What has Cartesianism to do with Jansenism?

Journal of the History of Ideas

Volumn 60, Issue 1, 1999, Pages 37-56

  Schmaltz, Tad M ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0042527898     PISSN: 00225037     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/3653999     Document Type: Article

References (79)

1. See Nigel Abercrombie, The Origins of Jansenism (Oxford, 1936), 87-92; and J. Orcibal, "De Baius à Jansénius, le 'comma pianum,' " Revue des sciences religieuses, 36 (1962), 115-39.
2. See Nigel Abercrombie, The Origins of Jansenism (Oxford, 1936), 87-92; and J. Orcibal, "De Baius à Jansénius, le 'comma pianum,' " Revue des sciences religieuses, 36 (1962), 115-39.
3. Oeuvres de Descartes, ed. C. Adam and P. Tannery (1897-1920; Paris, 1964-73), I, 366 (hereafter cited as AT).
4. AT, IV, 119.
5. AT, IV, 157.
6. AT, I, 383-84, 454-56. See Roger Ariew, "Descartes and Scholasticism: The Intellectual Background to Descartes' Thought," The Cambridge Companion to Descartes, ed. J. Cottingham (Cambridge, 1992), 58-90.
7. AT, I, 50.
8. See AT, IV, 11-20.
9. AT, IV, 122.
10. AT, VII, 58.
11. AT, III, 360.
12. AT, VIII-1, 20.
13. AT, IV, 116. Cf. Descartes's claim in a later letter, perhaps again to Mesland, that "absolutely speaking" we can always "hold back from pursuing a clearly known good, or from admitting a clearly perceived truth" (AT, IV, 173).
14. AT, IV, 115.
15. Oeuvres de Messire Antoine Arnauld Docteur de la maison et société de Sorbonne (Paris, 1775-83), I, 671 (hereafter cited as OA).
16. Histoire de la philosophie cartésienne (Paris, 1868), I, 434.
17. J. Orcibal, "Qu'est-ce que le jansénisme," Cahiers de l'association internationale des études françaises, 3 (1953), 39-53.
18. See J.-R. Armogathe and M. Dupuy, "Jansénisme," Dictionnaire de spiritualité: ascétique et mystique, doctrine et histoire (Paris, 1974), VIII, 102-48.
19. This corresponds to what Cognet (Le Jansénisme [Paris, 1961]) has called "first Jansenism," which, in contrast to a "second Jansenism" that emerges from the writings of Quesnel and reflects battles in the late 1670s concerning Louis's attempt to extend the régale, emphasizes theological issues over political ones.
20. Receuil de quelques pièces curieuses concernant la philosophie de Monsieur Descartes (Amsterdam, 1684), 23.
21. See, for instance, OA, III, 392.
22. See E. J. Kremer, "Grace and Free Will in Arnauld," in The Great Arnauld and Some of His Philosophical Correspondents, ed. E. J. Kremer (Toronto, 1994), 219-39.
23. Arnauld in fact had objected to Malebranche's view that free consent derives from our will rather than from God by saying, "I do not know whether Pelagius ever said anything more pelagian" (OA, XXXVIII, 648-49).
24. See P. Jansen, Le cardinal Mazarin et le mouvement janséniste français, 1653-1659 (Paris, 1967).
25. Louis XIV: Mémoires for the Instruction of the Dauphin, tr. P. Sonnino (New York, 1970), 54.
26. OA, I, 291-94.
27. The source of the controversy was the discussion in Molina's 1588 Concordia liberi arbitrii cum gratiœ donis, divina prœscientia, providentia, prœdestinatione, et reprobatione, ad nonnullos primœ partis D. Thomœ articulos.
28. Mémoires du P. René Rapin sur l'Eglise et la société, la cour, la ville, et le jansénisme, 1644-1669 (Paris, 1865), III, 506.
29. This label is cited in D. Van Kley, The Jansenists and the Expulsion of the Jesuits from France, 1757-1765 (New Haven, 1975), 31.
30. Cited in C. de Rochemonteix, Un Collège de Jésuits aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles: le Collège Henri IV de la Flèche (Le Mans, 1889), IV, 4n-6n.
31. Rapin, Mémoires, I, 246, 283, and 290, respectively.
32. AT, VIII-1, 323.
33. This view has a basis in Descartes himself; see AT, III, 298.
34. Thomas Lennon and Patricia Ann Easton, The Cartesian Empiricism of François Bayle (New York, 1992), 1.
35. J. Prost, Essai sur l'atomisme et l'occasionalisme dans la philosophie cartésienne (Paris, 1907), 158.
36. Oeuvres complètes de Malebranche, ed. A. Robinet (Paris, 1958-69), XVIII, 84ff.
