Pierre Bayle
No religious or philosophical dogma can be proven, so everyone, even an atheist, deserves tolerance and the freedom to follow their conscience.
Placement
Huguenot exile in Rotterdam: his “Historical and Critical Dictionary” turned skepticism against every dogmatism and pleaded for tolerance, even of atheists.
Key ideas
- Skepticism
- Rights of the erring conscience
- The problem of evil
Influence
Influenced by 4
Sextus Empiricus
influenced by
Bayle’s article ‘Pyrrho’ (Dictionary, 1697) renewed the sceptical arguments preserved by Sextus and argued that reason cannot defend Christian doctrine, which rests on faith alone. P. Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique (1697), “Pyrrhon”; R. H. Popkin, The History of Scepticism from Savonarola to Bayle (2003); SEP “Pierre Bayle”
Evidence: AI draft
Sextus Empiricus › c. 160–210
Michel de Montaigne
influenced by
Bayle drew on Montaigne’s Essays from the Various Thoughts on the Comet (1682) to the Dictionary (1697); C. B. Brush (1966) read his scepticism as variations on Montaigne’s. C. B. Brush, Montaigne and Bayle: Variations on the Theme of Skepticism (1966); S. Giocanti, on Bayle’s use of Montaigne, Libertinage et philosophie à l’époque classique 21 (2024)
Evidence: AI draft
Michel de Montaigne › 1533–1592
Francisco Sanches
influenced by
Bayle gave Francisco Sanches an article in his Historical and Critical Dictionary (1697), calling the author of That Nothing Is Known (1581) a ‘great Pyrrhonist’. P. Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique (1697), “Sanchez”; F. Sanches, Quod nihil scitur (1581); SEP “Francisco Sanches”
Evidence: AI draft
Francisco Sanches › 1551–1623
René Descartes
influenced by
Bayle taught Cartesian philosophy at Sedan and Rotterdam, and in his Dictionary (1697) turned the Cartesian arguments against sensible qualities against the reality of extension itself. P. Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique (1697), “Zénon d’Élée”, “Pyrrhon”; R. H. Popkin, The History of Scepticism from Savonarola to Bayle (2003); SEP “Pierre Bayle”
Evidence: AI draft
René Descartes › 1596–1650
Influenced 3
Bernard Mandeville
influenced
Mandeville took from Bayle’s Various Thoughts on the Comet (1682) the view that people act from passions, not professed principles, which underlies The Fable of the Bees (1714). P. Bayle, Pensées diverses sur la comète (1682); B. Mandeville, The Fable of the Bees, ed. F. B. Kaye (1924), introduction; SEP “Bernard Mandeville”
Evidence: AI draft
Bernard Mandeville › 1670–1733
Voltaire
influenced ✓
Voltaire took up Bayle’s critical method against dogma, and in the Poem on the Lisbon Disaster (1756) invoked Bayle, who ‘teaches doubt’, against philosophical optimism. Voltaire, Poème sur le désastre de Lisbonne (1756); SEP “Pierre Bayle”
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata
Voltaire › 1694–1778
David Hume
influenced
In the Treatise (1739) Hume used Bayle’s Dictionary article ‘Spinoza’ to turn the charge of atheism back on the theologians’ doctrine of an immaterial soul. D. Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature (1739), “Of the immateriality of the soul”; P. Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique (1697), “Spinoza”; SEP “Pierre Bayle”
Evidence: AI draft
David Hume › 1711–1776
Criticism
Mutual critique 1
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz ⇄ mutual
criticised
In the article ‘Rorarius’ of his Dictionnaire (1697; 2nd ed. 1702) Bayle questioned Leibniz’s pre-established harmony: how could a dog’s soul pass from pleasure to pain unprompted? P. Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, art. “Rorarius”, remarks H and L; G. W. Leibniz, Éclaircissement (1698); SEP “Pierre Bayle”
Evidence: AI draft
criticised by
Leibniz’s Theodicy (1710) answered Bayle’s claim that reason cannot reconcile evil with a good God, arguing that faith and reason agree and this is the best possible world. G. W. Leibniz, Essais de Théodicée (1710), Discours préliminaire, Parts I–III; SEP “Leibniz on the Problem of Evil”
Evidence: AI draft
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz › 1646–1716
Criticizes 1
Baruch de Spinoza
criticised
Bayle called Spinoza’s single substance ‘the most absurd and monstrous hypothesis’: God would be both the Germans and the Turks killing each other (Dictionnaire, 1697, ‘Spinoza’). P. Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique (1697), art. “Spinoza”, remark N; SEP “Pierre Bayle”
Evidence: AI draft
Baruch de Spinoza › 1632–1677
Works
Footnotes as an arsenal of skepticism – on evil, on Spinoza and on the limits of reason in religion.
Position
Bayle used erudition as a weapon of doubt. In his Historical and Critical Dictionary the footnotes swell into long arguments showing that reason, pressed far enough, entangles itself in contradictions – above all when it tries to reconcile a good God with the evil in the world. Faith cannot be proved, only held. After the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which cost his brother his life, he argued for tolerance: even an erring conscience has rights, and a society of atheists could be morally decent. Leibniz wrote his Theodicy in reply, and the Enlightenment from Voltaire to Hume drew on his arsenal.
Life & context
Pierre Bayle was born in 1647 in Le Carla in southern France, the son of a Calvinist pastor. Briefly a Catholic convert as a student in Toulouse, he returned to his faith and had to flee. After teaching at the Protestant academy of Sedan he settled in Rotterdam in 1681, where he taught at the Illustrious School, edited the learned journal Nouvelles de la République des Lettres (1684–87) and lost his professorship in 1693 after clashes with fellow Huguenots. He died there in 1706.
Further main works
- Various Thoughts on the Occasion of a Comet (1682)
- Philosophical Commentary on the Words “Compel Them to Come In” (1686)
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