Chapter 21 The Fifth Group of Objections to the Six Meditations① Ⅰ

Mr. Gassendi Mr Gassendi to Mr Descartes gentlemen: The kindness of the venerable Father Melsena to allow me to participate in these sublime meditations you have written on the First Philosophy is something I am very grateful for, because of the grandeur of the subject, the power of the thought, and the sophistication of the language. , has given me great joy; and at the same time, indeed, to see you so vigorously and courageously, and so successfully at work for the advancement of science, to see you begin to discover for us things that in all the past centuries have been unrecognized. stuff, which makes me happy too.

The only thing I didn't like was that he wanted me to write to you if any doubts remained in my mind after reading your Meditations; In favor of your arguments, what I have written is only a defect of my own mind, and it may even be said that if I dared to say anything to the contrary, it would only show my own ignorance.Even so, I could not refuse my friend's request, because it occurred to me that it was not my intention, but his, that you would approve of it; and also because I knew you were so reasonable , you will easily believe that I am only asking you my doubts after deliberation, and have no other ideas.In fact, if you can see the end from beginning to end without worrying about it, that's already very good.Because I don't want my questions to disturb your emotions, to make you feel uneasy about your judgment, or to make you have to spend time that you could have used better to answer my questions.Not only would I never think so, but I would never advise you to do so.I can't help but blush even daring to put these doubts to you, for I am sure that there is not one of my doubts that you have not considered over and over again in your mind, and there is not one of them that you have deliberately placed unwillingly or unwillingly. considered insignificant.I finally brought them up, but only as a proposal, without any other intentions.This proposal of mine is not against what you say and what you intend to argue, it is only against the method and reasoning with which you argue it.In fact, I profess to believe that there is a God, and that our souls are immortal; my question is simply to see what you mean by your demonstration of these metaphysical truths, and of the other problems contained in your work. How effective is the reasoning employed.

① The first French edition is missing, for the reason see the previous "Statement".This article is translated from the second French edition. of things that may arouse doubt I do not need to say much about the first meditation, since I am in favor of the method you have taken to get rid of all your prejudices.The only thing I don't quite understand is why you don't want to outright, in a few words, assume as unreliable all the things you've known up to that time (in order to then confuse the things you admit to be true) pick them out) rather than assume them all to be wrong, at the expense of breaking free from one old stereotype and adopting another, entirely new.You see how, in order to come to this conclusion, you have to imagine a deceitful God or some kind of demon who has all his cunning to play tricks on you, though only if you attribute your disbelief to the inadequacy of the human spirit. Sensibility and mere weakness of nature seem to do the trick.In addition, you pretend that you are in a dream so that you have the opportunity to question everything and consign everything that happens in this world to illusion.

But can you really convince yourself that you are by no means awake, and that everything that is before you and that is happening is false and deceitful?No matter what you say, no one will believe that you will fully believe that nothing you know is true, that it is the senses, or sleep, or God, or a demon who continues to play tricks on you.Wouldn't it be better for a philosopher to say things straight, honestly, and as they really are, than to put on airs, falsify, and pursue oblique and outlandish things, as people will object to you. Is the candor of man more suited to the earnestness of the pursuit of truth?Even so, since you think it's that good, I won't refute it any more.

On the spiritual nature of man, and how it is easier to know than bodies 1. Regarding the second meditation, I can see that you have not come out of your confusion and fantasy; however, I can also see that through these ghost images, you still recognize that this is at least true, even if you have suffered from it. You, confused, are a thing after all; that's why you conclude that whenever you say or think in your mind the proposition "I am, I exist," it must be true.But I don't see why you need to go to so much trouble, since you already know for sure that you exist, since you can draw the same conclusion from some of your other actions, since the light of nature clearly tells us that whatever works All things have, or exist.

