Toleration has once again become a central focus of liberal theories of justice. In recent years, many liberal theorists have put aside foundational arguments about autonomy and equality in order to explore directly how individuals with diverse identities and beliefs can live together peacefully. Early modern proponents of liberalism were similarly animated by concerns about identity and difference, originally developing the modern concept of toleration amidst the conflicts of the European wars of religion. In the works under review here, Ingrid Creppell and Alan Levine admirably plumb the insights of these authors in order to propose more fruitful ways for conceptualizing toleration in our own times.

Creppell organizes her work around the seeming conflict between toleration and identity. A strong commitment to a group identity is usually thought to stand in tension with the toleration of others. In her first two chapters, she explores this tension theoretically and proposes an alternative account of toleration to mitigate it. The following four chapters each address a major early modern thinker—Bodin, Montaigne, Locke, and Defoe—whose ideas exemplify this alternative approach to toleration.

Creppell begins her theoretical analysis by arguing that liberal and postmodern approaches to toleration and identity are deficient. Liberal theorists usually attempt to circumvent the dangers of difference by emphasizing the universal nature or common interests of all individuals. Postmodern theorists attempt to overcome the potentially divisive nature of identity by accentuating the multiple identities inherent in each of us.

The author suggests that particularism and difference do not need to be overcome or deconstructed in order to achieve toleration and peaceful accommodation. Her politics of toleration attempts to forge relationships that will bind diverse individuals together in collective life without erasing their particular identities. Indeed, she argues that staying in relation with the person or group with whom one is in conflict is central to the definition of toleration.

Achieving this notion of toleration depends upon convincing individuals to adopt what Creppell calls “bridging identities,” self-understandings that help individuals to imagine themselves in relations of mutuality and toleration with diverse others. They do not replace particular identities but overlay them with links to collective life. Political leaders, public thinkers, and artists can all play a role in propagating these identities by emphasizing the value of people's “commitment to continued interaction for common goals” (p. 160).

Creppell's chapters on Bodin, Montaigne, Locke, and Defoe demonstrate how each of these thinkers attempted to reformulate conceptions of the self in order “to bridge animosities between groups while not washing away the content of difference and otherness” (p. 153). Bodin outlines a new identity that directs individuals to refrain from violence, recognize the supreme authority of the sovereign, and accept the neutrality of the public realm. Montaigne complements this vision with a new moral psychology that emphasizes concrete, bodily experience and is intended to ground people's thinking so that their minds will not “fly off in potentially harmful and coercive directions” (p. 84). Locke further justifies toleration by elaborating a set of overlapping dualisms between religion/politics, inner/outer, mind/body, and private/public that encourages individuals to recognize a realm of personal freedom. In the novel Robinson Crusoe, Defoe more subtly advocates toleration by making his protagonist the embodiment of a new attitude toward public judgment that accepts diversity and promotes the common good.

Creppell's book deserves attention not only from scholars of the history of political thought but also from contemporary theorists interested in issues of toleration and identity. The early theoretical chapters are among the strongest. The historical chapters are also insightful but suffer from some oversights. The chapter on Bodin, for example, fails to mention that this early proponent of toleration was also the author of a book, De la démonamanie des sorciers, that calls upon political leaders actively to root out and persecute witches within their realms. (Creppell does briefly mention Bodin's position on witchcraft in her chapter on Montaigne [p. 72].) The diverse participants in Bodin's dialogue on toleration, the Colloquium Heptaplomeres de Rerum Sublimium Arcanis Abditis, likewise argue that atheists should not be tolerated. In his First Letter on Toleration, Locke, too, withholds toleration from atheists—a point that Creppell mentions only in a footnote (p. 185 n. 37). Insofar as her intention is to accentuate the positive steps these writers took toward justifying toleration, it is perhaps understandable that she did not emphasize the limits of their views; but these points should at least have been more directly addressed. In addition, these points raise some questions about her account of the political bridging identities outlined by Bodin and Locke. Bodin and Locke attempted to link individuals to a state that was not wholly neutral, as Creppell suggests, but committed to defending and propagating religious values. It is precisely this common good end that appears to make their accommodation possible. Lacking this common good end, as is the case in our own times, we may find it more difficult to formulate bridge identities that successfully link diverse individuals to a tolerant public realm.

