Adolphe Garnier

Adolphe Garnier (27 March 1801 – 4 May 1864) was a French academic philosopher, the main disciple and continuator of Théodore Jouffroy.

Biography

Garnier was born in Paris. He studied at the Collège Bourbon, where he had Jouffroy as a teacher and won the first prize in philosophy in the concours général. He later became a lawyer while contributing to several literary and philosophical collections.

In 1827, he published a pamphlet on the death penalty that drew attention to him and brought him back to philosophy. After passing the agrégation in philosophy in 1827, he taught in Versailles, then in the Parisian colleges of Saint Louis (from 1833), Louis-le-Grand (from 1835 to 1838), and Henri-IV (1840–1841) as well as at the École normale supérieure (1834–1835).

On May 25, 1840, Garnier defended his two theses for the Doctorate of Letters at the University of Paris. The first, in French, is a critique of the philosophy of Thomas Reid. The second, in Latin, is a reflection on poetry.

He was appointed assistant professor of philosophy at the University of Paris Faculty of Letters in 1842, then succeeded Jouffroy in the chair of dogmatic philosophy in 1845 in this university. He also contributed to Le Globe.

He died in Jouy-en-Josas and is buried in the Montmartre Cemetery.

Works

De la Peine de mort, 1827 Précis d'un cours de psychologie, 1831. Œuvres philosophiques de Descartes, publiées d'après les textes originaux, avec notices, sommaires et éclaircissements, par Adolphe Garnier, 4 vol., 1835 La Psychologie et la Phrénologie comparées, 1839 Critique de la philosophie de Thomas Reid, doctoral thesis, 1840 Quid poesis?, doctoral thesis, 1840 De la Perception de l'infini et de la foi naturelle, 1846 Morale sociale, ou Devoirs de l'État et des citoyens en ce qui concerne la propriété, la famille, l'éducation, la liberté, l'égalité, l'organisation du pouvoir, la sûreté intérieure et extérieure, 1850 Traité des facultés de l'âme, comprenant l'histoire des principales théories psychologiques, 3 vol., 1852. Histoire de la morale, 2 vol., 1855–1857 De la Morale dans l'antiquité, Éd. Germer Baillière, coll. «Bibliothèque de philosophie contemporaine», 1865