Libert Froidmont (Latin: Libertus Fromondus; 3 September 1587, in Haccourt-Liège – 28 October 1653, in Louvain) a son of Gerard Libert de Froidmont and Marguerite Radoux, was a Liégeois theologian and scientist. He was a close companion to Cornelius Jansen and corresponded with René Descartes.
Life
Froidmont was educated by the Jesuits in his native Haccourt, near Liège, and studied philosophy in Leuven at the Falcon college. He became friends with Jansenius but did not pursue his studies and instead went to teach first at Antwerp and later back at Louvain. As a young professor there he was excited about Galileo's discoveries and introduced them to his students.
His scientific interests led him to publish on physics and mathematics.
Acknowledging him as an authority on meteors, Descartes sent him his Discourse on the Method, which Froidmont received rather critically. The scientific revolution may have been underway but Froidmont, who was well informed on many scientific matters, kept a traditionalist Aristotelian view. Nevertheless, he sought to co-opt rather than reject new approaches.Davide Cellamare, and Paul J.J.M. Bakker, Libertus Fromondus' Christian Psychology: Medicine and Natural Philosophy in the 'Philosophia christiana de anima', (1649), Lias, 42:1 (2015), pp. 37-66.
While teaching philosophy he also started studying theology and obtained a doctorate in 1628. Meanwhile, he had become close to Jansenius who entrusted him with the posthumous publication of the Augustinus. Froidmont succeeded him in the chair of Scripture at Louvain.
Works Coenae saturnalitiae, variatiae Somnio sive Peregrinatione coelesti (Louvain, 1616) Dissertatio de cometa anni 1618 (Antwerp, 1619)
Labyrinthus sive de compositione continui (Antwerp, 1631) Commentarii in libros Quaestionum naturalium Senecae (Antwerp, 1632) Anti-Aristarchus sive orbis terrae immobilis adversus Philippum Lansbergium (Antwerp, 1634) Philosophia Christiana de Anima (1649), where he talks about "novacula occami".
References
Bibliography Bernès, A.-C. (éd.), Libert Froidmont et les résistances aux révolutions scientifiques. Actes du Colloque Château d'Oupeye, 26-7 septembre 1987, Haccourt, 1988.
Demaret, H., Notice Historique sur Libert Froidmont de Haccourt, Liège,1925.
External links Libert Froidmont at Wikimedia Commons. Libert Froidmont at the Scholasticon Libert Froidmont at Lovaniensia and KU Leuven Special Collections