Fideism, Scepticism, or Free-Thought? The Dispute Between Lamy and Saint-Laurens over Metaphysical Knowledge

Abstract

From 1708 to 1710, the Cartesian monk François Lamy exchanged several letters with a reader of his work on the value and possibility of knowledge. The young Saint-Laurens teased Lamy on several issues related to what we can know of God, of justice and morality, and of metaphysics, thus progressively revealing surprising aspects of his thought. Was Saint-Laurens a sceptic, a fideist, or a free-thinker? By exploring the main arguments exchanged in this recently published correspondence, this paper ultimately shows the impotence of seventeenth-century rationalism when put on the trial of the new sceptical and libertine trends.