You go on to say that even so, you don't quite know what you are.I know you mean what you say, and I'm more than willing to agree with you, because that's the point of the question; and, in fact, it's exactly what you don't have to go through with all those hypotheses to pursue. s things. After this you propose to examine what you have thought you have hitherto been, so that after you have removed from there everything that could allow the slightest doubt, you will be left only with certainty and unshakability.Of course you can do that, everyone agrees.After you've tried this beautiful plan, and then found out that you've always thought you were a person, you ask the following question: What is a person?In this, after deliberately throwing out the common definition, you stop at those things which were originally mentioned before, such as, that you have a face, two hands, and all the other members you call the body; There is what you eat, what you walk, what you feel, what you think, etc. that you attribute to your soul.I agree with you on this, as long as we keep the distinction you draw between mind and body.You said you hadn't considered further what the soul was; or, if you had, you had imagined it to be something finer, like wind, fire, or air, permeating and Spread into the coarser parts of your body.This is indeed remarkable; but with body you have no doubt that it is something of such a nature that it can have a definite shape, can occupy a certain place, can fill a space and crowd out all other bodies, can Perceived due to touch, sight, hearing, smell and taste, can be moved in several ways.You may now still call these things properties of bodies, provided you do not ascribe all these things to every kind of body, for the wind is a body which, however, cannot be perceived by sight; Other things, which you call the properties of the soul, are excluded from the properties of bodies, for wind, fire, and many other bodies are automatic, and have the property of moving other bodies at the same time.

As for what you go on to say that you don't think bodies have automaticity, I don't see how you can now justify that.For, if it is according to you, then every body, by virtue of its nature, must be immobile; every motion can proceed only from an immaterial principle; Spiritually active beings, neither water can flow nor animals can walk. 2. Later, you inquired whether, on the assumption of your phantasy, you could affirm that some of those things which you thought belonged to the nature of bodies were also yours; and after a lengthy examination, You say that you have nothing like this.It is here that you begin to see yourself no longer as a whole person, but as the closest, most hidden part of yourself, which you previously thought of as your soul.soul!Or whatever you are, please tell me that you once imagined that you were the wind or some other object of this nature, which permeated and spread through all parts of your body; have you changed your mind now? ?Of course you didn't.Why can't you still be a gust of wind, or a very fine, very sparse form of your purest blood, that spreads through all your limbs, stirred up by the heat of your heart or whatever The essence of life, which, that is, you, gives life to your members and sees with your eyes, hears with your ears, thinks with your brain, and thus performs all the functions normally ascribed to you?If so, why don't you have the same shape as your body, just as the air contained in the jar has the same shape as the jar?Why should I not think that you have the same covering as your body, or are covered by the skin that encloses your body?Why may I not think that you fill a space, or at least the space of those parts which your gross body and its finest parts do not fill?For, indeed, the body does have tiny spaces, into which you are scattered; therefore, where your parts are, there are no parts of your body; There is no water part where the wine part is, although it cannot be distinguished visually.Since your gross body cannot be with you in all the little space you fill up, why can't you drive other bodies out of the place you occupy?Why don't I think you move yourself in many ways?For how can you move your limbs without moving yourself, since they are subject to so many different movements through you?Indeed, on the one hand, if you don't move yourself, you can't push something else, because you can't do it without force;If all this is true, how can you say that there is nothing in you that belongs to objects?

①Referring to Descartes: "... Suppose there is a certain extremely powerful, and, if it can be said, extremely vicious and cunning person, he uses all his strength and scheming to deceive me...". 3. Later, when you continued your investigation, you said that you also saw that some of the things attributed to the soul are not in you, such as eating and walking. But, first, a thing can be an object without eating.Secondly, if you are a body like our former animal spirit, then, since your gross limbs are nourished by a gross substance, and you yourself are fine, why can't you be What about a finer substance nourished?Besides, your limbs are part of this body. When this body grows, don't you also grow?When it weakens, do you not weaken yourself?As for walking, since you do not move your limbs, and you do not transfer them somewhere, they cannot move by themselves, and cannot be transferred anywhere by themselves, then if there is no action on your part, How is this possible?You will answer: But if I really have no body, then of course I cannot walk.If you say this, and your intention is to fool us, or yourself, then you need not be so serious; if you say it seriously, then not only must you prove that you really do not have the body you say, but also You have to prove that you don't have the nature of things that walk and eat.

