LEIBNIZ (GOTTFRIED WILHELM)

Autograph letter signed ("Leibniz") to Thomas Burnett ("Monsieur"), in French, Hanover, 8[/18] April, 1698

Footnotes

'...WILLIAM FIRST, OR SECOND, OR THIRD? ASK NOT, CRITICS, GREAT'S THE WORD...': THE REMAINING CORRESPONDENCE FROM LEIBNIZ TO THOMAS BURNETT OF KEMNAY, HITHERTO HELD AT KEMNAY HOUSE.

This letter, and the three following, form part of the significant and extensive correspondence between Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) and Thomas Burnett 'un gentilhomme Ecossois' of Kemnay in Aberdeenshire (1656-1729). Their meeting at the Court of Hanover in 1695 led to an eighteen-year correspondence, with Burnett also mentioned in many other of Leibniz's writings, particularly with regards to his efforts to release Burnett from the Bastille as described in the following lot (see Patrick Riley, Leibniz's Scottish Connection: The Correspondence with Thomas Burnett of Kemney, Journal of Scottish Philosophy, I, (1), 2003, pp.69-85). The most recent Akademie edition of Leibniz correspondence accessible online includes some 29 letters from Leibniz to Burnett, and 51 from Burnett to Leibniz written during the period 1695-1707, with more still to be published. Our lots comprise the remaining correspondence hitherto held by the family at Kemnay.

Thomas Burnett, a Scottish lawyer, met Leibniz whilst returning from a tour of France, Italy and Germany, during which he was welcomed at the courts of Berlin and Hanover at a time when the protestant Electress Sophia stood as successor to Queen Anne's throne. Leibniz was already corresponding at length on matters religious and political with Burnett's cousin Gilbert Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury, whose celebrated History of the English Reformation served as a vindication of the accession of William and Mary. The family connection and Burnett's support of the Electress' claim to the English throne notwithstanding, Leibniz also found in Burnett a useful conduit to fellow-philosopher John Locke, with whom he was keen to correspond, and a source of intellectual and political news and gossip from England and elsewhere (see Stewart Duncan, Toland and Locke in the Leibniz-Burnett Correspondence, September 2017, PhilArchive online resource). Our letters show he was also the means for Leibniz to obtain the latest writings published in English ("...I saw some issues of an English journal or newspaper which was half-way between a scholarly journal and a society newspaper, but I don't know if it's carried on..."). On a personal level, Leibniz described Burnett as being somewhat disposed to melancholy, a man concerned not so much in politics but on the truth of religion and against the corruption of morals (Leibniz, 29 September 1702, in Gerhardt, p.160). Burnett's side of the correspondence, written in an idiosyncratic French which Gerhardt described as "wenig correct und sehr unorthographisch" (Duncan, p.1), shows an evident enjoyment of the prestige afforded to him in intellectual circles by his position as intermediary, but also shows a particular tendency to steer Leibniz towards the opinions of Locke in particular on various matters ranging from philosophy to the coinage crisis.

Leibniz begins this wide-ranging letter by touching on the ongoing controversy between John Locke and Edward Stillingfleet, the Bishop of Worcester, promising he will discuss this at length at a later date. The previous year Stillingfleet had published Three Criticisms of Locke in response to Locke's Essay on Human Understanding, in which he accused Locke of undermining the doctrine of the Trinity and thus prompting a very public debate.

Also shown here is his close relationship with the Electress Sophia, a friendship that lasted for forty years. He asks Burnett for some cheerful yet spirited reading matter for her, "stricken" as she is after the death of her husband ("...her spirit consoles her head, but her heart can not recover so quickly...") and speaks in somewhat proprietorial terms ("...I did not write without the knowledge of the Electress, but she is completely uninvolved with it..."). Sophia, a well-read woman of exceptional intellectual ability, became a friend and patron of Leibniz when he held the post of librarian at the Court of Hanover. Their correspondence runs to around 600 items on all possible subjects including the social and political events of the day, court gossip, travel and, inevitably, philosophy. Indeed, she is now recognised as not just the correspondent of Leibniz but as a philosopher in her own right (Lloyd Strickland, The Philosophy of Sophie, Electress of Hanover, Hypatia 24, 2009, p.422-440).

Throughout these letters, Leibniz is preoccupied with English politics and the issue of the Protestant (and therefore Hanoverian) succession, demonstrating a great admiration for the English monarchy. At the time of writing, the Electress Sophia was the next protestant in line to the throne, but it was not until the 1701 Act of Settlement that she was formally named heiress presumptive and, whilst she did not survive long enough to take up the Crown, that position was to be secured by her son George. In the present letter Leibniz fears "black practices" against King William in a precarious political situation and speaks here of the readiness of Germany and the Empire to have troops mobilised against France despite the negotiations towards peace (which eventually resulted in the Treaty of the Hague in October 1698).

In the enclosed copy letter, Leibniz engages the Bishop of Salisbury in a discussion about matters religious and political, namely his thoughts on dissenters and the exclusion of Catholics from the crown. Gilbert Burnet (1643-1715) was '...a political bishop... one of the few British writers of his time who could boast of a European reputation. Many of his works were published on the continent in French, Dutch, and even German translations. Louis XIV was obviously well aware of his History of the Rights of Princes. Bishop Jacques Bossuet, tutor to the dauphin and one of the most celebrated of French theologians of the day, considered Burnet one of the three principal champions of Protestantism. Burnet also corresponded with several notable continental figures in religious and intellectual circles, including Daniel Le Clerc, Philippus van Limborch, and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz...' (Martin Greig, ODNB). The Akademie collected correspondence includes a letter from Leibniz to Gilbert Burnet written three days before ours (no.311, p.478). However, the contents of which bears little resemblance to our 'postscript' and it may be, therefore, that our 'copy' is the only surviving record of another letter.

The main body of the letter is published in Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz: Allgemeiner politischer und historischer Briefwechsel, Akademie Verlag, 1998 (no.316, L2, p.492-493), available online, but without the postscript to Thomas Burnett or the copy postscript to Gilbert Burnet. Another longer letter to Burnett written on the same day is also included in the correspondence (no.316, L1, p.486-491). It is also published Susan Burnett, Without Fanfare: The Story of my Family, 1994, p.11-12, and elsewhere but not in Gerhardt's, Die philosophischen Schriften von Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, 1887. It has been held in the archive at Kemnay House, Aberdeenshire, until now.

Provenance: Thomas Burnett, 2nd of Kemnay (1656-1729); and thence by descent.