LACHELIER, JULES. – Philosopher, born 27 May 1832 at Fontainebleau, died there 18 January 1918. Professor at the Lycée of Caen (1864), he later taught (1864–75) at the École normale supérieure.
Under the influence of Maine de Biran and Ravaisson, L. developed transcendental idealism in a Kantian direction toward a spiritualistic realism. The true, profound, and organic unity in the world of phenomena is not given by purely mathematical laws, but by the law of finality, whereby nature presents itself as a unified system of teleological wholes. Thought is therefore immanent in nature (force and movement), tending teleologically toward its full expression in consciousness. This teleological explanation makes room for freedom and suggests, as a religious conclusion, the existence of a higher Principle of thought and reality, as a demand of “the passage from the formal absolute to the real and living absolute, from the idea of God to God.” The ultimate essence of thought, not reached by mere psychological analysis, is thus revealed in metaphysics, with a tendency to overcome pantheism.
L. influenced, among others, Boutroux and Bergson.
Principal works: De natura syllogismi (Paris 1871; 2nd ed., ibid. 1935); Du fondement de l’induction (doctoral thesis, ibid. 1871; 9th ed., 1907); Psychologie et métaphysique (two essays in Rev. philos., 19 [1885], reprinted in the 2nd ed. of Du fondement de l’induction, ibid. 1896); Études sur le syllogisme (ibid. 1907).