You go on to say that you don't even feel anything, don't feel things.Yet you yourself do see colors, hear sounds, and so on.You said: These things cannot be done without a body.I believe this; but, first, you have a body, you are in the eyes, and you cannot see without the eyes; and second, you can be a very delicate object that operates with sense organs.You said: I seemed to feel many things in my sleep that I later knew I hadn't felt.But though you are mistaken in that you seem to feel without your eyes what you cannot feel with them, you have not always been guilty of the same mistake; Sensing and accepting images enables you to use images without using your eyes.

Finally, you notice that you are thinking.Of course it cannot be denied here; but it still remains to be proved that the faculty of thought surpasses the nature of the body to such an extent that whether it is the spirit which is called animal, or any other body, however thin, Nothing, fineness, purity, fragility is fit for such a thing as the ability to think.It must also be shown that the soul of an animal is not corporeal either, since animals think; or, if you prefer, besides using their external senses, animals also know things internally, not only when they are awake, but even when This is what happens when they are asleep.Finally, it must be shown that although you have never left this gross, heavy body, and have never thought of anything apart from it, it does not help your thinking at all, so that you can think without it, Keeping you from being dazzled by the fumes or those dark, thick fumes that sometimes cause so much confusion in the brain.

4. After this you come to the conclusion that, then, I am only a thinking thing, that is to say, a spirit, a soul, an intellect, a reason.Here I admit that I made a mistake, because I thought I was talking to a person's soul, or to the inner principle by which a person lives, feels, moves, and understands, but I It is to speak to a pure spirit; for I see you not only freed from the body, but also from a part of the soul.Are you following the example of those ancients in this point?Those ancients, though they believed that the soul was diffused throughout the body, thought that the main part of it lived in some part of the body, such as in the heart or in the brain; not because they believed that the soul itself was not in this part, but because they believed that the spirit In this place, it is like attaching to the soul, combining with the soul, and thinking that the spirit and the soul inform this part together.Yes, on this point, I should have remembered what you said in "On Method", because you said in that book that your idea is that what people usually attribute to the growing, feeling soul All functions, independent of the rational soul; Those functions can be performed before the rational soul enters the body, just as they are performed every day in animals that you think are irrational.But I don't know how I've forgotten it; perhaps because I'm not yet sure whether you don't want to use the name soul for this inner principle by which we grow and feel like animals, or whether you think this The name is only for our spirit, though the original meaning is to animate it, and the spirit is only what we think with, as you yourself are sure.At any rate, I would like you to be called a spirit henceforth, and that you should be exactly a thinking thing. You go on to say that only thinking is inseparable from you.But this cannot deny you, chiefly because you are only a spirit, and you admit no difference between the substance of the soul and your substance except that rational one of which they speak in the schools.However, I hesitate to know whether, when