which hurts the foot than by another existing in some other quarter, it is reasonable that it should convey to the mind pain in the foot rather than in any other part of the body. And although the parchedness of the throat does not always proceed, as it usually does, from the fact that drinking is essential for the health of the body, but sometimes comes from quite a different cause, as is the case with dropsical patients, it is yet much better that it should mislead on this occasion than if, on the other hand, it were always to deceive us when the body is in good health; and so on in similar cases.

And certainly this consideration is of great service to me, not only in enabling me to recognise all the errors to which my nature is subject, but also in enabling me to avoid them or to correct them more easily. For knowing that all my senses more frequently indicate to me truth than falsehood respecting the things which concern that which is beneficial to the body, and being able almost always to avail myself of many of them in order to examine one particular thing, and, besides that, being able to make use of my memory in order to connect the present with the past, and of my understanding which already has discovered all the causes of my errors, I ought no longer to fear that falsity may be found in matters every day presented to me by my senses. And I ought to set aside all the doubts of these past days as hyperbolical and ridiculous, particularly that very common uncertainty respecting sleep, which I could not distinguish from the waking state; for at present I find a very notable difference between the two, inasmuch as our memory can never connect our dreams one with the other, or with the whole course of our lives, as it unites events which happen to us while we are awake. And, as a matter of fact, if someone, while I was awake, quite suddenly appeared to me and dis

appeared as fast as do the images which I see in sleep, so that I could not know from whence the form came nor whither it went, it would not be without reason that I should deem it a spectre or a phantom formed by my brain [and similar to those which I form in sleep], rather than a real man. But when I perceive things as to which I know distinctly both the place from which they proceed, and that in which they are, and the time at which they appeared to me; and when, without any interruption, I can connect the perceptions which I have of them with the whole course of my life, I am perfectly assured that these perceptions occur while I am waking and not during sleep. And I ought in no wise to doubt the truth of such matters, if, after having called up all my senses, my memory, and my understanding, to examine them, nothing is brought to evidence by any one of them which is repugnant to what is set forth by the others. For because God is in no wise a deceiver, it follows that I am not deceived in this. But because the exigencies of action often oblige us to make up our minds before having leisure to examine matters carefully, we must confess that the life of man is very frequently subject to error in respect to individual objects, and we must in the end acknowledge the infirmity of our nature.

SELECTIONS FROM OBJECTIONS URGED BY CERTAIN MEN OF LEARNING AGAINST THE PRECEDING MEDITATIONS: WITH

THE AUTHOR'S REPLIES

FROM THE FIRST SET OF OBJECTIONS1

The objection

But he (Descartes) proceeds, 'Further, I should like to ask, whether "I" who have this idea could exist, if no such being existed,' i.e., if none existed, 'from which the idea of a being more perfect than I proceeds,' as he says immediately before. For,' says he, 'from what should I proceed? From myself, from my parents, or from some other beings? But, if I were selforiginated, neither should I doubt, nor should I wish for anything, nor should I suffer lack of anything whatsoever, for I should have given myself all the perfections of which I have any idea, and should thus myself be God.' 'But, if I am derived from something else, the end of the series of beings from which I come will ultimately be one which is self-originated, and hence what would have held good for myself (if self-originated) will be true of this.' This is an argument that pursues the same path as that taken by St. Thomas, and which he calls the proof from the causality of an efficient cause.' It is derived from Aristotle. But Aristotle and St. Thomas are not concerned with the causes of ideas. Perhaps they had no need to be, for might not the argu

1 The author of these objections of the first group is Caterus, a priest of Alkmaar.

ment take a more direct and less devious course?—I think, hence I exist; nay I am that very thinking mind, that thinking. But that mind, that thought, springs either from itself or from something else. On the latter alternative, from what does that something else come? If it is self-derived, it must be God? for that which is self-originated will have no trouble in conferring all things on itself.

Descartes' Reply

I have not said that it is impossible for anything to be its own efficient cause; for, although that statement is manifestly true when the meaning of efficient cause is restricted to those causes that are prior in time to their effects or different from them, yet it does not seem necessary to confine the term to this meaning in the present investigation. In the first place the question1 would in such a case be unmeaning, for who does not know that the same thing can neither be prior to nor different from itself? Secondly, the light of nature does not require that the notion of an efficient cause should compel it to be prior to its effect; on the contrary, a thing does not properly conform to the notion of cause except during the time that it produces its effect, and hence is not prior to it. Moreover, the light of nature certainly tells us that nothing exists about which the question, why it exists, cannot be asked, whether we enquire for its efficient cause, or, if it does not possess one, demand why it does not have one. Hence, if I did not believe that anything could in some way be related to itself exactly as an efficient cause

1 The question 'Can a thing be its own efficient cause?'

is related to its effect, so far should I be from concluding that any first cause existed, that, on the contrary, I should once more ask for the cause of that which had been called first, and so should never arrive at the first of all. But I frankly allow that something may exist in which there is such a great and inexhaustible power that it has needed no assistance in order to exist, and requires none for its preservation, and hence is in a certain way the cause of its own existence; such a cause I understand God to be. For, even though I had existed from all eternity and hence nothing had preceded my existence, none the less, seeing that I deem the various parts of time to be separable from each other, and hence that it does not follow that, because I now exist, I shall in future do so, unless some cause were so to speak to re-create me at each single moment, I should not hesitate to call that cause which preserves me an efficient cause. Thus, even though God has never been non-existent, yet because He is the very Being who actually preserves Himself in existence, it seems possible to call Him without undue impropriety the cause of His own existence. But it must be noted that here I do not mean a preservation which is effected by any positive operation of causal efficiency but one due merely to this fact, that the essential nature of God is such that He cannot be otherwise than always existent.

From these remarks it is easy for me to make my reply to the distinction in the use of the term 'selforiginated' or per se, which, according to the counsel of my learned theological adversary, requires explanation. For, although those who, confining themselves to the peculiar and restricted meaning of efficient cause, think it impossible for a thing to be its own efficient cause, and do not discern here another species of cause analogous to an efficient cause, are accustomed