Margaret D. Wilson, Ideas and Mechanism
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), pp. 336–52.
God
David Blumenfeld, ‘Leibniz’s proof of the uniqueness of God’, Studia Leibnitiana
6:2 (1974), pp. 262–71.
William Lane Craig, The Cosmological Argument from Plato to Leibniz (London:
Macmillan, 1980), pp. 257–81.
288
The Principles
FurtherofReading
Nature and Grace
T. Allan Hillman and Tully Borland, ‘Leibniz and the imitation of God: A criti-
cism of voluntarism’, Philosophy & Theology 23:1 (2011), pp. 3–27.
Mogens Laerke, ‘Leibniz’s cosmological argument for the existence of God’,
Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 93:1 (2011), pp. 58–84.
Sukjae Lee, ‘Leibniz on divine concurrence’, The Philosophical Review 113:2
(2004), pp. 203–48.
Konrad Moll, ‘Deus sive harmonia universalis est ultima ratio rerum: the
conception of God in Leibniz’s early philosophy’, in Stuart Brown (ed.), The
Young Leibniz and His Philosophy (1646–76) (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1999), pp.
65–78.
David Werther, ‘Leibniz and the possibility of God’s existence’, Religious Studies
32:1 (1996), pp. 37–48.
Leibniz’s mill
Stewart Duncan, ‘Leibniz’s mill arguments against materialism’, Philosophical
Quarterly 62:247 (2012), pp. 250–72.
Paul Lodge, ‘Leibniz’s mill argument against mechanical materialism revisited’,
Ergo 1:3 (2014), pp. 77–99.
Paul Lodge and Marc Bobro, ‘Stepping back inside Leibniz’s mill’, The Monist
81:4 (1998), pp. 553–72.
Optimism
J. Franklin, ‘Two caricatures, II: Leibniz’s best world’, International Journal for
the Philosophy of Religion 52:1 (2002), pp. 45–56.
Jonathan Hill, ‘Maximum effect, minimum outlay: The coherence of
Leibniz’s fruitfulness criterion’, History of Philosophy Quarterly 27:4 (2010),
pp. 335–58.
George MacDonald Ross, ‘Leibniz and the origin of things’, in Marcelo Dascal
and Elhanan Yakira (eds), Leibniz and Adam (Tel Aviv: University Publishing
Projects, 1993), pp. 241–57.
Lloyd Strickland, ‘Leibniz on whether the world increases in perfection’, British
Journal for the History of Philosophy 14:1 (2006), pp. 51–68.
Catherine Wilson, ‘Leibnizian optimism’, The Journal of Philosophy 80:11 (1983),
pp. 765–83.
Organism and mechanism

François Duchesneau, ‘Leibniz’s model for analyzing organic phenomena’,
Perspectives on Science 11:4 (2003), pp. 378–409.
Francois Duchesneau, ‘The organism-mechanism relationship: An issue in the
Leibniz-Stahl controversy’, in Ohad Nachtomy and Justin E. H. Smith (eds),
The Life Sciences in Early Modern Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2014), pp. 98–114.
Hide Ishiguro, ‘Unity without simplicity: Leibniz on organisms’, The Monist 81:4
(1998), pp. 534–52.
289
Further Reading
Ohad Nachtomy, Ayelet Shavit, and Justin Smith, ‘Leibnizian organisms, nested
individuals, and units of selection’, Theory in Biosciences 121:2 (2002), pp.
205–30.
Antonio Nunziante, ‘“Corpus vivens est Automaton sui perpetuativum ex naturae
instituto”. Some remarks on Leibniz’s distinction between “Machina natu-
ralis” and “Organica artificialia”’, Studia Leibnitiana Sonderheft 32 (2004),
pp. 203–16.
Perception and apperception

