^{page 139 note 2} Reg. vi, AT. x, 381–4Google Scholar (epistemological aspect); Reg. xii, ibid., 418–27 (ontological aspect). This division into “epistemological” and “ontological” aspects is merely an exegetical expedient, since the original texts do not permit of an exact correlation in the sense implied by this modern description. It is indeed no easy task to decide exactly how “absolute” terms, each of which “in se continet naturam puram et simplicem” (Reg. vi), are to be related to the simple natures described in Reg. xii. It is dubious whether, on Descartes' own premisses, what is epistemologically absolute can be univocallycorrelated to what is ontologically simple, and what is epistemologically relative to what is ontologically complex. But unless such a correlation is achieved there is little coherence between the simple natures of Reg. vi and those of Reg. xii. (The abbreviation “AT.” refers to the 12-volume edition of Descartes' correspondence and works edited by MM. Adam and Tannery.)

^{page 139 note 3} Descartes, p. 236.

^{page 140 note 1} Cf. Letter of June 16,1641, to Mersenne. “Par le mot Idea, j'entends tout ce qui peut être en notre pensée, et … j'en ai distingué trois sortes: à savoir quaedam sunt adventitiae, comme l'idée qu'on a vulgairement du Soleil; aliae factae vel factitiae, au rang desquelles on peut mettre celle que les Astronomes font du Soleil par leur raisonnement; et aliae innatae, ut Idea Dei, Mentis, Corporis, Trianguli, et generaliter omnes quae aliquas Essentias Veras, Immutabiles et Aeternas repraesentant” (AT. iii, 383). Commenting on this passage Gilson, M. remarks: “L'idée innée proprement dite … nous livre une ‘vraie et immuable nature,’ c'est-à-dire une essence dont la définition s'impose nécessairement à notré pensée” (Commentaire, p. 328)Google Scholar.

^{page 140 note 2} I shall be dealing more or less exclusively with the simple natures per se of Reg. xii, and for reasons which will become, I hope, progressively apparent. The so-called epistemological characteristics of simple natures, of which examples are given in Reg. vi and which are called “absolute terms” (“ut … independens, causa, simplex, universale, unum, aequale, simile, rectum … ”—AT. x, 381)—these present little difficulty if viewed as “ultimate limits to formal analysis” (Keeling), that is, in the context of Descartes' methodology. The philosopher himself, in the same rule, makes it quite clear how an “absolute”term can become a “relative” one, and vice versa.

^{page 141 note 1} The Philosophy of Descartes, p. 162. Cf. the whole discussion, pp. 154–63.

^{page 142 note 1} The Philosophy of Descartes, p. 70.

^{page 142 note 2} Ibid., pp. 236 n. 1, 264 n.4. It is of course possible that I have failed to grasp what Dr. Keeling really means to imply—but I have felt compelled to take the terminology he uses at its face value.

^{page 142 note 3} I must not be taken to insinuate that Dr. Keeling himself envisages simple natures as inhabiting some subsistent world. I am merely trying to examine any hypothesis under which it may be possible to pin down their ontological status.

^{page 143 note 1} “ … communes illae notiones, quae sunt veluti vincula quaedam ad alias natures simplices inter se conjugendas, et quaram evidentia nititur quidquid ratiocinando concludimus. Hae scilicet: quae sunt eadem uni tertio, sunt eadem inter se; item, quae ad idem tertium eodem modo referri non possunt, aliquid etiam inter se habent diversum, etc.” (Reg. xii, AT. x, 419).

^{page 143 note 2} Vide supra, n. 1.

^{page 144 note 1} Op. cit., p. 264 n.4. This passage should be compared with a former statement relative to “Awareness of Sensible appearances,” e.g. “Complexes of sense-ideas (are) analysable into simpler ideas or sensa (but never into simple natures, for these are purely conceptual and non-sensory)” (ibid., p. 162). If complexes of sense-ideas are not to some extent analysable into the simple natures which they represent, how, one may ask, is the “correspondence” referred to above to be maintained? Cf. Descartes' own remarks on this very point: “ … si judicem aliquam figuram non moveri, dicam meam cogitationem ease aliquo modo compositam ex figura et quiete; et sic de caeteris” (Reg. xii, AT. x, 420). If this be taken in conjunction with the methodological directives of Reg. xii already referred to, I do not see how it is possible to maintain that simple natures are “purely conceptual and non-sensory” unless we concentrate exclusively on Descartes' later doctrine of innatism. But there, as I said, simple natures as such are never mentioned at all.

^{page 144 note 2} “Cum autem agnoscimus fieri non posse, ut ex nihilo aliquid fiat, tunc propositio haec: Ex nihilo nihil fit, non tanquam res aliqua existens, neque etiam ut rei modus consideratur, sed ut veritas quaedam aeterna, quae in mente nostra sedem habet, vocaturque communis notio, sive axioma” (Princ. i, 49. (AT. viii (i), 23)).

^{page 144 note 3} Always saving of course their possible inherence in the mind of God.

^{page 144 note 4} Haldane and Ross thus happily translate “ad omnia genera rerum sextendunt.”

