Pierre Gassendi | |
|---|---|
 Pierre Gassendi byLouis-Édouard Rioult | |
| Born | (1592-01-22)22 January 1592 |
| Died | 24 October 1655(1655-10-24) (aged 63) |
| Education | University of Aix-en-Provence University of Avignon(Th.D., 1614) |
| Era | 17th-century philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
| School | |
| Institutions | University of Aix-en-Provence Collège Royal |
Main interests | Philosophical logic,physics,ethics |
Notable ideas | Calor vitalis (vital heat) |
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Pierre Gassendi (French:[pjɛʁgasɛ̃di];[5] alsoPierre Gassend,Petrus Gassendi, Petrus Gassendus; 22 January 1592 – 24 October 1655) was a Frenchphilosopher,Catholic priest,astronomer, andmathematician.[1][6][7] While he held a church position in south-east France, he also spent much time in Paris, where he was a leader of a group offree-thinking intellectuals. He was also an active observationalscientist, publishing the first data on thetransit of Mercury in 1631. The lunar craterGassendi is named after him.
He wrote numerous philosophical works, and some of the positions he worked out are considered significant, finding a way betweenskepticism anddogmatism.Richard Popkin indicates that Gassendi was one of the first thinkers to formulate the modern "scientific outlook", of moderated skepticism andempiricism. He clashed with his contemporaryDescartes on the possibility of certain knowledge. His best known intellectual project attempted to reconcileEpicureanatomism withChristianity.
Gassendi was born atChamptercier, nearDigne, inFrance to Antoine Gassend and Françoise Fabry.[8] His earliest education was entrusted to his maternal uncle, Thomas Fabry, thecuré of the church of Champtercier.[9] A youthful prodigy, at a very early age he showed academic potential and attended the collège (the town high school) at Digne, where he displayed a particular aptitude for languages andmathematics. In 1609 he entered theUniversity of Aix-en-Provence, to study philosophy under Philibert Fesaye, O.Carm.[10] at the Collège Royal de Bourbon (the Faculty of Arts of the University of Aix).[11] In 1612 the college of Digne called him to lecture ontheology. While at Digne, he travelled toSenez, where he received minor orders from Bishop Jacques Martin. In 1614 he received the degree ofDoctor of Theology from theUniversity of Avignon,[12] and was elected Theologian in the Cathedral Chapter of Digne. On 1 August 1617 he received holy orders from Bishop Jacques Turricella of Marseille.[9] In the same year, at the age of 24, he accepted the chair of philosophy at the University of Aix-en-Provence, and yielded the chair of theology to his old teacher, Fesaye. Gassendi seems gradually to have withdrawn from theology. He maintained his position as Canon Theologian at Digne, however, and in September 1619, when Bishop Raphaël de Bologne took possession of the diocese of Digne, Gassendi participated and made the speech on behalf of the Chapter.[13]
He lectured principally on theAristotelian philosophy, conforming as far as possible to the traditional methods while he also followed with interest the discoveries ofGalileo andKepler. He came into contact with the astronomerJoseph Gaultier de la Vallette (1564–1647), the Grand Vicar of the Archbishopric of Aix.[14]
In 1623 theSociety of Jesus took over the University of Aix. They filled all positions with Jesuits, so Gassendi was required to find another institution.[15] He left, returning to Digne on 10 February 1623, and then returned to Aix to witness an eclipse of the moon on 14 April and the presence of Mars in Sagittarius on 7 June, from which he returned again to Digne.[16] He travelled toGrenoble on behalf of the Chapter of Digne for a lawsuit, most reluctantly, since he was working on his project on Aristotle's paradoxes.[17] In 1624 he printed the first part of hisExercitationes paradoxicae adversus Aristoteleos. A fragment of the second book later appeared in print atThe Hague (1659), but Gassendi never composed the remaining five, apparently thinking that theDiscussiones Peripateticae ofFrancesco Patrizzi left little scope for him.