37. Régis, Cours entier de philosophie ou systeme general selon les principes de M. Descartes (1691; New York, 1970), I, 123; L'Usage de la raison et de la foy (Paris, 1704), 16.
38. Régis, Cours entier de philosophie ou systeme general selon les principes de M. Descartes (1691; New York, 1970), I, 123; L'Usage de la raison et de la foy (Paris, 1704), 16.
39. 7AT, VII, 31.
40. This condemnation was preceded by the 1662 condemnation by the Faculty of Theology in Louvain of five propositions from Descartes, three of which directly concern the issue of the Eucharist.
41. e siècle,́ Archives de philosophie, 6 (1929), 51 n.2.
42. Considerations sur l'état présent de la controverse touchant le Très Saint-Sacrement de l'autel, où il est traité en peu de mots de l'opinion qui enseigne que la matière du pain est changé en celle du corps de Jésus-Christ par son union substantielle à son âme et à sa personne divine (Hollande, 1671).
43. Cited in Trevor McClaughlin, "Censorship and the Defenders of the Cartesian Faith in Mid-Seventeenth Century France," JHI, 40 (1979), 572.
44. For a discussion of the 1671 royal decree and its relation to the 1624 statutes, see Roger Ariew, "Damned If You Do: Cartesians and Censorship, 1663-1706," Perspectives on Science, 2 (1994), 257-66.
45. See, e.g., Thomas Lennon, Battle of the Gods and Giants: The Legacies of Descartes and Gassendi, 1655-1715 (Princeton, 1993), ch. 1; and L. W. B. Brockliss, "Descartes, Gassendi, and the Reception of the Mechanical Philosophy in the French Collèges de Plein Exercice, 1640-1730," Perspectives on Science, 3 (1995), 450-75.
46. See, e.g., Thomas Lennon, Battle of the Gods and Giants: The Legacies of Descartes and Gassendi, 1655-1715 (Princeton, 1993), ch. 1; and L. W. B. Brockliss, "Descartes, Gassendi, and the Reception of the Mechanical Philosophy in the French Collèges de Plein Exercice, 1640-1730," Perspectives on Science, 3 (1995), 450-75.
47. Correspondance de Mme de Sévigné, ed. R. Duchêne (Paris, 1972), II, 398.
48. Voyage du Monde de M. Descartes (Paris, 1690), 285.
49. Collectio judiciorum de novis erroribus, ed. C. Duplessis d'Argentré (Paris, 1728-36), III-2, 344ff.
50. La politique du clergé de France (Cologne, 1681), 107.
51. See G. [Rodis-]Lewis, "Augustinisme et cartésianisme à Port-Royal," Descartes et le cartésianisme hollandais, eds. E. J. Dijksterhuis et al. (Paris, 1950), 131-82, especially her conclusion there that "excepting perhaps Pontchateau, Arnauld thus appeared totally isolated in his attachment to Cartesianism as such" (ibid., 148). Cf. Steven Nadler, "Cartesianism and Port-Royal," Monist, 71 (1988), 573-84.
52. See G. [Rodis-]Lewis, "Augustinisme et cartésianisme à Port-Royal," Descartes et le cartésianisme hollandais, eds. E. J. Dijksterhuis et al. (Paris, 1950), 131-82, especially her conclusion there that "excepting perhaps Pontchateau, Arnauld thus appeared totally isolated in his attachment to Cartesianism as such" (ibid., 148). Cf. Steven Nadler, "Cartesianism and Port-Royal," Monist, 71 (1988), 573-84.
53. See G. [Rodis-]Lewis, "Augustinisme et cartésianisme à Port-Royal," Descartes et le cartésianisme hollandais, eds. E. J. Dijksterhuis et al. (Paris, 1950), 131-82, especially her conclusion there that "excepting perhaps Pontchateau, Arnauld thus appeared totally isolated in his attachment to Cartesianism as such" (ibid., 148). Cf. Steven Nadler, "Cartesianism and Port-Royal," Monist, 71 (1988), 573-84.
54. "Observations," Descartes et le cartésianisme hollandais, 116. Cf. Du Vaucel's critique of Desgabets's views on the "indéfectibilité des créatures" in ibid., 122ff, 125ff.
55. "Observations," Descartes et le cartésianisme hollandais, 116. Cf. Du Vaucel's critique of Desgabets's views on the "indéfectibilité des créatures" in ibid., 122ff, 125ff.
56. He was allowed, however, to publish the 1675 Critique de la critique, 3 response to Simon Foucher's Critique of Malebranche's Recherche de la vérité.
57. Cited in G. Guitton, Le père de la Chaize, confesseur de Louis XIV (Paris, 1959), I, 42.
58. Mémoires, III, 486.
