I am in doubt as to the propriety of making my first meditations in th place above mentioned matter of discourse; for these are s metaphysical, and so uncommon, as not, perhaps, to be acceptable t every one. And yet, that it may be determined whether the foundation that I have laid are sufficiently secure, I find myself in a measur constrained to advert to them. I had long before remarked that, i relation to practice, it is sometimes necessary to adopt, as if abov doubt, opinions which we discern to be highly uncertain, as has bee already said; but as I then desired to give my attention solely to th search after truth, I thought that a procedure exactly the opposite wa called for, and that I ought to reject as absolutely false all opinion in regard to which I could suppose the least ground for doubt, in orde to ascertain whether after that there remained aught in my belief tha was wholly indubitable. Accordingly, seeing that our senses sometime deceive us, I was willing to suppose that there existed nothing reall such as they presented to us; and because some men err in reasoning and fall into paralogisms, even on the simplest matters of geometry, I convinced that I was as open to error as any other, rejected as fals all the reasonings I had hitherto taken for demonstrations; an finally, when I considered that the very same thoughts (presentations which we experience when awake may also be experienced when we ar asleep, while there is at that time not one of them true, I suppose that all the objects (presentations) that had ever entered into my min when awake, had in them no more truth than the illusions of my dreams But immediately upon this I observed that, whilst I thus wished t think that all was false, it was absolutely necessary that I, who thu thought, should be somewhat; and as I observed that this truth, think, therefore I am (COGITO ERGO SUM), was so certain and of suc evidence that no ground of doubt, however extravagant, could be allege by the sceptics capable of shaking it, I concluded that I might without scruple, accept it as the first principle of the philosophy o which I was in search

In the next place, I attentively examined what I was and as I observe that I could suppose that I had no body, and that there was no worl nor any place in which I might be; but that I could not therefor suppose that I was not; and that, on the contrary, from the ver circumstance that I thought to doubt of the truth of other things, i most clearly and certainly followed that I was; while, on the othe hand, if I had only ceased to think, although all the other object which I had ever imagined had been in reality existent, I would hav had no reason to believe that I existed; I thence concluded that I wa a substance whose whole essence or nature consists only in thinking and which, that it may exist, has need of no place, nor is dependent o any material thing; so that "I," that is to say, the mind by which I a what I am, is wholly distinct from the body, and is even more easil known than the latter, and is such, that although the latter were not it would still continue to be all that it is

After this I inquired in general into what is essential to the trut and certainty of a proposition; for since I had discovered one which knew to be true, I thought that I must likewise be able to discover th ground of this certitude. And as I observed that in the words I think therefore I am, there is nothing at all which gives me assurance o their truth beyond this, that I see very clearly that in order to thin it is necessary to exist, I concluded that I might take, as a genera rule, the principle, that all the things which we very clearly an distinctly conceive are true, only observing, however, that there i some difficulty in rightly determining the objects which we distinctl conceive

In the next place, from reflecting on the circumstance that I doubted and that consequently my being was not wholly perfect (for I clearl saw that it was a greater perfection to know than to doubt), I was le to inquire whence I had learned to think of something more perfect tha myself; and I clearly recognized that I must hold this notion from som nature which in reality was more perfect. As for the thoughts of man other objects external to me, as of the sky, the earth, light, heat and a thousand more, I was less at a loss to know whence these came for since I remarked in them nothing which seemed to render the superior to myself, I could believe that, if these were true, they wer dependencies on my own nature, in so far as it possessed a certai perfection, and, if they were false, that I held them from nothing that is to say, that they were in me because of a certain imperfectio of my nature. But this could not be the case with-the idea of a natur more perfect than myself; for to receive it from nothing was a thin manifestly impossible; and, because it is not less repugnant that th more perfect should be an effect of, and dependence on the les perfect, than that something should proceed from nothing, it wa equally impossible that I could hold it from myself: accordingly, i but remained that it had been placed in me by a nature which was i reality more perfect than mine, and which even possessed within itsel all the perfections of which I could form any idea; that is to say, i a single word, which was God. And to this I added that, since I kne some perfections which I did not possess, I was not the only being i existence (I will here, with your permission, freely use the terms o the schools); but, on the contrary, that there was of necessity som other more perfect Being upon whom I was dependent, and from whom I ha received all that I possessed; for if I had existed alone, an independently of every other being, so as to have had from myself al the perfection, however little, which I actually possessed, I shoul have been able, for the same reason, to have had from myself the whol remainder of perfection, of the want of which I was conscious, and thu could of myself have become infinite, eternal, immutable, omniscient all-powerful, and, in fine, have possessed all the perfections which could recognize in God. For in order to know the nature of God (whos existence has been established by the preceding reasonings), as far a my own nature permitted, I had only to consider in reference to all th properties of which I found in my mind some idea, whether thei possession was a mark of perfection; and I was assured that no on which indicated any imperfection was in him, and that none of the res was awanting. Thus I perceived that doubt, inconstancy, sadness, an such like, could not be found in God, since I myself would have bee happy to be free from them. Besides, I had ideas of many sensible an corporeal things; for although I might suppose that I was dreaming, an that all which I saw or imagined was false, I could not, nevertheless deny that the ideas were in reality in my thoughts. But, because I ha already very clearly recognized in myself that the intelligent natur is distinct from the corporeal, and as I observed that all compositio is an evidence of dependency, and that a state of dependency i manifestly a state of imperfection, I therefore determined that i could not be a perfection in God to be compounded of these two nature and that consequently he was not so compounded; but that if there wer any bodies in the world, or even any intelligences, or other nature that were not wholly perfect, their existence depended on his power i such a way that they could not subsist without him for a single moment

