Most people do not take the trouble to understand things at their deepest level. They lack either interest or ability, or both. But philosophers, as men who aim and claim to understand things more deeply, are rare; and true philosophers, for reasons Plato gave in the Republic, are rarer still.
Philosophy done rightly is a central part of a broader Christian wisdom that takes all truths captive (2 Corinthians 10:5). The ruling or architectonic art and science, philosophy is inquiry into the nature of ultimate reality. By seeing and describing for humanity the nature and works of God, the true philosopher, as Augustine says in the City of God, gives the highest glory to God by his loving obedience to the Triune God's command to take all truths captive.
By Christian revelation, philosophy reached its apex in development, solidity, and veracity in the writings of Augustine, Anse1m, Aquinas, Duns Scotus, Bonaventure, and other extraordinarily gifted saints who philosophized -- unlike many before and after -- in the light of faith.
One part of philosophy is metaphysics, which studies the nature of all existence, both physical and spiritual. The German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) became the world's greatest metaphysician when he identified pre-established harmony as the core principle of created man and world.
Arguably the most powerful and versatile and profound thinker of the modern age, Leibniz, who invented calculus (contemporaneously with Newton), squarely faced down and refuted the atheist-materialist elements and tendencies of eminent thinkers before, during, and after his day, including the ancient "atomist" philosophers, Isaac Newton, Rene Descartes, John Locke, and David Hume.
What made Leibniz the thinker so powerful and so dominant among other eminent thinkers was his extraordinary native intellect, a distinctive metaphysical turn of mind that plumbed first to final causes, his manifest gifts as pioneering mathematician and physicist, and his deep classical and Scholastic learning. In Leibniz, these powers were framed and driven by a staunchly orthodox, Calvinistic Christian faith and by a deeper philosophical or Augustinian understanding of Scripture.
As his prolific writings bear witness, Leibniz, as philosopher, physicist, and mathematician, was inspired and fueled by a deep and personal and heartfelt Christian faith that guided him in asking the right questions and avoiding the wrong conclusions.
A Christian Leibniz famously enraged the atheist-infidel Voltaire of Candide when he demonstrated that this world, for all its tragedy and evil and suffering, is in fact the best of all possible worlds. By philosophical proofs rooted both in God's spoken Word (created nature) and in His written Word (the Bible), Leibniz demonstrated how only the best possible world could emanate from God, Who is an absolutely perfect being.
Deeper than his critics, Leibniz went on to explain the nature of perfection itself, noting how there are several entirely different perfections in nature, and how God possesses them all in the highest degree. He defined omnipotence, for example, as the power to do whatever can be done of Good.
God, possessing supreme and infinite wisdom, acts in the most perfect manner, not only metaphysically, but also morally speaking. The more enlightened and informed we are about God's works, the more we will be disposed to find them excellent and in complete conformity with what we might, when at our faithful best, have desired.
But since to show that an architect could have done better is to find fault with his work, Leibniz argued with consummate skill and holy purpose against those who believe that God might have made things better.
God acts always in the most perfect and desirable way possible. All of God's works — that is, all creation -- must therefore carry his mark in themselves, as man, for example, carries God's image. Love of God requires our complete satisfaction and acquiescence with respect to what He has done (without our being quietists as a result). Knowledge of this great truth is the foundation of the love we owe God in all things.
Understanding evil in Platonic terms as privation, or as lack of fuller actualization and existence, Leibniz developed a profound metaphysical explanation of the Fall and of inherited sin.
The Fall occurred because finite man, with his limited, finite perspective, could focus overly on self rather than on God. So, "because of lack of attention, the first man was able to turn away from the Supreme Good and be content with some created thing, and thus, he fell into sin."
This created world, this best of all possible worlds, is one in which the Fall would occur and evil and suffering would exist. This creation is an order of finite things created by an infinite God. This actual creation, as compared with other possible creations, is one that conduces most to the glorification of a God Who saves His elect. So in the end, Leibniz argues, "there is more perfection in the whole sequence of created nature and history (providence) than if the evil had not occurred."
At the most fundamental causal level, this creation is God's free outpouring of common grace crowned by the salvific and sanctifying grace given to the elect. On the Day of Perfect Judgment by the Perfect Judge, the reprobate will get justice — eternity in hell without the Lord - - while the elect get mercy — eternity in heaven with the Lord. For Leibniz, "Heaven would not be heaven if it was not the best possible place to be." And "Neither our senses nor our mind has ever tasted anything approaching the happiness that God prepares for those who love Him."
