Meditations on First Philosophy

The first such belief

— Second Meditation ⤴

the representative reality of ideas—that is, the reality that a idea represents.

— Third Meditation ⤴

Now it is obvious by the natural light that the total cause of something must contain at least as much reality as does the effect.

— Third Meditation ⤴

But perhaps really all my ideas are caused from the outside, or all are innate, or all are made up; for I still have not clearly perceived their true origin.

— Third Meditation ⤴

seclusion

— First Meditation ⤴

When I say ‘Nature taught me to think this’, all I mean is that •I have a spontaneous impulse to believe it, not that •I am shown its truth by some natural light.

— Third Meditation ⤴

be absurd to

— Second Meditation ⤴

I will obstinately cling tothesethoughts, and in this way, if indeed it is not in mypower to discover any truth,* yet certainly to the best ofmy ability and determination I will take care not to givemy assent to anything false, or to allow thisdeceiver,however powerful and cunning he may be, to imposeupon me in any way.

— Second Meditation ⤴

similarly, heat can’t be produced in a previously cold object except by something of at least the same order of perfection as heat, and so on. (·I don’t say simply ‘except by something that is hot’, because that is not necessary. The thing could be caused to be hot by something that doesn’t itself straightforwardly contain heat—i.e. that isn’t itself hot— but contains heat in a higher form, that is, something of a higher order of perfection than heat.

— Third Meditation ⤴

But it is also true that the idea of heat or of a stone can be caused in me only by something that contains at least as much reality as I conceive to be in the heat or in the stone.

— Third Meditation ⤴

But have I then forgotten those other occasions on which I have been deceived by similar thoughts in my dreams?

— First Meditation ⤴

shady

— Third Meditation ⤴