A mind of her own: Hélène Metzger to émile Meyerson, 1933

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Volumn 94, Issue 3, 2003, Pages 477-491

  Chimisso, Cristina ^a   Freudenthal, Gad ^b  

^a OPEN UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

^b CNRS   (France)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 29544439002     PISSN: 00211753     EISSN: 15456994     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1086/380655     Document Type: Article

References (79)

1. Hélène Metzger's letter to Émile Meyerson, dated 6 May 1933, is found among a collection of some twenty-five letters and postcards Metzger addressed to Meyerson between 1923 and 1933. These are preserved among Meyerson's personal papers at the Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem, file number A 408/71. The fact that Meyerson's papers are at the CZA may surprise historians of science; it is a consequence of Meyerson's having held a central position in the Jewish Colonization Association. The Jewish Colonization Association was founded in 1891 as a philanthropic organization that assisted Jews who were persecuted or in depressed economic circumstances to emigrate and settle somewhere (notably in Argentina) where they could find productive employment. See Encyclopedia Judaica (Jerusalem, 1972), Vol. 10, pp. 44-49.
2. Our main source of information on Metzger's life, offering both factual details and insights into how she viewed her situation within the French community of historians of science, is the collection of letters she wrote to George Sarton between 1921 and 1944, preserved among Sarton's papers at the Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, call number bMS Am 1803 (1032). These letters have been published almost in their entirety as Hélène Metzger, "Extraits de lettres, 1921-1944," in Études sur/Studies on Hélène Metzger, ed. Gad Freudenthal (Leiden: Brill, 1990), pp. 247-269 (hereafter cited as Metzger, "Lettres").
3. For a biography see Freudenthal, "Hélène Metzger: Éléments de biographie," Études Sur/Studies on Hélène Metzger, ibid., pp. 197-208 (the volume also contains a bibliography of Metzger's work and articles on various aspects of her life and work).
4. A shorter version in English is forthcoming in Paula Hyman and Dalia Ofer, eds., Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia, CD-ROM (Jerusalem: Shalvi, in press).
5. For a study of Metzger's philosophical project in its social and intellectual settings see Cristina Chimisso, "Hélène Metzger: The History of Science between the Study of Mentalities and Total History," Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 2001, 32:203-241.
6. For the published version of the thesis see Hélène Metzger, La genèse de la science des cristaux (Paris: Alcan, 1918; rpt., Paris: Blanchard, 1969).
7. The monographs are Metzger, Les doctrines chimiques en France du début du XVIIe à la fin du XVIIIe siècle (Paris: Presses Univ. France, 1923; rpt., Paris: Blanchard, 1969);
8. Metzger, Les concepts scientifiques (Paris: Alcan, 1926);
9. Metzger, Newton, Stahl, Boerhaave et la doctrine chimique (Paris: Alcan, 1930; rpt., Paris: Blanchard, 1974);
10. Metzger, La chimie (Paris: Boccard, 1930);
11. Metzger, La philosophie de la matière chez Lavoisier (Paris: Hermann, 1935);
12. and Metzger, Attraction universelle et religion naturelle chez quelques commentateurs anglais de Newton (Paris: Hermann, 1938).
13. The essays are collected in Metzger, La méthode philosophique en histoire des sciences, ed. Gad Freudenthal (Paris: Fayard, 1987).
14. On Meyerson's life see André Metz, "Émile Meyerson" [Séance du 26 novembre 1960: "Commémoration du centenaire de la naissance de deux Épistémologues français: Emile Meyerson et Gaston Milhaud"], Bulletin de la Société Française de Philosophie, 1961, pp. 98-105;
15. Encyclopedia Judaica (cit. n. 1), Vol. 11, pp. 1468-1469;
16. and Yoram Mayorek, "Émile Meyerson and the Beginning of the Involvement of the Jewish Colonization Association in Eretz Israel" [in Hebrew], Cathedra for the History of Eretz Israel and Its Yishuv (Jerusalem), 1991, 62:67-79.
