Abstract

This paper presents and discusses unpublished notes written around 1703 in which Leibniz defends a dual-aspect theory of modification against the common interpretation that force alone is sufficient to account for change. Leibniz’s analysis of the different abstract elements of modification implies a rethinking of what permanence is, what force or an act is, and what a subject is. I show that the conceptual resources developed in these notes provide the means for thinking about the abstract but real constituents of the monad. I argue that active force is only a real abstract, and I defend against certain deflationary readings the notion of primary matter as representing the series of limitations of an entelechy, which is precisely instantiated by the series of perceptions and appetites in a monad. Given this groundwork, the paper finally offers a reconciliatory reading of the different monadic inventories, which present different real abstracts of the monad with varying degrees of logical abstraction.