Complete Works, Volume I

...beyond some witty sayings you will find nothing that stings the adversary; or if anything touches the outer skin, it is indeed mildly, modestly, and with a certain expression of an inward-lying benevolence, which he was most ready to renew. Just as indeed occurred when, barely five years having elapsed, he had the opportunity of embracing DESCARTES at Paris, and of manifesting a favorable affection in the praises of so great a man. This was through the mediation of such great men as the Abbot CÉSAR D'ESTRÉES, who, having now been made Bishop of Laon, and holding a rank among the Peers of France due no less to his most noble lineage than to his miter and merits, has nevertheless not laid aside his care for the liberal arts; a thing which has happened sometimes to others—not indeed to those whom an ardent virtue has raised to the stars, but to those whom that fortune, persistent in playing its insolent game, has set over human affairs. That most illustrious prelate wished to receive at dinner, together with GASSENDI, DESCARTES, and JEAN DE LAUNOY, his Parisian theologian, GILLES PERSONNE DE ROBERVAL the mathematician, MICHEL DE MAROLLES Abbot of Villeloin, the Reverend Father MARIN MERSENNE and HILARION DE COSTE, and that Abbot of Marivaux, who, when about to cross the sea to America, suffered shipwreck in the very port of Paris. An illness of GASSENDI’S arising in the night did not permit him to be present as a guest; therefore they hastened to him toward evening, with the master of the feast as their leader, and the memory of past things was entirely erased. For their friendship remained thereafter whole and sound, at least on the part of GASSENDI, who made honorable mention of DESCARTES in his posthumous work now coming to light; although DESCARTES did not seem to have altogether cast off a hostile spirit in the French responses to the Instances published in that same year. And would that, if any dissensions should arise in the future—which heaven forbid—among learned men, careful attention be paid to the example of gentleness, no less than of skill and acumen, of which GASSENDI has given a sufficiently ample specimen, from which it may be judged whether he deserved the title of a most acute genius.

Some others have found a deeper knowledge of Mathematics lacking in our Philosopher, because, they say, he produced nothing in his writings from which one might infer further progress in Geometry and Arithmetic; and for that reason they also strive to blunt his acumen, or wish to detract somewhat from his immense praises. But GASSENDI was in no way inferior to the greatest mathematicians, although he was ignorant of, or rather neglected to learn, some things which