OF KNOWLEDGE. 



333 



for publishing, in 1710, his most popular work, the 

 1 Theodicee.' In doing so he gave further expression 

 to an idea which had been familiar to him for some 

 time. He had early recognised that knowledge presents 

 two forms the knowledge of efficient causes and the 

 knowledge of final causes, the mechanical and the teleo- 

 logical view of things, that it is a desire of the human 



which Leibniz desired to counter- 

 act, for wherever it is admitted, 

 it leads, in most minds, to a 

 strong assertion of scepticism and 

 a corresponding indifference, if 

 not antagonism, towards religion. 

 It must be added that Bayle 

 anticipated likewise the modern 

 school of thought, which relies 

 upon the possibility of establishing 

 morals and a system of ethics with- 

 out the assistance of any religious 

 or philosophical creed. This side 

 is fully expounded, e.g., in Prof. 

 Jodl's ' Geschichte der Ethik ' (vol. 

 i., 2nd ed. , p. 418 sqq. ). As Bayle 

 was quite unsystematic in his writ- 

 ings and expounded his fundamen- 

 tal convictions as occasion presented 

 itself, suggesting, and frequently 

 only insinuating, his real meaning, 

 his influence may be considered 

 from very different points of view. 

 The fact that, for him, religious 

 truths were not rational but super- 

 rational, and that morality did not 

 depend upon them but had its 

 foundation in human nature itself, 

 put such truths out of contact 

 both with reason and moral con- 

 duct, removing them without a 

 distinct avowal of unbelief into a 

 region which presented little inter- 

 est. They were not an essential 

 factor for either the intellectual or 

 the moral life of humanity. In 

 spite of many passages which may 

 be construed as revealing personal 

 belief in Bayle's own mind, this 

 .seems nowhere to be a clear and 



necessary conviction. Thus differ- 

 ent writers have put various sides 

 of Bayle's reasoning into the fore- 

 ground. M. Picavet (in the ' Grande 

 Encyclopedic,' art. "Bayle") em- 

 phasises his doctrine of tolerance ; 

 Prof. Jodl hails with approval his 

 doctrine of the independence of 

 ethics from religion and meta- 

 physics ; and Prof. Windelband 

 represents him as a pronounced 

 exponent of the doctrine of the 

 twofold truth. " Religion is for 

 him possible only as an actual 

 revelation ; in contradiction to 

 philosophical knowledge, he rep- 

 resents quite rigidly the twofold 

 truth ; and, whilst he might, there- 

 fore, personally claim credit for a 

 faith contrary " or superior " to 

 reason, his writings, and especially 

 the articles in his Dictionary, were 

 not less dangerous to the doctrines 

 of positive religion than to those of 

 the Deists" (Windelband, loc. cit., 

 p. 413). Voltaire, who quotes Bayle 

 frequently, does not accept his dic- 

 tum that a society of atheists would 

 be quite possible. With Voltaire 

 some religious beliefs are required 

 to regulate and restrain the con- 

 duct of men at large. Bayle had 

 admitted that true religion, which 

 he identifies with the love of God, 

 would indeed do so ; but this, he 

 thought, was too rare an occur- 

 rence, and the conventional religion 

 of the Churches did morally more 

 harm than good. 