you say that thinking is inseparable from you, you mean that you have been thinking as long as you exist.Of course, this point has a lot in common with the thinking of some ancient philosophers. In order to prove that the human soul is immortal, they said that the soul is in a state of constant motion, that is, according to my understanding , it has been thinking. But it's not easy to convince those who don't understand how you can think in your coma, how you can think in your mother's womb.Besides, I don't know if you think that as early as in your mother's womb, or when you emerged from your mother's womb, you have been penetrated into your body, or into some part of your body in.But I don't want to push you any further, or even ask you, when you were in your mother's womb, or the first few days, or the first months, or the first few years, did you remember that you thought if you answer me that you have forgotten, I don't want to ask you why you have forgotten: I just want to tell you to think about it, not to mention that you hardly have any thinking at that time; How cloudy it should be, how slight. You go on to say that you are not that mass of limbs that people call a human body.This should agree with you, because until now you have been considered only a thinking thing, only a part of the human composite, which is distinct from the external, gross part.Say: Nor am I a thin air that permeates these limbs, nor wind, nor fire, nor vapour, nor breath, nor anything else I can invent and imagine; Because I had assumed that none of these things existed, and, even without changing that assumption, I felt that I still knew for certain that I was a thing.But, spirit!Please stop here, suspend all this assumption, or rather, stop all this fiction and destroy it once and for all.You say: I am not air or anything like air.But if the whole soul is something like this, why are you (you may be said to be the noblest part of the soul), you not considered to be the finest flower of the soul, or the purest and liveliest of the soul part? You say: perhaps those things that I assume do not exist are real things, no different from what I know myself to be.But I don't know anything about it, and I'm not going to argue now.But if you don't know anything, if you don't argue, then why do you say you are anything but?You say: I know that I exist; and this knowledge, so clearly achieved, cannot depend on or be derived from what I do not yet know.All right; but at least you have to remember that you haven't proved that you're not air, or vapor, or anything like that. 5. You then describe what you call imagination.Because you said: imagination is nothing but thinking about the shape or image of a physical thing.However, this is to show that you use a kind of thinking that is very different from what you imagine to know your nature.But since you can define the imagination as you like, I beg you to tell me why, if you are really corporeal (and you probably are, since you haven't proved that you are not), why can't you use a corporeal Shape or image to think of yourself?I ask you, when you think about yourself, what do you experience that appears in your thinking?Is it not a pure, clear, subtle entity that spreads like a comforting wind throughout the body, or at least in the brain, or some part of the body, to animate it, where it is Exercising all the functions you think you are exercising?You say: I admit that everything I can grasp imaginatively does not belong to this knowledge I have of myself.But you did not say how you knew it; and, since you said not long ago that you did not know whether all these things belonged to your essence, from where do you now deduce this result? 