Saint Germain Identität und Vollkommenheit (German Edition)

According to their interpretation, usually delivered in feigned accents of aggrieved piety, the war was simply and purely a struggle between the forces of sweetness and light Britain and France, of course on the one hand and an evil, foul-smelling aggressor Germany, obviously on the other. From the outset, the American government, press, and radio openly and blatantly manifested a degree of dedication to the cause of Britain and France that made a hideous mockery of our official posture of neutrality.

Many of the circumstances of World War II seem to have been only a repetition of those of Hughes discusses at some length. Perhaps the definitive repudiation of the myth that Germany was plotting global conquest in apart from the lack of documentary evidence in support of that melodramatic conviction is to be found in the amazing fact that Germany was, in reality, ill-prepared both militarily and economically when the war came.

The most complete study of this important subject is that of an American economist, Burton H. Taylor recently expressed it: They were by no means ready for the type of war in which they became involved. Unfortunately for the schemes of the interventionists at the time, not all Americans were sold on the pristine unalloyed purity of the Allied cause or on the fable of a German threat to our national security. This necessitated a high pressure propaganda campaign, hitherto without parallel in American history. One might have imagined that the United States was flooded with Axis agents, carrying on a active propaganda … for influencing American public opinion.

No doubt there were German, Japanese, and Italian agents in this country. But they were not getting a hearing on lecture platforms or publishing articles in influential magazines. With his tongue in his cheek, he told the American people on October 27, , that he had come by a secret German map revealing a Nazi deign to conquer South America.

They never really existed to begin with! The conventional interpretations given by Allied propagandists to explain the diplomatic origins of the war in as well as the background to American entry therein are as unlike the truth as it is humanly possible to imagine. When compared with the most recent revisionist research into these subjects, they read like something straight from the pages of Alice-In-Wonderland or a Grimm fairy tale.

It is widely held that there can be no controversy this time. All moves of a peaceful nature by Axis leaders before or during the war are ignored or misrepresented while the bellicose policies of Roosevelt, Churchill, Halifax, Kennard and other are clothed in the deceptive garb of sweet reasonableness. His wartime treatise, The Course of German History, was one of the most virulent attacks ever penned on Germany by a professional historian anywhere.

Nonetheless there is scarcely an article in the sacred creed of Allied wartime propaganda which he leaves unchallenged in his The Origin of the Second World War. Taking every issue and crisis of major import which divided Germany and the West before the war, Taylor makes it clear that Hitler was a shrewd statesman who never wanted war and certainly not the global holocaust which actually came in In his own words: If pro-Allied propaganda had earlier conditioned American thinking so as to smooth the path for eventual American intervention against Germany, that same propaganda after our entry in late was admirably calculated to persuade Americans of the inspired wisdom of a war and postwar policy of vindictive, grinding harshness toward the Reich.

In Britain, as in the United States, Germanophobia reached feverish proportions. One of the best known and most extreme of the Germanophobic writers in Britain during the period was the late Lord Vansittart. Having held highly important and responsible posts in the British diplomatic service, he was assured of a large and sympathetic audience.

Another British writer, E. It is now widely accepted amongst those who have given thought to the problem of Germany … that the world has not a normal, rational people to deal with, but a nation suffering from an acute attack of homicidal mania, rendered more dangerous by a background of specious philosophy and more horrible by a lust for inhuman, calculated cruelty; a nation moreover subject to the recurrence of similar attacks, of which this last is only the most severe ….

In America an even more melodramatic and comic-book type interpretation of German history came from the pen of Paul Winkler with his The Thousand Year Conspiracy: Secret Germany Behind the Mask. Another writer in this country, Theodore N. Males over sixty and women over forty-five could be exempted. One might dismiss writers like Winkler and Kaufman as lunatic fringe fanatics, and even Vansittart was, after all, a politician and hence might be expected to indulge in some strong propagandizing.

But it is difficult to understand why talented scholars, without solicitation, rushed into print with the most specious Germanophobic works. For example, the above-mentioned British historian A. Taylor in a facile book, The Course of German History, 77 undeniably characterized by a sparkling literary style, wrote that:. Germany is not a typical European nation, nor even a typical Great Power; shaped by history, it has acquired a unique character and played a unique role, a role almost entirely aggressive and destructive, an alien body in the structure of European civilization.

No doubt many uninformed non-Germans were impressed by such irresponsible statements at the time. Viewed, however, in the light of the last decade and a half, during which time Berlin had become a glowing symbol of Western opposition to Red totalitarianism, there is something contemptibly mean and petty about them.

Vermeil, incidently, became one of the leading spokesmen of a school of writers fond of tracing the roots of Nazism back to a supposedly pathological German intellectual and cultural tradition. The prostitution of the intellect for propaganda purposes assumed still other forms. Might it not be advisable then to destroy such a nation or to sterilize its population? The situation in the cinema and radio was, if anything, worse. This driving, irrational impulse seemed to operate without reference to, and even to the exclusion of, all other goals.

No thought was given to the power balance situation of tomorrow or the day after, to the insane folly of substituting the inherently far more menacing power of the U. One might have imagined that the alliances and enmities of the period had been given eternal certification in Heaven. Had we not permitted reason and good sense to be consumed in the fires of vindictive passion, we would never have assented to the fateful innovation of constituting ourselves at once as judge, jury, prosecutor, and hangman of defeated military and political leaders at Nuremberg.

MAN KANN LUEGEN FUEHLEN.

After World War II there was a marked lessening of interest in Germany with the consequence that there was a considerable decline in the current production of literature concerned with that country. Be that as it may, however, books and articles about Germany are still fairly plentiful. Hence the question arises: Has there been any significant development of a corrective literature to counter the tendentious interpretations of previous years? To the shame of honest historiography, the answer must be a very decided negative.

The older historians, of the most part, manifest a stubborn reluctance to surrender their fixed delusions. The younger ones have been so indoctrinated during their entire education careers that they seem completely unaware of the challenge thus presented to their scholarship.

The sole exception to this is a veritable handful of revisionist historians. Thus far, however, their efforts have been mainly limited, by and large, to tracing the origins of World War II and the genesis of Pearl Harbor. Little attention of a revisionist nature has been accorded to German history as such by non-German scholars. Bismarck as the supposed embodiment of Machiavellian power politics; the wicked Prussian and German ruling classes; that nebulous demon, German intellectual development and all the rest of the tiresome litany. But isolated trends in Western nations become dominant ideas in Germany.

Kings, diplomats, and demagogues, who succumbed to the demoniac lure of power, existed elsewhere; but the inclination of the majority of the German people and of German intellectuals to accept them uncritically is the troubling problem. Perhaps it should not surprise us that even the present urgent state of world affairs had had little influence upon Mr. He still seems to feel we can afford the luxury of baiting Germany, as is evident from some of his recent articles in which he delivers his accustomed wearying preachments to the Germans on the alleged pernicious influences in their history.

A widely read college level text by Louis L. Snyder, gathers between its covers all the threadbare cliches and superstitions ever penned by Germanophobic writers. Nazi extremism was not a bolt out of the heavens, nor did it occur in a vacuum. Behind it was a long tradition; its roots lay deep in history.

It was the result of a national tradition of discipline and obedience, ground into the Germans by a combination of Hegelian worship of the State, Prussian intransigence, militarism, nationalism, romanticism, and historicism …. Germany has remained an obstreperous, unhappy stepchild among nations. It seems incredible that years after the end of World War II sensational treatments of the Winkler-Kaufman- Brickner variety should continue to appear in print.

Yet such has been the case. An article by Alfred Werner 94 achieved a new dimension even for Germanophobic cant. Apparently no German must ever again lift his head in polite company. On the other hand, Germans were widely anathematized journalistically for the recent world wide rash of anti-Semitic outrages. When one considers the sheer bulk of the volume and the turgid if ingratiating style in which it is written, this is a remarkable tribute to the manner in which skilled promoters can contrive popularity.

But far more important, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, embodying as it does the very worst features of the Germanophobic propaganda of , contributes very little to an honest understanding of German history, its publicity buildup and the rave reviews to the contrary notwithstanding. Shirer gives scarcely a hint as to the real reason for the advent of Nazism: His account of the coming of World War II simply takes no account of the findings of recent revisionist scholarship, as is perhaps to be expected, while his repeated sneers directed at the members of the anti-Nazi resistance within Germany only betray still further his basic and deep-seated antipathy to everybody and everything German.

The appearance of such a work at this time when German and Western amity was never more urgently needed is distinctly to be regretted. Even more regrettable, however, has been the emergence, in large part during the months following the seizure of Adolf Eichmann, of a body of horror literature alleging brutal German wartime crimes, mainly against the Jews of Europe, of such depravity and magnitude that readers might thereby be tempted to speculate that, whatever Allied statesmen did to provoke conflict with the Axis powers, they were entirely justified in taking such action.

Equally as important, they would have to be balanced off against the crimes perpetrated against the Germans by the Allies. Hitherto it had been customary only to cite those crimes attributed to Germany. Moreover it took on distinctly macabre overtones when the discrepancy between the number expelled and those who actually reached Germany reached a possible three million mark. Spaight and Sir Arthur Harris, for incontrovertible proof of this charge. Veale correctly describes it, marked an ominous departure from the rule that hostilities are to be limited to operations against enemy military forces alone.

Because we were doubtful about the psychological effect of propagandist distortion of the truth that it was we who started the strategic bombing offensive, we have shrunk from giving our great decision of May 11, , the publicity it deserves. That surely was a mistake. It was a splendid decision.