Robert Brandom, ‘Leibniz and degrees of perception’, Journal of the History of
Philosophy 19:4 (1981), pp. 447–79.
Rocco J. Gennaro, ‘Leibniz on consciousness and self-consciousness’, in Rocco J.
Gennaro and Charles Huenemann (eds), New Essays on the Rationalists (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 353–71.
Larry M. Jorgensen, ‘The principle of continuity and Leibniz’s theory of con-
sciousness’, Journal of the History of Philosophy 47:2 (2009), pp. 223–48.
Alison Simmons, ‘Changing the Cartesian mind: Leibniz on sensation, represen-
tation and consciousness’, The Philosophical Review 110:1 (2001), pp. 31–75.
Pre-established harmony
Gregory Brown, ‘God’s phenomena and the pre-established harmony’, Studia
Leibnitiana 19 (1987), pp. 200–14.
Gregory Brown, ‘Is there a pre-established harmony of aggregates in the Leibnizian
dynamics, or Do non-substantial bodies interact?’, Journal of the History of
Philosophy 30:1 (1992), pp. 53–75.
Mark A. Kulstad, ‘Causation and preestablished harmony in the early develop-
ment of Leibniz’s philosophy’, in Steven Nadler (ed.), Causation in Early
Modern Philosophy: Cartesianism, Occasionalism, and Preestablished Harmony
(University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1993), pp. 93–117.
Mark A. Kulstad, ‘Two interpretations of the pre-established harmony in the
philosophy of Leibniz’, Synthese 96:3 (1993), pp. 477–504.
Paul Lodge, ‘Leibniz’s commitment to the pre-established harmony in the late
1670s and early 1680s’, Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 80:3 (2009), pp.
292–320.
David Scott, ‘Leibniz and the two clocks’, Journal of the History of Ideas 58:3
(1997), pp. 445–63.
Substance
Martha Brandt Bolton, ‘Change in the monad’, in Eric Watkins (ed.), The
Divine Order, the Human Order, and the Order of Nature: Historical Perspectives
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 175–94.
Nicholas Jolley, ‘Leibniz and the causal self-sufficiency of substances’, in Nicholas
Jolley (ed.), Causality and Mind: Essays on Early Modern Philosophy (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 169–82.
290
The Principles
FurtherofReading
Nature and Grace
Samuel Levey, ‘On unity and simple substance in Leibniz’, The Leibniz Review 17
(2007), pp. 61–106.
Samuel Levey, ‘On unity, borrowed reality and multitude in Leibniz’, The Leibniz
Review 22 (2012), pp. 97–134.
Jeffrey K. McDonough, ‘Leibniz’s conciliatory account of substance’, Philosophers’
Imprint 13:6 (2013), pp. 1–23.
Donald Rutherford, ‘Unity, reality and simple substance: A reply to Samuel
Levey’, The Leibniz Review 18 (2008), pp. 207–24.
Donald Rutherford, ‘Simple substances and composite bodies (§§1–5)’, in
Hubertus Busche (ed.), Monadologie (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2009), pp.
35–48.
Andrew D. H. Stumpf, ‘Harmonizing Leibniz’s ontology’, Dialogue 51:3 (2012),
pp. 467–83.
John Whipple, ‘The structure of Leibnizian simple substances’, British Journal for
the History of Philosophy 18:3 (2010), pp. 379–410.
291
Index
absolute necessity see necessity: absolute Basil, St, 249–50