He spent some time with his patronNicolas Peiresc. After 1628 Gassendi travelled inFlanders and inHolland where he encounteredIsaac Beeckman andFrançois Luillier.[17][18] He returned to France in 1631. In 1634 the Cathedral Chapter of Digne had become disgusted at the wasteful behavior of Provost Blaise Ausset, and they voted to replace him. They obtained an arrêt of the Parliament of Aix, dated 19 December 1634, which consented to his deposition and to the election of Gassendi asprovost ofthe Cathedral Chapter. Gassendi was formally installed on 24 December 1634. He held the Provostship until his death in 1655.[19]
During this time he wrote some works, at the insistence ofMarin Mersenne. They included his examination of the mystical philosophy ofRobert Fludd,[20] an essay onparhelia,[21] and some observations on the transit ofMercury.
Gassendi then spent some years travelling through Provence with theduke of Angoulême, governor of the region. During this period he wrote only the one literary work, hisLife of Peiresc, whose death in 1637 seemed to afflict him deeply;[22] it received frequent reprintings and an English translation. He returned to Paris in 1641, where he metThomas Hobbes.[23] He gave some informal philosophy classes, gaining pupils or disciples; according to the biographer Grimarest, these includedMolière,Cyrano de Bergerac (whose participation in classes is disputed),[24]Jean Hesnault andClaude-Emmanuel Chapelle, son of Lullier.[25][26]
In 1640Mersenne engaged him in controversy withRené Descartes. His objections to the fundamental propositions of Descartes appeared in print in 1641; they appear as the Fifth Set of Objections in the works of Descartes[27] and as a separate edition entitledDisquisitio Metaphysica[28] with rejoinders.[29] Though Descartes is often credited with the discovery of themind-body problem, Gassendi, reacting to Descartes' mind-body dualism, was the first to state it.[30] Gassendi's tendency towards the empirical school of speculation appears more pronounced here than in any of his other writings.Jean-Baptiste Morin attacked hisDe motu impresso a motore translato (1642).[22] In 1643 Mersenne also tried to garner support from the GermanSocinian and advocate of religious toleranceMarcin Ruar. Ruar replied at length that he had already read Gassendi but was in favour of leaving science to science not to the church.[31]
In 1645 he accepted the chair of mathematics in theCollège Royal in Paris, and lectured for several years with great success. In addition to controversial writings on physical questions, there appeared during this period the first of the works for which historians of philosophy remember him. In 1647 he published the well-received treatiseDe vita, moribus, et doctrina Epicuri libri octo. Two years later appeared his commentary on the tenth book ofDiogenes Laërtius.[32] In the same year he had published the more important commentarySyntagma philosophiae Epicuri.[33]
In 1648 ill-health compelled him to give up his lectures at the Collège Royal. Around this time he became reconciled to Descartes, after years of coldness, through the good offices ofCésar d'Estrées.[34]
Gassendi travelled in the south of France in the company of hisprotégé, aide and secretaryFrançois Bernier, another pupil from Paris. He spent nearly two years atToulon, where the climate suited him. In 1653 he returned to Paris and resumed his literary work, living in the house ofMontmor, publishing in that year lives ofCopernicus and ofTycho Brahe. The disease from which he suffered, a lung complaint, had, however, established a firm hold on him. His strength gradually failed, and he died at Paris in 1655. A bronze statue of him (by Joseph Ramus) was erected by subscription at Digne in 1852. A large crater on the Moon is named after him.[35]
As part of his promotion of empirical methods and his anti-Aristotelian and anti-Cartesian views, Gassendi was responsible for a number of scientific 'firsts':
In addition to these achievements, Gassendi performed work ondetermining longitude via eclipses of the Moon and on improving theRudolphine Tables. He addressed the issue offree fall inDe motu (1642) andDe proportione qua gravia decidentia accelerantur (1646).[36]
Edward Gibbon styled him "Le meilleur philosophe des littérateurs, et le meilleur littérateur des philosophes" (The greatest philosopher among literary men, and the greatest literary man among philosophers).
