Background
Lavelle, Louis was born in 1883 in Saint-Martin-Le-Villeréal.
Lavelle, Louis was born in 1883 in Saint-Martin-Le-Villeréal.
Taught philosophy at the Sorbonne and at the Collège de France: 1934, cofounder and coeditor, with René Le Senne, of the collection of works La Philosophie de l'Esprit.
Main publications:
(1928) De T Être, Paris: Alcan.
(1933) La Conscience de soi. Paris: Grasset.
(1934) La Présence totale, Paris: Aubier.
(1936) Le Moi et son destin, Paris: Aubier.
( 1940) Le Mal et ¡a souffrance. Paris: Plon.
(1945) Du Temps et de l’éternité, Paris: Aubier.
(1946) La Dialectique de l’éternel présent, Paris: Aubier.
Secondary literature:
Smith, C. (1964) Contemporary French Philosophy, London: Methuen, pp. 47-74.
Lavelle’s philosophical position can be encapsulated in the phrase ‘participation in being'. Our own inadequate and imperfect selves are, according to Lavelle, bounded by both the transcendental realm of the totality of being and the external world which is composed of physical objects and other limited human beings. We insert ourselves into this scheme of things when we become the initiators of acts by which we participate in being.
For Lavelle, to be is to act.
Our actions have two aspects, the first of which is their inferiority, or the awareness that our own beings are part of the totality of being. The existence of our imperfect selves presupposes that there is such an absolute, or God, on which we and our acts depend and which is itself pure act. Through our acts we present ourselves to the absolute.
The totality of being is not static but dynamic, and the creative and existential energy in our own actions is derived from this ceaseless source of dynamism.
The other aspect of our actions is their exteriority, which is externalized or embodied in physical objects. Such objects are not dependent on our minds, but we bring them forth through our acts as entities of which we are aware. Once brought forth the physical world then constitutes the limitation of our imperfect selves.
Concentration on the external world or any of its constituents is a distraction which turns our attention away from the spiritual inwardness of our being.
Lavelle rejects the views of those existentialists who promote the fragmentation of human existence and the endless quest for new acts in the pursuit of self-authentication. In the words of one commentator, he ‘criticises the conception of a wholly creative existence which leaves in the wake of its acts a trail of debris comprising mere rejected by-products of authentic living’. Instead. Lavelle holds that, by continuous involvement in our acts, we can enrich our spiritual being.
For Lavelle, to act is to be free.
The absolute, as pure act, is wholly free, whereas we are only limitedly so. Our acts are rational and reflective, in opposition to the passivity and limitation of our instinct, and we become more fully human and more fully free by reducing the spontaneity of the instinct to the benefit of reflection. The ideal towards which we strive and which is our essence is a communion of fellowship founded on rationality.