Leibniz on the Psychology of Damnation and the Complaint of the Damned

Abstract The recent literature on Leibniz’s views on salvation and damnation has focused on whether Leibniz was a lifelong believer in the doctrine of eternal damnation, or whether he came to accept universalism, the doctrine that everyone will be saved. Neglected, however, has been Leibniz’s complex and surprising justification of damnation. In this paper, I examine Leibniz’s attempt to answer the ‘complaint of the damned’: the damned’s complaint that God has treated them unjustly by creating them such that damnation was inevitable. I argue that Leibniz’s ‘psychology of damnation’ is the centerpiece of his response to the complaint of the damned. I further show that the psychology of damnation is not only of theological interest, but also provides an account of the moral psychology of evil in general, and helps solve a puzzle that arises from Leibniz’s naturalized theory of punishment – the puzzle of how vice can be naturally ‘self-punishing.’