Henri Louis Habert de Montmor published Gassendi's collected works, most importantly theSyntagma philosophicum (Opera, i. and ii.), in 1658 (6 vols., Lyons).Nicolaus Averanius published another edition, also in 6 folio volumes, in 1727. The first two comprise entirely hisSyntagma philosophicum; the third contains his critical writings onEpicurus,Aristotle,Descartes,Robert Fludd andHerbert of Cherbury, with some occasional pieces on certain problems ofphysics; the fourth, hisInstitutio astronomica, and hisCommentarii de rebus celestibus; the fifth, his commentary on the tenth book ofDiogenes Laërtius, the biographies of Epicurus,Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc,Tycho Brahe,Nicolaus Copernicus,Georg von Peuerbach, andRegiomontanus, with some tracts on the value of ancient money, on the Romancalendar, and on the theory of music, with an appended large and prolix piece entitledNotitia ecclesiae Diniensis; the sixth volume contains hiscorrespondence. TheLives, especially those of Copernicus, Tycho and Peiresc, received much praise.
TheExercitationes excited much attention, though they contain little or nothing beyond what others had already advanced against Aristotle. The first book expounds clearly, and with much vigour, the evil effects of the blind acceptance of the Aristoteliandicta on physical and philosophical study; but, as occurs with so many of the anti-Aristotelian works of this period, the objections show the usual ignorance of Aristotle's own writings[citation needed]. The second book, which contains the review of Aristotle's dialectic orlogic, throughout reflectsRamism in tone and method. One of the objections to Descartes became famous through Descartes's statement of it in the appendix of objections in theMeditations.
His bookAnimadversiones, published in 1649, contains a translation ofDiogenes Laërtius, Book X on Epicurus, and appeared with a commentary, in the form of theSyntagma philosophiae Epicuri.[36] His labors on Epicurus have historical importance, but he has been criticized for holding doctrines arguably irreconcilable with his strong expressions of empiricism.
In the book, Gassendi maintains his maxim "that there is nothing in the intellect which has not been in the senses" (nihil est in intellectu quod non prius fuerit in sensu), but he contends that the imaginative faculty (phantasia) is the counterpart of sense, because it involves material images, and therefore is intrinsically material, and that it is essentially the same both in men and brutes. However, he also admits that the classic qualifier of humanity,intellect, which he affirms as immaterial and immortal, comes to an understanding of notions and truths that no effort of sensation or imagination could have attained (Op. ii. 383). Gassendi illustrates the capacity to form "general notions"; the conception of universality (ib. 384), which he says brutes never are able to partake in, though they utilizephantasia as truly as men; the notion ofGod, whom he says we may imagine ascorporeal, but understand as incorporeal; and lastly, the reflex by which the mind makes the phenomena and operations within it the objects of its attention.
The English EpicureanWalter Charleton produced an English adaptation of this book,Physiologia Epicuro-Gassendo-Charletonia, in 1654.[36]
TheSyntagma philosophicum is divided, according to the usual fashion of theEpicureans, intologic (which, with Gassendi, as withEpicurus, is truly canonic), physics, and ethics.
The logic contains a sketch of the history of the scienceDe origine et varietate logicae, and is divided into theory of right apprehension (bene imaginari), theory of right judgment (bene proponere), theory of right inference (bene colligere), theory of right method (bene ordinare). The first part contains the specially empirical positions which Gassendi afterwards neglects or leaves out of account. The senses, the sole source of knowledge, supposedly yield us immediate cognition of individual things; phantasy (which Gassendi takes as material in nature) reproduces these ideas; understanding compares these ideas, each particular, and frames general ideas. Nevertheless, he admits that the senses yield knowledge—not of things—but of qualities only, and that we arrive at the idea of thing or substance byinductive reasoning. He holds that the true method of research is the analytic, rising from lower to higher notions; yet he sees and admits that inductive reasoning, as conceived byFrancis Bacon, rests on a general proposition not itself proved by induction. The whole doctrine of judgment, syllogism and method mixes Aristotelian andRamist notions.
