For, occupied incessantly with the consideration of the limits prescribed to their power by nature, they became so entirely convinced that nothing was at their disposal except their own thoughts, that this conviction was of itself sufficient to prevent their entertaining any desire of other objects; and over their thoughts they acquired a sway so absolute, that they had some ground on this account for esteeming themselves more rich and more powerful, more free and more happy, than other men who, whatever be the favors heaped on them by nature and fortune, if destitute of this philosophy, can never command the realization of all their desires. Thinking and extension may in the end be necessarily connected and it may be that modes can exist apart from substances, inconceivable though these things apparently seem to be. The Discourse on the Method is a philosophical and mathematical treatise published by René Descartes in 1637. Here one begins from an hypothesis and derives a contradiction; one then concludes that the hypothesis must be false, and that its denial is true. Hence it is that I cannot in any degree approve of those restless and busy meddlers who, called neither by birth nor fortune to take part in the management of public affairs, are yet always projecting reforms; and if I thought that this tract contained aught which might justify the suspicion that I was a victim of such folly, I would by no means permit its publication. Thus I perceived that doubt, inconstancy, sadness, and such like, could not be found in God, since I myself would have been happy to be free from them. He published his Meditations together with these Objections and Replies. But what those specific laws are requires empirical research; they are too complex logically to be knowable a priori by us, with our finite capacities. In one sense, this method is like the method of geometry that Euclid had given to the world in that one began with self-evident truths as axioms and then deduced by equally self-evident steps a set of theorems. Thus it is observable that the buildings which a single architect has planned and executed, are generally more elegant and commodious than those which several have attempted to improve, by making old walls serve for purposes for which they were not originally built. Descartes is clearly open to speculation because the model he uses for light is one that lacked empirical confirmation. Canada, Descartes’ complete works can be found in, This is now the standard English translation. If Descartes was not as modest in his cognitive aspirations as his method of doubt requires, then that only shows that Descartes too had his failings as a human being – it is not to denigrate the contribution he made to the emergence of the modern mind as one that is committed to finding truth, and that is open, and ready to submit to criticism. But as soon as I had finished the entire course of study, at the close of which it is customary to be admitted into the order of the learned, I completely changed my opinion. In particular, the laws of geometry, of extended substance, are guaranteed to be true. In this, as appears to me, I was successful enough; for, since I endeavoured to discover the falsehood or incertitude of the propositions I examined, not by feeble conjectures, but by clear and certain reasonings, I met with nothing so doubtful as not to yield some conclusion of adequate certainty, although this were merely the inference, that the matter in question contained nothing certain. Indeed, it is out of God’s goodness that the heretic and the unbeliever be deceived in this way, since if they realized what was really happening, that the body and blood of Christ were being consumed, they could charge the Christian with the sin, horrid to conceive, of cannibalism. He could not envision a more complicated physics, one that included the molecular biology of DNA molecules materially embodying the required information. Then if there are any imperfections in the constitutions of states (and that many such exist the diversity of constitutions is alone sufficient to assure us), custom has without doubt materially smoothed their inconveniences, and has even managed to steer altogether clear of, or insensibly corrected a number which sagacity could not have provided against with equal effect; and, in fine, the defects are almost always more tolerable than the change necessary for their removal; in the same manner that highways which wind among mountains, by being much frequented, become gradually so smooth and commodious, that it is much better to follow them than to seek a straighter path by climbing over the tops of rocks and descending to the bottoms of precipices. And the examples of many men of the highest genius, who had, in former times, engaged in this inquiry, but, as appeared to me, without success, led me to imagine it to be a work of so much difficulty, that I would not perhaps have ventured on it so soon had I not heard it currently rumoured that I had already completed the inquiry. Of philosophy I will say nothing, except that when I saw that it had been cultivated for many ages by the most distinguished men, and that yet there is not a single matter within its sphere which is not still in dispute, and nothing, therefore, which is above doubt, I did not presume to anticipate that my success would be greater in it than that of others; and further, when I considered the number of conflicting opinions touching a single matter that may be upheld by learned men, while there can be but one true, I reckoned as well-nigh false all that was only probable. Having found the solutions, one then has the premises from which the theorem to be proved follows.