MAINE DE BIRAN

maine de biran, francois-pierre-gonthier (1766-1824), french philosopher, was born at bergerac, on the 29th of november, 1766. the name maine he assumed (some time before 1787) from an estate called le maine, near mouleydier. after studying with distinction under the _doctrinaires_ of perigueux, he entered the life-guards of louis xvi., and was present at versailles on the memorable 5th and 6th of october 1789. on the breaking up of the _gardes du corps_ biran retired to his patrimonial inheritance of grateloup, near bergerac, where his retired life preserved him from the horrors of the revolution. it was at this period that, to use his own words, he "passed _per saltum_ from frivolity to philosophy." he began with psychology, which he made the study of his life. after the reign of terror maine de biran took part in political affairs. having been excluded from the council of the five hundred on suspicion of royalism, he took part with his friend laine in the commission of 1813, which gave expression for the first time to direct opposition to the will of the emperor. after the restoration he held the office of treasurer to the chamber of deputies, and habitually retired during the autumn recess to his native district to pursue his favourite study. he died on the 20th (16th, or 23rd, according to others) of july 1824. maine de biran's philosophical reputation has suffered from two causes--his obscure and laboured style, and the fact that only a few, and these the least characteristic, of his writings appeared during his lifetime. these consisted of the essay on habit (_sur l'influence de l'habitude_, 1803), a critical review of p. laromiguiere's lectures (1817), and the philosophical portion of the article "leibnitz" in the _biographie universelle_ (1819). a treatise on the analysis of thought (_sur la decomposition de la pensee_), although sent to press, was never printed. in 1834 these writings, together with the essay entitled _nouvelles considerations sur les rapports du physique et du moral de l'homme_, were published by victor cousin, who in 1841 added three volumes, under the title _oeuvres philosophiques de maine de biran_. but the publication (in 1859) by e. naville (from mss. placed at his father's disposal by biran's son) of the _oeuvres inedites de maine de biran_, in three volumes, first rendered possible a connected view of his philosophical development. at first a sensualist, like condillac and locke, next an intellectualist, he finally shows himself a mystical theosophist. the _essai sur les fondements de la psychologie_ represents the second or completest stage of his philosophy, the fragments of the _nouveaux essais d'anthropologie_ the third. maine de biran's first essays in philosophy were written avowedly from the point of view of locke and condillac, but even in them he was brought to signalize the essential fact on which his later speculation turns. dealing with the formation of habits, he is compelled to note that passive impressions, however transformed, do not furnish a complete or adequate explanation. with laromiguiere he distinguishes attention as an active effort, of no less importance than the passive receptivity of sense, and with butler distinguishes passively formed customs from active habits. he finally arrived at the conclusion that condillac's notion of passive receptivity as the one source of conscious experience was not only an error in fact but an error of method--in short, that the mechanical mode of viewing consciousness as formed by external influence was fallacious and deceptive. for it he proposed to substitute the genetic method, whereby human conscious experience might be exhibited as growing or developing from its essential basis in connexion with external conditions. the essential basis he finds in the real consciousness, of self as an active striving power, and the stages of its development, corresponding to what one may call the relative importance of the external conditions and the reflective clearness of self-consciousness he designates as the affective, the perceptive and the reflective. in connexion with this biran treats most of the obscure problems which arise in dealing with conscious experience, such as the mode by which the organism is cognized, the mode by which the organism is distinguished from extra-organic things, and the nature of those general ideas by which the relations of things are known to us--cause, power, force, &c. in the latest stage of his speculation biran distinguishes the animal existence from the human, under which the three forms above noted are classed, and both from the life of the spirit, in which human thought is brought into relation with the supersensible, divine system of things. this stage is left imperfect. altogether biran's work presents a very remarkable specimen of deep metaphysical thinking directed by preference to the psychological aspect of experience. the _oeuvres inedites_ of maine de biran by e. naville contain an introductory study; in 1887 appeared _science et psychologie: nouvelles oeuvres inedites_, with introduction by a. bertrand. see also o. merton, _etude critique sur maine de biran_ (1865); e. naville, _maine de biran, sa vie et ses pensees_ (1874); j. gerard, _maine de biran, essai sur sa philosophie_ (1876); mayonade, _pensees et pages inedites de maine de biran_ (perigueux, 1896); g. allievo, "maine de biran e la sua dottrina antropologica" (turin, 1896, in _memorie dell' accademia delle scienze_, 2nd ser., xlv, pt. 2); a. lang, _maine de biran und die neuere philosophie_ (cologne, 1901); monographs by a. kuhtmann (bremen, 1901) and m. couailhac (1905); n. e. truman in _cornell studies in philosophy_, no. 5 (1904) on maine de biran's philosophy of will.