Nicholas de Malebranche
born Aug. 6, 1638, Paris, France
died Oct. 13, 1715, Paris
French Roman Catholic priest, theologian, and major
philosopher of Cartesianism, the school of philosophy
arising from the work of René Descartes. His philosophy
sought to synthesize Cartesianism with the thought of St.
Augustine and with Neoplatonism.
Malebranche, the youngest child of the secretary to King
Louis XIII, suffered all his life from malformation of the
spine. After studying philosophy and theology at the Collège
de la Marche and the Sorbonne, he joined the Congregation of
the Oratory and in 1664 was ordained a priest. Chancing to
read Descartes’s Traité de l’homme (“Treatise on Man”), he
felt compelled to begin a systematic study of mathematics,
physics, and the writings of Descartes.
Malebranche’s principal work is De la recherche de la
vérité, 3 vol. (1674–75; Search After Truth). Criticism of
its theology by others led him to amplify his views in
Traité de la nature et de la grâce (1680; Treatise of Nature
and Grace). His Entretiens sur la métaphysique et sur la
religion (1688; “Dialogues on Metaphysics and on Religion”),
a series of 14 dialogues, has been called the best
introduction to his system. His other writings include
research into the nature of light and colour and studies in
infinitesimal calculus and in the psychology of vision. His
scientific works won him election to the Académie des
Sciences in 1699. Also influential are his Méditations
chrétiennes (1683; “Christian Meditations”) and Traité de
morale (1683; A Treatise of Morality).
Central to Malebranche’s metaphysics is his doctrine that
“we see all things in God.” Human knowledge of both the
internal and the external world is not possible except as
the result of a relation between man and God. Changes,
whether of the position of physical objects or of the
thoughts of an individual, are directly caused not, as
popularly supposed, by the objects or individuals themselves
but by God. What are commonly called “causes” are merely
“occasions” on which God acts to produce effects. This view,
known as Occasionalism, hesitantly and inconsistently
applied by Descartes, was more completely developed by
Malebranche. Cartesian dualism between body and mind was
also rendered compatible with orthodox Roman Catholicism by
Malebranche. The inability of minds and bodies to interact
is, according to Malebranche, simply a special case of the
impossibility of interaction between created things in
general.
With reference to sensation, Malebranche believed that
sensory experiences have only a pragmatic value, appraising
men of harm or benefit to their bodies. As aids in reaching
knowledge, they are deceptive because they do not bear
genuine witness to the actual nature of things perceived.
Ideas alone are the objects of human thought processes. All
such ideas are eternally contained in a single archetypal or
model idea of the essence of matter called “intelligible
extension.” God’s mind or reason contains ideas of all of
the truths that men can discover. God’s creation occurred
after his contemplation of the same ideas, which are known
only partially by men but are completely known to God. In
contrast to Descartes’s notion that men can directly
perceive themselves, Malebranche declared that a person can
know that he is but not what he is. He also reversed the
Cartesian dictum that human existence can be known without
demonstration, whereas God’s requires demonstration;
Malebranche held that man’s own nature is completely
unknowable, whereas God’s is an immediate certainty needing
no proof.
