CAR 
and vifited Silefia, Poland, Pomerania, the ccads of the 
Baltic, Brandenbnrgh, Holftein, Eafl Ff.eiland,WL(t Frief- 
land; in his pafl'age to which lad place he was in danger 
of being murdered. The failors fancied he was a mer¬ 
chant, who had a large fmn of money about him, and, 
■perceiving that he was a foreigner who had little acquaint¬ 
ance in the country, and a man of a mild difpofition, they 
relblved to kill him, and throw his body into the fea. 
They even difcourfed of their defign before his face, think¬ 
ing he undcrflood no language but the French, in which 
he always 1 'poke to his fervant. Des Cartes' fuddenly 
darted up, and, drawing his fword, (poke to them in their 
own language, in Inch a refolute tone as.ftrnck terror into 
them : upon which they behaved very civilly. The year 
following he went to Paris, where he cleared himfelf from 
the imputation of having been received among the Rofi- 
crufians, w hom he confidered as a company of vilionaries 
and impoltors. Dropping the dudy of mathematics, he 
now applied himfelf again to ethics and natural philolo- 
phy. The fame year he took a journey through Swifier- 
iand to Italy. Upon his return he fettled at Paris; but 
his (Indies being interrupted by frequent vifits, he went in 
1628 to the liege of Rochelle. He returned to Paris in 
November, but in the following fpring he repaired to Am- 
derdam, and from thence to a piace near Franeker, in 
Friedand, where he began his Metaphylical Meditations, 
and (pent (bine time in dioptrics; about this time, too, he 
wrote his thoughts upon meteors. After about fix months, 
lie returned to Amderdam. 
Des Cartes imagined, that nothing could more promote 
the temporal felicity of mankind, than the union of natu¬ 
ral philofophy with mathematics ; but, before he (hould 
fet himfelf to relieve men’s labours, or multiply the con¬ 
veniences of life by mechanics, he thought it necelfary 
to difeover fome means of fecuring the human body from 
dileafe and. debility : this led him to the (tudv of anatomy 
and chemidry, in which he employed the winter at Am¬ 
derdam. He now, viz. about 1631, took a voyage to Eng¬ 
land, and made fome obfervations near London upon the 
variation of the compafs. In the fpring of 1633 he re¬ 
moved to Deventer, where he completed feverai works 
that were left unfinifhed the year before, and refumed his 
dudies in adronomy. In the Cummer he put the laft hand 
to his Treatifeof the World. The next year he returned 
to Amderdam, but foon after took a journey into Den¬ 
mark, and the lower parts of Germany. In autumn, 
1635, he went to Lewarden, in Friedand, w here he re¬ 
mained till 1637, and wrote his Treatife of Mechanics. 
The fame year he publilhed his four treatifes concerning 
Method, Dioptrics, Meteors, and Geometry. About this 
time he received an invitation to fettle in England, from 
Sir Charles Cavendifh, brother to the earl of .Newcadle, 
with which he did not feem backward to comply, efpeci- 
ally upon being allured that the king was a catholic in his 
heart: but the breaking out of the civil wars in this coun¬ 
try prevented his journey. At the end of 1641, Lewis 
XIII. of France invited him to his court, upon very ho¬ 
nourable terms ; but he could not be pet Loaded to quit his 
retirement. This year he publifhed his Meditations con¬ 
cerning the Exiftence of God and the Immortality of the 
Soul. In 1645, he again applied to anatomy, but was a 
little diverted front this dudy by the quedion concerning 
the quadrature of the circle, which was at that time agi¬ 
tated. During the winter of the fame year, lie cotnpofed 
a finall trad againd Gadendus’s Indicates; and another 
on the Nature of tbePafiions. About this time he carried 
on an epidolary correfpondence with the princefs Elizabeth, 
daughter to Frederic V. eledor palatine, and king of Bo¬ 
hemia, who had been his pupil in Holland. 