Acta eruditorum, 4, 10, 165n Bayle, Pierre, 4, 17, 25, 69–70, 80n, 120n,
aggregates, 14, 42–3, 48–50, 61, 67, 127, 123–5, 135, 163–4, 180, 192–3, 194n,
280 195, 198n, 199–200, 202n, 203, 204n,
angel, 50, 68, 138, 151–2, 158, 170–1, 205–7, 209, 211–13, 215–17, 218n,
179–80, 199, 247, 254, 281 219–20, 222–4, 225n, 226–9, 231,
animal spirits, 146, 259 234–5, 240, 241n, 242–7, 249–51,
animalcules, 132, 139–40, 149 253–4, 256, 258, 259n
animals, 18–19, 27–31, 35, 37–9, 49, 67–9, beauty, 158, 163, 194, 197, 206–7, 209,
75–6, 78–82, 86, 95, 129, 132–4, 136, 224–5, 229, 242, 260, 262–3, 268–9,
138–42, 147–9, 163, 165, 170, 180, 275, 277
186, 191–2, 204, 206–7, 220, 223–5, body
243, 257, 259, 265, 271–5, 278, 280 as well-founded phenomena, 6, 48–50,
annihilation, 15, 51–2, 142, 165, 191, 222, 278
280 expresses the whole universe, 27,
antecedent will see God: antecedent will of 128
apperception, 16–18, 50, 66–7, 69, 75–6, organic, 27, 29–30, 37, 107, 129–31, 135,
184, 260, 272, 279–80 137–9, 143, 149, 163–5, 189, 191,
appetition, 16–17, 23, 30, 35–6, 49, 56, 204, 225, 257, 271
68–9, 73, 109–10, 144–5, 271, 275, Buridan’s ass, 180
278–80
Aquinas, St Thomas, 40, 94n, 137–8, 160, cause
219, 221, 231, 254, 264 efficient, 21, 33, 91, 93, 145, 159, 173,
Aristotle, 6, 39–40, 61, 65, 68, 72, 82, 111, 183, 242, 244, 259, 275
131, 179, 189, 202–3, 212, 220, 221n, final, 7, 21, 33, 92–3, 145, 159, 183, 243,
222–3, 250, 258 275, 279
Arnauld, Antoine, 2, 4, 60n, 63–4, 104n immanent, 53, 55
atomism, 44–6 transeunt, 55
Augustine, St, 90, 152, 171, 175–6, 179, Chrysippus, 212–15, 239
188–9, 236, 249, 264, 268 Cicero, 111, 200, 212–15, 220, 223, 236
City of God, 31, 38, 152–4, 171, 207, 265,
Barbarus, Hermolaus, 23, 109, 111–12, 276, 279–80
190 Clarke, Samuel, 4, 58, 117
bare particular, 56 complete concept, 62–4, 92, 120
292
Index
compossibility, 116 God
compounds, 14–15, 17, 20, 26, 37, 39, antecedent will of, 32, 159–60, 173–4,
42–3, 46–8, 50, 52–3, 55–8, 70, 83, 187–8, 195–6, 226, 238
127–9, 270–1, 280 beauty of, 160
concurrence see God: concurrence of concurrence of, 108–9, 174–5, 249, 254
consequent will see God: consequent will of consequent will of, 32, 159–61, 173, 187,
continuity, law of, 65–6, 141n 196, 206, 238
continuum, 225, 252, 278 decisive will of see God: consequent
contradiction see principle of contradiction will of
creation, 1, 15, 51–2, 66, 85, 107, 109, decretory will of see God: consequent
114–15, 122, 153, 186, 191–2, 225–6, will of
228, 253, 256–7, 263, 280 existence of, 1, 22–3, 36, 94–5, 97, 99,
continuous, 108–9, 175, 177, 251–4 102–5, 167–8, 179, 220, 252, 275
final will of see God: consequent will of
death, 16, 18, 29, 37, 66, 68, 75–6, 138, foreknowledge of, 164, 178, 248–9
140–2, 157–8, 191, 272–5, 280 goodness of, 25, 31, 52, 91, 94, 96–7, 99,
Democritus, 44, 131 118, 153, 160, 162, 168, 187, 194–5,
Descartes, René, 23, 30, 38–9, 45, 54, 67, 197, 199, 201–3, 205, 207, 217,
97–8, 103, 105–6, 123, 138, 145–7, 224–7, 234, 239, 247, 249, 263, 269,
166, 175, 177n, 182–3, 222, 241 274, 277
Diodorus, 213–15 justice of, 123, 153, 160–1, 186, 192,
Diroys, François, 226–7 211, 217, 227, 249, 274
mediate will of, 196
eduction, 139, 189–90 omnipotence of, 7, 55, 94, 96, 126, 168,
entelechy, 6, 16–17, 23, 27–9, 35, 37, 66–7, 209n, 246n, 274
72–3, 109, 111–12, 128–9, 132, 134–5, omniscience of, 66, 94, 102, 110, 119,
