We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2024
1 GA IV.3.1 means chapter IV, paragraph 3, section 1; English edition edited by Nicholas Lash, University of Notre Dame Press, 1979.
2 See Bastable, J. D. “The Germination of Belief within Probability according to Newman”, Philosophical Studies, Vol. XI (1961–62), p. 85, note 10Google Scholar.
3 Dessain, S. “Cardinal Newman on the Theory and Practice of Knowledge. The Purpose of the Grammar of Assent”, The Downside Review, 75, January 1957CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 GA II.1 p. 32 Without any condition does not mean without reserve.
5 GA II.1 p. 32.
6 Ker, I. Introduction to Newman, J. H. An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent, Clarendon, Oxford, 2001, p. xivGoogle Scholar.
7 GA IX p. 271.
8 GA IX p. 270.
9 See Tillman, M. K. “The Personalist Epistemology of John Henry Newman”, Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, vol. LX (1986), pp. 235–244CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
10 GA VIII.2.3 p. 251.
11 GA IX.1 p. 275.
12 GA VIII.1.2 p. 230.
13 See Ferreira, M. J. “Newman on Belief‐Confidence, Proportionality and Probability”, The Heythrop Journal, Vol. XXVI (1985), pp. 164–176CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
14 GA VIII.1 p. 234.
15 GA VIII.2.1 p. 239.
16 OC 1.
17 Rhees, R. (edit.)Recollections of Wittgenstein, Oxford, Blackwell, 1984, p. 130Google Scholar.
18 See N., Malcolm, Ludwig Wittgenstein, A Memoir, New York‐Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1984, p. 59Google Scholar.
19 Henry Whitehead, Alfred's brother, was a Fellow and lecturer in classics at Trinity College, Oxford, when Newman was an honorary Fellow. Alfred Whitehead met Newman probably only once in Edgbaston, in 1889 when he was considering joining the Catholic Church. “[Whitehead] never forgot his few minutes with Newman. And the man remained high in his esteem. In philosophical lectures at Harvard he recommended reading him, and sometimes went so far in praise of Newman's merit as a thinker to call him the most profound mind of the nineteenth century”. Lowe, V. Alfred North Whitehead The Man and his Work, The John Hopkins University Press, 1985, p. 171CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
20 “Yorick Smythies, a former student of Wittgenstein’s, told me that Wittgenstein had said of J. H. Newman's Grammar of Assent, that Newman thought the grammar was supporting the Christian faith whereas, in fact, the faith was supporting the grammar, as if it were suspended from a balloon. Thus assent to religious belief is an ascent or an elevation rather than the result of an upward climb. The driving force that impels this upward thrust is love of Christ and trust in his redemptive power.” Barrett, C. Wittgenstein on Ethics and Religious Belief, Oxford, Blackwell, 1991, p. 181Google Scholar.
21 “…Professor Anscombe informed me at the Conference that Wittgenstein did not read Newman's book [Grammar of Assent], although he had read in the Apologia.” FitzPatrick, P. J. Eine komische Bemerkung H. Newmans in Leinfellner E. and others (edd.)Wittgenstein and his impact on contemporary thought, Wien, HPT, 1978, pp. 42–45. And also “I was informed by Professor Anscombe that Wittgenstein did not read the Grammar of Assent; but that, on hearing this theme in the book stated, he acknowledged the likeness to his own views. On what Malcolm had in mind, I can offer no information; but I record Professor Anscombe's recollection that Wittgenstein did not like Tract 90.” FitzPatrick, P. J. Newman's Grammar and the Church Today in D., Nicholls and F., Kerr (edit.)John Henry Newman Reason, Rhetoric and Romanticism, Bristol, The Bristol Press, 1991, p. 128Google Scholar note 1.
22 See Grassi, O. (edit.)L’idea di ragione, Milan, Jaca Book, 1992; p. 73Google Scholar; Fey, W. R Faith and Doubt, Shepherdstown, Patmos Press, 1976, p. 158Google Scholar; Bearsley, P. J. “Aquinas and Wittgenstein on the Grounds of Certainty”, The Modern Schoolman, Vol. LI (1974), pp. 301–334CrossRefGoogle Scholar; McCarthy, G. “Newman and Wittgenstein: The Problem of Certainty”, Irish Theological Quarterly, Vol. 49 (1982) n. 2, pp. 98–120CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Holyer, R. “Religious Certainty and the Imagination: an Interpretation of J. H. Newman”, The Thomist, n. 50 (1986), pp. 395–416CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ferreira, M. J. Doubt and Religious Commitment, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1980Google Scholar; Ferreira, M. J. Scepticism and Reasonable Doubt, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1986Google Scholar.
23 See Barrett, C. Newman and Wittgenstein on the Rationality of Religious Belief, in Ker, I. (edit.)Newman and Conversion, Edinburgh, T&T Clark, 1997Google Scholar; Levvis, G. W. “The Wittgensteinian Consistency of Scepticism”, Philosophical Investigations, n. 15 (1992), pp. 66–78Google Scholar; Gallacher, H. P. “Wittgenstein over kennis”, Kennis en metode, n. 2 (1978), pp. 18–29Google Scholar.