59. Victor Cousin, Fragments philosophiques pour servir à l'histoire de la philosophie (Paris, 1866), III, 301.
60. Ibid., III, 303ff.
61. OA, I, 671.
62. Cited in F. Bluche, Louis XIV, tr. M. Greengrass (New York, 1990), 208.
63. Ibid., 394.
64. In contrast to earlier condemnations of Cartesianism, there is no emphasis in the 1691 condemnation on Descartes's denial of real qualities that persist without a subject in the Eucharist (though it does condemn the Cartesian thesis that "the matter of bodies is nothing other than their extension, and the one cannot be without the other"). For a reprint of the 1691 condemnation, see Roger Ariew, "Quelques condamnations du cartésianisme: 1662-1706," Bulletin cartésien XXII, Archives de Philosophie, 57 (1994), 4ff.
65. See J.-R. Armogathe, Theologia cartesiana: l'explication physique de l'Eucharistie chez Descartes et dom Desgabets (The Hague, 1977), 105.
66. See for instance OA, XXXVIII, 94.
67. There is a summary of this book in Abercrombie, Origins, 134-36. Abercrombie objects that Jansen's critique of philosophy is in some tension with his own use of philosophy to refute the Molinists, an objection which assumes an Arnauldian reading of this critique.
68. See Arnauld, Examen d'un ecrit qui a pour titre: Traité de l'essence du Corps, & de l'union de l'Ame avec le Corps, contre la Philosophie de M. Descartes (1680), in OA XXXVIII, 100-124. For discussion of his position, see E. J. Kremer, "Arnauld's Interpretation of Descartes as a Christian Philosopher," Interpreting Arnauld, ed. E. J. Kremer (Toronto, 1996), 77-83. The only access we have to the views to which Arnauld is reacting is by way of his summary of them, since Le Moine's Traité is lost.
69. See Arnauld, Examen d'un ecrit qui a pour titre: Traité de l'essence du Corps, & de l'union de l'Ame avec le Corps, contre la Philosophie de M. Descartes (1680), in OA XXXVIII, 100-124. For discussion of his position, see E. J. Kremer, "Arnauld's Interpretation of Descartes as a Christian Philosopher," Interpreting Arnauld, ed. E. J. Kremer (Toronto, 1996), 77-83. The only access we have to the views to which Arnauld is reacting is by way of his summary of them, since Le Moine's Traité is lost.
70. See Arnauld, Examen d'un ecrit qui a pour titre: Traité de l'essence du Corps, & de l'union de l'Ame avec le Corps, contre la Philosophie de M. Descartes (1680), in OA XXXVIII, 100-124. For discussion of his position, see E. J. Kremer, "Arnauld's Interpretation of Descartes as a Christian Philosopher," Interpreting Arnauld, ed. E. J. Kremer (Toronto, 1996), 77-83. The only access we have to the views to which Arnauld is reacting is by way of his summary of them, since Le Moine's Traité is lost.
71. For Desgabets's development of this account, see Armogathe, Theologia cartesiana, §2.II.
72. For the emphasis on the incomprehensibility of revealed truths, see Arnauld's remarks at OA, XXXVIII, 121-24.
73. Cited in Abercrombie, Origins, 214. The prominence of Arnauld is confirmed by the Jesuit litany cited above.
74. See R. Taveneaux, Le jansénisme en Lorraine, 1640-1789 (Paris, 1960), 118-31. Cf. Armogathe, Theologia cartesiana, §2.II.
75. See R. Taveneaux, Le jansénisme en Lorraine, 1640-1789 (Paris, 1960), 118-31. Cf. Armogathe, Theologia cartesiana, §2.II.
76. Compare the stress in the articles cited in note 48 on the wariness of Arnauld's Cartesianism in Port-Royal with the emphasis in Taveneaux (Le jansénisme, 118-31) on Desgabets's successes in Lorraine.
77. See G. Rodis-Lewis, "Augustinisme et cartésianisme," L'Anthropologie cartésienne (Paris, 1990), 101-25, and H. Gouhier, Cartésianisme et augustinisme au xviie siècle (Paris, 1978).
78. See G. Rodis-Lewis, "Augustinisme et cartésianisme," L'Anthropologie cartésienne (Paris, 1990), 101-25, and H. Gouhier, Cartésianisme et augustinisme au xviie siècle (Paris, 1978).
79. I would like to thank Steven Nadler and Roger Ariew for helpful comments, and to acknowledge that work on this article was made possible by a fellowship sponsored by the Research Triangle Foundation of North Carolina and by the support of the National Humanities Center.