17. For his publications see, notably, Émile Meyerson, Identité et réalité, 3rd ed. (Paris: Payot, 1908)
18. (the English translation is Identity and Reality, trans. K. Loewenberg [London: Allen & Unwin, 1930]);
19. Meyerson, De l'explication dans les sciences, 2 vols. (Paris: Payot, 1921);
20. and Meyerson, Du cheminement de la pensée, 3 vols. (Paris: Alcan, 1931).
21. The published correspondence between Meyerson and Harald Hoffding shows the wide network of Meyerson's intellectual and personal friendships and acquaintances: Correspondence entre Harald Hoffding et Émile Meyerson, ed. Frithiof Brandt, Hans Hoffding, and Jean Adigard des Gautries (1939; rpt., Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 2002).
22. Meyerson, too, never had an academic post, although to our knowledge this had no detrimental effect on his self-esteem.
23. There is a persistent misperception that Metzger and Meyerson had kindred philosophical approaches to the study of science. This perception has been nurtured, notably, by the fact that the late Thomas S. Kuhn mentioned Alexandre Koyré, Émile Meyerson, Hélène Metzger, and Anneliese Maier together as authors that had most influenced him; see T. S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: Univ. Chicago Press, 1962), p. vii n 1.
24. The relationship between history and philosophy in the study of science in France in the interwar period is analyzed in Cristina Chimisso, Gaston Bachelard: Critic of Science and the Imagination (Routledge Studies in Twentieth-Century Philosophy) (London/New York: Routledge, 2001), Ch. 5.
25. Hélène Metzger to George Sarton, 20 June 1922, in Metzger, "Lettres," pp. 249-250 (crystallography professor);
26. and Metzger to Sarton, 18 May 1922, quoted in Freudenthal, "Hélène Metzger: Éléments de biographie" (cit. n. 2), p. 198 (Lévy-Bruhl). In another letter she said that Lévy-Bnihl always supported her research and was always "the first reader" of her work:
27. Metzger to Sarton, 14 April 1927, in Metzger, "Lettres," p. 255.
28. [Émile Bréhier],'"Notre programme," Revue d'Histoire de la Philosophie, 1927, 1:1-4, on p. 4;
29. André Lalande, "L'épistémologie de M. Meyerson et sa portée philosophique," Revue Philosophique de la France et de l'Étranger, 1922, 47:259-280, on p. 259;
30. Meyerson, Identité et réalité (cit. n. 4), pp. xiii-xiv;
31. Meyerson, Identity and Reality, trans. Loewenberg (cit. n. 4), pp. 7-8;
32. Meyerson, Cheminement de la pensée (cit. n. 4), p. viii;
33. Georges Canguilhem, Études d'histoire et de philosophie des sciences (Paris: Vrin, 1968), p. 12;
34. and Canguilhem, Idéologie et rationalité dans l'histoire des sciences de la vie (Paris: Vrin, 1977), pp. 12-13.
35. Hélène Metzger, "La méthode philosophique dans l'histoire des sciences," in Méthode philosophique, ed. Freudenthal (cit. n. 3), pp. 57-74, on p. 59 (goals of history of science);
36. and Metzger, "Tribunal de l'histoire et théorie de la connaissance scientifique," Méthode Philosophique, ibid., pp. 23-39, on p. 38.
37. Lucien Lévy-Bruhl, La mentalité primitive (Paris: Alean, 1922).
38. Metzger pointed out that "[Lévy-Bruhl's doctrine] has immediately gone beyond the small circle of the specialists which it seemed to address: it has been read, discussed, commented on, employed, not only by ethnologists, travelers and colonial administrators; but also by philosophers, psychiatrists, psychologists, pedagogues, sociologists and historians": Hélène Metzger, "La philosophie de Lucien Lévy-Bruhl et l'histoire des sciences," in Méthode philosophique, ed. Freudenthal (cit. n. 3), pp. 113-124, on p. 117.
39. The controversy about "primitive mentality" that took place in Paris in the 1920s cannot be separated from the institutional restructuring that took place in the same period and that saw sociology, psychology, history of science, and ethnology acquire or strengthen their independence from philosophy. See Cristina Chimisso, "The Mind and the Faculties: The Controversy over 'Primitive Mentality" and the Struggle for Disciplinary Space at the Inter-War Sorbonne," History of the Human Sciences, 2000, 13:47-68.