Levine's book focuses solely on Montaigne's political philosophy. Since toleration is central to Montaigne's political philosophy, this study overlaps thematically with Creppell's. Yet this book is more than just a study of Montaigne's views on toleration. Levine systematically explores Montaigne's political thought and demonstrates his “important but underappreciated influence on modern thought as a whole and his role in the origins of liberalism in particular” (pp. 15–16). The result is the best book-length study of Montaigne's political ideas yet published in English.

Levine argues that Montaigne's major contribution to the theory of liberalism and toleration was the articulation of a tolerant mind-set or psychology. Central to this mind-set was a withering skepticism that challenged humanity's ability to know any transcendental or metaphysical truths. Yet skepticism alone is not sufficient to justify toleration, for if we cannot know anything, then there would seem to be no more reason to tolerate others than to dominate them. Levine suggests that Montaigne avoids this nihilistic conclusion by grounding his philosophy in a phenomenological conception of the self. Since our senses and reason are faulty, we cannot know with certainty anything about the external world. But we do have direct access to our experiences, and as such, can know with certainty the limits of our knowledge as well as some basic goods of human experience.

Montaigne's skepticism points specifically to two ideals of the good life. One is the natural simplicity of the lives of animals, peasants, and the “cannibals” of the New World. All of these beings live their lives without sophistication according to their bodily needs and wants. The other ideal is the sophisticated simplicity of the sensual philosopher. According to Levine, this ideal is Montaigne's highest vision of the good life. While the sensual philosopher still organizes his or her life around bodily needs, he or she has a more developed sense of reason, is more self-consciously aware of the limits of knowledge, and is more actively engaged in self-creation.

Montaigne's ideal of the good life serves to justify his political argument for toleration. He calls for a sharp separation of public and private so that individuals might freely engage in self-reflection and self-creation. He also emphasizes the importance of stability and obedience, but argues that people will be more likely to obey if rulers abdicate control over personal matters.

Levine ultimately claims that Montaigne offers a more compelling justification of toleration than more well-known defenses. He avoids problematic appeals to metaphysical ideals or rights, and also avoids the problems that characteristically plague postmodern arguments, by basing his defense of toleration upon a phenomenological conception of the self. Yet Levine admits that Montaigne's conception of the self “is only likely to appeal to the most self-aware of thinkers,” since it involves both radical skepticism and deep introspection (p. 239). His theory thus lacks the broad appeal of other theories.

The major shortcoming of Levine's analysis is his tendency to impose too much unity on Montaigne's ideas. Montaigne, for example, makes contradictory statements about religion—sometimes praising it, sometimes criticizing it, and sometimes proclaiming ignorance about all divine matters. Yet Levine portrays Montaigne as an atheist and attempts to explain away all those passages where he praises religious values (e.g., p. 52). Similarly, Levine argues on somewhat tenuous grounds that Montaigne not only personally preferred the sophisticated simplicity of the philosopher to the natural simplicity of peasants and cannibals, but also posited sophisticated simplicity as the highest good for all human beings. An equally plausible case can be made that Montaigne saw both lives as equally good for different people in different circumstances.

Ironically, Levine's attempt to unify Montaigne's thought leaves him with an interpretation of the philosopher that appears less tolerant and open to diversity than Montaigne himself seems to have been. Montaigne was equally willing to see both the good and bad in religion, and the benefits and drawbacks of both natural and sophisticated living. His refusal to take sides once and for all, and his willingness to live with ambiguity and inconsistencies, is an aspect of his tolerant mind-set that Levine overlooks.

Despite these criticisms, Toleration and Identity and Sensual Philosophy are lucid accounts of the early modern origins of toleration that open new avenues for rethinking toleration in contemporary times. They deserve attention from readers interested in early modern political thought, as well as those interested in theories of identity and toleration.