Philosopher · Early modern
Francisco Suárez
1548–1617 · Suárezianism (Jesuit scholasticism)
Jesuit, Doctor Eximius (Paul V); his Defensio Fidei was burned in London and Paris for denying royal absolutism.
The most systematic of the Jesuit scholastics, Suárez's Metaphysical Disputations (1597) were the first full treatise of metaphysics independent of commentary on Aristotle, read by Descartes, Leibniz and Wolff; he denied the real distinction of essence and existence and held that being is known by a single concept. In De Legibus he grounded law in reason and will together, civil authority in the consent of the community under God, and defended tyrannicide in extreme cases against James I.
Why he matters: His metaphysics formed the textbooks of Catholic Europe for two centuries and his political theory is the Catholic alternative to divine-right absolutism and to the social contract alike; congruism, his doctrine of grace, is a permitted school.
Where to be careful
Thomists (Gilson among them) charge that his “essentialism” and his rejection of the real distinction led philosophy toward rationalism; the Church commends St. Thomas as the principal master but has never censured Suárez.
Reading
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On Laws and God the Lawgiver (De Legibus, selections)Francisco Suárez, SJ (in Selections from Three Works) · Law, the state and the ius gentium.
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Metaphysical Disputations (Disputations 5, 7, 31 in English)Francisco Suárez, SJ · Individuation, distinctions, and essence and existence.
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A Companion to Francisco Suárezed. Victor Salas and Robert Fastiggi · Essays on every side of his thought.
Documented positions
Where this thinker stands on each dispute the test covers.