Abstract

In an effort to document the infiltration of rationalistic and essentialistic patterns of thought in nineteenth century scholasticism, Father Gurr has been patient and thorough enough to search through most of the Catholic manuals in use from 1750 to 1900, focusing on the single problem of the principle of sufficient reason. Whatever the ultimate origins of this principle, it received its classic formulation with Leibniz and Wolff. It is from these thinkers that the manual writers borrowed the concept, disengaging it from its rationalistic implications with only varying degrees of success.--L. S. F.