Editing Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (section)

===Personal life===
Leibniz never married. He proposed to an unknown woman at age 50, but changed his mind when she took too long to decide.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Brown |first1=Stuart |title=Historical Dictionary of Leibniz's Philosophy |date=2023 |publisher=Rowman and Littlefield |location=Lanham |isbn=9781538178447 |page=1 |edition=2nd}}</ref> He complained on occasion about money, but the fair sum he left to his sole heir, his sister's stepson, proved that the Brunswicks had paid him fairly well. In his diplomatic endeavors, he at times verged on the unscrupulous, as was often the case with professional diplomats of his day. On several occasions, Leibniz backdated and altered personal manuscripts, actions which put him in a bad light during the [[Newton v. Leibniz calculus controversy|calculus controversy]].<ref>{{Cite book|last=Leibniz|first=Gottfried Wilhelm Freiherr von|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bOIGAAAAYAAJ&q=leibniz+altered+manuscripts&pg=PA90|title=The Early Mathematical Manuscripts of Leibniz: Translated from the Latin Texts Published by Carl Immanuel Gerhardt with Critical and Historical Notes|date=1920|publisher=Open court publishing Company|isbn=9780598818461 |language=en}}</ref>

He was charming, well-mannered, and not without humor and imagination.<ref>See Wir IV.6 and Loemker §50. Also see a curious passage titled "Leibniz's Philosophical Dream", first published by Bodemann in 1895 and translated on p. 253 of Morris, Mary, ed. and trans., 1934. ''Philosophical Writings''. Dent & Sons Ltd.</ref> He had many friends and admirers all over Europe. He was identified as a [[Protestant]] and a [[philosophical theism|philosophical theist]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Christian Mathematicians – Leibniz – God & Math – Thinking Christianly About Math Education|url=http://godandmath.com/2012/01/30/christian-mathematicians-leibniz/|date=2012-01-31}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Discourse on Metaphysics and Other Writings|year=2012|publisher=Broadview Press|isbn=978-1-55481-011-6|pages=23–24|author=Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz|editor-first=Peter|editor-last=Loptson|quote=The answer is unknowable, but it may not be unreasonable to see him, at least in theological terms, as essentially a deist. He is a determinist: there are no miracles (the events so called being merely instances of infrequently occurring natural laws); Christ has no real role in the system; we live forever, and hence we carry on after our deaths, but then everything—every individual substance—carries on forever. Nonetheless, Leibniz is a theist. His system is generated from, and needs, the postulate of a creative god. In fact, though, despite Leibniz's protestations, his God is more the architect and engineer of the vast complex world-system than the embodiment of love of Christian orthodoxy.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Owen's Ape & Darwin's Bulldog: Beyond Darwinism and Creationism|year=2009|publisher=Indiana University Press|isbn=978-0-253-22051-6|pages=102–103|author=Christopher Ernest Cosans|quote=In advancing his system of mechanics, Newton claimed that collisions of celestial objects would cause a loss of energy that would require God to intervene from time to time to maintain order in the solar system (Vailati 1997, 37–42). In criticizing this implication, Leibniz remarks: "Sir Isaac Newton and his followers have also a very odd opinion concerning the work of God. According to their doctrine, God Almighty wants to wind up his watch from time to time; otherwise it would cease to move." (Leibniz 1715, 675) Leibniz argues that any scientific theory that relies on God to perform miracles after He had first made the universe indicates that God lacked sufficient foresight or power to establish adequate natural laws in the first place. In defense of Newton's theism, Clarke is unapologetic: "'tis not a diminution but the true glory of his workmanship that nothing is done without his continual government and inspection"' (Leibniz 1715, 676–677). Clarke is believed to have consulted closely with Newton on how to respond to Leibniz. He asserts that Leibniz's deism leads to "the notion of materialism and fate" (1715, 677), because it excludes God from the daily workings of nature.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Controversy in Marketing Theory: For Reason, Realism, Truth, and Objectivity|year=2003|publisher=M. E. Sharpe|isbn=978-0-7656-0931-1|first=Shelby D.|last=Hunt|page=33|quote=Consistent with the liberal views of the Enlightenment, Leibniz was an optimist with respect to human reasoning and scientific progress (Popper 1963, p. 69). Although he was a great reader and admirer of Spinoza, Leibniz, being a confirmed deist, rejected emphatically Spinoza's pantheism: God and nature, for Leibniz, were not simply two different "labels" for the same "thing".}}</ref> Leibniz remained committed to [[Trinitarian Christianity]] throughout his life.<ref>Leibniz on the Trinity and the Incarnation: Reason and Revelation in the Seventeenth Century (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007, pp. xix–xx).</ref>