OF DOUBTS AND INSTANCES

I N D E X .

The Occasion of Writing, Page 1
Response. 2
Instance 1. The necessity of the Instance. 3
2. That the concern here is not the Truth of things, but the force of reasonings. 4
3. If they were Demonstrations, there was no necessity to implore a decree of the Sorbonne. 6

Upon Meditation I: which is, Of those things which can be called into doubt.

A Single Doubt. Concerning the Method by which all knowledge, whether true or false, is ordered to be cast out, even by employing contrivances. 11
Response. 12
Instance 1. That a Philosopher is not a boaster, but a student of wisdom. 13
2. That it is falsely supposed that all prejudices can be stripped away, and thereafter most certain and evident principles held. 14
3. Likewise, that all prejudices are to be held for a time as doubtful and false, so that thereafter wicked habit may no longer twist the mind from the right perception of things. 16
4. In purging the mind of opinions, a selection must be made, as in purging the humors; namely, so that not all, even the laudable ones, are expelled. 18

Upon Meditation II: which is, On the Nature of the Human Mind: That it is better known than the Body.

Doubt 1. On the Uselessness of the preceding apparatus for one to infer that he is, because he thinks; and from that, as from a principle, to deduce all things with certainty; and specifically that he is not a body. 26
Response. 27
Instance 1. That all things were objected in good faith: even regarding Deception. 28
2. That the Sceptics are groundlessly reviled, who more rightly left behind both the actions of life and τὰ φαινόμενα; and only made controversy concerning things truly obscure and uncertain. 30

4. That those are not to be censured who do not look up to the boasted Demonstrations, and who rise to the nature of God and the soul by other ways. 8
5. That the force of Demonstrations is not to be estimated by their being boasted of, nor by the ignorance of others. 10

5. That every sense is indeed fallacious; but not every sensation is false; nor is he who is awake no more certain that he is awake than that he is asleep. 20
6. That God is unworthily held as if a deceiver, so that we might make it doubtful whether we are not perhaps deceived in those things which seem most evident and certain to us. 21
7. That the mind is wrongly cast into falsehood in the hope that it might more easily rise to the truth. 23
8. That recourse is wrongly had to an evil Genius to persuade us that we are deceived when we think that there is a heaven, that we have hands, and the rest, or hold them as more than dreams. 25
9. That it is not legitimately concluded that the proposed Method is legitimate. 26

3. That for one to inquire what he is, it is not necessary that by fiction and laborious effort he prove that he is, or exists. 32
4. What is the sum and series of this and the remaining Meditations. 34
5. That one toils in vain in establishing, as an unshakable principle, that I am; and especially for him who spo-