6. You go on to say: It is necessary to carefully withdraw his spirit from this thing in order to make itself quite clear about its own nature.This opinion is very good; but tell us, after you have thus withdrawn so carefully, what clarity you have gained concerning your nature; for you only say that you are a thinking thing An activity, and this is what we all already know, you have not let us know what this acting entity is, what is the nature of this entity, how it is integrated with the body, how and how much it is different way to work with so many different things; You also didn't let us know many other things like that that we didn't know until now.You said that you should use reason to comprehend things that cannot be comprehended by imagination, and you have to equate imagination with common senses; but, what a spirit!Can you show us that there are several faculties within us, and not just one, by which we know everything generally?When we open our eyes and look at the sun, it is a manifest feeling; then, when I close my eyes and the sun appears in my mind, it is a manifest, inner realization.In the end, however, how can I recognize that I perceive the sun with the common senses or with the faculties of the imagination and not with the spirit or with the intellect, so that I can now use a different intellect from the imagination, and a different intellect now, as I please? What about the imagination, to understand the sun?Of course, if the brain is so deranged, or the imagination bruised, that the intellect cannot perform its own pure function, then the intellect can really be said to be different from the imagination, and the imagination can really be said to be different from the intellect.But since we cannot see this, it is of course very difficult to draw a real and definite distinction between the two.For, as you say, when we think the image of a bodily thing, it is an imagination, and since it is impossible to think of the body in any other way, does it not follow that the body can only be known by the imagination?Or, if objects can be known in another way, isn't that other cognitive function unrecognizable? After this, you say, you cannot but believe that you know better of those bodily things of the senses, whose images are made by thought, than of yourself, which do not come of the imagination, and do not know what; therefore Strangely enough: something suspicious, something outside of you, is recognized and understood more clearly and distinctly.But, first of all, you do well in saying that this self that does not know what it is, because, in truth, you do not know what it is, do not know its nature, and therefore you cannot be sure whether it cannot fall into imagine.Secondly, it seems that all our knowledge comes from the senses, and though you disagree with the common philosophers on this point (who say: everything in the intellect was first in the senses), it is still true Yes, especially in the intellect there is nothing that is not first offered to the senses, not by contact with them (or 'by encounter', as the Greeks say. ), although it was completed later and improved by analogies, combinations, divisions, additions, subtractions, and the like, it need not be discussed here.And if, therefore, that which presents itself, which impinges on the senses itself, impresses the mind more strongly than that which it makes itself, and which it presents itself according to the form of things, according to the way things once touched the senses. Much, that's no surprise.Yes, you said that physical things are indeterminate.Yet, if you will admit the truth, you are no less sure of the existence of the body in which you live, and of all that surrounds you, than