New Essays on Human Understanding

New Essays on Human Understanding (French: Nouveaux essais sur l'entendement humain) is a chapter-by-chapter rebuttal by Gottfried Leibniz of John Locke's major work, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. It is one of only two full-length works by Leibniz (the other being the Theodicy). It was finished in 1704 but Locke's death was the cause alleged by Leibniz to withhold its publication. The book appeared some sixty years later.[1] Like many philosophical works of the time, it is written in dialogue form.

The two speakers in the book are Theophilus ("loving God" in Greek),[2] who represents the views of Leibniz, and Philalethes ("loving truth" in Greek),[3] who represents those of Locke. The famous rebuttal to the empiricist thesis about the provenance of ideas appears at the beginning of Book II: "Nothing is in the mind without being first in the senses, except for the mind itself".[4]

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References

  1. ↑ Oeuvres philosophiques, latines et françoises, de feu Mr. de Leibnitz, tirées de ses manuscrits, qui se conservent dans la bibliothèque royale à Hanovre, et publiees par Rud. Eric Raspe, Amsterdam et Leipzig, 1765.
  2. ↑ "θεόφιλος". LSJ.
  3. ↑ "φιλαλήθης". LSJ.
  4. ↑ Book II, Ch. 1, §2: "Nihil est in intellectu quod non fuerit in sensu excipe: nisi ipse intellectus".

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