40. Meyerson, Cheminement de la pensée (cit. n. 4), p. 31.
41. Metzger, Doctrines chimiques en France (cit. n. 3), p. 348;
42. Metzger, Attraction universelle et religion naturelle (cit. n. 3), p. 8;
43. and Metzger, Concepts scientifiques (cit. n. 3), p. 43.
44. Metzger, "Philosophie de Lucien Lévy-Bruhl" (cit. n. 11), p. 121. We of course refer to Lévy-Bruhl's views before the revision of his theory expressed in the posthumously published Cornets (1947); this revision is irrelevant for a comparison with the work of Metzger, who died in 1944.
45. In 1929 Metzger wrote: "I did not become acquainted with him [Meyerson] personally and I did not study his, books until after I had done much work and published two volumes." Hélène Metzger, "La philosophie d'Émile Meyerson et l'histoire des sciences," in Méthode philosophique, ed. Freudenthal (cit. n. 3), pp. 95-106, on p. 95.
46. Metzger's second monograph, Les doctrines chimiques en France, was published in 1923. The first item in the collection of letters that Metzger addressed to Meyerson is a postcard dated 6 Mar. 1923.
47. Interestingly, almost as soon as Metzger became acquainted with Sarton she alerted him to the publication of Meyerson's De l'explication dans les sciences and offered to write a review, thereby putting herself in the position of the master's messenger even before she came to know him personally : Metzger to Sarton, 21 July 1921, in Metzger, "Lettres," p. 248.
48. This review was published in Isis, 1922, 4:382-385;
49. for her subsequent reviews of Meyerson's books see Isis, ibid., 1925, 5:517-520
50. Isis, 1927, 9:470-472
51. Isis, 1932, 17:444-445.
52. Metzger to Sarton, 14 Apr. 1927, in Metzger, "Lettres," p. 255. She is referring to Les concepts scientifiques, published in 1926. Meyerson was to cite that "little book" in footnotes to Du cheminement de la pensée (pp. 806, 811);
53. presumably he read it only after meeting with Metzger about the index. Metzger did not mind compiling the indexes for Lucien Lévy-Bruhl's L'âme primitive (Paris: Presses Univ. France, 1927)
54. and Le surnaturel et la nature dans la mentalité primitive (Paris: Presses Univ. France, 1931); see p. xiii of the latter.
55. Metzger, "Philosophie d'Émile Meyerson" (cit. n. 15), p. 95.
56. For Koyré's reference to Meyerson as his "teacher" see Fondation "Pour la science," Centre International de Synthèse, Section d'Histoire des Sciences, "Communications officielles: Séance du 23 Janvier 1935," Archeion, 1935, 17:81-84, on p. 83.
57. Metzger's dedication was certainly also motivated by the fact that Meyerson was involved in the writing of the chapter on Stahl; see Metzger to Sarton, 10 Aug. 1925, 29 Mar. 1926, in Metzger, "Lettres," p. 253.
58. Metzger to Sarton, l Nov. 1937, in Metzger, "Lettres," p. 260, expresses her disappointment over Ducassé's preferment.
59. Edmée Charrier, L'évolution Intellectuelle féminine (Paris: Mechelinck, 1931), pp. 407-408, 212.
60. Metzger to Sarton, 20 June 1922, in Metzger, "Lettres," p. 250.
61. Metzger to Sarton, 22 Apr. 1926, in Metzger, "Lettres," pp. 254-255.
62. Christopher Charte, "Le beau marriage d'Émile Durkheim," Actes de la Recherche en Sciences Sociales. 1984, 55:45-49.
63. Metzger to Sarton, 22 Apr. 1926, in Metzger, "Lettres," pp. 254-255.
64. Chimisso, "Hélène Metzger" (cit. n. 2), p. 231.
65. All the documents mentioned in this paragraph are in the collection described in note 1, above. In a postcard dated 13 Mar. 1925 Metzger gives the bibliographical details of a book by Stahl, obviously in response to a request from Meyerson. Similarly, in a postcard dated 2 July 1926 she supplies a couple of references to her La genèse de la science des cristaux and continues: "désirez-vous que je recherche quelque document sur ce sujet?"
