Six metaphysical meditations: $b Wherein it is proved that there is a God and that mans mind is really distinct from his bodyDescartes, René
PhilosophyPhilosophy
Six metaphysical meditations: $b Wherein it is proved that there is a God and that mans mind is really distinct from his body
Descartes, René
Descartes, René, 1596-1650; First philosophy; God -- Proof, Ontological; Knowledge, Theory of; Metaphysics; Methodology
What now can be _Objected_ against me? shall I say, that I am so made by
_Nature_, as to be often _deceived_? No; For I now Know that I cannot be
_deceived_ in those Things, which I _clearly_ Understand. Shall I say,
that at other times I have esteem’d many Things _True_ and _Certain_,
which afterwards I found to be _falsities_? No; for I perceived none
of those things _clearly_ and _distinctly_, but being Ignorant of this
_Rule_ of _Truth_, I took them up for Reasons, which Reasons I afterward
found to be _Weak_. What then can be said? Shall, I say, (as lately I
objected) that Perhaps I am _asleep_, and that what I now think of is
no more _True_, then the _Dreams_ of People _asleep_? But this it self
_moves_ not my Opinion; for certainly tho I were _asleep_, if any thing
appear’d _evident_ to my Understanding, ’twould be _True_.
And Thus I Plainly see, that the _Certainty_ and _Truth_ of all _Science_
Depends on the _Knowledge_ of the _True God_, so that before I had _Known
Him_, I did _Know nothing_; But now many things both of _God_ himself,
and of other _Intellectual Things_, as also of _Corporeal nature_, which
is the _Object_ of _Mathematicks_, may be _Plainly Known_ and _Certain_
to me.
MEDITAT. VI.
_~Of Corporeal Beings~, and Their ~Existence~: As Also of the Real
Difference, Between ~Mind~ and ~Body~._
It now remains that I examine whether any _Corporeal Beings_ do _Exist_;
And already I know that (as they are the _Object_ of _Pure Mathematicks_)
they _May_ (at least) _Exist_, for I _clearly_ and _distinctly_ perceive
them; and doubtless _God_ is _able_ to _make_, whatever I am _able_ to
_perceive_, and I never Judged any thing to be _beyond_ his _Power_, but
what was _Repugnant_ to a _distinct perception_. Moreover, such _Material
Beings seem_ to _Exist_ from the _faculty_ of _Imagination_, which I
find my self make use of, when I am conversant about them: for if I
attentively Consider what _Imagination_ is, ’twill appear to be only _a
certain Application of our Cognoscitive or knowing Faculty to a Body or
Object that is before it_; and if it be _before it_, It must _Exist_.
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