Divine Dialogues

[...gland, and would allow any] blacksmith to create as mocking a proverb regarding actual sin as he did regarding original sin, making people say, "What is all this fuss about the wagging of a nut?" The author is mocking Descartes' theory that the soul interacts with the body via the pineal gland (the "nut"). If the "conflict between flesh and spirit" is just a gland moving, then sin seems as trivial as a "wagging nut" rather than a moral catastrophe like the "eating of the forbidden fruit" (the Apple) in Eden. just as he did about the eating of the apple.

Besides, if this conflict is not a combat between two contrary lives seated within the soul itself, but instead the thing that opposes the soul is merely the animal spirits original: "Spirits"; in early science, these were thought to be fluids in the nerves that caused motion. in a physical body (as Descartes original: "Cartesius" expressly affirms), then the souls of the wicked and the godly would be equally freed from the pressures of sin in the afterlife.

These few examples original: "Tasts" should be enough to satisfy us of what a poor original: "savoury" (used ironically) interpreter Cartesian philosophy would be of Holy Scripture and theological mysteries. Therefore, religion suffers nothing by the loss of Cartesianism's reputation, since the ideas unique to it have so little power to serve religion. Indeed, if Descartes had demonstrated—rather than just claimed—that matter cannot think, he would have done a great service to religion itself.

However, Providence has ordered things so that his philosophy becomes useful to religion in an indirect original: "oblique" way, whether he intended it or not. Or rather, that part of it which was most against his intention—namely, the flaws and defects so easily found in it—serves religion best. For the failure of his intelligence and hard work in mechanical philosophy The attempt to explain all natural phenomena through the motion of physical parts. has fully convinced wise people that the phenomena of the universe must be attributed to a higher and more divine principle than mere matter and mechanical motion. This is the main reason why his greatest praiser original: "Encomiast"; likely referring to Henry More himself, who initially admired Descartes. so warmly recommends reading Cartesian philosophy, as you may see in the preface to his Treatise on the Immortality of the Soul.

Sections 14, 15.

I believe that when these things are properly considered, they will easily clear the author of these Dialogues from any accusation of being unwise in opposing the re-