In the second part of theSyntagma, the physics, appears the most glaring contradiction between Gassendi's fundamental principles. While approving of the Epicurean physics, he rejects the Epicurean negation of God andparticular providence. He states the various proofs for the existence of an immaterial, infinite, supreme Being, asserts that this Being is the author of the visible universe, and strongly defends the doctrine of the foreknowledge and particular providence of God. At the same time he holds, in opposition to Epicureanism, the doctrine of an immaterial rationalsoul, endowed withimmortality and capable offree determination.Friedrich Albert Lange[37] claimed that all this portion of Gassendi's system contains nothing of his own opinions, but is introduced solely from motives of self-defence.
The positive exposition ofatomism has much that is attractive, but the hypothesis of thecalor vitalis (vital heat), a species ofanima mundi (world-soul) which he introduces as a physical explanation of physical phenomena, does not seem to throw much light on the special problems which he invokes it to solve. Nor is his theory of the weight essential to atoms as being due to an inner force impelling them to motion in any way reconcilable with his general doctrine of mechanical causes.
In the third part, the ethics, over and above the discussion on freedom, which on the whole is indefinite, there is little beyond a milder statement of the Epicurean moral code. The final end of life is happiness, and happiness is harmony of soul and body (tranquillitas animi et indolentia corporis). Probably, Gassendi thinks, perfect happiness is not attainable in this life, but it may be in the life to come.
According toGabriel Daniel, Gassendi was a littlePyrrhonian in matters of science; but that was no bad thing.[38] He wrote against the magical animism of Robert Fludd, andjudicial astrology.[39][40] He became dissatisfied with thePeripatetic system, the orthodox approach tonatural philosophy based on the writings ofAristotle. Gassendi shared anempirical tendency of the age. He contributed to the objections against Aristotelian philosophy, but waited to publish his own thoughts.
There remains some controversy as to the extent to which Gassendi subscribed to the so-calledlibertinage érudit, the learnedfree-thinking that characterised theTétrade, the Parisian circle to which he belonged, along withGabriel Naudé and two others (Élie Diodati andFrançois de La Mothe Le Vayer). Gassendi, at least, belonged to thefideist wing of the sceptics, arguing that the absence of certain knowledge implied the room for faith.[41]
In his dispute with Descartes he did apparently hold that the evidence of the senses remains the only convincing evidence; yet he maintains, as is natural from his mathematical training, that the evidence of reason is absolutely satisfactory.
Gassendi acknowledged that while the complete realisation of the continual pursuit of ultimate pleasure through communion with God might not occur in one's lifetime, he argued against the consumption of meat, considering it a significant obstacle to achieving a divine vision. Drawing support from scripture and the natural world, he envisioned a restored paradise where humans and animals coexisted in peaceful dominion, contrary to the tyranny displayed in the butchering of animals for pleasure.[2]
Gassendi supported his case forvegetarianism with arguments from medicine, history, and scripture. Inspired by Neoplatonic vegetarians and early Christian thinkers, he aligned vegetarianism with Christian doctrines, emphasizing the immortality of the soul. Gassendi, a Catholic priest, advocated for a plant-based diet without dogmatism, asserting that decisions in this lifetime were crucial for preparing the body and mind for the next. He admired the historical virtue of vegetarian practitioners and urged scholars to extract and follow the best ideas from throughout history, asserting that, especially among humanists, a vegetarian lifestyle should be embraced.[2]
Gassendi himself was not a vegetarian, but admitted that "if I were wise, I would abandon [meat] bit by bit, and nourish myself solely on the gifts on the earth ... I do not doubt that I would be happier for longer and more constantly in better health."[42]
Samuel Sorbière, a disciple,[43] recounts Gassendi's life in the first collected edition of the works, byJoseph Bougerel,Vie de Gassendi (1737; 2nd ed., 1770); as doesJean Philibert Damiron,Mémoire sur Gassendi (1839). An abridgment of his philosophy was given by his friend, the celebrated traveller,François Bernier (Abrégé de la philosophie de Gassendi, 8 vols., 1678; 2nd ed., 7 vols., 1684).
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Adamson, Robert (1911). "Gassendi, Pierre".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 11 (11th ed.). pp. 503–504.
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