Lindemann, a Cabinet member and confidant of Churchill, produced in early a remarkable Cabinet paper on the subject of the strategic bombing of Germany:. It described, in quantitative terms, the effect on Germany of a British bombing offensive in the next eighteen months approximately March September The paper laid down a strategic policy. The bombing must be directed essentially against German working-class houses. Middle-class houses have too much space round them, and so are bound to waste bombs … One wonders if it was the cultivated humanitarianism inherent in this decision to assure the death of more working class Germans per bomb which entitled the Allies, and in particular the British, to sit in moral judgment on German leaders at Nuremberg in !

Who can doubt the criminal quality of the Soviet butchery of thousands of Polish officer in the Katyn forest in ? Even the Nuremberg tribunal resisted albeit by inaction Soviet attempts to lay that one at the door of Germany. No doubt the enthusiastic response of the Soviet soldiery to the incitements of Ilya Ehrenburg to seize the women of Germany as the spoils of victory which resulted in the rape of half the women of Berlin alone lent substance to the pretensions of moral dignity assumed by the prosecuting powers at Nuremberg. Neither the proceedings at Nuremberg in nor those associated with the recent trial of Adolf Eichmann were such as to inspire the confidence of the impartial investigator.

Likewise the frenetic efforts of some academic scholars to prove the charge have fallen quite flat. The simple fact then is that there is every reason to believe that a final accounting must exculpate Germany of any unique inhumanity in the waging of World War II, just as revisionist scholarship had exonerated her of sole or even primary guilt for the war itself. There is a monotonous uniformity in all their interpretations, the fundamental error of which lies in the fact that they, in assessing the reasons for the demise of democracy and the rise of Nazi totalitarianism in Germany, ascribe primary or even sole causality to factors supposedly indigenous to German history and society.

Had either of these men been offered a fraction of the concessions to which they were entitled, the Weimar Republic could have been saved and the world spared the insane bloodbath of , as well as the consequent alteration of the world balance of power to the advantage of the U. This was the portentous, terrifying essence of the most genuinely crucial period in modern world history; what seems, indeed, to have marked the real beginning of the Decline of the West. It is a story in which the impartial historian can assign at most a very minor role to German villainy.

If villains must be had, the historian must also look elsewhere: The reader may best obtain an adequate insight into the real reason for the advent of World War II in the following: The Devin-Adair Company, A Study in Statecraft New Brunswick: The most complete listing of revisionist books dealing with all aspects of World War II is to be found in the indispensable Select Bibliography of Revisionist Books Oxnard: The interested reader should gain an adequate insight into the true nature of the wartime diplomacy of the West in the following volumes which deal entirely or in part with the subject: Henry Regnery Company, ; George N.

Henry Regnery Company, ; Richard N. Rutgers University Press, ; Richard F. Fenno, The Yalta Conference Boston: Heath and Company, ; John T. Neumann, Making the Peace, Washington, D. The Caxton Printers, Ltd. The Hauser Press, Simon and Schuster, ; Allen W. Henry Regnery Company ; and Albert C. Wedemeyer, Wedemeyer Reports New York: Henry Holt and Company, Henry Regnery Company, ; and F.

Veale, Advance to Barbarism Appleton: Nelson Publishing Company, The ordeal of the Oder-Neisse and Sudeten Germans at the close of World War II had not yet been fully told, though there is abundant evidence, much of it making for revolting reading, contained in Kurt Glaser, Czecho- Slovakia: A Critical History, Caldwell: Munich University Press, Horst Mahler — Sprechverbot..

Through a daily, ever increasing lie propaganda, the National Socialist world view must appear to be spawned in Hell, so that any approach to this thought brings cold sweat to the forehead of a German. It begins to grasp: That the war aims of our enemy were not accomplished with the military defeat of the German Empire in That the enemy is safe from the power of the national community only if he manages to kill the soul of the German people.

Therefore, he continues the extermination war against us increasingly harder every day and with all the weapons of psychological and physical warfare. That the strategically planned soul murder could only have been set in motion in the state of absolute military incapacity of the German people. The German people recognize — through the globally worsening political situation — the conditions for the success of the enemy after the capitulation of the Wehrmacht:. The Germans must be persuaded to have a guilt complex that makes it impossible for them to be proud of themselves.

To keep the spiral of silence intact, those individuals who voice historical truth must be silenced by means of criminal jurisdiction. Horst Mahler — Ostern Nach jahrzehntelangem politischem Wachkoma erlebt unser Volk derzeit in rasantem Tempo einen Erkenntnisschock. Es beginnt zu erkennen:. Die Juden sind Idenditaetsdiebe und wir werden von ihren Luegen irregefuehrt. Das ganze Christentum ist in ihren Haenden gefangen. Yahweh als der Christliche Gott wurden aus den heiligen Schriften gezielt vertrieben.

Ich bedauere in diesem Land, U.

Orders in the concentration camps …If we want to receive a full work exertion from a detainee then it is also necessary that he is strengthened, rested and ready for the workweek. For that he needs Sunday as a rest day. It is sharply demanded that the detainees bathe once a week in the future and that his laundry and other things that he needs are in order….

Das folgende Buch nicht verbreiten da die Gesetze sich in Deutschland nicht veraendert haben. Nur weil es ein beruehmter Jude schreibt ist es kein Schutz fuer Deutsche. Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil. And this lie about special cruelty to the women prisoners… baloney all the way through. In all 60, Jews died of all causes. Orders and Rules of the Concentration Camp Auschwitz Abbreviated translation from Auschwitz Befehle by germanvictims. It is forbidden for SS Men to call detainees to the fence to give them shoes and clothing for repair. I reminded last time that this is not only forbidden but dangerous because the fence is during the day — off and on — electrically loaded.

The leaders of the guards as well as the department leaders are requested to thoroughly lecture their men on this requirement. Starting Monday April 7, , the work hours of the detainees is as follows: He was able to stop the flight and shoot the escapee. It is planned that Sunday work in the near future will be eliminated starting immediately.

Sunday work, in any case, can only be allowed for life-sustaining services like taking care of animals, horse stables, and kitchen work. Further only for absolutely necessary repairs. For this, it is necessary to carefully train the work commandos to accomplish their workload with the help of the work of the detainees to complete their work obligations in any case during the 6-day workweek. We have learned that Sunday work is not adding to productivity, to the contrary. If we want to receive a full work exertion from a detainee then it is also necessary that he is strengthened, rested and ready for the work week.

It is sharply demanded that the detainees bathe once a week in the future and that his laundry and other things that he needs are in order. The animals also need a rest day. It is expected that these measures are adhered to. If not all service places adhere to these rules then it is expected that we have down times by animals and people and will continue to have them in the future.

This is counterproductive to our war production goals and contrary to our final goal in our struggle, namely victory. Lunch time is to be used for resting. It is strictly to control that the detainees after eating their lunch are resting on their beds to enable a full digestion of their meals to strengthen their ability to work.

It is strictly to be made sure by the various commandos that these regulations are adhered to. It is necessary to point out that it is completely unacceptable and also not SS style when a commando leader of work convoys from the FKL during moving in and out has the detainees carry their food bags and tent canvas.

It goes without saying that a commander leader as well as his accompanying posts carry their equipment themselves. It is below the dignity of an SS-Man to have the detainees carry things for him. It is strictly required to have a businesslike behavior between command leaders and accompanying personnel toward female advisers and detainees.

The commanding office will hand out hardest and severest punishments if these regulations are loosened up in the slightest degree. The female detainees are not here to make life easier for the guard personnel but to work productively in the framework of their present responsibilities and a strict personal distance is required to be successful in these goals. Commandment warns for the last time against loosening the hard and necessary interactions by the command leadership or their assisting posts. The guards are to be clearly educated and instructed by the unity leaders.

Instructions to the commanders until 15 June We are reminding again, that it is strictly forbidden to let detainees pick up lunch, dinner, coffee, etc. Violations will be punished with immediate replacement of detainees from the dormitory as well as the strictest punishment of the SS-man. This is an urgent reminder that under no circumstances are the detainees allowed to transport and clean bikes and motor cycles. I will hand out the strictest punishment for breaking this rule. All incoming mail for female detainees is to be sent to the newly established censorship location, female camp Birkenau.

For the properly and timely delivery of mail for the female detainees in camp branches, private homes and other service offices are responsible — in the first place — the respective female commando leader — and in second place — the female High Overseer Frau Zimmer. In all cases a consistent return address and address are to be listed; for example: Detainee Herta Meier No. I am forbidding that work commandos are assigned to not life-sustaining work on Sundays.

The detainees are required to be assigned on this day to de-lousing, bathing, clothes change, linen change and clothing repair. The same is required in all camps outside of this. The bill is issued at the end of the month. Providing more than one household help has been denied. In any case, household help is only provided for families with many children after approval of the SS-Business Administration, Office Group D… Working groups will be assigned for special projects such as laundry days, spring cleaning, etc. I have noticed that children are present throughout the day in the working camp and roaming about.

Also during the arrival and departure of the groups, children are attaching themselves to closed prison columns. I am forbidding this and point out the danger that exists for the children due to the necessary handling of weapons by the accompanying guard in the case of an attempt to escape. Furthermore, the association of children with the detainees in this way, has such a moral disadvantage for the children that it is irresponsible from the side of the parents.

The SS-members are to instruct their wives and children accordingly and constantly have to be vigilant that their children stay away from detainees and not loiter in the camps or in the working areas. We have noticed that the guarding troops are not carrying out their responsibilities well — partially due to missing training, partially because they are clueless, partially due to the carelessness of the SS-Men. Frequent mistakes are conversations with detainees, especially on transportation cars and not sufficient distance from detainees.

I am ordering as of today that every company leader trains their company every week regarding these issues. I am to be reported to every Saturday night of the content and results of these trainings. In especially urgent cases, the doctor is to be informed after the delivery. Further, I order that the female detainees who are working in households and so forth, are not to be delivered for arrest to Birkenau.