138, 165, 190, 256–7, 278, 281 160, 164, 168, 183, 219n, 226–7,
Epicurus, 44, 191, 212–13, 240, 245 231, 239, 241, 274, 285
Euclid, 217, 230 presumptive will of see God: antecedent
evil, 169, 171–3, 185–6, 188, 196–7, 199, will of
201–2, 205, 208–11, 224n, 231, 239, secret will of see God: consequent will of
243, 250–1, 263–5, 269 uniqueness of, 21, 96–8
as a privation, 175–7, 210, 249, 268 Grotius, Hugo, 200, 219, 221, 232
metaphysical, 232
moral, 194, 204–5, 220, 232, 241, 250 harmony, 7, 97, 137, 162, 164, 169, 183,
permission of, 201, 209, 236n, 239, 207, 218, 248, 269, 271, 275
264 of efficient and final causes, 7, 32, 153–4,
physical, 194, 204–5, 232, 241, 247, 250 234
extension, 14, 34, 45–7, 145, 165, 242, 278 of nature and grace, 32, 38, 154–6, 158,
170
Fall, the see sin: of Adam pre-established, 30, 38, 96, 105, 123–5,
flower of substance see substance: flower of 143–5, 147, 163, 165, 182–3, 186,
force, 16, 30, 40, 61–2, 93, 128, 145, 164, 223, 229, 245, 276, 279, 281
176, 182–3, 190, 208, 210, 241, 250, universal, 26, 114, 123–4, 163, 282
256–7, 275, 278 Hartsoeker, Nikolaus, 192
free will, 64, 88, 198–9, 208, 211, 218, 229, Hobbes, Thomas, 4, 55, 122
263 Huygens, Christiaan, 2, 6, 210n
hypothesis of agreements see harmony:
Galileo, Galilei, 166, 210n pre-established
Gassendi, Pierre, 45, 191, 245, 255n hypothesis of concomitance see harmony:
generation, 29, 37, 138–9, 141, 191, 257, pre-established
273
genie, 28, 49, 136, 151, 158–9, 265, 276, identity of indiscernibles, 35, 58–9, 88, 96
278, 281 immortality see soul: immortality of
293
inertia, 22, 99, 175–6, 250 miracles, 46n, 52, 123, 149, 181, 183, 192,
innate ideas, 84–5 199, 229, 235, 245–7, 257, 268
Molinists, 249
Jansenists, 249 monad
Jaquelot, Isaac, 183, 184n, 234, 251n, 253n, bare see entelechy
254n, 259 change in, 15–16, 35, 52–3, 62, 72, 77,
Jesuits, 249 93, 271
Journal des sçavans, 4, 247 derivative, 107
dominant, 28, 37, 134–5, 271–2, 275
Kepler, Johann, 175, 250 nature of, 14–17, 24, 26–7, 34–7, 39–41,
King, William, 157, 245n, 247n 50, 58, 60, 62, 64, 68, 73, 75, 77, 97,
kingdom of grace, 32, 38, 154, 158, 170–1, 111, 113–15, 120–2, 125–30, 271–2,
194, 240, 276, 281 275, 278–9, 281
kingdom of nature, 32, 38, 154, 158, 170–1, primitive, 107
194, 240, 276, 281 windowless nature of, 15, 52–3
multitudes see compounds
Last Judgement, 155, 170
laws necessity
of efficient causes see laws: of motion absolute, 178, 180, 186, 212, 221, 224,
of final causes, 30, 38, 93, 143–4, 271, 237, 241–2, 244, 266–7, 269, 275,
275 279
of logic, 106 hypothetical, 178, 203, 215, 266–7
of motion, 6, 30, 38, 51, 143–5, 147, metaphysical, 217, 227, 237–8, 248, 269
153–4, 158, 164, 183, 198, 223, 234, moral, 203, 217, 227–8, 237, 241, 244,
240–1 266, 270
of nature see laws: of motion
psychical see laws: of final causes occasionalism, 54–5, 108–9
lazy sophism, 249, 267 organism, 149, 163–4
Leeuwenhoek, Antony van, 2, 132, 139, 192 original sin see sin: original
Leucippus, 44, 131
Locke, John, 4, 45, 56n Pascal, Blaise, 132
Paul, St, 206, 237
Malebranche, Nicolas, 2, 4, 54–5, 108n, perception
123, 132n, 139, 153n, 192, 223, 228n, confused, 24, 36, 74, 76n, 110–12, 114,
229–30, 232, 257, 258n 121, 125–7, 134, 145, 184–5, 260,
matter, 26–8, 30, 44–6, 47n, 58, 127–8, 272, 275–6
133–7, 145, 163, 166–7, 172–3, 176, distinct, 17–18, 24, 26, 35–6, 73–5,
183, 198, 204–5, 220–1, 223, 234, 239, 78–9, 111–14, 125–8, 134–5, 184,
