Background
Bayle was born on November 18, 1647 at Carla-le-Comte, France.
( Richard Popkins meticulous translation--the most compl...)
Richard Popkins meticulous translation--the most complete since the eighteenth century--contains selections from thirty-nine articles, as well as from Bayles four Clarifications. The bulk of the major articles of philosophical and theological interest--those that influenced Leibniz, Berkeley, Hume, and Voltaire and formed the basis for so many eighteenth-century discussions--are present, including David, Manicheans,Paulicians,Pyrrho,Rorarius,Simonides,Spinoza, and Zeno of Elea.
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(Toward the end of his life, Pierre Bayle characterized hi...)
Toward the end of his life, Pierre Bayle characterized himself as one who had taken part in the great contest of faith and reason. No phrase could more accurately describe the generation during which he wrote and thought (1680-1706), for beneath the apparent stability of the French classical age and the apparent order of the reign of Louis XIV, the Enlightenment was preparing, the arms to be used by the Encyclopedists against organized religion were being forged, and two contrary modes of thought were contesting for the minds of the intellectual community of Europe. It was a crucial period in Western thought during which the A ge of Faith passed into the A ge of Reason.1 Faith was belief in the creeds and traditions of Christianity, in a divine Providence which intervened in the affairs of the world, in a God of miracles, and in eternal rewards and punishments. The mind possessed by faith was unafraid of mysteries, the incomprehensible, even on occasion the contradictory, for all objects of belief were founded on the revealed Word of God wherein Christians found the sure answers to the questions of existence. Doctrinal differences between confessions did not change the essential image of faith, for all Christians thought alike on one point all ultimately referred their queries to a divine authority for final answer. Since the time of St. Augustine faith had ruled as a queen over the intellectual life of Europe. Reason occupied the servants quarters and had no other role than to defend the dogmas of the faith. Early in the seventeenth century, however, the hold of faith on the mind of Europe was no longer general. The anarchy and horrors of the wars of religion in sixteenth-cen1 For a comprehensive work on this period see Paul Hazard s The European Mind: The Critical Years 1680-1715 (N ew Haven, (Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.) About the Publisher Forgo
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(A new translation of Pierre Bayle's first great work, whi...)
A new translation of Pierre Bayle's first great work, which undermines the influence of "superstition" in political life and laid the groundwork for the separation of church and state. "I tremble when I recall the terrible appearance the comet had on Saturday evening in the clear sky, when it was observed by everybody with inexpressible astonishment. It seemed as though the heavens were burning, or as if the very air was on fireFrom this little star stretched out such a wonderfully long tail that even an intellectual man was overcome with trembling; one's hair stood on end as this uncommon, terrible, and indescribable tail came into view...O wonderful almighty God! The heavens show thy might and the earth thy handiwork!" -- Eyewitness account of a comet which appeared over Europe on December 24, 1680 The appearance of this comet caused so many panicked inquiries to be made of Pierre Bayle, one of the Enlightenment's greatest thinkers, that he decided to formally respond to them, hence the present work, which first appeared in 1682. The book's principle task was to undermine the influence of "superstition" in political life, and it was here that Bayle made the notorious suggestion, unique in the history of political thought until then, that a decent society of atheists is possible in principle. There is no other English translation of this book in print--the only other version was printed in 1708. This translation is based on a recently revised critical edition of the complete French text and includes a substantial interpretive essay that both elucidates the arguments of the work and indicates the importance of Bayle in the history of the modern Enlightenment. "All students of political philosophy will be in Bartlett's debt when this is published. Because of Bayle's argument, supporters of religion today have great difficulty in assuming that religion is the only way to morality. Everybody in the field has heard of Bayle, and most are vaguely aware of the significance of his argument, but few have read him; and Bartlett now makes this easy." -- Harvey C. Mansfield, Harvard University
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Bayle was born on November 18, 1647 at Carla-le-Comte, France.
As a young man, Pierre was educated by the Jesuits at Toulouse, and under their influence he converted to Catholicism for a brief period.
After moving to Rotterdam in 1681 to teach philosophy and history, Pierre Bayle published (1682) his anonymous reflections on the comet of 1680, deriding the superstition that comets presage catastrophe. He also questioned many Christian traditions, thus arousing the ire of a Calvinist colleague, Pierre Jurieu. Bayle’s plea for religious toleration (even for atheists) eventually convinced Jurieu that Bayle was an atheist in disguise. The rift between the two was complete when Bayle advocated a conciliatory attitude toward the anti-Calvinist government of Louis XIV; in 1693 Bayle was deprived of his Rotterdam professorship.
Thereafter, Bayle devoted himself to his famous Dictionnaire, ostensibly a supplement to Louis Moreri’s dictionary but in fact a work of considerable originality. In this encyclopaedic work the articles themselves—on religion, philosophy, and history—are little more than summary expositions. The bulk of the Dictionnaire consists of quotations, anecdotes, commentaries, and erudite annotations that cleverly undo whatever orthodoxy the articles contain. Vehement objections were voiced, particularly to the article “David, ” to the bias in favour of Pyrrhonistic (radical) skepticism, atheism, and epicureanism, and to the use of Scripture to introduce indecencies. This oblique method of subversive criticism was adopted by 18th-century encyclopaedists.
Bayle was convinced that philosophical reasoning led to universal skepticism, but that nature compelled man to accept blind faith, an extremely popular view in the early 18th century. Bayle’s last years were troubled by allegations that he was conspiring with France to detach the Dutch from their Anglo-Austrian alliance. On his death, however, foe and friend alike lamented the passing of a great intellectual.
Bayle's most significant work is probably his Dictionnaire historique et critique, consisting of articles concerning a wide range of thinkers. In addition to reporting others' views, Bayle attached footnotes to a number of the articles in which he presented his own position. The Dictionnaire was widely read, and was to influence later philosophers as diverse as Berkeley, Leibniz, and Voltaire.
(A new translation of Pierre Bayle's first great work, whi...)
( Richard Popkins meticulous translation--the most compl...)
(Toward the end of his life, Pierre Bayle characterized hi...)
