Philosophical essays

Introduction 1. Leibniz: Life and Works vii 2. Principle of Selection and Rationale for the Volume x 3. Selected Bibliography of the Works of Leibniz xii 4. Selected Bibliography of Secondary Works xiii 5. Translations and Other Texts Referred to in the Notes xiv Part I. Basic Works 1. Letter to Foucher (1675) 1 2. Preface to a Universal Characteristic (1678-79) 5 3. Samples of the Numerical Characteristic (1679) 10 4. On Freedom and Possibility (1680-82?) 19 5. Meditations on Knowledge, Truth, and Ideas (1684) 23 6. On Contingency (1686?) 28 7. Primary Truths (1686?) 30 8. Discourse on Metaphysics (1686) 35 9. From the Letters to Arnauld (1686-87) 59 10. On Copernicanism and the Relativity of Motion (1689) 90 11. On Freedom (1689?) 94 12. The Source of Contingent Truths (1685-89?) 98 13. Notes on Some Comments by Michel Angelo Fardella (1690) 101 14. Preface to the Dynamics (1691?) 105 15. Dialogue on Human Freedom and the Origin of Evil (1695) 111 16. A Specimen of Dynamics (1695) 117 17. New System of Nature (1695) 138 18. Note on Foucher's Objection (1695) 145 19. Postscript of a Letter to Basnage de Beauval (1696) 147 20. On the Ultimate Origination of Things (1697) 149 21. On Nature Itself (1698) 155 22. From the Letters to Johann Bernoulli (1698-99) 167 23. From the Letters to de Volder (1699-1706) 171 24. To Queen Sophie Charlotte of Prussia, On What Is Independent of Sense and Matter (1702) 186 25. Letter to Coste, On Human Freedom (1707) 193 26. Response to Father Tournemine, on Harmony (1708) 196 27. From the Letters to Des Bosses (1712-16) 197 28. Principles of Nature and Grace, Based on Reason (1714) 206 29. The Principles of Philosophy, or, the Monadology (1714) 213 30. Letter to Samuel Masson, on the Study of Theology 225 31. From the Letters to Wolff (1714-15) 230 Part II. Leibniz on His Contemporaries A. Descartes and Malebranche 1. Letter to Countess Elizabeth(?), On God and Formal Logic (1678?) 235 2. Letter to Molanus(?), On God and the Soul (1679?) 240 3. On the Nature of Body and the Laws of Motion (1678-82) 245 4. On Body and Force, Against the Cartesians (1702) 250 5. Conversation of Philarete and Ariste (1712) 257 B. Hobbes and Spinoza 1. Dialogue (1677) 268 2. Comments on Spinoza's Philosophy (1707?) 272 3. Two Sects of Naturalists (1677-80) 281 C. Locke 1. From a Letter to Thomas Burnett, on the Occasion of Rereading Locke (1703) 284 2. From the Letters to Thomas Burnett, on Substance (1699) 285 3. From a Letter to Lady Masham, on Thinking Matter (1704) 290 4. Preface to the New Essays (1703-5) 291 D. Berkeley 1. From a Letter to Des Bosses (1715) 306 2. Remarks on Berkeley's Principles (1714-15) 307 E. Newton 1. Absolute and Relative Motion, from Letters to Huygens (1694) 307 2. Planetary Theory, from a Letter to Huygens (1690) 309 3. Against Barbaric Physics (1710-16?) 312 4. From the Letters to Clarke (1715-16) 320 Appendixes 1. Notes on the Texts 347 2. Brief Biographies of Some Contemporaries of Leibniz 350 Index 358