A Final Look

The journey from beginning to end has been difficult but has had its rewards. Chief among them is a new appreciation of the coherence, breadth, and depth of Leibniz’s thought. It offers an unusual degree of freedom to those studying philosophy, and contains a consummate richness almost unimaginable in other more straight-laced schemes. Storms erupting over inconsistencies are replaced by a glassy sea once the relevant claims are seen as alternative theories rather than as Truths. If they are Truths, the picture is quite bleak. For two theses have now

been established beyond doubt: (1) Idealism and Realism are inconsistent and (2) Idealism and Realism are endorsed together in all of Leibniz’s major mature works. Attributing incoherent Truth-Pluralism to Leibniz would be inevitable if Theory-Pluralism hadn’t come along to save the day. One is left wondering what Leibniz himself was thinking when he so reg-

ularly and inextricably interfused Idealism with Realism. I have tried to figure out how he could operate with such a major ‘‘psychic division’’ going all the time. I can’t fathom doing it myself – I would definitely be a ‘‘one view’’ theorist! But in many ways it’s just like Leibniz to push his way through obstacles in the headlong pursuit of a Renaissance and rationalist ideal. The example that keeps coming to mind is the Florence dome. To make

this dome so large, Filippo Brunelleschi was forced to use ideas and plans scavenged from disparate sources: geared hoists, Islamic mosques, buttressing techniques, classical buildings, and the ancient Roman ‘‘herringbone’’ pattern of bricklaying. All these had to submit to a final synthesis – realized jointly in one magnificent cupola. They could not remain individual and scattered. Through sheer force of the Renaissance will, they were combined. And so I think it was with the Idealist and Realist elements Leibniz

found in sources far and wide and close at hand. They had to yield to a final synthesis. If they tried to cling to their isolating individuality, they would be forced into a synthesis befitting the Renaissance ideal of unity. Anything less was unthinkable. The reader is of course entitled to her own opinion about interpretive

schemes. Taking a long view of the matter, it is enough if through this study she comes to an appreciation of the full riches of Leibniz’s system.