Quotes by Ren Descartes

“Common sense is the most widely shared commodity in the world, for every man is convinced that he is well supplied with it.”

“I suppose therefore that all things I see are illusions; I believe that nothing has ever existed of everything my lying memory tells me. I think I have no senses. I believe that body, shape, extens...”

“Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power.”

“I desire to live in peace and to continue the life I have begun under the motto 'to live well you must live unseen”

“Let whoever can do so deceive me, he will never bring it about that I am nothing, so long as I continue to think I am something.”

“although we very clearly see the sun, we ought not therefore to determine that it is only of the size which our sense of sight presents; and we may very distinctly imagine the head of a lion joined...”

“Some years ago I was struck by the large number of falsehoods that I had accepted as true in my childhood, and by the highly doubtful nature of the whole edifice that I had subsequently based on th...”

“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.”

“And thus, the actions of life often not allowing any delay, it is a truth very certain that, when it is not in our power to determine the most true opinions we ought to follow the most probable.”

“It is only prudent never to place complete confidence in that by which we have even once been deceived.”

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

“There is nothing more ancient than the truth.”

“The dreams we imagine when we are asleep should not in any way make us doubt the truth of the thoughts we have when we are awake.”

“To live without philosophizing is in truth the same as keeping the eyes closed without attempting to open them.”

“It is not enough to have a good mind. The main thing is to use it well.”

“But in my opinion, all things in nature occur mathematically.”

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

“that the grace of fable stirs the mind"...and..."that the perusal of excellent books is, as it were, to interview with the noblest men of past ages”

“Thus the perception of the infinite is somehow prior in me to the perception of the finite, that is, my perception of God is prior to my perception of myself. For how would I understand that I doub...”

“When I turn my mind's eye upon myself, I understand that I am a thing which is incomplete and dependent on another and which aspires without limit to ever greater and better things...”