STATEMENT OF LEIBNIZ'S PHILOSOPHY 



mutual relations of the Monads which are implied in the 

 compound substance. The vinculum substantiate is no- 

 where mentioned by Leibniz except in the correspondence 

 with Des Bosses. It is in no way essential to his philo- 

 sophy ; but it is the suggestion of a way in which his 

 system might possibly be made consistent with the Roman 

 Catholic dogma of Transubstantiation, which requires 

 that bodies should be considered as real substances. 



Leibniz tells us plainly that he has no great liking for 

 the vinculum substantiate, and that it is better to dispense 

 with it, unless any would-be disciple of his finds it 

 necessary as an aid to religious faith \ It ought not, 

 however, to be forgotten that Leibniz was encouraged in 

 rejecting the Cartesian view that the essence of bodily 

 substance is extension and motion, by the fact that this 



1 Cf. Gr. ii. 499. A. Lemoine, in his thesis entitled Quid sit Materia 

 apud Leibnitium (Paris, 1850), discusses fully the Letters to Des Bosses, 

 with the object of showing that the vinculum substantiate is an excres- 

 cence upon the philosophy of Leibniz, and that the use he makes 

 of it involves inconsistency with his general position. Erdmann, 

 in his History of Philosophy (Eng. Tr., vol. ii. p. 188) holds that it 

 is not to be regarded merely as a concession to the* religious 

 scruples of Roman Catholics, but that it is really a part of Leibniz's 

 life-long endeavour to reconcile the Roman Catholic and Lutheran 

 Churches Cf. Lettre au Due Jean Frederic (no date) (Klopp, iv. 

 444) : ' There is also a considerable feature of my philosophy 

 which will make it somewhat welcome to the Jesuits and other 

 theologians. It is this, that I re-establish the substantial forms 

 which the Atomists and Cartesians claim to have exterminated. 

 Now it is certain that without these forms and the difference there 

 is between them and real accidents, it is impossible to maintain 

 our mysteries ; for if the nature of body consists in extension, 

 as Descartes holds, it undoubtedly involves a contradiction to 

 maintain that a body exists in many places at once/ Dillmann 

 (Neue Darstellung der Leibnizischen Monadenlehre, p. 25) has no doubt 

 that the vinculum substantiate is the same as the ' soul ' of the 

 body or its dominant Monad. Logically, perhaps, it ought to 

 be so ; but it is far from clear that Leibniz meant this. For he 

 several times uses the terms ' soul ' or ' dominant Monad ' in the 

 same sentence as the term vinculum substantiate without identifying 

 them. And he speaks of the vinculum substantiate being 'abolished,' 

 ' destroyed,' ' supernatural ly removed,' &c. But he afterwards admits 

 that the vinculum substantiate cannot come into being or be destroyed. 

 So that Leibniz's entire treatment of the matter is tentative and 

 unsatisfactory. 



