La Mothe Le Vayer

Parmi les libertins dits érudits, François de La Mothe Le Vayer a souvent passé pour le représentant typique de la duplicité sociale, à la fois libre penseur accusé d’incroyance et précepteur royal fidèlement attaché à la cour. Ce travail cherche à saisir le lien entre la marginalité intellectuelle et la centralité politique de La Mothe Le Vayer en étudiant sa trajectoire comme acteur social. Il approche le préceptorat royal par des sources notariées et monarchiques qui permettent de situer le phénomène libertin dans la société parisienne, de décrire la proactivité des savants dans le système des charges et de comprendre l’activation conjoncturelle d’une relation de patronage construite dans le temps long.

Introduction to a section comprising seventeen articles on skepticism in the modern world. Attention is given to historical and cultural background that shaped, and was shaped by, skepticism, including globalization, the Reformation, and the rise of modern science.

Recensione di un’edizione critica realizzata nell’ambito del CELLF 17e-18e siècles, dell’Université Paris-Sorbonne, in cui si analizzano cinque trattati francesi seicenteschi che affrontano tematiche storiche e permettono di riconsiderare la storiografia del Seicento.

In this paper we study a probable reference to Justin (an ancient Greek apologist) in
Montesquieu’s "Lettres Persanes". In letter 33, the Persian Usbek discusses the possibility of
salvation for Christians: in our opinion, this passage (and especially the expression “semence
de nos dogmes”) turns against Christians Justin’s conception of Λόγος σπερματικός. After a
short presentation of ancient Christian apologetics and of Justin’s thought, we will point out
that Montesquieu had a good knowledge of patristic literature and a copy of Justin’s works in
his library. Then we will see that Justin played a key-role in the seventeenth century debate on
the possibility for pagans to be saved (“querelle de la vertu des païens”) – a problem that
Montesquieu discussed in a lost work, and that is the real object of letter 33. Finally, we will
study the letter 33 itself. We will show that the allusion to Justin strengthens the irony and the
ambiguity of the text: precisely because of Usbek’s use of Christian expressions, this letter
challenges not only Christian, but also Muslim religious primacy.