TITLE: The Foundations of Freedom in Leibniz's Metaphysics

ii (University of New Brunswick) This thesis is an investigation of the nature and.. "found,ation of freedom in Lei bniz ' s self-avowedly deterministic,metaphysics. The carrying out of this investigation requires an over-all evaluation of Leibniz's Rationalism. This eval-uation is.obtained by placing L~ibniz 'in, the perspective proyided by an examinatio ~ of Rationalism's prior development in the thought of Des~artes and Spinoza. Throu'ghout the, ~hesis, as a result of this particular '':L. ~pproach, attent~on\ls focussed not only on Rationalist meta-physics, but on methodology as well, especially in terms,of how the two reflect each other~ The thesis concludes by presenting the nature of freedom, and of L,eibniz's Rationalism generally, ' as springing fr9m the fundamental ambiguity of the relationship between the laws of. reason and God (viewed as both the source of Creation. I and the objeot of worship). As such ~ the relationship between freedom and determinism in Leibniz's philosophy must o • d • be regarded as depending finally on unclarified aspects of his ontological views. ~ , t \ I: