be in us as the shape of Hercules is in a piece of marble when the marble is entirely neutral as to whether it assumes this shape or some other. However, if there were veins in the block which marked out the shape of Hercules rather than other shapes, then that block would be more determined to that shape and Hercules would be innate in it, in a way, even though labour would be required to expose the veins and to polish them into clarity, removing everything that prevents their being seen. This is how ideas and truths are innate in us – as inclinations, dispositions, tendencies, or natural potentialities, and not as actions; although these potentialities are always accompanied by certain actions, often insensible ones, which correspond to them.
Our gifted author seems to claim that there is nothing potential in us, in fact nothing of which we are not always actually aware. But he cannot hold strictly to this; otherwise his position would be too paradoxical, since, again, we are not always aware of our acquired dispositions or of the contents of our memory, and they do not even come to our aid whenever we need them, though often they come readily to mind when some idle circumstance reminds us of them, as when hearing the opening words of a song is enough to bring back the rest. So on other occasions he limits his thesis to the statement that there is nothing in us of which we have not at least previously been aware. But no one can establish by reason alone how far our past and now perhaps forgotten awarenesses may have extended, especially if we accept the Platonists’ doctrine of recollection which, though sheer myth, is entirely consistent with unadorned reason. And furthermore, why must we acquire everything through awareness of outer things and not be able to unearth anything from within ourselves? Is our soul in itself so empty that unless it borrows images from outside it is nothing? I am sure that our judicious author could not approve of such a view. Where could tablets be found which were completely uniform? Will a perfectly homogeneous and even surface ever be seen? So why could we not also provide ourselves with objects of thought from our own depths, if we take the trouble to dig there? Which leads me to believe that fundamentally his view on this question is not different from my own or rather from the common view, especially since he recognizes two sources of our knowledge, the senses and reflection.
Specimen Questions
1 Why does Leibniz believe that knowledge of the principles of logic and mathematics cannot be derived from experience?
2 Leibniz argues that ‘if some events can be foreseen before any test has been made of them, it is obvious that we contribute something from our side’. Do you agree?
3 What examples of innate ideas does Leibniz present? Why is it that experience could not be the source of these ideas?
Suggestions for Further Reading (Including Internet Resources)
1 G. W. Leibniz, New Essays on Human Understanding [Nouveaux essais sur l’entendement humain, c.1704; first pub. 1765], ed. and trans. P. Remnant and J. Bennett (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981).
2 Many of Leibniz’s other important works are translated in Leibniz, Philosophical Writings, ed. G. H. R. Parkinson (rev. edn, London: Dent, 1973). See also G. W. Leibniz, Philosophical Texts, ed. R. S. Woolhouse and R. Franks (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), which contains a helpful introduction for students.
3 A useful introduction is N. Rescher, The Philosophy of Leibniz (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1968).
4 See also C. D. Broad, Leibniz: An Introduction, ed. C. Lewy (rev. edn, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975).
5 For a general account of the philosophy of Leibniz and other ‘rationalist’ thinkers, see J. Cottingham, The Rationalists (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988).
6 For a valuable account of the Locke–Leibniz debate, see N. Jolley, Leibniz and Locke: A Study of the New Essays (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984).
7 Introductory entries on Leibniz’s philosophy and in particular his understanding of innate ideas can be found on these two online sites: Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy at https://www.iep.utm.edu/leib-met/#SH9d (by D. Burnham), and the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy at https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz/#InnIde (by B. Look). For a general survey of the historical debate surrounding innateness see also https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/innateness-history/ (J. Samet).
8 An online source of new Leibniz texts and translations is L. Strickland’s website http://www.leibniz-translations.com/ which has many useful links to further Leibniz resources.
9 For all currently available Leibniz texts go to https://leibnizedition.de.
Notes
* G. W. Leibniz, New Essays on Human Understanding [Nouveaux essais sur l’entendement humain, c.1704; first pub. 1765]. Trans. and ed. Peter Remnant and Jonathan Bennett (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), paras 44–53.
7 Scepticism versus Human Nature: David Hume, Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding*
The debate between Locke and Leibniz over the sources of knowledge exerted a strong influence on the philosophy of the eighteenth century. The famous Scottish philosopher David Hume came down firmly on the side of Locke. Sense experience, he argued, must be the basis of all knowledge concerning matters of fact or existence. Yet the work of Descartes, as we have seen from the above extract (no. 4), had shown, or seemed to show, that any attempt to base knowledge on sensory experience was wrong-headed, since a series of sceptical arguments could be mounted to call the reliability of the senses into doubt. In our next extract, from Section XII of An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748), Hume provided a systematic critique of much philosophical scepticism.
First Hume targets the kind of scepticism ‘much inculcated by Descartes’ – the kind of radical doubt entertained as a first step, prior to any science or philosophy. It is impossible, Hume argues, for us consistently to entertain this kind of universal doubt, and even if we could do so, the doubts raised would be entirely incurable. Next Hume targets the kind of scepticism that operates at a later stage, ‘consequent to science and enquiry’ – the kind which uses the supposed results of science and philosophy to cast doubt on our ordinary beliefs about the nature of the world around us. Here Hume draws attention to the power of human nature as against abstract philosophical reasoning: men are carried ‘by a natural instinct to repose faith in their senses’. Hume proceeds to develop this theme, by pointing out that ‘nature is always too strong for principle’. We are bound, when we leave the philosophy class and resume the ‘occupations of common life’, to be entirely immune to the abstract reasonings of the extreme sceptics or ‘Pyrrhonians’:1 they will ‘vanish like smoke’ when put in opposition to the ‘more powerful principles of our nature’. Finally, Hume goes on to allow the merits of ‘mitigated’ or limited scepticism, which warns us against too readily accepting wild and extravagant doctrines. There is a place for philosophy here, in showing us how to think sensibly, and avoid dogmatism. But we can only do this by ‘limiting our enquiries to such subjects as are best adapted to the narrow capacity of human understanding’; we must realize (as Hume argues elsewhere) that all our beliefs about matters of fact and existence must be ‘founded entirely upon experience’.2 Hume here sets up what was to become a highly influential conception of knowledge as something that can operate only within the bounds determined by our nature as human beings.