It has been noticed repeatedly, that SS-members who have nothing to do with incoming detainee transports, are present at the unloading location. I forbid all SS-members who are not assigned to a job here to step on the ramps. Offenders are to be reported to me for punishment.

The property of the detainee, regardless as to what it is clothing, gold, valuables, food and other personal items , and regardless where the detainee is, is not to be touched. The state determines the use of the property of the detainee. In special cases, the property of the detainee becomes state property.

He who lays hands on state property makes himself into a criminal and will be excluded from the SS. SS-members who defile themselves with such a low deed will be handed over to the SS-court for judgment. I expect from each decent SS-man, and that is the largest number, that he reports rogues so that we can keep our rows clean. The state today ensures that everyone can live a decent life.

It is therefore not necessary to end up on the wrong track. If someone is in need without their fault, he can turn to his supervisor and see if he can use some of the means provided by the state. In my service areas, such requirements are to be presented to me for my personal decisions. The SS-men are removing their pistols along with the holsters in the grooming room and hang them on the wardrobe so that the detainees have the chance of getting a hold of the pistols.

As of immediately, the pistols are to be removed from their holsters. The same is required in all rooms were detainees are present. The camp leaders are to make sure that the detainees have appropriate clothing and are cared for with blankets. It has happened that detainees answered the telephones. That this is outrageous and is strongly forbidden, I do not need to explain any further, nor the results that can come from this.

In the future I will have the guilty account for this. To see what the behavior of the SS was like, here a few translated excerpts from the Standort- und Kommandanturbefehle des Konzentrationslagers Auschwitz by the German Institute fuer Zeitgeschichte which is an official agency that is very anti-German that keeps documents. The concentrations camps were also filled with POWs; however, at this moment I do not know if Auschwitz had them.

They had a hospital at Auschwitz. The good treatment and medical care of the prisoners was of highest order. It is pointed out again and again that the prisoners need to be healthy to do their work for the military production:. Each train car is to be lined with wood wool. In every car there is a container with boiled water for tea, a toilet bucket, and a lantern.

During cold spells the train cars need to be supplied with a stove. Out of 41, detainees, 12, are working inside of the camps to keep the camps running. This is unreasonable in the 5 th year of war. Leisure time of the workers is to be used for rest… Unnecessary and harassing use of prisoners during their free time will be punished.

Prisoners let their food spoil instead of giving it to prisoners who could use it. To the diligent detainee we need to do all we can to make their life easier, including granting of release. To the lazy and incorrigible detainees, all possible punishment within the governing guidelines. Several armament companies pay the detainees a premium.

Some camps did not get paid premium amounts. This needs to be investigated. In one of the outer camps, detainees were beaten by civilians who work on the same job, so that they had to be put into the hospital temporarily. In the case were it is not possible to keep civilians separate from detainees, the civilians must be again instructed by the work location how to treat prisoners. Mistreatment of detainees by civilians are to be immediately reported.

The situation needs to be constantly monitored and malingerers need to be inspected…. It shows great character weakness and lack of honor when SS-men support and even cover up trafficking by prisoners. I will hand over these cases to the courts for strictest punishment…. Es macht eigentlich Hoffnung, wie nach Jahrzehnten doch immer wieder die Wahrheit ans Licht kommt. Das Schreiben ist ohne Kopf und Unterschrift und hat ein fremdes Wasserzeichen. Es sollte nur eine falsche Spur gelegt werden. Die Nazis als Kriegsplaner von Anfang an!

Im polnischen Original steht es ganz anders. Und Lipski selbst zitiert in seinen eigenen Memoiren zu diesem Besuch wiederum aus Szembeks Tagebuch. Und am Ende der Fahnenstange der Nachkriegshistorienschreiberlinge das Leckerlie: Hat allein Schultze-Rhonhof ermittelt und nur zu diesem einen Beispiel. In der Nacht, genauer um Mitternacht, wenn nur einer von ihnen Wache schiebt, werde ich trinken….

Es ist Herbst und ich bin in Cottbus in der Justizvollzugseinrichtung. Solche kursieren nur unter Erststrafern. Und gehofft und geschrieen zu Dir. Erbarme Dich meiner und hilf mir! Schau, ich will handeln mit Dir. Nach Jerusalem will ich ziehen, noch in dem Jahr, in dem ich nach dem Westen komme. In Deiner Stadt will ich Dir danken. Ganz unten bin ich. Geht es noch tiefer? Die Stanze muss ja mitdenken. Denn ich kann das nicht. Meine Gedanken sind weg, weit, weit weg.

Ein Neues habe ich eingelegt. Das Essen ist schlecht. Keine Klagen, ich werde satt. Aber Obst gibt es kaum. An die Luft komme ich auch nur eine Stunde am Tag. Dann platzen sie auf. Von Kindesbeinen an kenne ich das. Nein, ich gehe nicht an die Stanze. Sie haben die Strafe von zwei Jahren auf 18 Monate abgesenkt. Neun Monate war ich in Untersuchungshaft. Zwei Monate bin ich jetzt hier. Eckhard ist an diesem Tag ebenfalls auf Zelle geblieben.

Er sagt, er wisse nicht warum. Er ist ja auch zum zweiten mal drin. Eckhard sagt mir, was jetzt zu tun ist. Der Name kommt von dem Gitter, der den hinteren Zellenbereich vom vorderen Teil trennt. Neben dem Waschbecken ist das Klo. Es ist ruhig hier, wunderbar ruhig. Das ist ab der Nachtruhe immer so. Erst am Abend kann ich mich wieder darauf legen. Sie wollen uns am Tag wachen und in der Nacht schlafen sehen.

Wenn nur einer von ihnen Wache schiebt und eigentlich selbst schlafen will. Dass ich nichts esse, habe ich schon gesagt. Was zu tun war, habe ich getan. Der Wasserhahn ist nur ganz locker geschlossen, gerade so, dass er nicht tropft. In der Nacht, genauer um Mitternacht, wenn nur einer von ihnen Wache schiebt, werde ich trinken.

Oder jetzt muss wohl Mitternacht sein. Er hat kurz das Licht angeknipst und wieder aus. Jetzt habe ich ihn am Stiel befestigt. Jetzt saugt sich der Waschlappen voll Wasser. Jetzt ziehe ich den Waschlappen durch das Gitter zu mir herein. Trinken — ich sauge ihn aus. Dann mache ich das noch einmal und noch einmal. Trinken… Trinken… Jede Nacht. Dann muss ich auf die Waage steigen. Jede Nacht verliere ich ein Kilogramm. Und dass, obwohl den Stuhlgang zu lassen eine Qual ist. Ich habe getrunken, ja, aber viel zu wenig.

Der Urin ist dunkel. Der Stuhlgang ist knochenhart. Aber er muss raus. Obwohl das weh tut. Jede Nacht werde ich weniger, ein Kilogramm jede Nacht. So haben es die Alten gelehrt: Wenn ich Dich sehen werde, werde ich sterben. Du bist hier, wie Du am Anfang der Welt warst.

Das sage ich jeden Morgen vor dem Wecken. Dann beginne ich, wie der Evangelist Johannes begonnen hat. Das sage ich jeden Morgen:. Alles ist durch dasselbe geworden. In diesem war das Leben. Und das Leben war das Licht der Menschen. Und das Licht schien in die Finsternis. Aber die Finsternis hat es nicht begriffen. Er war nicht das Licht, sondern ein Zeuge des Lichtes. Denn das wahre Licht, das alle Menschen erleuchtet, sollte in die Welt kommen. Es war in der Welt und die Welt ist durch es geworden. Aber die Welt hat es nicht erkannt. Es kam in sein Eigentum. Aber die Seinen nahmen es nicht auf.

Die es aber aufnahmen, konnten sich durch das Licht als Gottes Kinder offenbaren. Kinder, die nicht aus dem Fleisch, noch aus dem Willen eines Menschen, sondern aus Gott geboren worden sind. Das beginnt wohl mit dem Zusammenbruch des Kreislaufes. Damit hat er ja Recht. Er ist ein eigentlich friedfertiger Mensch. Davor hat er Angst. Angst soll er auch haben. Morgen ist der siebte Tag. Der siebte Tag ist anders. Dass ich heute aus dem Arrest kommen werde und nicht erst in zwei Wochen, habe ich gewusst. Dort wird man auf Ihre Gesundheit achten.

Er ist fast leer. Ich liege in einem reinlich bezogenen Bett in himmlischer Ruhe und falle in einen tiefen Schlaf. Noch einmal zeigt sie auf die Folterwerkzeuge. Wer Dich sieht, wird sterben. So lehren es die Alten. Ich bin in Bautzen. Ich bin unten, ganz unten. So schlimm sei es nicht im Bautzen des Jahres ? Das ist nicht angenehm. Sie bringen uns auf einen Bahnhof. Er ist ein umgebauter Eisenbahn- Waggon mit vielen, vielen Zellen im Aufbau. Mit einem Berliner bin ich zusammen in einer der Zellen eingepfercht. In machen Zellen stecken drei Gefangene. Er war ebenfalls im Haftkrankenhaus in Bautzen.

Ewig dauert die Fahrt. In der Nacht bin ich wieder in Cottbus, erst mal auf der Zugangs-Zelle.

Germanwings Flug 9525 – das Lügengebilde bricht zusammen

Es ist kurz vor Weihnachten. Nein, eigentlich wollte ich nicht wieder hungern.

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Das Sinnesorgan Haut rebelliert ja gar nicht. Das sind 9 mal 21 Tage Arrest oder Unterbringung unter den anderen Arbeitsverweigerern. Dann klappe ich die Pritsche im hinteren Zellenteil hoch. Wie langsam die Zeit rinnen kann. Sie sind mit den Hunden bei Markus in der Nachbarzelle. Sie waren mit den Hunden drin. Sie haben ihn die ganze Nacht festgeschlossen, aufrecht am Tigergitter. An jeder Hand hatte er ein paar Handschellen. Diese haben sie am Gitter befestigt.

