“This is the best of all possible worlds.”
This is almost beyond question the single most famous quote associated with the philosophy of Leibniz. It is his response to the existence of evil in a world and essentially posits that if this is so, then God must be acting in a way consistent with that thesis. While famous, it is also quite infamous. In response to what has been seen as its lack of sophistication, Voltaire wrote his most famous work, Candide, as an answer to the folly of this concept.
“The present is big with the future.”
Liebniz was fond of repeating certain metaphors and phrases across the span of various texts. This is another of his foundational statements and recurs many times. This concept is a fundamental element to the overall philosophical perspective taken by Leibniz. Boiled down to essentials, he is simply positing the notion that the past and future conspire in all things, that each state is the consequence of a preceding state and that time and distance have no bearing on the issue whenever a perfect connection is made between past, present and future.
“Why is there something rather than nothing?”
If the thing about best of all possible worlds is the most famous philosophical assertion made by Leibniz, then this is quite like the most famous philosophical question ever posed by him. In this text he references “the great principle” of metaphysics: nothing ever occurs without a reason for it occurring. So by extension it must be that the universe exists for a reason. Leibniz was building upon the metaphysical questions posed by past philosophers who were intrigued by why the universe operates the way it does. The leap is here to question not why the universe operates, but more fundamentally: why is there a universe at all? The answer is not satisfying to all, perhaps most: because God wanted it that way.
“The world is governed by the wisest and most powerful of monarchs, whom we call God.”
This specific wording is from the text mentioned above, but throughout the canon of his essays can be found the metaphor of God as a monarch. Elsewhere, for instance, the thought is reframed as: “God as an Architect has done all in a manner befitting God considered as a Monarch.” The stipulation driving all manner of construction of this tenet is the same and with repetition and recurrence it becomes a portrait of Leibniz’s philosophy in miniature. The universe and everything in it is entirely traceable back to God. This is fine if you believe in God or a supreme being or some kind of intelligence behind the design, but if you don’t subscribe to that belief, almost the entirety philosophical output of Leibniz is unsatisfying. The terminology he uses is also a distinct product of his time. Living in a world long on architects but short on monarchies, how would he define God today?