you are of your own.Also, you have no other way of expressing yourself to yourself except by thinking, how can this be compared with things that have various ways of expressing themselves?Since those things manifest themselves not only by many different activities, but also by many very sensible and obvious accidents, such as size, shape, hardness, color, smell, etc., it is not surprising that they Although outside of you, you know and understand them better than you know and understand yourself.But you will say to me: How can I understand what is outside me better than myself?Let me answer you: this is the same as the fact that the eye can see everything but cannot see itself. 7. You say: Then what am I?is a thinking thing. What is a thinking thing?That is to say, one is doubting, understanding, affirming, denying, imagining, and feeling.You talk a lot here, but I don't want to talk about everything, I just want to talk about what you say you are a feeling.Because, to be honest, I'm surprised because you've said the exact opposite before.Don't you perhaps mean to say that besides the spirit there is in you a bodily faculty which dwells in the eyes, ears, and other senses, and which receives the image of the perceptible and begins to feel act, and you yourself then perform this act, with the result that you see, hear, feel everything?It is for this reason, I believe, that you place feeling and imagination in the same category as thinking.I would rather; but you will see whether the sense of the beast—which is no different from yours—is also to be called by the name of thought; A spirit like yours in some way.But you will say: my place is in the brain, where I receive, without changing my place, everything that comes to me through the qi flowing down the nerves; This is how it is being exercised and completed within me.I agree; but in beasts there are also nerves, spirits, and brains, and in the brains there is a knowing-principle, which in the same way receives what is transmitted to it through the spirits, which completes and ends sensory acts.You will say that this principle is nothing else in the animal brain than that which we call the phantasy or imaginative function.But point out to us yourself that you are something else in the human brain, not a function of human fantasy or imagination.I asked you just now for an argument or a sure sign by which you would tell us that you are something else than a human fantasy, but I don't think you can produce even one.I know you can point us to activities much higher than those of the beasts; but though man is the noblest and most perfect of animals, he is nevertheless an animal, and cannot learn from animals. Get rid of; therefore, though it is quite enough to prove that you are the best of all fancies or imaginations, yet you cannot but think that you are of their kind.Because, even if you use a special name, let's call you a spirit, it may be a more noble name, but it cannot be different in nature because of it. Of course, in order to prove that you are of an entirely different nature, that is to say, of a spiritual or immaterial nature, as you profess, you should act differently than the brutes produce actions. To produce an action, and if you cannot produce an action without the brain, at least you should produce an action without the brain, and yet you do not.Because as soon as the brain faints, you yourself faint; Not a single shadow remained.You say: All that is done in beasts is due to the blind impulse of an animal spirit and all other organs, as is done in clocks or other similar machines.But even if this be true of functions like nourishment, pulse, and the like (which are also like functions in man), the affirmation