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Gemeinsam hungert es sich immer besser. Dass ich nichts esse werde, sage ich bereits am Mittag. Ich werde es wieder hinbekommen. In der Nacht werde ich trinken. Der Leutnant, der den Arrest leitet, holt mich am dritten Tag. Ich werde das schon hinbekommen. Dann bringen sie mich weg. Wohin bringen sie mich? Aber es ist ein anderes Kommando. Gusseiserne Teile werde ich mit meinen neuen Zellenkameraden am Tage abfeilen.

Ich werde hier bleiben. Und werde hier bleiben; vorerst. Damals gab es kaum einen, der nicht dabei und nicht auch begeistert davon war. Das konnte uns damals gar nicht schnell genug gehen. Aber die, die haben Reisen mit uns gemacht, ins Ferienlager und so. Was verstanden wir als Kinder denn von Politik? Das endete dann schlagartig mit dem 8. Mai , als die Russen in unserem Dorf einmarschiert sind. Noch heute kann ich diese Zeit nur schwer beschreiben. Ich kann das nicht beschreiben. Mit uns war auch noch ein Freund aus Berlin festgenommen.

Bei der Verhandlung waren nur zwei russische Offiziere, zwei Schreiber und noch so zwei Leute anwesend. Die haben uns auch ziemlich kurz abgeurteilt und im November kamen wir dann nach Bautzen. So konnten wir immer sehen, wenn ein neuer Transport kam. In der Zelle neben uns waren einmal vier Jungs, die waren zum Tode verurteilt und einer nach dem anderen wurde nachts rausgeholt. Der Letzte, der hatte ein Gnadengesuch eingereicht und dem haben wir Hoffnung gemacht, du kommst bestimmt durch haben wir ihm immer wieder gesagt, den haben sie dann aber auch geholt. Also das als junger Mensch so zu verarbeiten, das ist schon schwer.

Da war auch eine alte Frau, so eine Arbeitslagerleiterin, die hat gesagt, sie hat das Lager nur geleitet, niemanden umgebracht. Die haben sie auch nachts raus geholt und die kam nicht wieder. Durch unser Loch das da war, konnten wir ziemlich viel beobachten. Es sind ja auch viele gestorben in Bautzen und Sachsenhausen. Einmal im Monat durften wir in die Dusche. Es war eine Riesendusche und wir Frauen mussten uns vor den Wachposten ausziehen. Alles mussten wir vor ihnen ausziehen und haben uns dabei schrecklich geniert.

Unter uns waren auch Frauen aus Russland, die waren als Zwangsarbeiterinnen nach Deutschland gekommen und haben hier gearbeitet. In Bautzen waren wir erst zu viert in einer Zelle. Die hatte eine Pritsche und drei Etagenbetten. Wir mussten um 6. Der hatte sogar richtige Toiletten und einen extra Waschraum.

Die Wachposten sind nur zur Essenausgabe in den Saal gekommen, sonst nicht. Hier wurde ich dann krank. Ich konnte kaum noch schlucken und kam ins Lazarett. Das war grausam, ja, aber so war das damals. Ich war 18 und wollte leben. Das war an meinem Geburtstag und an jedem Geburtstag den ich habe, muss ich daran denken. Es sind ja so viele gestorben. Wie Vieh wurden wir in Viehwaggons geladen und waren zwei Tage lang unterwegs, ohne Essen und Trinken.

Ich habe die Marmelade nicht genommen, denn davon bekam man noch mehr Durst. Mittags kamen wir dann in Sachsenhausen an. Wir standen in der Sonne und wurden registriert. Manche sind dann gestorben, die sind einfach umgefallen und waren Tod. Erst abends um halb neun kamen wir endlich ins Lager und wurden auf die Baracken aufgeteilt.

Hier blieb ich dann bis zum Die Leute im Bus und im Zug haben mir alle angesehen, wo ich herkam. Als ich zu Hause ankam, da hatte ich soviel zu Essen wie noch nie zuvor. Juni habe ich dann die DDR verlassen. Noch einmal eingesperrt werden wollt ich nun wirklich nicht. November ins Gelbe Elend gebracht. Zelle 42 im II. Doch nur 4 Schlafgelegenheiten befanden sich darin.

Die vorhandenen 3 Matratzenteile waren bereits unter den bisherigen Zelleninsassen aufgeteilt. Jeweils abends breitete ich meine Habseligkeiten zu einer Schlafstelle. Ganz schnell lernte man sich kennen, wurde vertraut miteinander, und schon ward das Schicksal des einzelnen zum gemeinsamen Schicksal. Man zog am gleichen Strick und versuchte sich Mut zu machen. Und dann war Heiligabend. Es mochte gegen 19 Uhr sein, genau wusste es keiner, denn von unseren Uhren waren wir bereits bei der Verhaftung befreit worden. Um diese Zeit begann immer die Christnacht in der heimatlichen Kirche.

Wie mag denen daheim zumute sein? Aus der Zelle heraustreten! Transportvorbereitungen versetzten uns jedes Mal in Unruhe und Spannung. Werde ich dabei sein? Wir waren nur verlegt worden. Schlimmer als die Schnarcher waren die Wanzen. Aber das half nur wenig. Eine makabre Art der Genugtuung. Der Hunger wurde noch qualvoller, obwohl der Magen immer mehr zu schrumpfen schien.

Und schon war das zweite Weihnachten im Lager nicht mehr fern. Unsere Lage schien aussichtsloser denn je. Hier erlebte ich Sylvester und den Beginn des Jahres Ich verbarg die Hand in der Hosentasche, um nicht aufzufallen. Aber was sollte es, wir hatten das gleiche Los! Wir froren wie die jungen Hunde. Morgens erhielten wir einen Topf lauwarmen Malzkaffee mit einem schmalen Kanten Kommissbrot.

Nachts zwangen wir uns, wach zu bleiben und uns auf den Beinen zu halten. Unbeschreiblich die Qualen, die jeder einzelne ertragen musste! Ganz benommen fand ich mich in Baracke 3 wieder. Juni wurde ich entlassen. Davor hatten meine Eltern einen Brief, datiert vom 7. Er hatte folgenden Wortlaut:.

Nun habe ich einen Wunsch an Sie. Ja, man hat bei diesen Jungen auch Waffen gefunden. Mein Name ist Gudrun Sauer, geborene Sinram. Ich bin stellvertretende Vorsitzende des Bautzen-Komitees e. Bis war uns sein Schicksal unbekannt. Erst nach der Wiedervereinigung erfuhren wir, dass er im Dezember im Zuchthaus Bautzen ums Leben kam. Lange Zeit hatte sie gehofft und geduldig die Schikanen ertragen, die ihr und uns Kindern auferlegt wurden. Man entzog uns nach und nach unsere Lebensgrundlagen. Es geht mir darum, einen Beitrag zu leisten, damit unschuldig Verurteilte rehabilitiert werden und ihnen Gerechtigkeit zuteil wird.

Die Zeit vergeht und zwei meiner Schwestern weilen nicht mehr unter uns. In der Arbeit im Bautzen-Komitee finde ich Kraft, denn jeder Erfolg, den wir im Interesse der Opfer erringen, macht mich optimistischer. Dezember oder davor. Polen, das bereits deutsches Gebiet seit nach dem 1. August auf den 1. September , bis Wer hat den Zweiten Weltkrieg wirklich entfesselt?

War es das Land, das Sie glaubten? Und… wo steht Deutschland vor allem? Unter den Angreifern oder den Angegriffenen? War declarations on Germany. And what did Germany do to all those countries? Not to one of them! Poland already occupying German territory occupied after World War 1 invades her smaller neighbour Czechoslovakia… 1st September Poland already occupying German territory occupied after World War 1 invades her smaller neighbour Czechoslovakia.

Where time is given it is the time used in the capital of the declaring country. So who declared war on whom? Who really started the Second World War? Was it who you believed it was? And… where does Germany stand primarily? In the ranks of the attackers or the attacked? Versailles Zahlungen — Lese das Buechlein hier. Time has revealed that the SS acted with honor in practically all matters while the Americans and British were the slimy betrayers of humanity….

I think you should have emphasized that Operation Keelhaul was a Communist program of genocide conducted by the American army on behalf of Stalin, just as Operation Eastwind was the same thing conducted by the British army, both on the orders of Dwight Eisenhower and Franklin Roosevelt.

Time has revealed that the SS acted with honor in practically all matters while the Americans and British were the slimy betrayers of humanity. Even you fail to mention the depths of his treachery and sadism, Pearl Harbor being the easiest to demonstrate. His refusal to accept Japanese surrender terms for years. The Morgenthau Plan for Germany. What were you doing? You were a speculator on Wall Street, profiting from the misery. We came to power in the same month of Brett 12 ignore the case. Spinoza ,14 declares that Gassendi was a thoroughly religion-intoxicated priest who tried to veil Epicurus's genuine materialism under a "nun's dress"; and Marx discards his philosophy precisely because it is christianized Epicureanism.

In a word, they take for granted that Gassendi "baptized Democritus and Lucretius as Aquinas had baptized Aristotle". An jure inter scepticos Gassendus numeratus fuerit, Paris: Hachette et Cie, Wilhelm Engelmann, , , Leopold Voss, , vol. The Philosophy of Gassendi, London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, , p. Lange, Geschichte des Materialismus, 2 vols. Lyon, Anisson et Posuel, in 8 volumes in 12 ; third and final edition: Gesellschaft in under the title "Gassendi's Skepticismus und seine Stellung zum Materialismus";18 but the fact that he wrote in a rather militant Roman-Catholic journal seems to have disqualified him in the eyes of scholars in the Lange tradition.

