ABSTRACT
The Jesuits taught Rene Descartes the classics and poetry for five years, after which he proceeded to ethics, logic, mathematics, physics and metaphysics. This order, based upon the trivium and quadrivium of mediaeval times, developed his sensibility along with his intellect, and must have aided the evolution of his superb power of literary expression. The eight years following upon his mystical experience were years of deep, and for the most part solitary, meditation. He may have seen some action during his stay in Germany; but historians now incline to the view that he never took part in any serious military engagement. The Discourse on Method was the product of Descartes’s interior conflict. He felt a duty towards orthodox belief, and he felt a duty towards his own ideal of the Sage or Savant. The Discourse on Method is the Charter of scientific humanism. No philosophical or scientific writer has escaped its influence.
