La philosophie naturelle comme enjeu institutionnel : l'opposition de l'Église catholique à la Franc-Maçonnerie

Abstract

Pierre Boutin : Natural philosophy as an institutional lever. The Roman Catholic church's opposition to Freemasonry. Research on Catholic opposition to Freemasonry, declared in 1738, has elucidated its relation to political events, but its doctrinal sources are unknown. One must take into account its context, in particular the exclusion of the churches from the elaboration and legitimation of natural philosophy. The condemnations by Clement XII and Benedict XIV, aimed at the political conceptions contained in the Anderson Constitutions (1723), prolonged the controversy around the intrusion of Newtonian physics and experimentation into the social field. Thus the Church's hostility is not surprising, for the Masonic legislator elaborated a liberal political model, inspired by natural law, using the new relationship between natural and moral philosophy and Newton's gravitational model. This includes the idea of the individual as subject to law, of liberty given by the law, and the autonomy of politics from religious institutions and of philosophy from theology.