Pardies, Ignace Gaston

Pardies, Ignace Gaston a French Jesuit, much noted for his attainments in philosophy, mathematics, and belles-lettres, was born, of distinguished parentage, at Paris in 1636. After due training at the schools in Paris, he conceived the purpose of entering the Society of Jesus, and joined the order in 1652. For several years he was employed as instructor in polite literature. His leisure he employed in speculative studies, and soon came to be noted for his mastery of the Cartesian philosophy. Pardies claimed not only to have mastered Des Cartes's views, but to have improved upon that system. He died in 1673, before he had really developed his own philosophical theories into a system, and there is not enough extant in his writings to judge of him as an original mind. Pardies had the reputation in his own day of a writer much cultivated, and with a neat and concise expression and pure diction. He had a dispute with Sir Isaac Newton regarding his New Theory of Light and Colors in 1672. His works are not of interest to us. A list of them is given in Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Generale, 39:190, 191. See also Bayle, Hist. Dict. s., v.; Niceron, Memoires, vol. 1and 9; Chaufepie, Nouv. Dict. histor. s.v. (J. H.W.)