Discourse on Metaphysics and Other Essays (Hackett Classics)

by Gottfried Wilhelm Freiherr von Leibniz

Paperback, 1991

Status

Available

Call number

110

Collections

Your library, Philosophy

Publication

Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. (1991), Edition: 9th, 96 pages

Description

Discourse on Metaphysics and Other Essays contains complete translations of the two essays that constitute the best introductions to Leibniz's complex thought: Discourse on Metaphysics of 1686 and Monadology of 1714. These are supplemented with two essays of special interest to the student of modern philosophy, On the Ultimate Origination of Things of 1697 and the Preface to his New Essays of 1703-1705. The translations are taken from Leibniz, Philosophical Essays , edited and translated by Roger Ariew and Daniel Garber (Hackett, 1989).

User reviews

LibraryThing member drbrand

[S]ince something rather nothing exists, there is a certain urge for existence or (so to speak) a straining toward existence in possible things or in possibility or essence itself; in a word, essence in and of itself strives for existence.

Leibniz is alternately brilliant and bizarre in his line of

thought. As you're reading, it's clear that you're in the presence of a masterful intellect, but many of his arguments hinge on some less than intuitive assumptions. One of his most startling conclusions is his solution to the problem of evil in The Monadology: the actual world is the best of all possible worlds. Essentially, since God is all good and possesses perfect reason, all that appears evil to us is a constituent of a larger "best possible world"—we just can't see the big picture. Needless to say, if you think God does not exist or that God is not all good, then there's a clear problem here.

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