24 PU 66.
25 “How it comes about that we can be certain is not my business to determine; for me it is sufficient that certitude is felt. This is what the schoolmen, I believe, call treating a subject in facto esse, in contrast with in fieri. Had I attempted the latter, I should have been falling into metaphysics; but my aim is of a practical character, such as that of Butler in his Analogy, with this difference, that he treats of probability, doubt, expedience, and duty, whereas in these pages, without excluding, far from it, the question of duty, I would confine myself to the truth of things, and to the mind's certitude of that truth.” GA IX, p. 270.
26 Phillips, D. Z. The Concept of Prayer, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1965, p. 1Google Scholar.
27 See Naulty, R. A. “Newman's Dispute with Locke”, Journal of history of Philosophy, n. 11 (1973), pp. 453–457CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Newman, Jay, “Newman on the Strength of Belief”, The Thomist, n. 44 (1977), pp. 134–140Google Scholar; Bastable, J. D. “Cardinal Newman's Philosophy of Belief”, Philosophical Studies, Vol. V (1955), pp. 52–55Google Scholar; Cameron, J. M. “Newman and Locke A Note on some Themes in An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent”, Newman Studien, Vol. IX, pp. 197–205Google Scholar.
28 See McCarthy, G. “Newman and Wittgenstein: The Problem of Certainty”, Irish Theological Quarterly, Vol. 49 (1982) n. 2, p. 111CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
29 GA VII.1.1 p. 177.
30 See Collins, P. M. “Newman, Foundationalism and Teaching Philosophy”, Metaphilosophy, Vol. 22 (1991), n. 1 and 2, pp. 143–161CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Schenck, D. “Newman's Complex Assent and Foundationalism”, International Philosophical Quarterly, n. 26 (1986), pp. 229–240CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
31 GA IV.3 pp. 90–91.
32 OC 559.
33 OC 204.
34 See Martin; D. “On Certainty and Religious Belief”, Religious Studies, n. 20 (1984), p. 602Google Scholar.
35 See Gullvåg, I. “Remarks on Wittgenstein's Über Gewissheit and a Norwegian Discussion”, Inquiry, n. 31 (1988), p. 378CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
36 GA VI.2.2 p. 174.
37 GA VII.1.1 p. 174.
38 ÜG 357–359.
39 ÜG 475.
40 GA VII.1.1 p. 102.
41 BPP II 689.
42 See Finch, H. L. R. “Wittgenstein's Last Word: Ordinary Certainty”, International Philosophical Quarterly, n. 15 (1975), p. 384CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
43 On doubt in Newman see Ferreira, M. J. Doubt and Religious Commitment, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1980Google Scholar; Powell, J. P. “Cardinal Newman on Faith and Doubt: the Role of Conscience”, The Downside Review, n. 99–100 (1981), pp. 137–148CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Holyer, R. “Newman on Doubt”, The Downside Review, n. 107–108 (1989), pp. 117–126Google Scholar.
44 GA VI, 2 p. 160.
45 OC 392.
46 OC 160.
47 See OC 310.
48 See OC 458.
49 OC 24.
50 See Frank, G. “Fondazione della conoscenza e fondamenti dell’operare (Moore and Wittgenstein)”, Nuova Corrente, n.72–73 (1977), p. 51Google Scholar.
51 “If you tried to doubt everything you would not get as far as doubting anything. The game of doubting itself presupposes certainty.” OC 115.
52 OC 519.
53 GA IX.3.2 p. 294.
54 See Morawetz, T. Wittgenstein & Knowledge The Importance of “On Certainty”, Amherst, The University of Massachusetts Press, 1978Google Scholar.
55 See Morawetz, T. Wittgenstein & Knowledge The Importance of “On Certainty”, Amherst, The University of Massachusetts Press, 1978, pp. 12–13Google Scholar.
56 See OC 617.
57 OC 81.
58 “The notion of a methodological proposition is like the notion of a proposition known a priori, a proposition which invariably specifies a condition for the possibility of knowing.”T., Morawetz, Wittgenstein & Knowledge The Importance of “On Certainty”, Amherst, The University of Massachusetts Press, 1978, p. 104Google Scholar. See also Morawetz, T. H. “Wittgenstein and Synthetic A Priori Judgments”, Philosophy, n. 49 (1974), pp. 429–434CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
59 OC 454.
60 The use of Wittgenstein's thought to clarify Newman ideas is not completely arbitrary. See Haldane, J. “Infallibility, Authority and Faith”, The Heythrop Journal, Vol. XXXVIII (1997), pp. 267–282CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
61 Finch, H. L. R. “Wittgenstein's Last Word: Ordinary Certainty”, International Philosophical Quarterly, n. 15 (1975), p. 384Google Scholar.
62 I would like to thank D. Z. Phillips, Teresa Iglesias and Gemma Lougheed for their critical comments on the previous version of this essay.