In the second half of the twentieth century, scholars have again taken for granted Gassendi's authenticity as a Roman-Catholic priest, as a Christian philosopher, as a seventeenth-century mechanist, nominalist, andidogmatist, anti-occultist, Copernican, Galilean, neo-Epicurean etc. Although some still favour Lange's position, others try to discover what led to the assumption that Gassendi professed a materialistic and antireligious philosophy without wanting to do so and even without knowing it.

All of the following more or less topically or polemically discard the cas Gassendi as an outdated debate: Constant Gutberiet, 6 , , , Van Gorcum, ; enlarged version: University of California Press, , and notes , Studio su Gassendi, Bari: Greenwood Press, , Martinus Nijhoff, , xiv-xvi, p. Anton Hain, , and Walter de Gruyter Quellen und Studien zur Philosophie 14 , , Sarasohn ignores the problem in her and articles: Eventually—with the remarkable exceptions of Margaret Osier , 27 and Lynn Sumida Joy , who provides and excellent analysis and bibliography of the whole controversy28— specialized Gassendian scholars in the last decade29 hardly mention it, as can be observed in Marco Messeri ,30 Barry Brundell ,31 Antonina Alberti 32 and Gianni Paganini This—and the French pro-Cartesian prejudice which leads practising philosophers to identify themselves with "mens" rather than Thomas Hobbes and the Mechanical World-View", Journal of the History of Ideas 46 , Pierre Gassendi on the immortality of the soul", in Religion, Science and Worldview eds.

Cambridge University Press, , pp. Advocate of History in an Age of Science, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, , , Der revidierte Anschluss an Pierre Gassendi, Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog, , who mentions Olivier Bloch's theory of Gassendi's radical "ambiguity" quite marginally, in his bibliographical survey, p. Michael "Gassendi on Sensation and Reflection: Lafisica di Pierre Gassendi, Milano: From Aristotelianism to a new natural philosophy, Dordrecht: Epicuro e Gassendi, Firenze: Die philosophischen Schriften von G. Whatever the case may be, the "scepticism" of Gassendi has never been questioned, it has only been qualified.

Since everyone knows how Popkin characterizes Gassendi's particular brand of "constructive scepticism",35 and after him Spink,36 not to mention Kiefl, Berr, Gregory, Bloch and lately Brundell, it is not necessary to discuss here those places in his work where Gassendi most explicitly expresses his middle-way doctrine between the dogmatists and the Pyrrhonians, as for example in the "Praefatio" of the Dissertationes Paradoxicae adversus Aristoteleos37 and in the second book of the Logica in the Syntagma philosophicum "De Logicae fine" , where he exposes and criticizes, first, the reasons given by the dogmatists, then the various modes of the sceptical epoche, and finally his own definition of the kind of truth about things that is attainable, and of the type of criteria that are available for recognizing that truth.

The passages in his work where he professes his unconditional obedience to the Roman Church have been quoted repeatedly for nearly four centuries, although variously interpreted. Popkin, History of Scepticism , Spink, French Free-Thought, , Verdier, ; of the seven books, only the second was prepared for publication in the Opera Omnia, and eventually Books One and Two came out in a posthumous first edition hereafter refered to as GO followed by volume and page number plus "a" or "b" for column, and the line numbers; the edition refered to is Petri Gassendi Diniensis Ecclesiae Praepositi, et in Academia Parisiensi Matheseos Regit Professons Opera Omnia in sex tomos divisa [.

Panswowe wydawnictwo Naukowe, Biblioteka Klasykow Filozofii, ; the Gassendian theory of truth is on corresponding to GO 1. My intent is to clarify under exactly what premise this ambiguity disappears. In the following analysis two contingent methodological axioms are assumed: Gassendi is sincere; he himself believes what he says is true or probabilior; in other words, his writings consistently express his own thoughts.

It is acceptable method to try to think in Gassendi's own terms, while endeavouring to retrieve his original intentions and the meanings of his words. On closer examination, it appears that the two axioms reinforce each other, for the first gives one an incentive to read Gassendi, and the careful perusal of Gassendi's work shows that he himself rules out insincerity. Neither the assertion nor the negation of these two axioms can be falsified. Strictly speaking, first, Gassendi could have been a liar, and from this starting point, whenever he says something, because he might be lying or not, we would have to decide what is the truth.

In this case, the interpretation of Gassendi's philosophy would become a hazardous undertaking, an infinitely difficult and very frustrating task. Yet that alternative might be the only correct one. So to be honest, one should say that one's choice is ultimately the one that suits one best, whatever arguments one might invoke as to the probability that Gassendi was not in fact a liar. This holds true even if those arguments are approved by most historians, including Olivier Bloch, who writes: Morin's Alae Telluris fractae [.

But Bloch remains in the realm of "vraisemblable". Because no apodicticity can be expected, this assumption has to be taken as a mere arbitrary axiom, and whatever is derived from it will remain hypothetical. Second, Gassendi may not have lied but merely erred, and then it would be silly to say with him that it is day when it is night, simply because he says that it is day and one has found a way to enter his thought processes. But his own teaching advises us to always temper the authority of an author with our own free reason "lumen naturalis", "intuitus mentis" and experience "propriorum sensuum experientia" , and if we do follow his own example and doctrine, we should adopt his mitigated scepticism without renouncing our right of adhering or not to what contradicts either our own intellectual insight, or the actual empirical evidence.

But now there arise two final and unanswerable objections: In other words, his own blindness for his fundamental preconceptions forces him into a kind of ventriloquism. Bloch seems to describe Gassendi as having such a split philosophical personality: Epicurean-materialistic on the one side and Christian-spiritualistic on the other. The second unanswerable objection is that we ourselves are blind to our own mental structures and that these structures are the true causes of our supposedly rational decisions, so that we are always the victims of the delusions of a-posteriori rationalization, or immediate "evidentia".

To both objections there is but one answer: I conclude these preliminary methodological declarations with a final statement. The most prominent "prejudice" in Gassendi's Bloch, La philosophie de Gassendi, p. The very fact that Gassendi is unaware of the logical equivocation of the expression "the true religion" betrays the structural nature of his faith within his mental universe.

The standpoint of the phenomenologist,. He himself knew well enough the argument of the religious sceptics of Montaigne and La Mothe Le Vayer among others , according to which it is mere coincidence "casus" that one is born in a particular society, and every man acquires a set of second-nature habits and prejudices through the education "paideia" his social environment gives him: Gassendi addressed the letter to Sir Edward himself, and says at the end of the printed copy that he wrote it in and gave the first copy to the "illustrissimus Baro" in , having kept an unfinished copy for himself; that copy was printed in the GO III.

Rochot made a French translation published in the Actes du tricentenaire de Pierre Gassendi, , Paris: The question, whether men who have not been given a chance to choose the "true religion" could be doomed for eternity, or why divine Providence sent Christ for the salvation of man but allowed so many humans to die before having entered the Church, remains for him "altum mysterium", although he says that there will soon not remain any nation in the world to whom the Gospel has not yet be announced,—which is the only reason I could see why he should admit that those who did not adopt the "True Religion" may be said to have chosen not to do so.

De salute enim summa agitur". So in his eyes, he is Roman Catholic because he chooses, yet he admits that he is particularly lucky to have been born in the right religious community. This principle applies to Gassendi's religious assertions, and to the rest of his statements and demonstrations as well. Gassendi, using the old sceptic trope of the tower seen as round from a great distance yet square when closer, shows that the only truth that is attainable is the explanation of various appearances of the same thing: Likewise, I do not pretend to know Gassendi himself, whatever made him, but only to inquire about the variety of his appearances; and since his appearances are in fact assertions about the appearances of the world seen from his position, the phenomenal truth we are looking for consists precisely in the determination of Gassendi's standpoints with relation to every set of phenomena about which he has left his observations to us.

Gassendi's dominant activity, epistemological model, and source of pleasure were his celestial observations. With these principles in mind, it is clear that on the supposition that he searched for satisfying and congruent solutions to all the problems which he raised, he must have written what seemed to him to be satisfactory. See also GO I. The trope of the tower is from Sextus Empiricus's Adv. Our superiority, of course, is that we have read Spinoza, Newton, Leibniz, Kant and the others, and have learned at school non-Euclidian logic and the Einsteinian theory of relativity.

But if we suspend our knowledge and just follow the logic of Gassendi's thought, we can come to his own vision of the coherence of his philosophy. My hypothesis is this: Why does Gassendi build his own system of metaphysics as a 44 Gassendi himself condemned opportunistic and insincere conformism, when, in his vindication of Epicurus against" the charge of hypocrisy and duplicity, he says that what was reasonable in a society who ignored the true religion, is no longer acceptable once the true religion has been revealed.

Quid facias tarnen, ubi spectaris hominem extra Religionem, in qua debemus cogitatione, verbo, opere consentire? Even today it is difficult to test such an hypothesis, for many churchmen still appear to hesitate giving vent to their personal religious feelings and therefore tend to broaden the gap between Gassendi's secular thought and his religious life; I am referring to the interesting book by the Jesuit Father Barry Brundell see his Pierre Gassendi, , p.

He shows that Gassendi's general aloofness is due to a lack of awareness of the real danger menacing the future of the Church. See too his conclusion: He could have picked from ancient and modern authors what was useful to him and have quietly lived a life of a practising astronomer, physicist and erudite like contemporaries such as Peiresc, the Du Puy brothers and Mersenne. Why did he, a doctor of theology and philosophy, take the risk of teaching a critical—and devastating—commentary on the peripatetic philosophy which he was at the same time teaching ex officio, while showing no intention of founding a sect or of stepping out of the institutional church.