of the actions of the senses, or those movements called the passions of the soul, is due to a The blind impulse of the animal spirit in beasts, but not in man?A piece of meat casts its image into the dog's eye, and when this image reaches the brain, it is connected to the soul by invisible hooks, and then the soul itself and the whole body (the soul, as if by some secret, invisible chains) connected to the whole body) is attracted to this piece of flesh.In the same way, a dog is frightened with a stone, which throws its image, and this image acts like a kind of lever to move the soul and the body with it to escape.But aren’t all these things the same way in humans?If you know that there is another way, by which these activities are carried out, please tell us, we will be very grateful to you.You will say, I am free, and I have the power to stop or move people from evil to good.But this knowing-principle in beasts can do similar things; and though dogs sometimes jump on their food without fear of being beaten or threatened, is it not so often the case with man?You said that a dog barks entirely out of impulse, which is different from a pre-thought-out choice when a person speaks; but can't it be said that a person speaks also through such an impulse?For what you ascribe to choice comes from the motion which excites him, and the power of which moves him to choose; and even in beasts, there is a choice, so to speak, when the impulse which moves the beast is very strong.For I have actually seen a dog adjust his voice to the trumpet, and imitate all the tones and changes of the trumpet, however sharp and sudden, however disorderly and capricious his master raised or lowered it, Lengthen or shorten the tone of the horn.You say that beasts are irrational. No human reason, it is true, but they have a rationality in their own way, which prevents us from saying they are irrational, if not compared with men; besides, speech or reason seems to be a function, This function is as common and as legitimately possessable to them as that principle or function by which they perceive, which is commonly called the inner sense.You say they cannot reason. But though their reasoning is not so perfect and extensive as that of men, yet they are capable of reasoning, differing only in degree from ours.You say they cannot speak.However, although they cannot speak like people (because they are not people), they can talk in their own way, making their own sounds, which they use as we use ours.But you say that even a fool can cobble together words to signify something, which the wisest brutes can't do.But I ask you to see whether it is fair and reasonable that you ask beasts to speak the language of man without paying attention to their own idiosyncrasies.All of these things, though, are long for debate. 8. You then present the wax example.On this point you say several things to show that what is called the accident of wax is not the wax itself or the substance of the wax, and that it is only the mind or intellect itself that can clearly perceive the wax or the substance of wax, and not the senses or imagine.But first of all, it is agreed that the concept of wax or waxy substance can be abstracted from the concept of waxy accident.But can you therefore say that you clearly grasp the substance or nature of wax?It is true that besides colour, shape, infusibility, etc., we perceive that there is something else which is the subject of these accidents and changes which we observe; but what this subject is or may be , we don't know, of course, because it is always hidden, and we only use guesswork to judge what body should be like a pillar or foundation to support all possible changes in wax. I wonder, therefore, why you dare say that after you have taken the wax off, almost as if unclothed it, in all its forms, you have a clearer and fuller comprehension of what it is.For, I agree with you that the wax (or, rather, the substance of the wax) should be distinct from all its forms; but you cannot say that you have grasped what it is, if you have no intention to deceive us, or You don't want to lie to your own words.Because it's not as obvious as a person.