The sense in which God is the immediate object of our perceptions.

Abstract

This article and the next are concerned with the dispute between Antoine Arnauld and Nicolas Malebranche over the epistemic role of ideas and whether they require divine illumination. Malebranche had argued that ‘we see all things in God’, while Arnauld countered that this view distorts the nature and function ideas, which is not to stand in the way of our perceptions, but to allow us to see through to the object in a particular way. On this issue Leibniz takes the side of Malebranche, but by claiming that his doctrine of expression, which says that each substance expresses every attribute of God more or less distinctly, is consistent with Malebranche’s argument. Thus, Leibniz maintains along with Malebranche that our perceptions depend on God. Yet they must also be our own, in some sense. Leibniz makes brief reference to the Averroists, who supposedly claim that when we die the soul becomes one with God. Leibniz objects that this would dissolve the soul’s individuality. The likely reason he raises this point is to suggest that even if we see all things in God, this cannot mean that we understand everything perfectly, since we must also be distinct from God.