He did not claim to be a prophet like Giordano Bruno, he was not a heretic, he did not provoke trouble like Valla, Campanella or even Galileo. Though Gassendi never attacked the writings of Aquinas, he did openly discuss and refute what he calls the "common doctrine", that is, Scholastic logic, metaphysics, physics and ethics. Why did he take the trouble of contradicting Aristotelian scientists46 such as Robert Fludd the Rosicrucian, and in his wake the Platonists and neo-Pythagoreans,47 Lord Herbert of Gherbury about the universality and power of reason,48 Descartes and his idealist proof for the existence of God and of the validity of rational intuitions,49 Jean-Baptiste Morin, and with him not only the astrologers but also all those who confused religious truth with scientific research,50 etc.?

Edoardi Herberti, "De Veritate"; cf. Why did he, a pastor, take the risk of being charged with the crime of introducing a wolf into the sheepfold? Why did he embark on a philosophical career at all,53 and why did he choose to be a sceptic? Why did he not believe in the heuristic power of mathematical language, as his venerated masters Kepler and Galileo and his friend Mersenne induced him to do? In a word, why was he reluctant towards Neoplatonism? How could he seriously believe in his theory of the dual soul, "mens vegetativa" or material soul and "mens intellectiva" or immaterial and supernatural soul?

How could he support a Stoico-Judeo-Christian doctrine of Providence as the prime and ultimate organizer of the universe and yet acknowledge the existence of natural calamities57 or monstrosities, the Aristotelian's "natures mistakes" GO II. How could he, having displayed in his polemical works an 53 He studied philosophy and theology in Aix ; in he took doctorates both in theology and in philosophy from Avignon University, and won the two competitions for the chairs of Philosophy and Theology at Aix, but chose philosophy instead of theology, as his early biographers say.

Tamizey de Larroque, ed. These questions can be and have been validly answered in many different ways, but my hypothesis provides a more coherent answer. Let us see what happens if we suppose that Gassendi's dedication to his particular faith is of structural relevance to his philosophical life and work. First, this supposition will have a feedback effect on our decision to take systematically all his statements as truthful, without sorting out those that are superficial from those that express his true deep philosophical self.

Second, it also has a feedback effect on the assumption that Gassendi's work is coherent, because it implies that his practice is coherent with his outspoken doctrine, something that his own doctrine demands. Each of these conclusions involving biographical matters rests, of course, upon our first axiom, that Gassendi does not say one thing and think another. To reach the point where Gassendi's scepticism comes in, we have to start from the origins of Gassendi's philosophical itinerary.

Can we in his life and doctrine observe a primacy of ethics over knowledge in which doctrine reflects and justifies life? The very disposition of the soul that leads one to judge rightly depends itself on the moral decision to cultivate the habit of loving, exacting and searching for the truth wherever it may be and covering it with kisses GO I. This goal is reasserted at the beginning of the Ethics GO As Gassendi himself notes, there is no opposition between action.

How, then, shall we decide whether in Gassendi's theory and practice cognitive theoretical nature has precedence over the will practical nature?

A passage from the Liber Proemialis GO 1. After having denied any preference on his part for this or that philosophical school, Gassendi here asserts: I stick only to the sole orthodox religion, which is the one I received from my elders: This statement is often considered as a typical instance of Gassendi's perfunctory or even cautious conformism. But if we read what follows directly we see it in another light: And as to what remains "quod superest" , I have it this way, that I always put reason before authority.

Gassendi proceeds then to explain that from Epicurus he adopts only those points that he judges most efficient for solving problems in physics and in ethics, and that he does not follow him blindly in every one of his opinions, especially those that pertain to religion. Giving his expression "quod superest" its full weight, this means that before he begins judging freely about things, he has already decided to stick without question to the Roman Catholic Church.

This text is a late echo of a similar declaration in his first work, the Exercitationes Paradoxicae. From then on his philosophy becomes architectonically subordinated to its essential dimension: Now, if one takes the Scriptures seriously, there is no half measure. As Philo Judaeus, one of. Gassendi's innumerable sources points out to the point of obsession, the dominant reality in a man's life is his relationship to his Creator, and the "true philosophy" in the Bible is precisely knowledge of that fact, which in philosophical terms can be expressed like this: So from Gassendi's own perspective it is clear that the choice for a religious life is at the same time free and the most reasonable choice a man can ever make.

It follows that Gassendi's philosophy as a whole is a religious performance. This notion now supports my integrated explanation of each particular theoretical choice he makes in his philosophy. Contrary to Barry Brundell, I believe that Gassendi's philosophical work should be seen as crypto-apologetic. Where Father Mersenne engages in open apologetics, Gassendi chooses to persuade his reader under the guise of a free-thinking rationalist.

This accounts for his constant reference to pagan authors to demonstrate ideas that are acceptable to a Christian philosophy, for his choice of Lucretius, for his provocative attacks on the established philosophical institutions teaching scholastics , and for his constant assertion of his independence of judgement in all matters that do not fall under the jurisdiction of sacred dogmas for example, his declaration about the Church's condemnation of the Copernican theory of the world in the Syntagma philosophicum The other factor which essentially determines Gassendi's philosophy is his theoretical choice for what is known as his scepticism.

From what has been found, we can now see why this can be understood as a religious attitude. In his "psychology" in the De rebus terreras viventibus sen de Animalibus of the Syntagma Philosophicum and the Animadversiones , Gassendi establishes that one of the appetites of the rational soul is the love of God as fatherly and perfectly benevolent omnipotent power GO II. Already in the Exercitationes paradoxicae, Gassendi reveals that his opposition to the Aristotelian idea of science has something to do with his intention of showing the impotence of secular, purely rational means for attaining absolute truth.

Dogma is supposed to guide reason in its choice between different rational solutions, not to contradict reason. In other cases, where dogmas give no clue as to how to solve a given enigma, Gassendi insists on the limited range of natural light, and therefore on the vanity of those who boast that reason can master knowledge of nature. Such is the case, for example, in "De usu partium in Animalibus" GO So Gassendi's argument concerning the contradictions of the sects merges with the traditional apologetic trope concerning the contradictions of the varieties of human opinion, a trope usually connected with that of the imbecillity of human reason which Gassendi attributes to Solomon, quoting the books of Kings and Ecclesiastes.

Beyond the polemic function of these tropes, we are led to a more fundamental attitude of religious-minded scepticism: Gassendi openly admits that we should acknowledge the fact that God did not think God is infinitely free, the Creator of essences and even of the logic which binds us but does not bind him, since he could create an infinity of other logics, for which he could in turn create intelligences that would be exactly and exclusively adapted to them.

Our mathematics is therefore not the language in which God wrote the universe: This provides us with a clue not only to Gassendi's rejection of mathematics as having a heuristic value in the sciences of nature— because it implies that our mind is able to practise the same mathematics and logic as God's mind something which from Gassendi's perspective is both foolish and blasphemous —but also to his rejection of astrology on the same grounds and of Herbert of Cherbury's deism.

Indeed, Gassendi's philosophy leads to the conclusion that whatever concerns God—the absolute, the infinite, and therefore true religion as the right way to negotiate man's relationship to God—has to transcend the limits of natural reason. This constitutes what has been called Gassendi's fideism. Gassendi 65 In gnoseological contexts, he abstains from mentioning the passage of Genesis 3, and 22 where it is said that Adam and Eve were expelled from Eden because they sought to become wise and to know as much as God; yet he refers to that passage when, in his De Animalibus [Syntagma Philosophicum, "Physica" De ipsa rerum veritate, quam persuasum pene habuit ter Maximum Deum reservatam sibi voluisse.

Et vide etiam, circa aeternam tibi tantopere commendatam foelicitatem, vide inquam, ut Deus ad illam ducere nos voluerit Revelatione solum ac Fide: Gassendi's reason for this is that God has given to each creature the kind and range of knowledge necessary to its nature. Thus, for our survival we need no more than the hypothetical—and to some extent efficient—knowledge that we receive through the senses and "ratiocinatio".

As soon as we forget that knowledge is a vital function we begin "hubrizein": Logically, then, this justifies the very viciousness of the circle in which reason is trapped, because God's justice is impenetrable to reason, and this is why it is necessary that we do not understand why such scandalous things happen as the fact that entire nations are denied the chance of knowing the true religion. But is this not the same trick used by the rhetoric of religious propaganda and the advocacy of the irrational in general?

It works only if one wants it to work. As Pascal himself, who was hardly a hard-boiled agnostic, said: But, if I may venture a qualitative judgement: Gassendi's decision is a serene one. One does not find in it the strained, proud quality of Montaigne or Bernier, who seem to say that if God is God, He should save them but they will not surrender any of the rights and powers of human nature, least of all reason, to their relationship with God.

One does not find either the somewhat wounded and desperate quality of Bayle's fideism. Perhaps the whole contents of Gassendi's works would have been the same even if he had not been a Roman Catholic, but it would definitely not have been so had he not been a deeply pious man. Connected with his fideist decision is precisely that optimistic quality found only in those who love the world in which they live, and love it systematically because they trust the Cause of causes.

If his optimism could be taken to be the cause for his decision of faith, it can also be seen as an effect of that decision, for faith is a result of the constant orientation of the will towards its own submission to the will of God. Precisely that unconcerned humility explains why Gassendi did not try to give a coercive power to his speculative work: He seems more concerned with clearing the errors and obstacles away from the path to the sciences for others than in gaining immortality through a personal contribution to the progress of any particular discipline.

All this has been attributed either to his intellectual weakness or to his moral pusillanimity, which are moral judgements, whereas it could well be the necessary consequence of his initial decision to put ethics before speculation, religion before philosophy, and to regard charity as a way to "voluptas". This matter I will leave open to discussion in order to return to the methodological issue that I raised before presenting my theory about Gassendi's scepticism as a religious attitude.

