NEW SYSTEM 305 



observers of our time, have come to my aid and have 

 led me the more readily to admit that no animal nor any 

 other organic substance comes into existence at the time 

 at which we think it does, and that its apparent genera- 

 tion is only a development and a kind of growth [aug- 

 mentation]. I have noticed also that the author of the 

 Eecherche de la Verite, M. Eegis 85 , M. Hartsoeker 36 , 



butterfly. 'God has preformed things, so that new organisms are 

 nothing but a mechanical consequence of a preceding organic 

 constitution ; as when butterflies come from silkworms, which 

 M. Swammerdam has shown to be merely a process of develop- 

 ment/ The'odicee, Preface (E. 476 a ; G. vi. 41) ; cf. Monadology, 

 74. John Swammerdam (1637-1680), of Amsterdam, is famous 

 as an observer of insect life. Marcello Malpighi (1628-1694), of 

 Bologna, the famous anatomist, is probably mentioned by Leibniz 

 because of his work on the process of incubation. Anton van 

 Leuwenhoek (1632-1723), of Delft, did much to support Harvey's 

 theory of the circulation of the blood. Leibniz refers to him on 

 account of his investigations regarding spermatozoa, in connexion 

 with which he may be regarded as one of the founders of the 

 science of embryology. 



31 Nicolas Malebranche (1638-1715) published his De la Recherche 

 de la Verite in 1674. Descartes had already given a similar title 

 to one of his writings. While differing greatly from Malebranche's 

 general theory, Leibniz endeavours to harmonize Malebranche's 

 view with his own on many particular points. See Foucher de 

 Careil, Lettres et opuscules inedils de Leibniz, Introduction. Leibniz 

 corresponded intermittently with Malebranche upon philosophical 

 and other questions between 1674 and 1711. In his Recherche de 

 la Verite, bk. ii. ch. 7, 3 ((Euvres, Jules Simon's ed., vol. iii. 

 pp. 199 sqq.), Malebranche xises expressions which indicate a belief 

 in the theory of preformation. 



35 Pierre Sylvain Regis or Leroy (Petrus Silvanus Eegius) 

 (1632-1707) was an exponent of the philosophy of Descartes, which, 

 in opposition to the idealism of Malebranche, he developed in an 

 empirical direction. Descartes, however, disowned the views of 

 Regis. See (Euvres de Descartes (ed. Cousin), vol. x. p. 70. Cf. 

 "Veitch, Method &c. of Descartes, note vi. on Innate Ideas. Cf. Kuno 

 Fischer, Descartes and his School, bk. iii. ch. 2. Regis, whose philo- 

 sophical school at Paris was in 1675 closed by Archbishop Harlay 

 on account of its Cartesian teaching, wrote a violent attack upon 

 Leibniz, charging him with injustice towards Descartes. This 

 attack, anonymously published, will be found, along with Leibniz's 

 reply, in E. 140 ; G: iv. 333. 



^ Nicolas Hartsoeker (1656-1725) was a Dutch physicist, whose 

 earlier work had mainly to do with the making of microscopes 

 and telescopes. Leibniz, writing to Des Bosses in 1709, calls him 

 vir clarissimus in Dioptricis (E. 461 a ; G. ii. 377). In 1694 Hartsoeker 

 published an atomist philosophy of nature, based on the sup- 



