THE MONADOLOGY 227 



in this, as he has done in his Dictionary, article ' Kora- 

 rius' 29 . 



1 7. Moreover, it must be confessed that perception and 

 that which depends upon it are inexplicable on mechanical 



In 1693, ostensibly on political as well as theological grounds, he 

 was deprived of his professorship, and he afterwards devoted him- 

 self to his Dictionnaire Historique et Critique (1695-96), which was the 

 precursor of the Encyclopaedias and the Encyclopaedist movement 

 in the following century. Among other writings he also published 

 a tract against religious persecution and a reply to Maimbourg's 

 libels upon Calvinism. He died in 1706. The Theoclicee of Leibniz 

 is to a large extent devoted to answering the arguments of Bayle, 

 who maintained the impossibility of reconciling faith with reason. 

 There .is much difference of opinion as to whether Bayle was 

 sincere in his combination of philosophical scepticism with an 

 appeal to faith in matters of religion. Probably in this regard he 

 meant to follow the example of Descartes. Leibniz seems to have 

 believed in the sincerity of Bayle's religious faith. He always 

 writes of Bayle with the greatest respect, saying of him (Theod. 

 174): ' Ubi lene, nemo melius,' and again, after his death: 'We 

 must believe that Bayle is now enlightened with that light, which 

 is refused to earth, since, according to all appearance, he has 

 always been a man of good will.' 



29 Like the greater part of Bayle's Dictionary, the article 

 ' Rorarius' may be said to consist mostly of foot-notes. Jerome 

 Rorarius (1485-1566), an Italian, was Papal Nuncio at the Court 

 of Ferdinand of Hungary. He was so great an admirer of the 

 Emperor Charles V that, on hearing a learned man speak of him 

 as inferior to Otho and to Frederick Barbarossa, he was moved to 

 write a treatise maintaining that men are less rational than the 

 lower animals. This treatise (Quod animalia bruta ratione utantur 

 melius homine) was not published until about 100 years after it was 

 written, when Descartes's views regarding the souls of animals 

 were under discussion. Bayle accordingly makes the name of 

 Rorarius the occasion of a full consideration of the question, in the 

 course of which he expounds and criticizes the opinions of Leibniz. 

 Bayle thinks it a pity that the position of Descartes is so difficult 

 to maintain and so unlikely to be true ; for otherwise it would be 

 very helpful to the true faith. That is to say, the Cartesian view 

 is regarded as confirming belief in the immortality of the soul by 

 making a very great distinction between man and 'the brutes 

 which perish.' But it seems to Bayle that Leibniz (whom he calls 

 ' one of the greatest minds in Europe ') has made some suggestions 

 (in regard to the solution of the general problem) which are worthy 

 of being developed. These suggestions are contained in the New 