242–4, 250, 257–8, 274–5, 278–9 272, 275–6, 279–80
imperfection of, 239, 250 little, 18, 35, 75–6, 78, 112, 157, 260, 281
is divided to infinity, 27, 37, 131–2, 135, perfection, 17, 21–5, 32, 36–7, 58, 72, 96,
225 99–100, 106, 109, 110n, 111–12, 115,
is indifferent to motion and rest, 167, 117–19, 121–2, 130, 159, 160–2, 168,
176, 242, 274 172, 173n, 175–7, 185–7, 190, 192,
see also plenum 194, 196–7, 199, 204, 207, 209, 211,
memory, 17, 19, 35, 73, 79–82, 272 216–18, 224, 228, 230–1, 236, 239,
metamorphosis, 28, 136–7, 273 241, 243, 249, 262, 264–5, 268, 274–7,
metempsychosis, 28, 136–7, 189, 273, 281 281
minds, 1, 7, 16, 19, 30–2, 35–6, 38, 49–50, pineal gland, 145–7
66–9, 82, 86, 102–3, 107, 113, 136, Plato, 1, 6, 50n, 83, 136, 138n, 172, 179,
141, 145, 147–54, 165, 176, 192, 198, 220, 221n, 236, 245, 250–1, 279
204–5, 270, 272–3, 276, 278, 281 plenum, 15, 26–7, 37, 55–8, 93, 127–8,
are images of the divinity, 7, 31, 38, 271, 281
149–53, 276, 279 Plotinus, 6
294
Index
Poiret, Pierre, 23, 105–6 substance, 1, 30, 37, 39–40, 50, 53–5, 60–7,
possible world see world: possible 70, 72, 76, 83–5, 92, 96–8, 108–9,
preformationism, 139, 141 114–15, 120, 123, 125, 133, 136, 143,
principle of contradiction, 20, 36, 85–8, 145, 159, 164, 167–8, 174–5, 177,
179, 281 183, 185–6, 190–1, 195, 204, 210, 225,
principle of sufficient reason, 20, 36, 59, 244, 249, 251, 254, 256, 258, 260, 270,
86–8, 96, 106, 117, 179, 281 272–4, 277–9
principle of the best, 23, 88, 107, 119, 164, as mirror of the universe, 25, 27, 29, 31,
270 37–8, 119–21, 129, 142, 149, 271,
principle of uniformity, 88, 133 275–6, 279
Pythagoras, 40, 191, 248 compound, 270–1, 280
flower of, 136
Quietism, 165 simple, 6, iv
14–18, 23–6, 34–5, 37, 39–40, 42–3,
reality 45–6, 48–51, 55, 62, 64, 66, 69–73,
degrees of, 97–9 75–6, 107, 113, 115, 119, 121, 126,
of essences/possibilities/truths, 22, 36, 165, 184–5, 191, 256–8, 260, 270–1,
101–4, 222 278–9, 281
see also perfection supreme see God
Remond, Nicole, 5–9, 13, 49, 120, 278 substantial form, 6, 190, 256
sufficient reason see principle of sufficient
Scholastics, 6, 15–16, 40, 53, 60, 68, 77, reason
84, 94, 166, 173–4, 176, 179, 215, 219, Swammerdam, Jan, 139, 192
224n, 254, 256
seeds, 29, 37–8, 138–40, 148–9, 163, 192, Thomists, 191, 219, 249
224, 257, 273 traduction, 139, 189–90, 257
sensation, 1, 17, 35, 73, 78–9, 157, 272 transcreation, 148, 192
sin truths
and creaturely imperfection, 100, 172, contingent see truths: of fact
268 eternal, 19, 22–3, 36, 82–3, 100–6, 172–
author of, 176, 254–6, 258, 267 3, 201, 209, 222, 224, 273, 276, 279
of Adam, 169n, 188, 192, 194, 264 of fact, 20–1, 23, 36, 89–92
original, 189 of mathematics, 83, 106, 223, 273
punishment of, 156–7, 159, 194 of metaphysics, 87, 273
see also evil: moral of morality, 221
Socrates, 207, 220 of reasoning, 20, 89, 212
soul of sciences, 84
animal, 28, 68–9, 78–81, 86, 134, 140,
142, 146, 148–9, 192 union of soul and body, 30, 143–4, 164,
immortality of, 142, 176, 190–1, 272 240–1, 244, 246, 271
rational see mind unity see substance: simple
transmigration of the see universe see world
metempsychosis
Spinoza, Baruch, 2, 39, 55, 67, 88, 103, world
105, 116, 117n, 123, 164, 173n, best, 1, 7, 25, 37, 107, 118–19, 168–9,
216–17, 241 180, 197, 209, 226, 231, 239, 261–2,
spontaneity, 181, 184 275, 279
Strato, 223–4, 241, 243–4 possible, 25, 101, 114–19, 167, 169,
295
180–1, 261–2