^{page 145 note 1} Substance, the only “genuine” category mentioned, should not, strictly speaking, have been lumped together with duration, order and number, since the latter are all modes of substance. On the other hand, it is perfectly consistent to maintain that all four are (or can be) equally concretely exemplified in things that (spiritually or materially) are substantial, endure, are ordered or numbered. In point of fact, art. 48 and the articles immediately subsequent to it are compact of terminological confusions, which are heightened rather than reduced by any attempt to correlate them (the articles) with the doctrine of the Regulae. Dr. Keeling tries manfully to interpret art. 48 in terms of simple natures (op. cit., p. 100), but admits that Descartes has got confused about “common notions,” and himself somewhat inconsistently declares (contra Descartes) that existence, duration, diversity and unity are common notions, when what he should have said (to be consistent with Reg. xii and his own original interpretation of it) was that existence, unity and duration were common natures of the third group (i.e. common to both intellect and matter) and that “diversity” was a common notion proper (i.e. a relation or vinculum), even though of course it also belonged to the same group. Of course, all this sort of criticism, it may be asserted, is mere hair-splitting. True enough! But unfortunately the very attempt that has been made (and vainly made in the present writer's opinion) to fit simple natures into the scheme of Descartes published works compels one to a somewhat pettifogging analysis if the incompatibilities of the case (viewed in an ontological context) are to be made clear.

^{page 146 note 1} Op. cit., p. 135. Boyce Gibson reaches this conclusion in the context of considering the original intuition of the self which (as Descartes himself was to insist to Burman (AT. v, 153)) contained implicitly the intuition of God. In point of fact the self does appear in isolation at first “due to the defensive and sceptical attitude which the method of doubt has compelled us to adopt in the face of a possibly alien universe”; but by leaning on what this critic calls the “method of expanding implications” we are able to transcend the (mere) self-intuition and thus attain God. “The finite is driven by the logic of its own being into the infinite.” This procedure, however, as Boyce Gibson admits, “plays havoc with the theory of the self as substance” (ibid., p. 105); and it also, I may add (despite the justificatory evidence for it in Descartes' own writings) complicates still further any attempt to interpret the self in terms of simple natures.

^{page 147 note 1} Descartes, p. 214, e.g. “Cette premiere vérité (sc. le Cogito) répond exactement aux exigences de nos règies formelles et elle leur fournit un contenu réel: en efiet, nous avons là précisément une connaissance immédiate, c'est-à-dire intuitive, d'une nature simple (le je comme sujet pensant) … ”

^{page 147 note 2} I.e. consistently with the passage in Reg. xii dealing with necessary and contingent relationship (AT. x, 421–2).

^{page 147 note 3} These are, first, “the thing” which is “I,” “existence,” “thinking”; second, the various vincula of knowledge expressed in the form of four principles, namely (a) necessary relation of attribute to substance, (b) causation, (c) sufficient reason, (d) non-contradiction. These principles, Keeling contends, are “extracted” from the Cogito-situation, and at the same time give the latter its structure (op cit., pp. 100–2).

^{page 147 note 4} Letter of June or July, 1646, to to Clerselier (AT. iv, 444).

^{page 147 note 5} The only satisfactory explanation of triangularity, on the basis of Descartes'own declarations, would be that God, on whom its essence depends, somehow holds it in equilibrium (1) in bis own mind (as the Neo-Platonists held), or (2) in some timeless and spaceless aspect of the created universe, or (3) merely in all human minds whether or not those minds were capable of making the necessary effort within themselves to grasp its essence.

^{page 148 note 1} II^æ Resp. Rationes etc. more geometrico dispositae (AT. x, AT. vii, 166).

^{page 148 note 2} Cf. Med. iii: “Unitas, simplicitas, sive inseparabilitas eorum omnium quae in Deo sunt, una est ex praecipuis perfectionibus quas in eo esse intelligo” (AT. vii, 50); II^æ Resp. “Sed praeterea in Deo intelligimus absolutam immensitatem, simplicitatem, unitatem omnia alia attributa complectentem … ”(AT. vii, 137).

^{page 148 note 3} Objj. Vae, AT. vii, 286–7.

^{page 148 note 4} It would, I think, have savoured of irreverence if someone had suggested to Descartes that God's nature or essence was composed of a series of “ontal elements” in necessary relationship. The various qualities or attributes predicated of him (Descartes might have retorted) are merely modes of his infinite Being through which our finite minds apprehend him.

^{page 149 note 1} Cf. note (i) to p. 146 supra.

^{page 149 note 2} Descartes seems definitely to have read some of Bacon's works (notably the De Augmentis scienliarum) and to have been impressed by the Lord Chancellor's inductive method (AT. i, 195, 251). On the other hand, a letter of January 1630 to Mersenne indicates that Bacon's “simple natures” or “forms” will meet the same fate as those of Aristotle, i.e. will be “explained away.”Here is the passage in point: “Je vous remercie des qualites que vous avez tirees d'Aristote; j'en avais dèjà fait une autre plus grande liste, partie tirée de Verulamio, partie de ma tête, et c'est une des premières choses que je têcherai d'expliquer, et cela ne sera pas si difficile qu'on pourrait croire; car les fondements étant posés, elles suivent d'elles-mêmes” (AT. i, 109).

^{page 150 note 1} A History of Modern Philosophy, vol. i, p. 202.

^{page 151 note 1} Op. cit., p. 236, n. 1.

^{page 151 note 2} Ibid., p. 143 n. 1, sub fin.