'The Art of Judgement': Thinking and Writing in Early Modern France

我的博士研究希望通过对早期现代“判断”概念的探索，对法国文艺复兴时期的修辞和哲学有新的认识。判断的艺术是人文学和修辞学复兴的教学传统的一个重要特征。与此同时，判断的概念也是十六世纪作家如蒙田（Michel de Montaigne）和维尔（Guillaume du Vair）讨论的一个重要焦点。然而，知识分子和文学史学家往往忽略了法国思想的这两个方面。根据这一观察，我的研究将追求以下激励问题：早期现代法国作家通过什么工具学习思考？他们的理性标准是什么？他们在什么问题上有分歧，在什么问题上有分歧？修辞学的话语是如何与其他思维方式相联系并区别于其他思维方式的？文艺复兴时期的“判断”为研究这些问题提供了一条重要的、尚未得到充分研究的途径，让我们得以了解早期现代的共同“生活形式”。哲学家路德维希·维特根斯坦（Ludwig Wittgenstein）解释说，一种“生命形式”是我们的条件所赋予的。它需要我们灌输特定的社会知识实践。因此，由于必然性，我们重视某些事物，认为某些事物是理所当然的，遵从某些权威，接受某些理性标准，并采用特定的解释模式。反过来，思考和写作活动成为这种生活形式的延伸。采用这种方法论立场，该项目将调查由修辞学戒律塑造的共同生活形式。为此，我将考察古典希腊和罗马修辞学指南的接受情况。这将使我们看到法国中小学和大学教育的教学理念和实践。16世纪早期的伊拉斯谟（Erasmus）等北方人文主义者将教学注意力集中在一个人的判断如何将“词语”和“事物”转化为可理解的“意义”上。反过来，学生们被训练在思考和写作的活动中具体运用他们的判断——在理解他们的世界的活动中。这种方法论方法使我们能够重建人文主义的生活形式，以及它是如何塑造早期现代法国思想的。从这里开始，我将研究判断工具如何影响16世纪法国思想和写作中的哲学优先事项和焦虑。对于蒙田、波丹、杜瓦尔和夏龙等作家来说，一个反复出现的主题是个人判断与更广泛的集体判断之间的紧张关系。集体判断确立了认识论和政治思想的规范性界限。然而，它也可能通过习惯的根深蒂固而腐蚀个人判断的独立性。这些作家共同的另一个重要主题是判断的不稳定性，以产生准确的语言表征。对审判的一系列隐喻和神秘的解释意味着，对于审判是什么以及它是如何运作的，几乎没有概念上的精确。反过来，这又导致人们怀疑自己或他人的判断能在多大程度上得到信任。事实上，在修辞学传统中的判断概念和斯多葛学派的文艺复兴认识论之间存在重叠，在后者中，判断在获得知识方面起着关键作用。这些主题直接触及我们最深的形而上学探究的核心。探索过去的人们如何通过他们的特定活动来理解他们的世界，让我们停下来反思我们自己的智力实践和理解的工具。

My DPhil research hopes to shed new light on French Renaissance rhetoric and philosophy through an exploration of the early modern concept of 'judgment'. The art of judgment was a critical feature in the revitalised pedagogical traditions of the studia humanitatis and ars rhetorica. At the same time, the concept of judgment was an important focus of discussion for sixteenth century writers such as Michel de Montaigne and Guillaume du Vair. However, intellectual and literary historians have tended to overlook these two aspects of French thought. From this observation, my research will pursue the following motivating questions: through what instruments did early modern French writers learn to think? What were their criterion of rationality? What did they disagree about, and on what terms? How did the discourse of the ars rhetorica relate to, and differentiate from, other modes of thinking? Renaissance 'judgement' provides an important understudied avenue for investigating these questions into a shared early modern 'form of life'.The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein explains that a 'form of life' is the 'given' to our condition. It entails our inculcation into particular social-intellectual practices. Thus, by necessity, we value certain things, take certain things for granted, defer to certain authorities, accept certain criterion of rationality, and adopt particular modes of interpretation. In turn, the activity of thinking and writing become extensions of this form of life. Adopting this methodological standpoint, the project will investigate a shared form of life shaped by the precepts of the ars rhetorica. To do this, I will examine the reception of classical Greek and Roman guides to rhetoric. This will allow us to see the pedagogical ideals and practices of school and university education in France. Northern humanist such as Erasmus in the early sixteenth century focused pedagogical attention on the way in which one's judgment transformed 'words' and 'things' into intelligible 'sense'. In turn, students were trained in a specific use of their judgment in the activity of thinking and writing-in the very activity of making sense of their world. This methodological approach allows us to reconstruct the humanist form of life and how this shaped early modern French thought.From here, I will the investigate how the instrument of judgment informed the philosophical priorities and anxieties in sixteenth century French thinking and writing. One recurring theme, for writers such as Montaigne, Bodin, Du Vair and Charron, was the tension between individual judgment and a broader notion of collective judgment. Collective judgment set the normative boundaries for epistemology and political thought. However, it could also corrupt the independence of individual judgment through the engraining of habit. Another important theme common to these writers was the instability of judgment to produce accurate linguistic representations. The series of metaphorical and mystical explanations of judgment meant there was little conceptual precision as to what it was and how it worked. In turn, this led to doubt as to the extent to which one could trust their judgment or that of others. Indeed, there is an overlap here between the notion of judgment in the tradition of rhetoric and the Renaissance revival of Stoic epistemology where judgment plays a key role in the attainment of knowledge. These themes reach straight to the heart of our deepest metaphysical enquiries. Exploring how people in the past made their worlds intelligible through their specific activity of making sense leaves us to pause and reflect on our own intellectual practices and instruments for making sense.