322 FIRST EXPLANATION 



4. I notice these things in order to prevent misunder- 

 standings, and to show that what you say on this point 

 is by no means contrary to what I have brought forward 8 . 

 Thus it appears that you do not make me out to be 

 wrong in requiring genuine unities, and in consequently 

 rehabilitating the substantial forms. But when you 

 appear to say that the soul of the lower animals must 

 have reason, if we attribute feeling [sentiment] to it 9 , that 

 is an inference 10 of which I do not see the proof 11 . 



5. With laudable candour you recognize that my 

 hypothesis of harmony or concomitance is possible. But 

 you still have a certain repugnance to it ; doubtless 

 because you think that it is purely arbitrary, through 

 not being aware that it follows from my view regarding 

 unities ; for everything in my theory is connected to- 

 gether. 



6. Accordingly you ask, Sir, of what use is all this 

 elaborate contrivance which I attribute to the Author of 

 nature 12 ? As if one could attribute too much contrivance 

 to Him, and as if this exact mutual correspondence of 



conscious [sensible] ; for in short this has to do with nothing but 

 the organic and mechanical structure, and I do not see that you 

 are right in attributing to the lower animals a principle of conscious- 

 ness, substantially different from that of men ' (E. 129 b ; G. iv. 488;. 



8 E. does not have this sentence. 



' Foucher wrote : l After all, it is not without ground that the 

 Cartesians acknowledge that if we allow to the animals a principle 

 of consciousness, capable of distinguishing good from evil, we must 

 also, as a consequence, allow to them reason, discrimination and 

 judgment ' (E. 129 b ; G. iv. 488). In the Remarques sur Us Objections de 

 M. Foucher Leibniz replies : ' I do this ' [attribute to the animals 

 a principle of consciousness, substantially different from that of 

 men] ' because we do not find that the animals make the reflexions 

 which constitute reason and which, producing the knowledge of 

 necessaiy truths or science, make the soul capable of personality. 

 The lower animals, having perception, distinguish good and evil ; 

 but they are not capable of moral good and evil, which presuppose 

 reason and conscience' (G. iv. 492). Cf. Honadology, 25-30. 



10 E. reads ' you make use of an inference.' 



11 E. reads l force.' 



12 Foucher's question is: 'Of what use is all this great elaborate 

 contrivance among substances, unless to make us believe that they 

 act upon one another, although this is not the case ? ' (E. 130 a ; 

 G. iv. 489). 



