Is Pufendorf a Voluntarist?
The above quoted statement as well as others that we will examine, asserting the independence of moral beings from natural beings and their mode of establishment, have led many authors, and, as a matter of fact, not the least significant, to regard Pufendorf as an uncompromising voluntarist, a thoroughly anti-naturalist (be this praised or blamed).
According to Knud Haakonssen, ?there is no general theoretical connection between natural and moral goods; it is not a matter of logical inference from one to the other... This is the core of Pufendorf's voluntarism'.[863] Kari Saastamoinen mentions, as for him, ?the so-called moral entities, which Pufendorf distinguishes sharply from physical entities' and adds futher: ?[T]he sphere of moral entities is still fundamentally distinct from the physical one. Moral entities “do not arise from the intrinsic substantial principles of things” '.[864] Simone Goyard-Fabre writes that ?jusnaturalism proves to be torn between Grotian rationalism and Pufendorfian voluntarism.’[865]This idea of voluntarism can also be found in Pierre Laurent’s work, even though the word is not used. He speaks of a radical independence of created things and imposed moral beings, based on the fact that moral beings find their origin in no internal principle of the substance of things. ?Barbeyrac has understood this so well that he uses it tojustify his translation of the Latin word impositio with the French word “institution”. The latter term, he writes, expresses quite faithfully “what is invested and established as opposed to what comes from nature” '.[866] The argument here is the opposite of any type of naturalism.
More recently, eventually, Thor Inge Rorvik mentions ?Pufendorf’s... firm distinction between entia moralia and entia physica’ and, shortly after this, mentions ?the voluntaristic theology’ promoted by Pufendorf.[867]
As we will now discuss, there is a tendency to exaggerate Pufendorf’s voluntarism. It is not that Pufendorf would not be a voluntarist at all: he is undeniably one. Yet, he is not as much as these authors seem to believe he is (as other authors do, whom we will discuss in the next section).
However, before examining the texts which, in our view, seem to temper Pufendorf’s voluntarism, we are going to review, in an order that we deem logical, Pufendorf’s key assertions about moral beings and their implications.
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