The Principles of Philosophy | Page 4

selections from the second,
third and fourth parts of that work, corresponding to the extracts in the
French edition of Gamier, are also given, as well as an appendix
containing part of Descartes' reply to the Second Objections (viz., his
formal demonstrations of the existence of Deity). The translation is
based on the original Latin edition of the Principles, published in 1644.
The work had been translated into French during Descartes' lifetime,
and personally revised and corrected by him, the French text is
evidently deserving of the same consideration as the Latin originals,
and consequently, the additions and variations of the French version
have also been given--the additions being put in square brackets in the
text and the variations in the footnotes.
A copy of the title-page of the original edition, as given in Dr. C.
Guttler's work (Munich: C. H. Beck. 1901), are also reproduced in the
present volume.

SELECTIONS FROM THE PRINCIPLES OF PHILOSOPHY
OF DESCARTES
TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN AND COLLATED WITH THE
FRENCH

LETTER OF THE AUTHOR
TO THE FRENCH TRANSLATOR OF THE PRINCIPLES OF
PHILOSOPHY SERVING FOR A PREFACE.
Sir,--The version of my principles which you have been at pains to
make, is so elegant and finished as to lead me to expect that the work
will be more generally read in French than in Latin, and better
understood. The only apprehension I entertain is lest the title should
deter some who have not been brought up to letters, or with whom
philosophy is in bad repute, because the kind they were taught has
proved unsatisfactory; and this makes me think that it will be useful to
add a preface to it for the purpose of showing what the MATTER of the
work is, what END I had in view in writing it, and what UTILITY may
be derived from it. But although it might be my part to write a preface
of this nature, seeing I ought to know those particulars better than any
other person, I cannot nevertheless prevail upon myself to do anything
more than merely to give a summary of the chief points that fall, as I
think, to be discussed in it: and I leave it to your discretion to present to
the public such part of them as you shall judge proper.
I should have desired, in the first place, to explain in it what philosophy
is, by commencing with the most common matters, as, for example,
that the word PHILOSOPHY signifies the study of wisdom, and that by
wisdom is to be understood not merely prudence in the management of
affairs, but a perfect knowledge of all that man can know, as well for
the conduct of his life as for the preservation of his health and the
discovery of all the arts, and that knowledge to subserve these ends
must necessarily be deduced from first causes; so that in order to study

the acquisition of it (which is properly called philosophizing), we must
commence with the investigation of those first causes which are called
PRINCIPLES. Now these principles must possess TWO
CONDITIONS: in the first place, they must be so clear and evident that
the human mind, when it attentively considers them, cannot doubt of
their truth; in the second place, the knowledge of other things must be
so dependent on them as that though the principles themselves may
indeed be known apart from what depends on them, the latter cannot
nevertheless be known apart from the former. It will accordingly be
necessary thereafter to endeavour so to deduce from those principles
the knowledge of the things that depend on them, as that there may be
nothing in the whole series of deductions which is not perfectly
manifest. God is in truth the only being who is absolutely wise, that is,
who possesses a perfect knowledge of all things; but we may say that
men are more or less wise as their knowledge of the most important
truths is greater or less. And I am confident that there is nothing, in
what I have now said, in which all the learned do not concur.
I should, in the next place, have proposed to consider the utility of
philosophy, and at the same time have shown that, since it embraces all
that the human mind can know, we ought to believe that it is by it we
are distinguished from savages and barbarians, and that the civilisation
and culture of a nation is regulated by the degree in which true
philosophy nourishes in it, and, accordingly, that to contain true
philosophers is the highest privilege a state can enjoy. Besides this, I
should have shown that, as regards individuals, it is not only useful for
each man to have intercourse with those who apply themselves to this
study, but