Stony Brook University

the wise, and many other things besides. 92 It concludes with the following:
Thus the sovereign wisdom has so well regulated all things that our duty must
also be our happiness, that all virtue produces its own reward, and that all
crime punishes itself, sooner or later. 93
This basically expresses Leibniz’s continual attempt to make virtue and utility
compatible. It might be objected that happiness has no place along with duty, since one’s
own happiness is not something that can be obligated; or, that happiness should in no way
be involved in the motive to perform one’s duties, since one can imagine duties so
arduous that no amount of happiness or pleasure could accompany them, though we
ought to perform them. Yet Leibniz is committed to the idea of harmony, and to the idea
that God has made everything in the most perfect and wise way. Therefore, Leibniz is
committed to saying that such duties are accompanied by happiness of some sort.
There is one other take on the science of happiness that is quite revealing. This is a
brief “demonstration” that Leibniz sketched back in 1678. It is part of a collection of
notes titled (by the Akademie) "Aphorisi de Felicitate, Sapientia, Caritate, Justitia.” The
demonstration is especially appropriate because it begins with the definition of justice
and shows that happiness is connected to both charity and wisdom. Yet the chain
terminates in an interesting way. Note that Leibniz labels the defined terms.
a b
Justice is the charity of the wise.
c
a Charity is universal benevolence.
d
c Benevolence is the habit of love.
f e
d To love someone is to be delighted in her felicity.
e
b Wisdom is the science of felicity.
g
e Felicity is a lasting joy.
f
g Joy is the state of pleasure, in which the sense of pleasure is greater than
the sense of pain.
h
f Pleasure or delight is the sense of perfection; it is a certain sense of a thing
that aids it or adds some power.
h Perfected is whose power (potentia) is increased or aided. 94
92 Grua, Texts Inédits p. 579 and Riley, Leibniz Political Writings, p. 83.
93 TI 581: “Ainsi la souueraine sagesse a si bien reglé toutes choses que nostre devoir doit faire aussi nostre
bonheur, que toute vertu produit sa recompense, et que tout crime se punit tost ou tard.”
94 A.6.4.2803: “Justitia est charitas sapientis. Charitas est benevolentia generalis. Benevolentia est habitus
amoris. Amare aliquem est ejus felicitate delectari. Sapientia est scientia felicitatis. Felicitas est laetitia
durabilis. Laetitia est status voluptatum, in quo sensus voluptatis tantus est, ut sensus doloris prae eo non sit
notabilis. Voluptas seu Delectatio est sensus perfectionis, id est sensus cujusdam rei quae juvat seu quae
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