Abstract

Maupertuis conflates Leibnizian arguments with a form of empiricism which Locke and Newton had inspired. In physics, he applies an optimum principle in order to generate a « system » ; and his teleology of the maximum saving is meant to counterbalance apparent discontinuities within empirical properties and laws. In physiology, the Leibnizian model is put to a different use. The Vénus physique suggests that the elementary organic parts are so adapted as to combine and reproduce a living organism ; and the Système de la nature fosters the analogy of the physiological « monad » as a theoretical notion. The epistemological unity of Maupertuis's theory of science depends upon the regulatory constraints he imposes on the empiricist methodology.