If we select the last as its dominant goal, then what are our ways and means to achieve it? We have only the written works of those who have gone before us. In the case of Gassendi, if we desire cumulative knowledge of his work, then it is time for us to unite our dispersed and isolated individual efforts to read him. What we need to do is read him with a kind of "period instrument", that is to say, with an instrument calibrated for a synthetic mastery of his own semantic system. This leads us to the point announced at the beginning of this paper: Such a project would not only be a major contribution to scholarship, it would also be wholly in the spirit of Charles Schmitt's life-long efforts to promote a scientific history of philosophy.

Admittedly, Descartes was not named in them, but, according to Descartes, Voetius had included among the marks of atheism "those things he knew popular opinion ascribed me, wrongly for that matter". It is true that the disputations on atheism were reprinted in Voetius's Disputationes theologies selecta , but their text was almost certainly changed for this new edition. Indeed, the text of the disputations shows that at the time the main object of Voetius's worries were still the Remonstrants.

Nevertheless, the disputations on atheism do contain various allusions to contemporary developments that might have some bearing on Descartes. In any case, much of it was used by Voetius's friend, Martin Schoock, in Admiranda Methodus, one of the most violent works ever written against Descartes. Les impressions nouvelles, , Journal for Theology and the Church 2 , ; I have dealt myself with this problem in the introduction to La querelle d'Utrecht. Voetius is not impressed by the fact that some people do understand the meaning of the words "God" and "exist," but still deny God's existence.

After all, there are also Sceptics who "from sheer vanity and malice" doubt or rather pretend to doubt the most evident principles. The practical atheist denies God's will even if he not invariably denies His existence. Epicurus, for example, did not deny the existence of gods, but he did say that they have no influence on earthly matters, which is an indication of practical atheism. Indirect atheists, on the other hand, are all those who hold ideas that, in some way or another, imply atheism. However, since the undermining of our natural notion of God is fundamental to any kind of atheism, almost all forms of atheism, 4 Nostri communiter ex Rom.

Disputationes tkeologicae selectae, vol. I , p. On natural theology in general in this period, see John E. Piatt, Reformed Thought and Scholasticism: The idea that every man has a natural notion of God, was part of the Dutch Confession; cf. Bakhuizen van den Brink, De Nederlandse belijdenisgeschriften, Amsterdam: Ton Bolland, 2nd ed.

The Ephesians are described as being "without God in the world" Eph. The Gentiles "know not God" I Thess. As a result, Voetius's elaborate classification of the various causes and forms of atheism is actually very simple. To the general causes belong man's corruption and consequent aversion from God, his blindness, vanity, and arrogance; his contempt for ancients and moderns; his striving after things that are new or not easily known; his reluctance to believe things he cannot see: Quae sunt vel internae vel externae.

Voetius interprets them as belonging to both the will and the intellect; cf. Aristotle, Metaphysica I, i 1, a The "Faustian", however, gives up because eventually he cannot know all he wants to know. The kind of knowledge he tries to obtain is impossible, so that he constantly runs up against the limitations of human knowledge.

His scepticism is based on frustration. Voetius believes that the frustration of the Faustian is caused by his not being satisfied with "learned ignorance": The cause of this shipwreck is that such a person was not ready to stop his intellect and subdue it, and to feed it with learned ignorance. Still, the mind should as much find its rest in learned ignorance as in science.

Indeed, this, too, is to know: Cum tarnen in docta ignorantia non minus mentis quietatio quaerenda sit, quam in scientia. Sassen, Henricus Renerius, de eerste "cartesiaansche" hoogleeraar te Utrecht, Amsterdam: Noord-Hollandsche Uitgeversmaatschappij, cf. Noord-Hollandse Uitgeversmaatschappij, , p.

Southern Illinois University Press, I take pleasure in noting that the eminently learned Mersenne, too, considers this a cause of atheism or a road to it, p. Art is long, life short, the occasion rare, and expenence unreliable or dangerous. Read what is said by commentators of both authors and use it as an answer to our contemporary empirics who know everything without books, without study, without education, relying only on their lazy and erratic thinking. In fact, however, perfect knowledge is impossible, so that Cartesianism is a sure road for Scepticism.

The reference is to Mersenne's Quastiones celebemma in Genesim What Voetius has in mind is probably the end of the first chapter of Book I, where Aristotle says that "the man of experience is held to be wiser than the mere possessors of any power of sensation, the artist than the man of experience, the master craftsman than the artisan; and the speculative sciences to be more learned than the productive. Thus it is clear that Wisdom is the knowledge of first principles".

Sane Aristoteles non veretur sapientem non expertum praeferre experto non sapienti Metaph. Et hoc facit tri tum illud Hippocratis: Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio volucris, experientia fallax seu perkulosa. The use of the word "cogitatio" in this context is probably an allusion to Descartes. II Voetius explicitly used the concept of "learned ignorance" against the Cartesians during the Crisis of Speaking of the attack by the new philosophers on "occult qualities", he pointed out that the view of philosophers and physicians who admit the existence of this kind of causes "is more in accordance with learned ignorance".

The contrary opinion, however, "which pretends to know everything and seems to promise the effortless acquisition of absolute wisdom, must be held in suspicion". This is evident in one of the books that started it off, De Scepticismo by Martin Schoock. Indeed, "inflated nitwits" and "moderns"—no doubt the Cartesians—are told that a sure road to scepticism is to strive for perfect knowledge. Noord-Hollandse Uitgeversmaatschappij, new edition with additional bibliography by Theo Verbeek, Utrecht: Ex officina Henrici Lussinck, The fact that only vol. I appeared in was due to a crisis in the paper industry.

The book as it stands consists of four parts, devoted to the history of scepticism, the arguments against scepticism, the role of experience, and various particular philosophic disciplines, all belonging to the arts and to theoretical philosophy. The second volume was to be devoted to a discussion of practical philosophy and of the "higher faculties" theology, medicine and law , and to a critical evaluation of Cartesians and Aristotelians alike "Praefatio"; see also p.

Quanquam autem hi a scepticismo alienissimi videntur, ad nihil scire tarnen viam expeditissimam faciunt, dum omne scire prae suo scire nihil putant; quod tarnen si penitius excutiantur ipsis ineptius deprehendetur. Sed hac de re pluribus subsequentibus libris. De Scepticismo II, vii, p. The senses, for instance, are more certain than reason.

Indeed, ultimately all natural knowledge derives from the senses. It is a power to operate on given materials. It has to be subdued and, at any rate, cannot be left to itself. Accordingly, he vigorously protests against the view that in astronomical and physical matters the Holy Spirit "speaks according to the mind and opinions of the erring vulgar".

The Bible does not reveal them, and the senses and reason are unable to attain them. Accordingly, physical explanations are essentially empirical. They are necessarily limited to the immediate causes of things and events, such as they are perceived by the senses. First, because they uphold an impossible ideal of science. Second, because they reject the senses. Third, because they arrive at conclusions which contradict the Bible.

There he criticized systematic doubt mainly for two reasons. The first is that doubt is a cheap means to achieve originality, a theme Schoock borrowed from Voetius Sect. I, 14—59; Querelle, pp. De Scepticismo IV, xix, p. Schoock adds that the Holy Spirit is a "spirit of truth" John This is in keeping with the empirical tendency of most of Schoock's other work.

De Scepticismo II, iv-vi, ; cf. Popkin, The History of Scepticism, revised edition, Assen: Van Gorcum, , Schoock's position anticipates Voetius's contributions to the debate on Copernicanism. Voetius had rejected the Copernican system as early as Now, he particularly insisted on the limitations of knowledge. No man is free from errors, no more than he is from misery or sin.

Ill of the Disputationes Theologica Selectie This last disputation has an "appendix on philosophic doubt", See also Voetius' "disputatio continens aliquot positiones miscellaneas" 24 May , Disputationes, vol. The original editions are lost. See also Nader openinge van eenige stucken in de cartesiaensche philosophie raeckende de H.

This pamphlet analyzed, in a not entirely satisfactory way, by Dr. Vos in his paper: Voordrachten wetenschappelijk symposium Utrecht 3 maart , ed. I, ; see my paper "Voetius en Descartes", in De onbekende Voetius, The texts put forward by Voetius are classical: One must not think that in this life "pansophy" or "quasipansophy" 39 are possible or a method by which to obtain easily and quickly a science of all things natural and sure and evident explanations and demonstrations. This stops those who arrogantly promise no end of wonders and who, in the name of Lull, Paracelsus, Hermes, the Brothers of the Rose-Cross, have mystified the world with this Gorgon head.

The more progress the true scientist makes, the more he makes his own that confession of our former teacher Heinsius: According to Voetius, ignorance as such is always reprehensible. It is a "malum triste", a regrettable evil, and even a "malum turpe", a condemnable vice. Hartlib, Dury and Comenius, Farnborough, Hants: Gregg International Publishers, original edition: Liverpool ; Thomas H.

Reformer of Education, Hildesheim Stadia irenica 8, passim see index, s. Vere sapientes, quo ulterius progressu, eo libentius usurpabant laudatissimum illud celeberrimi Heinsii quondam Praeceptoris nos tri Symbolum "Quantum est quod nescimus". The Scriptural basis of "learned ignorance" is Rom.

Voetius pursues by making an allusion to the Cartesians: The term "docta ignorantia", as it is used by Voetius, seems to be particular to him. For example we are not allowed to ask demons to reveal us the future, which is a case of "superstitiosa curiositas". There is sinful curiosity, too, if we strive for knowledge about creatures without minding "debitum finem", that is, the knowledge of God. Finally, curiosity occurs when someone tries to know more than his own faculties allow him. It is that of "seeking to know what cannot be known by any finite intellect or what cannot be known by human intellect during this life".