I was disposed straightway to search for other truths and when I ha represented to myself the object of the geometers, which I conceived t be a continuous body or a space indefinitely extended in length breadth, and height or depth, divisible into divers parts which admi of different figures and sizes, and of being moved or transposed in al manner of ways (for all this the geometers suppose to be in the objec they contemplate), I went over some of their simplest demonstrations And, in the first place, I observed, that the great certitude which b common consent is accorded to these demonstrations, is founded solel upon this, that they are clearly conceived in accordance with the rule I have already laid down In the next place, I perceived that there wa nothing at all in these demonstrations which could assure me of th existence of their object: thus, for example, supposing a triangle t be given, I distinctly perceived that its three angles were necessaril equal to two right angles, but I did not on that account perceiv anything which could assure me that any triangle existed: while, o the contrary, recurring to the examination of the idea of a Perfec Being, I found that the existence of the Being was comprised in th idea in the same way that the equality of its three angles to two righ angles is comprised in the idea of a triangle, or as in the idea of sphere, the equidistance of all points on its surface from the center or even still more clearly; and that consequently it is at least a certain that God, who is this Perfect Being, is, or exists, as an demonstration of geometry can be

But the reason which leads many to persuade them selves that there is difficulty in knowing this truth, and even also in knowing what thei mind really is, is that they never raise their thoughts above sensibl objects, and are so accustomed to consider nothing except by way o imagination, which is a mode of thinking limited to material objects that all that is not imaginable seems to them not intelligible. Th truth of this is sufficiently manifest from the single circumstance that the philosophers of the schools accept as a maxim that there i nothing in the understanding which was not previously in the senses, i which however it is certain that the ideas of God and of the soul hav never been; and it appears to me that they who make use of thei imagination to comprehend these ideas do exactly the some thing as if in order to hear sounds or smell odors, they strove to avail themselve of their eyes; unless indeed that there is this difference, that th sense of sight does not afford us an inferior assurance to those o smell or hearing; in place of which, neither our imagination nor ou senses can give us assurance of anything unless our understandin intervene

Finally, if there be still persons who are not sufficiently persuade of the existence of God and of the soul, by the reasons I have adduced I am desirous that they should know that all the other propositions, o the truth of which they deem themselves perhaps more assured, as tha we have a body, and that there exist stars and an earth, and such like are less certain; for, although we have a moral assurance of thes things, which is so strong that there is an appearance of extravaganc in doubting of their existence, yet at the same time no one, unless hi intellect is impaired, can deny, when the question relates to metaphysical certitude, that there is sufficient reason to exclud entire assurance, in the observation that when asleep we can in th same way imagine ourselves possessed of another body and that we se other stars and another earth, when there is nothing of the kind. Fo how do we know that the thoughts which occur in dreaming are fals rather than those other which we experience when awake, since th former are often not less vivid and distinct than the latter? An though men of the highest genius study this question as long as the please, I do not believe that they will be able to give any reaso which can be sufficient to remove this doubt, unless they presuppos the existence of God. For, in the first place even the principle whic I have already taken as a rule, viz., that all the things which w clearly and distinctly conceive are true, is certain only because Go is or exists and because he is a Perfect Being, and because all that w possess is derived from him: whence it follows that our ideas o notions, which to the extent of their clearness and distinctness ar real, and proceed from God, must to that extent be true. Accordingly whereas we not infrequently have ideas or notions in which some falsit is contained, this can only be the case with such as are to some exten confused and obscure, and in this proceed from nothing (participate o negation), that is, exist in us thus confused because we are not wholl perfect. And it is evident that it is not less repugnant that falsit or imperfection, in so far as it is imperfection, should proceed fro God, than that truth or perfection should proceed from nothing. But i we did not know that all which we possess of real and true proceed from a Perfect and Infinite Being, however clear and distinct our idea might be, we should have no ground on that account for the assuranc that they possessed the perfection of being true

But after the knowledge of God and of the soul has rendered us certai of this rule, we can easily understand that the truth of the thought we experience when awake, ought not in the slightest degree to b called in question on account of the illusions of our dreams. For i it happened that an individual, even when asleep, had some ver distinct idea, as, for example, if a geometer should discover some ne demonstration, the circumstance of his being asleep would not militat against its truth; and as for the most ordinary error of our dreams which consists in their representing to us various objects in the sam way as our external senses, this is not prejudicial, since it leads u very properly to suspect the truth of the ideas of sense; for we ar not infrequently deceived in the same manner when awake; as whe persons in the jaundice see all objects yellow, or when the stars o bodies at a great distance appear to us much smaller than they are For, in fine, whether awake or asleep, we ought never to allo ourselves to be persuaded of the truth of anything unless on th evidence of our reason. And it must be noted that I say of our reason and not of our imagination or of our senses: thus, for example although we very clearly see the sun, we ought not therefore t determine that it is only of the size which our sense of sigh presents; and we may very distinctly imagine the head of a lion joine to the body of a goat, without being therefore shut up to th conclusion that a chimaera exists; for it is not a dictate of reaso that what we thus see or imagine is in reality existent; but it plainl tells us that all our ideas or notions contain in them some truth; fo otherwise it could not be that God, who is wholly perfect an veracious, should have placed them in us. And because our reasoning are never so clear or so complete during sleep as when we are awake although sometimes the acts of our imagination are then as lively an distinct, if not more so than in our waking moments, reason furthe dictates that, since all our thoughts cannot be true because of ou partial imperfection, those possessing truth must infallibly be foun in the experience of our waking moments rather than in that of ou dreams