66. Apparently Meyerson's health did not allow him to travel. (Indeed, concern about Meyerson's health is recurrent throughout Metzger's messages to him.) Metzger writes from London (1 July 1931): "Your message, which I read in front of 300 or 400 persons, was applauded and it made a welcome contrast with the Bolsheviks' discourse on capitalist science and on economic history." At this memorable congress, the sudden appearance of a Soviet delegation, including Nicolai Bukharin, N. I. Vavilov, Boris Hessen, and E. Colman, left a lasting impression. The "Bolshevik"-Marxist- contributions were gathered and published in an influential volume under the title Science at the Cross Roads (London: Kniga, 1931; rpt., London: Cass, 1971).
67. Meyerson's address read by Metzger was published in Archeion, 1932, 14:106.
68. The list of acknowledgments mentions Koyré, Lalande, Lévy-Bruhl, Lichtenstein, Metz, I. Meyerson, Parodi, Roustan, de Broglie, Einstein, Langevin, and Meyerson's two secretaries, Marguerite Alexandre and Suzanne Babied. Note that Koyré was still a junior scholar at this stage (the first part of his Études galitéennes, the first of his history of science writings, would be published in 1936; the full work, dedicated to the memory of Meyerson, appeared in 1939).
69. André Lalande, "Lettre" [Séance du 26 novembre 1960: "Commémoration du centenaire de la naissance de deux Épistémologues français: Émile Meyerson et Gaston Milhaud"], Bull. Soc. Franç. Phil., 1961, pp. 53-54, on p. 54;
70. and Morris Schlick to Herbert Feigl, 21 July 1929, in Wiener Kreis Stichting, Moritz Schlick Nachlass, Amsterdam, Inv.-Nr. 94, p. 9. The latter is published with the kind permission of the Wiener Kreis Stichting and of the Philosophisches Archiv of the University of Konstanz. We are grateful to Michael Heidelberger of the University of Tübingen for calling our attention to the phrase describing Meyerson and for supplying us with a copy of the letter.
71. Postcard dated 18 Sept. 1933: "... je vous envoie à l'occasion de la nouvelle année mes meilleurs voeux de guérison prompte et rapide. Si vous ne m'avez pas tout à fait oubliée, agréez mes amitiés respectueuses." Only once before had Metzger sent Meyerson wishes on the occasion of the Jewish New Year: in a postcard dated 6 Sept. 1926 she wrote, "Mes meilleurs voeux pour 5687." The Jewish element is almost entirely absent from Metzger's letters to Meyerson. Except for these two New Year wishes, there is only one card (undated, postmarked Oct. 1932), written to Meyerson from Germany by Metzger's friend Bertha Bessmertny, to which Metzger added three words in Yiddish (in Latin script): "Meseltov. Gut Jontef."
72. More often than not, Metzger concludes her messages with the informal, friendly "meilleur(s) souvenir(s)."
73. Hélène Metzger, rev. of Émile Meyerson, Réel et déterminisme dans la physique quantique (Paris: Hermann, 1933)
74. Archeion, 1933, 15:483-484.
75. Followed by two printed lines: Téléphones club 11.97.89; secrétariat: 12.24.22 Chéques postaux: No 1039.46
76. Lucien Lévy-Bruhl (1857-1939).
77. The French does not distinguish between "his" and "her." To write "his or her" would have been anachronistic; and Metzger clearly had men in mind.
78. Perhaps the correct translation is "I," with the rest of the sentence in the first person singular as well. Metzger wrote "responsable" in the singular and may have intended the "pluriel de modestie," often used in French academic writing.
79. The sentence alludes to the Italian painter Antonio Allegri, known as "II Correggio" (1489-1534), who, after receiving a painting by Raphael, said "Anch'io son pittore!" ("I, too, am a painter"). This is the last sentence in the preface of Montesquieu's L'esprit des lois (1748): "If this work meets with success, I shall owe it chiefly to the grandeur and majesty of the subject. However, I do not think that I have been totally deficient in point of genius. When I have seen what so many great men both in France, England, and Germany have said before me, I have been lost in admiration; but I have not lost my courage: I have said with Correggio, 'And I also am a painter.' "Quoted from Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu, The Spirit of Laws, trans. Thomas Nugent, rev. by J. V. Prichard (London: Bell, 1914).