Voetius dissociates himself from Cusanus in "De docta ignorantia" I, i, Ibid.

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Oberman, Contra vanam curiositatem: Meijering, Calvin wider die Neugierde: U, , and other papers in this volume. Thomas is a rather unusual source in this context; cf. Oberman, Contra vanam curiositatem, , who concludes by saying: Jhdt gingen im grossen und ganzen respektvoll an dem Aquinaten vorbei. Ihre Interessen, darunter besonders die brennende Frage der curiositas, fanden sie nicht von ihm wahrgenommen", p.

But, whereas according to Thomas philosophy and theology virtually penetrate each other in a harmonious synthesis, the agreement between faith and reason postulated by Voetius is of a different order. This agreement can only be achieved by carefully demarcating what does, and what does not belong to the province of finite intellect.

Moreover, the limits of science, must be fixed by theology and not by philosophy, because theology is of a higher order than philosophy: Philosophy must be accommodated to Christian Theology, not the other way round. Otherwise the maidservant would put herself, under the pretext of freedom, in the place of the mistress and dominate over her in a licentious and tyrannical way.

In his comments on Col. True philosophy cannot be "vain".

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God would be a deceiver, if it were. Vain, however, is any philosophy that is not based on the senses and on "sound reason". All astronomers confess that their discipline is difficult and that the data on which it relies are inaccurate. See also "De docta ignorantia" II, Ibid. Their opinion is corroborated by Biblical evidence: THEO VERBEEK How great is, therefore, the temerity of those who construct their own world system against what was revealed by the Holy Spirit, the maker of it all, to Moses and to the other sacred authors; the more so because those who have no instruction at all and are not informed of all observations and measurements often are the most impertinent, those indeed who are not afraid to question the truth and the authority of Holy Writ, to subordinate it to their own hypothesis or require that it is not contradicted by it.

Voetius admits that the question of the sun's movement is, in itself, not fundamental to religion. But it certainly is a sign of "impudence and profanity" to hold an idea that is so evidently opposed to Holy Writ. All participants to the debate felt there was much more at stake than a precise astronomical problem. This was clear already in , when the question was first discussed in a Cartesian context.

From the beginning, the question was not whether Copernicanism was better as an astronomical hypothesis, but how much value must be attached to a reconstruction of the world on the basis of rational insights. Constitutio autem cceli secundum dogmata. By setting up a standard for truth that could evidently conflict with both the senses and the Bible, the Cartesians had, in fact, created a "sceptical crisis".

Ill The fundamental motive behind the accusation of scepticism, therefore, was to combat 'Vain curiosity". Until the first half of the seventeenth century, the use of this doctrine had been limited to preventing very particular questions, such as, for example, why God elects certain people and rejects certain others. Their own idea was that they did not.

According to them, God is free, so that any attempt to know His creation a priori amounts to a sacrilegious effort to penetrate into a sphere that was essentially closed to mortals, that of God's being. This, however, was exactly what the Cartesians did. Commenting on mechanist physics, Schoock points out that to subject nature to mechanics amounts to a restriction of God's actions by the rules of an essentially human craft. Naturally, one may ask whether Aristotelianism itself is not open to the same criticism.

De illustribus aliquot qastionibus physiologicis III, xv-xvi; see also Querelle, p. Meijering, Calvin wieder die Neugierde. The division, therefore, between common sense and philosophy was not of an essential, but only of a practical nature. In adopting the Aristotelian categories of "form" and "matter" one did not commit oneself to the authority of one philosopher. Aristotelian science was not a fixed body of doctrines, but rather a collection of problems and methods which had been passed on from generation to generation.

The example of Voetius and Schoock shows that in the seventeenth century scepticism was a taboo. It belonged to a later generation to realize that scepticism of some kind was perhaps an effective weapon in upholding the sake of orthodoxy. This is clearly visible in the work ofJohannes Regius What is given are individual things and events. General ideas are not only useless but, because of their limited corroboration, misleading. They are nothing but "entia rationis". It is nonsense to suppose that they can in any way be a true representation of things. In Regius's view, scepticism is a wholesome alternative.

Invariably his conclusion is that nothing is certain. Even so, scepticism must be preferred, at least if its motives are not vicious. Sassen, Geschiedenis van de wijsbegeerte in Nederland tot het eind der negentiende eeuw, Amsterdam, Brussels: For an exposition of Regius's general philosophy, see his De beginselen der bespuwende filosojy, Amsterdam: By Adrianus en Johannes Douci, Excudit Henricus Halma, Similar accents had been heard in a sermon on Col. Nodige waerschouwinge tegen het oordeel, en meesterschap der reden over de Schnftuyre en Goddelijcke waerheden, Franeker: By Hans Gyselaar, Knuttel.

Ex officina Francisci Halmae, Oratio pro Scepticismo, p. Moreover, whereas Voetius and Schoock had been cautious about some kinds of philosophy only, Regius issues a warning against all philosophy. And, whereas both Voetius and Schoock had to face the impossible task of refuting what they saw as dangerous scepticism by insisting on the limitations of knowledge, Regius's task was less ambiguous. No doubt, the rise of Cartesianism and the corresponding decline of Aristotelianism had made things easier.

Indeed, Regius's plea for scepticism turns out to be a plea for the rights of common sense. The concept, however, that links his position with that of Voetius and Schoock is that of "curiosity. In particular, Scarre insists that Descartes presents the deceiver argument merely as a methodological device and Scarre focuses on the fact that Descartes was impatient with attempts to refute the deceiver argument, saying that it was merely "metaphysical" or ''hyperbolical'' and was not to be taken seriously, that is, not as an actual possibility.

Descartes' grounds for disdain of the demon, Scarre speculates, are first, a solid disbelief in the existence of witches and witchcraft and hence a modern scientist's rejection of demons and demonology, and second, a sincere belief in the existence of a benevolent God for whom deception is impossible. In other words, according to Scarre, in knowing that God exists, Descartes knows that there are no deceiving demons. And, as Scarre points out, this makes Descartes very modern, indeed, for a thousand years of Catholic tradition acknowledged that God gave Satan licence to tempt human souls through deception, and if Descartes did not believe in witches, the majority of his contemporaries did, and witches were being tortured and burned during the very years in which Descartes introduced and then retracted his deceiving demon.

Martial Gueroult argues that Descartes knows that omnipotence and deception are incompatible, and this is why Descartes qualifies his introduction of the demon by saying in Meditation II: Henri Gouhier says that the demon is in fact unnecessary, for the sceptical argument is complete without the demon, and the doubt is all "pretense" anyway.

II This brings me to the historiographie issue that is the point of my paper. This issue is perhaps most explicitly broached by John Locke. Bishop Edward Stillingfleet accused Locke of being a Socinian because Locke believed in the prevalence of reason in matters of religion and in the general reasonableness of Christianity.

Locke was outraged, and stated explicitly that he was not a Socinian. I think we can accept the sincerity of Locke's disclaimer. Nevertheless, Stillingfleet and others. Locke's philosophy in fact provided aid and comfort to Socinians. The historiographie problem here is the relation between biography and logic. There is no biographical evidence that Descartes believed that a deceiving demon is an actual possibility as opposed to a metaphysical possibility, that is, abstracted from reality, just as there is no biographical evidence that Locke was a Socinian or, even if he appeared to be, a fellow traveler.

Quite the contrary, in fact, in each case. So as historians of philosophy—at least from what I shall call the biographical school of interpretation—in giving an exposition of a philosopher's position, we are instructed to discount whatever the philosopher himself discounts.

If Descartes says that the demon hypothesis is hyperbolical and rediculous, not to be taken seriously, then we are not warranted to take it seriously. And never mind that Locke's philosophy can be seen logically to imply Socinianism. University of Minnesota Press, , p. Discussed by Harry G.

Frankfurt in his Demons, Dreamers, and Madmen: Because Locke explicitly does not intend to support Socinianism, then we are not licensed to see it that way. The biographical interpretation thus opposes head on the logical interpretation. This is a very old conflict in philosophy. It goes back at least to the opposition of Socrates to the sophists, and it remains a difference roughly between those on the one hand who take rhetoric or hermeneutics in general as the most important bases of interpretation and those on the other hand who generate their interpretations from the logical implications of a philosopher's basic principles.

Another very rough splitting of these two schools is between those who stress the historical context and the socio-intellectual milieu in trying to understand what a philosopher means, and those who claim that principles, positions, and arguments are perennial and can be examined, criticized, and evaluated independently of the cultural context in which they arise and play a role.

The difference is expressed by members of what I shall call the logical school of interpretation. Members of the biographical school apparently believe that sceptical arguments are like tools or instruments that can be applied or not, and they take scepticism to be an attitude that one can choose to hold or not.

Thus, anyone who has a sceptical crisis is in a pathological condition. That is, someone like David Hume who really despairs about scepticism has a psychological disorder. Hume himself finds relief from sceptical doubts by wrenching himself away from study by engaging in such ordinary occupations as playing cards, conversing with friends, and eating. Hume does not, however, believe that this therapy destroys the disease of scepticism. It just relieves the symptoms.

Blaise Pascal, also, relieves the symptoms of his deep sceptical depression by resorting to religious belief, but, good Jansenist, he still knows that he can never know if he is saved, and he remains terrified of the infinite immensity of space. So those who argue that one can just ignore scepticism, and those who claim that sceptical arguments can simply be applied or not according to choice, have to hold—ingenuously perhaps—that scepticism is just a psychological attitude that can be turned on or off at will, and that one can choose to apply or not to apply sceptical arguments to a position, and, in particular, they have to claim that if the philosopher who holds or constructs the position says that sceptical arguments are not to be applied to it, then they do not apply and cannot be used in interpreting the position.