FOUILLÉE, ALFRED. - Philosopher, born at La Pouezz (Maine-et-Loire) in 1838, died at Lyon in 1912. After the publication of *Philosophie de Platon* (2 vols., Paris 1869), he taught lectures at the École normale supérieure (1873–79), but had to resign from teaching due to health reasons.
He was a prolific writer and agile polemicist. Principal works: *Histoire de la philosophie* (Paris 1875); *La liberté et le déterminisme* (ibid. 1872); *L'évolutionnisme des Idées-Forees* (2 vols., ibid. 1890); *La morale des Idées-Forees* (ibid. 1908); *Esquisse d'une interprétation du monde* (posthumous, ibid. 1913). Fouillée’s originality lies in his conception of ideas as real and efficacious forces, the *Idées-Forees*. Ideas are not external to the universe, as Plato held, but remain within it in the form of desire, sentiment, and thought, influencing the cosmic process from within. An idea realizes itself unless hindered by an antagonistic idea. Thus, the ideal formed in humanity is a force that gradually makes it real.
Fouillée’s philosophy, while displaying a certain spiritualistic impulse, is fundamentally monistic and deterministic.