Discourse on the Method and Metaphysical Meditations

DISCOURSE ON THE METHOD

perhaps it is only a bit of copper and glass that I take for gold and diamonds. I know how much we are prone to mistake ourselves in what concerns us, and also how much the judgments of our friends should be suspect to us when they are in our favor. But I shall be very glad to show in this discourse what paths I have followed and to represent my life therein as if in a picture original: "tableau". Descartes uses the metaphor of a painting to suggest he is offering a perspective for others to view, rather than a definitive decree., so that each person may judge it; and that, learning from common report the opinions people will have of it, this may be a new means of instructing myself that I shall add to those I am accustomed to using.

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Thus my purpose here is not to teach the method that everyone must follow to lead their reason well, but only to show in what way I have tried to lead my own. Those who take it upon themselves to give precepts Rules or instructions intended as a guide for conduct. must consider themselves more capable than those to whom they give them, and if they fail in the slightest thing, they are blameworthy. But, proposing this writing only as a history, or, if you prefer, as a fable By calling his work a "fable," Descartes cleverly protects himself from critics; he is simply telling a story that may contain useful examples, rather than dogmatically asserting truth. in which, among some examples that one may imitate, one will perhaps also find several others that one will have reason not to follow, I hope that it will be useful to some without being harmful to anyone, and that all will be grateful to me for my frankness.

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I was nourished on letters Referring to "Belles-lettres" or a classical education in the humanities, including Latin, Greek, and rhetoric. from my childhood, and because I was persuaded that by their means one could acquire a clear and assured knowledge of everything useful for life, I had an extreme desire to learn them.

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But as soon as I had finished that entire course of study at the end of which one is customarily received into the rank of the learned original: "doctes". This refers to the formal graduation or recognition as a scholar., I entirely changed my opinion; for I found myself embarrassed by so many doubts and errors that it seemed to me I had made no other profit, in trying to instruct myself, except that I had discovered my ignorance more and more. And yet I was in one of the most famous schools in Europe, where I thought there ought to be learned men, if there were any in any place on earth. I had learned there everything that others learned; and even, not having been content with the sciences we were taught, I had gone through all the books treating of those subjects considered the most curious and rare that could fall into my hands. Along with that, I knew the judgments that others made of me, and I did not see that I was considered inferior to my fellow students, even though there were already some among them who were destined to fill the places of our masters; and finally, our century seemed to me as flourishing and as fertile in good minds as any of the [preceding ones.] Text cuts off at "précé-", completed as "précédents".