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Leibniz’s

© Lloyd Strickland, 2014

Edinburgh University Press Ltd

Typeset in 11/13pt Ehrhardt MT Pro by

ISBN 978 0 7486 9321 4 (hardback)

The right of Lloyd Strickland to be identified as Author of this work

Glossary of Terms 280

I would like to extend my warmest thanks to an anonymous reviewer for

In the notes, commonly cited editions of Leibniz’s writings are referred to

A = Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe, ed. Deutsche Akademie der

Few works of philosophy can rival Leibniz’s Monadology in terms of

THE ORIGINS AND FATE OF THE MONADOLOGY

Remond continued to explain Fraguier’s belief that poets had succeeded in

The two separate threads – Remond’s request for ‘clarification’ of monads,

Even with the benefit of a commentary, the Monadology is a difficult text to

2. And there must be simple substances, because there are compounds;

4. There is also no dissolution to fear, and there is no conceivable way in

7. There is also no way of explaining how a monad could be internally

13. This complete specification must encompass a plurality within the

16. We ourselves experience a plurality within a simple substance when

18. The name ‘entelechies’ could be given to all simple substances, or

19. If we wish to call ‘soul’ everything which has perceptions and

22. And as every present state of a simple substance is naturally a conse-

23. therefore, since we apperceive our perceptions when we come

34. This is how the speculative theorems and practical canons of

44. For if there is a reality in essences or possibilities, or indeed in eternal

And these correspond to what there is in created monads: the subject

53. Now as there is an infinity of possible universes in the ideas of God,

56. Now this interconnection, or this accommodation of all created things

63. The body belonging to a monad, which is its entelechy or soul,

69. Thus there is nothing uncultivated, nothing sterile, nothing dead in

78. These principles have given me a way of naturally explaining the

Definition – gives the essence or nature of a thing

This yields the following structure:

Leibniz begins with a definition of the monad: a simple substance which

2. And there must be simple substances, because there are compounds;

Leibniz now gives an argument for simple substances. The argument

Premise 1: There are compounds.

The argument is straightforward enough. The assertion that there are

Premise 1: Without simple substances there could be no compounds.

Here Leibniz argues that by virtue of having no parts, monads cannot be

4. There is also no dissolution to fear, and there is no conceivable way in

In M5 Leibniz ruled out monads beginning naturally, and in M4 he ruled

7. There is also no way of explaining how a monad could be internally

Leibniz now argues that there is no inter-substance causality, or transeunt

Here Leibniz moves from ‘actions belong to substances’ to ‘every sub-

Moreover, Leibniz held that each individual substance is defined by its

13. This complete specification must encompass a plurality within the

14. The passing state, which encompasses and represents a plurality

Leibniz starts by giving a very technical definition of perception as the

All grades of monad have perceptions, and hence represent external

Leibniz established that there must be an internal principle of change in

16. We ourselves experience a plurality within a simple substance when

Leibniz now gives us an everyday example of a simple substance encom-

The argument detailed here is often referred to as ‘Leibniz’s Mill’, or the

Glossary of Terms 280

A = Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe, ed. Deutsche Akademie der

Preface (referenced in M80) and b (referenced in M69)