A difpute arifing between Chridina, queen of Sweden, 
and M. Clianut, the relident of France, concerning the 
following quedion, When a man carries love or hatred to 
excels, which of titefe two irregularities is the word? 
the relident Cent the quedion to Des Cartes, who, upon 
that occafion drew up the Diflenation upon Love that is 
T E S. s 35 
pubiiflted in the fird volume of his letters, which proved 
highly fatisfadory to the queen. In June, 1647, lie took 
a journey to France, where the king fettled on him a pen- 
fion of 3000 livres ; but he returned to Holland about the 
end of September. In November lie received’ a letter from 
M. Clianut, in queen Chriiiina’s name, defiring his opi¬ 
nion of the fovereign good; which lie accordingly lent 
her, with lome letters upon the fame fubjeet, formerly 
written to tiie princefs Elizabeth, and his Treat.lit on tite 
Paflions. The queen was fo highly pleafed with them, 
that die wrote him a letter of thanks with iter own hand, 
and invited him to come to Sweden. He arrived at Stock¬ 
holm in October, 1648. The queen engaged him to attend 
iter every morning at five o'clock, to inilruft iter in his 
philofophy; and dcfired him to revife and diged all his 
unpublilhed writings, and to draw from them a complete 
body of philofophy. Site purpofed, alfo, to fix him in 
Sweden, by allowing him a revenue of three thoufand 
crowns a-year, with an edate which Ihould defeend to his 
heirs and affigns for ever ; and to edablidi an academy, of 
which lie was to be the director. But thefe dedgns were 
frudrated by his death, which happened Feb. 11, 1650, 
in the 54th year of his age. His body was interred at 
Stockholm ; but feventeen years after, was removed to Pa¬ 
ris, where a magnificent monument was erefted to him in 
the church of Genevieve du Mont. As to his character. 
Dr. Barrow, in his Opufcula, tells 11s, that Des Cartes was 
doubtlefs a very ingenious man, and a real pliilofopher, 
and one who feems to have brought thole a Hi dances to 
that part of philofophy relating to matter and motion, 
which, perhaps, no one had done before ; namely, a great 
Iki 11 in mathematics; a mind habituated, both by nature 
andcudom, to profound meditation ; a judgment exempt 
from all prejudices and popular errors, and furnilhed with 
a good number of certain anu feieCt experiments ; a great 
deal of leifure; an entire difengagement, by It is own 
choice, from the reading of ufelefs books, and the avoca¬ 
tions of life ; with an incomparable acutenefs of wit, and 
an excellent talent of thinking clearly and didincliy, and 
of exprefiing his thoughts witli the utmod perfpic-uity. 
He was never married, but had one natural daughter, who 
died when die was but five years old. 
There have been feverai editions of his works, and com¬ 
mentaries upon them ; particularly thole of Scliooten 011 
his Geometry. His improvement of the Icience of , Al¬ 
gebra may be feen under that head, in vol.i. p. 281. 
CARTE'S IAN PHII.OSOPH Y, or Cartesian ism, f. 
the fydeni of philofophy advanced by Des Cartes, and 
maintained by his followers, the Cartelians. This philo¬ 
fophy is founded on two great principles, the one metaphy- 
fical, the other phyfical. The metaphylical one is this, 
l think, therefore I am, or Iexijl: the phyfical principle is, 
that nothing exi/ls but fubfiances. Subdance he makes of 
two.kinds; one a fubdance that thinks, the other a fub- 
liance extended ; fo that aftual thought and actual exten- 
fion make the efience of fubdance. The elTence of matter 
being tints fixed in extendon, Des Cartes concludes that 
there is no vacuum, nor any poflibility of it, in nature; 
but that tite univerle is absolutely full: by this principle, 
mere fpace is quite excluded, for extenfion being implied 
in the idea of fpace, matter is fo too. DesCartes defines 
motion to be the tra’nflation of a body from the neigh¬ 
bourhood of others that are in contact with it, and confi¬ 
dered as at red, to tite neighbourhood of otlver.bodies; by 
which he dedroys the diliinftion between motion that is 
abf.lute or real, and that which is relative or apparent. 
He maintains that the fame quantity of motion is always 
preferved in the univerfe, becaufe God mud be fuppofed 
to aft in the moil condant and immutable manner. And 
lienee, alfo, lie deduces his three laws of mo: ion. See the 
article Motion. 
Upon thefe principles Des Cartes explains mechanically 
how tite world was formed, and how the prefent pheno¬ 
mena of nature came to arife. He fuppofes that God cre¬ 
ated matter of an indefinite extenfio.u, which he feparated 
into 
