Abstract

Discusses the Meditationes, its reception, and Descartes's response. In this work, Descartes avoided theological questions. Describes the structure of the Principia, the culmination of his metaphysics dealing with the cogito, freedom of the will, divine predestination, inertial principles, the conservation of motion, dynamic relativism, and his theory of vortices, which he used to account for planetary orbits, weight or gravity, tides, and magnetism. Chronicles Descartes's religious controversy with Voetius and his dispute with Regius, whom he accused of plagiarizing his work.