René Descartes Quotes

• I could not possibly exist with the nature I actually have, that is, one endowed with the idea of God, unless there really is a God; the very God, I mean, of whom I have an  idea.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• I will suppose then, not that there is a supremely good God, the source of truth; but that there is an evil spirit, who is supremely powerful and intelligent, and does his utmost to deceive me.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• Some years ago now I observed the multitude of errors that I had accepted as true in my earliest years, and the dubiousness of the whole superstructure I had since then reared on them; and the consequent need of making a clean sweep for once in my life, and beginning again from the very foundations, if  I would establish some secure and lasting result in science.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• I could take it as a general rule that whatever we conceive very clearly and very distinctly is true.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• I think, therefore I am.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• I noticed that while I was trying to think everything false, it must needs be that I, who was thinking this, was something.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• Since my present aim was to give myself up to the pursuit of truth alone, I thought I must…reject as if absolutely false anything as to which I could imagine the least doubt, in order to see if I should not be left at the end believing something that was absolutely indubitable.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• Good sense is the most fairly distributed thing in the world; for everyone thinks himself so well supplied with it, that even those who are hardest to satisfy in every other way do not usually desire more of it than they already have. In this matter it is not likely that everybody  is mistaken; it rather goes to show that the power of judging well and distinguishing truth from falsehood, which is what we properly mean by good sense or reason, is naturally equal in all men.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• The reading of good books is like a conversation with the best men of past centuries—in fact like a prepared conversation, in which they reveal their best thoughts.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

• I desire to live in peace and to continue the life I have begun under the motto to live well you must live unseen.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Philosophy

• When it is not in our power to determine what is true, we ought to follow what is most probable.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Wisdom

• The reading of all good books is like conversation with the finest men of past centuries.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Books, Reading

• Common sense is the best distributed thing in the world, for everyone thinks he is so well-endowed with it that even those who are hardest to satisfy in all other matters are not in the habit of desiring more of it than they already have.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Wisdom

• There is nothing more ancient than the truth.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Truth

• You just keep pushing. You just keep pushing. I made every mistake that could be made. But I just kept pushing.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Mistake, Truth

  Tags in Just

• Whenever anyone has offended me, I try to raise my soul so high that the offense cannot reach it.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Soul

  Tags in Try, Reach

• When it is not in our power to follow what is true, we ought to follow what is most probable.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Power

  Tags in True, Follow

• Travelling is almost like talking with those of other centuries.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Like, Century

• There is nothing so strange and so unbelievable that it has not been said by one philosopher or another.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Uncategorized

  Tags in Philosopher, Strange

• The two operations of our understanding, intuition and deduction, on which alone we have said we must rely in the acquisition of knowledge.

  René Descartes

  Topics in Knowledge

  Tags in Understanding

René Descartes (41)

Birth:	31st March, 1596
Death:	11th February, 1950
Nationality:	French
Profession:	Mathematician, Philosopher, Writer

About

René Descartes was a French philosopher, mathematician, and writer who spent most of his adult life in the Dutch Republic. He has been dubbed the 'Father of Modern Philosophy', and much subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his writings, which are studied closely to this day.

Related Authors

• Orson Pratt
• John Leslie Britton
• John D. Barrow
• John Herschel
• Marston Morse
• Giovanni Alfonso Borelli
• David Hilbert
• Albrecht Durer
• Simon Newcomb
• John Tukey

Advertisement

Today's Anniversary - 23rd December

Births

• 1949 - Adrian Belew
• 1812 - Samuel Smiles
• 1902 - Norman Maclean
• 1933 - Akihito
• 1805 - Joseph Smith

Deaths

• 2000 - Victor Borge
• 1959 - Lord Halifax
• 1972 - Abraham Joshua Heschel
• 2007 - Oscar Emmanuel Peterson
• 1873 - Sarah Grimke