对于一个人，我们只看见了衣服和帽子，我们想知道他到底是什么，只要脱掉他的衣服和帽子就行。然后，既然你以为用某种方式理解了这个东西，那么我请你告诉我们，你是怎么领会它的？是不是把它领会成为一种可融的，有广延的东西？ 因为，我想你不是把它领会为一个点，虽然它有时大有时小。 这样的一种广延既然不能是无限的，而是有它的界限的，那么你不能也用某种方式把它领会为有形状的吗？然后，既然把它领会为好象是你看见了它，那么你不能给它一种颜色吗，尽管这种颜色是非常模糊不清的？当然，你既然把它视为比纯粹的空虚有更多一点的物体和物质，那么对你来说它似乎是更可见的；由此可知，你的理智是一种想像。假如你说你把它理解为没有广延，没有形状，没有颜色，那么请你老老实实告诉我们它是什么。 你说我们看见了并且由我们的精神领会了一些人，虽然我们看见的却是他们的帽子和衣服。这话并不能给我们说明是理智而不是想像功能在判断。事实上，一只狗（你不同意它有一个和你的一样的精神）不是用同样方式判断吗？它不是仅凭看到了它主人的衣服或帽子就能认出来它的主人吗？ 还有，不管它的主人是站着，是躺着，是弯着身子，是蜷缩着或是伸展着，它不是总能认出它的主人，虽然它的主人可以用所有这些形象而不是只用这一种而不用那一种形象表现出来，和蜡一样。当它追逐一只野兔，它首先看见它活着，然后又看见它死了，剥了皮，切成一块块的，你想它不认为这还是原来的野兔吗？因此，你所说的对于颜色、软硬、形状等等的知觉不是看，也不是摸等等，而只是精神的一种观察，这话我同意，不过，精神要同想像功能实际上没有分别才行。 但你又接着说：这种观察可以是片面的、模糊的，也可以是全面的、清楚的，这要根据对于组成蜡的那些东西所进行的研究的程度而定。这就不能给我们说明精神对于在蜡里边的那种超乎它的外在形象以外的、我不知道是什么的那种东西所进行的观察是对于蜡的一种清楚、分明的认识，而只说明感官对于自己在蜡上所注意到的一切偶性，对于蜡所能有的一切变化，所进行的研究或观察。从这上，不错，我们能够理解和解释我们用蜡这个名称所指的是什么东西；但是，能够理解，甚至也能够让别人理会这个越是赤裸裸地来看就越是莫名其妙的实体是什么，对于我们来说却是一件完全不可能的事。 九、你紧接着说：关于这个精神，或者不如说我自己（因为直到现在除了我是一个精神之外，我什么都不承认），我将要说什么呢？关于好像那么清楚、分明地领会了这块蜡的这个我，我将要说什么呢？我对我自己认识得难道不是更加真实、确切，而且更加清楚、分明吗？因为，如果由于我看见蜡而断定有蜡，或者蜡存在，那么由于我看见蜡因此有我，或者我存在这件事当然也就越发明显，因为有可能是我所看见的事实上并不是蜡；也有可能是我连看什么东西的眼睛都没有；可是，当我看见或者当我想是看见（关于这一点，我不去加以分别）的时候，这个在思维的我倒不是个什么东西，这是不可能的。同样，如果由于我摸到了蜡而断定它存在，其结果也是一样。我在这里关于蜡所说的话也可以适用于外在于我、在我以外的其它一切东西上去。这些都是你自己的话，我把这些话拿过来是为了使你注意，它们的确证明了由于你看见和清楚地认识了那块蜡的存在和所有那些偶性，因而你清楚地或不清楚地认识了你存在，但是这些话不能因此证明你清楚或不清楚地认识了你是什么或什么是你的本性；而恰恰这是必须主要加以证明的，因为人们并不怀疑你的存在。我在以前没有进一步提出我的意见，现在我也不想坚持，不过请你注意：在你里边除了精神以外你什么都不承认，为了这一点，你甚至不愿意同意你有眼睛、手以及身体的任何别的器官，可是你谈到你所看见，你所摸到……的蜡和它的偶性，而这些，实在说来，假如没有眼睛，没有手，你就不能看见，不能摸到，或者按照你的说法，也不能想是看见，想是摸到。 你接着说：可是，如果说蜡在不仅经过视觉或触觉，同时也经过很多别的原因而被发现了之后，我对它的概念和知觉好像是更加清楚、分明了，那么我对于我自己的认识岂不是应该越发更加明显、清楚、分明了吗，既然一切用以认识和领会蜡的本性或别的物体的本性的道理都更加容易、更加明显地证明我的心灵的本性？可是，既然你所推论关于蜡的东西，都只能证明人们知道精神的存在，而不能证明它的本性，同样，其它一切也不会证明出更多的东西来。即使除此而外你想要从对蜡的实体的这一知觉中推论出别的什么东西，你也只能得出这样的结论，即既然我们对于这个实体只不过是领会得非常模糊，只不过是把它领会成为我不知道是个什么，那么同样，精神也只能用这种方式来领会，以致的确可以在这里重复你在别处说过的话：我不知道是什么的那个你自己。 你最后说：然而我终于不知不觉地回到了我原来想要回到的地方；因为，既然这是我现在弄清楚了的一件事，即精神以及物体本身不是用感官或想像功能所能真正认识的，而是只有用理智才能认识的，而且它们不是由于被看见了或被摸到了才被认识的，而只是由于被思维所理解了或者了解了才被认识的，那么我非常显然地认识了没有什么对我来说比我的精神更容易被认识的了。对你来说，这话说得很好；但是对我来说，我看不出你从什么地方能推论出对于你的精神，除了它存在以外，还能清清楚楚地认识别的东西。因而我也看不出这个沉思的标题本身（即《人的精神是比物体更容易认识的》）所许的愿已经实现了；因为你的计划不是要证明人的精神的存在，或人的精神的存在比物体的存在更清楚，因为肯定没有人怀疑它的存在，你无疑是想要使它的本性比物体的本性更加明显。不过我看不出你做到了什么。谈到物体的本性时，你，精神啊！你自己曾说过，关于物体，我们认识了许多东西，例如广延、形状、运动、对地位的占据等等。 可是关于你自己，除了你不是物体性的一部分的一种聚集，不是空气，不是风，不是一种在走路或在感觉的东西等等以外，你说了什么？不过，即使我们同意了你所有这些东西（虽然你自己反对了其中的某几个），这也并不是我们所期待的；因为，实在说来，所有这些东西都不过是一些否定，而我们并不要求你向我们说你不是什么，而是要求你告诉我们你是什么。 因此你终于说你是一个在思维，也就是说，在怀疑，在肯定，在否定……的东西。可是，首先，说你是一个东西，这一点都没有说到已知的什么；因为“东西”是一个一般的、泛泛的、不确指的词儿，它对你并不比对世界上一切东西更合适，并不比一个不是纯粹“什么都不是”更合适。你是一个东西，那就是说你不是一个“什么都不是”，或者换言之，但意思完全一样，即你是一个什么东西。但是，一块石头也不是一个“什么都不是”，或者，假如你愿意的话，是一个什么东西；一个苍蝇也是一样，世界上所有的东西都是这样。然后，说你是一个在思维的东西，这倒是真地说到已知的东西了，但它在以前并不是未知的东西，它也不是我们所要求于你的；因为有谁怀疑你是一个在思维的东西？可是我们所不知道的，我们因而希望要知道的，是认识并深入到专以思维为其职责的那个实体的内部。因此，我们所追求的，也是你应该得出结论的，并不是你是一个在思维的东西，而是以思维为其属性的这个东西是什么。What's the matter!假如请你对于酒给我们一个更准确、高于寻常之见的知识的话，你以为光说酒是葡萄挤出来的液体的东西，它有时是白的，有时是红的，它是甜的，能醉人等等就算满足了，而不想尽量揭露和表明它的实体的内部，指出这个实体如何由酒精、蒸馏液、酒石酸以及其他若干部分以适当的分量，适当的温度混合到一起而构成的吗？因此，既然大家期待你，而你也答应关于你自己给我们一个比寻常之见更准确的认识，那么你自己会判断像你那样做的，即对我们说你是一个在思维、在怀疑、在理解……的东西，那是不够的；你应该对你自己做一番像化学分解那样的工作，使你能够给我们揭露并且使我们认识你的实体的内部。当你这样做了以后，要由我们来检查一下，看看比起物体（它的本性已经由解剖学、化学、那么多不同的技艺、那么多的感觉和那么多不同的实验给我们表明得如此清楚了）来，是否你更被认识了。