Rene Descartes Quotes
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I am thinking, therefore I exist. I was a substance whose whole essence or nature is solely to think, and which does not require any place, or depend on any material thing, in order to exist. Accordingly this 'I' - that is, the soul by which I am what I am - is entirely distinct from the body, and indeed is easier to know than the body, and would not fail to be whatever it is, even if the body did not exist.
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I concluded that I might take as a general rule the principle that all things which we very clearly and obviously conceive are true: only observing, however, that there is some difficulty in rightly determining the objects which we distinctly conceive.
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Situations in life often permit no delay; and when we cannot determine the course which is certainly best, we must follow the one which is probably the best. This frame of mind freed me also from the repentance and remorse commonly felt by those vacillating individuals who are always seeking as worthwhile things which they later judge to be bad.
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How can you be certain that your whole life is not a dream?
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At last I will devote myself sincerely and without reservation to the general demolition of my opinions.
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The chief cause of human errors is to be found in the prejudices picked up in childhood.
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I should consider that I know nothing about physics if I were able to explain only how things might be, and were unable to demonstrate that they could not be otherwise.
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Reason is nothing without imagination.
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Here I beg you to observe in passing that the scruples that prevented ancient writers from using arithmetical terms in geometry, and which can only be a consequence of their inability to perceive clearly the relation between these two subjects, introduced much obscurity and confusion into their explanations.
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The greatest minds, as they are capable of the highest excellencies, are open likewise to the greatest aberrations; and those who travel very slowly may yet make far greater progress, provided they keep always to the straight road, than those who, while they run, forsake it.
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Before examining this more carefully and investigating its consequences, I want to dwell for a moment in the contemplation of God, to ponder His attributes in me, to see, admire, and adore the beauty of His boundless light, insofar as my clouded insight allows. Believing that the supreme happiness of the other life consists wholly of the contemplation of divine greatness, I now find that through less perfect contemplation of the same sort I can gain the greatest joy available in this life.
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I can doubt everything, except one thing, and that is the very fact that I doubt. Simply put - I think, therefore I am.
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This result could have been achieved either by his God endowing my intellect with a clear and distinct perception of everything about which I would ever deliberate, or simply by impressing the following rule so firmly upon my memory that I could never forget it: I should never judge anything that I do not clearly and distinctly understand.
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By 'God', I understand, a substance which is infinite, independent, supremely intelligent, supremely powerful, and which created both myself and everything else that exists. All these attributes are such that, the more carefully I concentrate on them, the less possible it seems that they could have originated from me alone. So, from what has been said it must be concluded that God necessarily exists.
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The mind effortlessly and automatically takes in new ideas, which remain in limbo until verified or rejected by conscious, rational analysis.
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To live without philosophizing is in truth the same as keeping the eyes closed without attempting to open them.
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... moral certainty is certainty which is sufficient to regulate our behaviour, or which measures up to the certainty we have on matters relating to the conduct of life which we never normally doubt, though we know that it is possible, absolutely speaking, that they may be false.
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The object of music is a Sound. The end; to delight, and move various Affections in us.
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The reading of all good books is indeed like a conversation with the noblest men of past centuries who were the authors of them, nay a carefully studied conversation, in which they reveal to us none but the best of their thoughts.
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So far, I have been a spectator in this theater which is the world, but I am now about to mount the stage, and I come forward masked.
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Illusory joy is often worth more than genuine sorrow.
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The principal use of prudence, of self-control, is that it teaches us to be masters of our passions, and to so control and guide them that the evils which they cause are quite bearable, and that we even derive joy from them all.
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Be that as it may, there is fixed in my mind a certain opinion of long standing, namely that there exists a God who is able to do anything and by whom I, such as I am, have been created. How do I know that he did not bring it about that there is no earth at all, no heavens, no extended thing, no shape, no size, no place, and yet bringing it about that all these things appear to me to exist precisely as they do now?
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You just keep pushing. You just keep pushing. I made every mistake that could be made. But I just kept pushing.