But failure to grasp and appreciate this world as the best possible world stems from finite, limited perspective and from fallen, fractured, sinful human nature. And ultimately, "those who are not satisfied with what God does seem to me [says Leibniz] like dissatisfied subjects whose attitudes are not much different from those of rebels." Indeed: "It is difficult to love God well when we are not disposed to will what God wills."
But the spiritual regeneration of the elect by the blood of God the Son Jesus the Christ gives hope. So, by His saving and sanctifying grace, we must endeavor in this earthly life to be truly satisfied with everything that has come to us according to His will. Specifically, we must be acquiescent with regard to the past, but, as regards the present and future, we must act in accordance with what we presume to be the will of God, insofar as we can prayerfully judge it, "trying with all our might to contribute to the general good and especially to the embellishment and perfection of that which affects us or that which is near us, that which is, so to speak, in our grasp."
Leibniz's philosophy, being thoroughly Christian, is a philosophy of ultimate optimism. All things fall out as they should because the Perfect God is Sovereign over all. So "God foreknew and predetermined, from the beginning, not only the infinite series of things, but also the infinite number of possible combinations of actions, passions, and changes of those things; and in the same way, he also foreknew and predetermined the free effects of individual created minds." Thus does man, variously directed in his desires, experiences his willing as authentically free within God's sovereign plan, by a deep and unfathomable Divinely preestablished concurrence.
But Leibnizian talk of God's absolute sovereignty irritates atheists as well as professing Christians infected with Arminian heresy, and typically elicits ignorant cries of "Calvinism!" and robotism. So predictably, reactions to Leibniz's Christian optimism, in a fallen world, differ widely according to the spiritual conditions of the reactors.
A mercurial and anti-Christ Voltaire flew into ridiculous, self-righteous, and uncomprehending hysterics.
An icy, atheistic Bertrand Russell, a fellow mathematician vexed by a Christian's invention of the highest math, tried hard in his inferior history of philosophy to separate Leibniz the philosopher and mathematician and physicist from Leibniz the Christian — to no avail. So, this best possible world is one in which a true philosopher and his true philosophy about this world are disparaged by benighted, uncomprehending unbelievers.
But despite a secular and atheistic and hostile modernity, Leibniz endures. Since the 19th Century, in philosophical circles, Leibniz has been studied as a foundational modern metaphysician, the third of the three great Rationalists, with Descartes and Spinoza, and in contrast to the three great Empiricists, Locke, Berkeley and Hume.
If the Lord tarries, Leibniz's explicitly Christian philosophy, untainted by the secular-liberalism of the barbaric, Cartesian-Rationalist, anti-Christ, Enlightenment, could play a critical Providential role in restoring both science and the Christian churches to a solid and Scriptural foundation.
The intelligent Christian who studies Leibniz is edified and strengthened and encouraged in his faith. No thinker of philosophical or theological stature has been more insistent than Leibniz on the awesome and wondrous beauty of both God and His creation.
Leibniz spoke self-consciously as a true philosopher when he said: "I always searched for first principles." One marvels when, to illustrate his point, he explains how God has chosen and created the most perfect world, the one that is "at the same time the simplest in hypotheses and the richest in phenomena."
But alas, the philosopher too is finite and fallen, as the mighty Leibniz, as the joyful philosophical slave of God, is fast and first to admit. With a true humility that sees and heeds Divine limits, he warns that "to know in detail the reasons that could have moved Him to choose this order of the universe — to allow sins, to dispense His saving grace in a certain way — surpasses the power of the finite mind, especially when it has not yet attained the enjoyment of the vision of God."
Finally, God, for Leibniz, is all in all. He is intimately united with all creatures, in proportion to their perfection. Having placed man at the center of His creation, God has more regard for the least of the intelligent souls than for the whole machinery of the world. And, sweetest of all, God does everything for the best, and nothing can harm those who love Him.
So, in the end, we must say of Herr Leibniz what Leibniz said of the great Augustine: "this great man had very solid and very profound thoughts."
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Winston McCuen is a metaphysician and political philosopher and Christian apologist. He is a Reformed believer, native South Carolinian, proud son of the Confederacy, and outspoken Southern patriot. He holds a Ph.D. and an M.A. in philosophy from Emory University, is a John C. Calhoun scholar, and a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Furman University in history and philosophy. Formerly a welding instructor, philosophy instructor and Latin teacher, he holds multiple welding certifications and is a senior certified nuclear metallurgical welding engineer.
