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Philosophical Values and American Learning
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 August 2009
Extract
“…. Quand il se presente à nous quelque doctrine nouvelle,” wrote the greatest French skeptic, “nous avons grande occasion de nous en deffier, et de considerer qu'avant qu'elle fust produite sa contraire estoit en crédit et authorité…. Je ne change pas aisément, de peur que j'ay de perdre au change…. Je suis desgoustée d la nouvelleté quelque visage qu'elle porte.”
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- Copyright © University of Notre Dame 1942
References
1 Essaies, bk. II, chap, xii; bk. I, chap, xxiii. “…. When any new doctrine is represented unto us, we have great cause to suspect it, and to consider how, before it was invented, the contrary unto it was in credit…. I do not easily change, for feare I should lose by the bargaine…. I am distasted with noveltie, what countenance soever it shew.”
2 Descartes' philosophical support differed, in its nature, from that provided by the leading English philosophers of the seventeenth century. The fifth and sixth parts of the Discours de la methode(ed. Gilson, Etienne, Paris, 1925, pp. 49–63Google Scholar) indicate he believed, no less than they, that the mind could bring about a tremendous improvement in the material lot of man; but he did not understand, as well as they did, the importance for this purpose of the inductive method—of observation and experiment. He was not trained early in his life in reasoning from experiments, or in performing experiments, and his own “method” steered the mind in other directions than those which have been fundamental in the rise of modern science (cf. Gilson, ibid., pp. 405 sq. and Gilson, , “Descartes, Harvey et la scolastique,” Etuiles de philosophic medievale (Strasbourg, 1921), pp. 191–245Google Scholar. It was his method, rather than his enthusiasm for material improvement, which made a deep impression on the thought and art of seventeenth-century France. I hope to return to this subject in a book on the history of industry and civilization in early modern times.
3 Sorokin, P. A., The Crisis of Our Age, New York, 1941Google Scholar.
4 Stace, W. T., The Destiny of Western Man,New York, 1942Google Scholar.
5 Bk. II, chap, xii, “The writings of the ancient fathers (I meane the good, the solide, and the serious) doe tempt, and in a manner remove me which way they list.”
6 “To prove any thing they please likely.”
7 Cf. Nitobe, Inazo, Bushido: The Soul of Japan, New York, 1905, esp. pp. 64, 69, 147,173, 176, 185, 190Google Scholar.
8 As quoted by Calvin, , Institution it la religion Chreslienne,chap, ii (Pannier, Jacques, ed.), Paris, 1936, vol. I, pp. 112–13Google Scholar.
9 Bk. II, chap. xii.
10 Macaulay, Lord, Critical and Historical Essays, London, 1886, vol. II, p. 368Google Scholar.