Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/133

Rh For an instant Descartes seems to have concurred in the plan of purchasing a post at Chatellerault, but easily gave up the idea, and settled in Paris (June 1625), in the quarter where he had sought seclusion before. By this time he had ceased to devote himself to pure mathematics, and in company with his friends Mersenne and Mydorge was deeply interested in the theory of the refraction of light, and in the practical work of grinding glasses of the best shape suitable for optical instruments. But all the while his aim was fixed on something beyond either mathematics or physics ; he was engaged with reflections on the nature of man, of the soul, and of God; and it need cause no surprise that Descartes for a while remained invisible even to his most familiar friends. But their importunity made a hermitage in Paris impossible ; and a graceless friend surprised the philosopher in bed at 11 o clock in the morning meditating on some problem, and occasionally taking notes. In disgust at the apparent hopelessness of the position for a student, Descartes started for the west to take part in the siege of La Rochelle, and entered the famine-stricken city with the victorious troops on the 30th October 1628. A meeting at which he was present after his return to Paris decided his vocation. lie had expressed an opinion that the true art of memory was not to be gained by technical devices, but by a philo sophical apprehension of things ; and the Cardinal de Berulle, the founder of the Congregation of the Oratory, was so struck by the tone of the remarks as to impress upon the speaker the duty of spending his life in the examination of truth. Descartes accepted the philosophic mission. In the end of 1628 he left Paris, and in the spring of 1629 he settled in Holland. His financial affairs he had intrusted to the care of the Abbe&quot; Picot, and as his literary and scientific representative he adopted Pore Mersenne. Between the ages of thirty-three and fifty-three (1629-1649) Descartes lived almost entirely in Holland. Thrice only did he revisit France during that period in 1644, 1647, and 1648. The first of these occasions was in order to settle family affairs after the death of his father in 1640. The eldest brother seems to have been disposed to take all he could, and to have expected the philosopher to be yielding in money matters. So little notice did the family think it necessary to take of a brother who had sunk to the level of literature, that a letter of Ren to his father, affectionately excusing his long absence, reached Rennes only after that father was lying in the tomb. The second brief visit, in 1647, partly on literary, partly on family business, was signalized by the award of a pension of 3000 francs, obtained from the royal bounty by Cardinal Mazariu in consideration of the advantages which Descartes s investigations conferred upon mankind, and to aid him in continuing his experiments. The pension was punctually paid. The last visit in 1648 was less fortunate. A royal order summoned him to France for new honours an additional pension and a permanent post for his fame had by this time gone abroad, and it was the age when princes sought to attract genius and learning to their courts. But when Descartes arrived, he found Paris rent asunder by the civil war of the Fronde. He paid the costs of his royal parchment, and left for his Dutch home without a word of reproach. The only other occasions on which he was out of the Netherlands were in 1630, when he made a flying visit to England to observe for himself some alleged magnetic phenomena, and in 1634, when he took an excursion to Denmark. During his residence in Holland he lived at thirteen different places, and changed his abode twenty-four times. In the choice of these spots two motives seem to have in fluenced him the neighbourhood of a university or college, and the amenities of the situation. Franeker, one of the neatest towns in Friesland, was the seat of a university founded in 1585 ; Harderwyk contained a venerable gymna sium, of some note in the pliysical sciences and theology; Deventer possessed a seminary still well endowed, but less famous than it had been in the days of Erasmus ; l Utrecht acquired a university so late as 1634 ; and Leyden had a notable one founded in 1575. Amersfoort, where he also lived, seems to be connected with a love affair, the only one in his life ; at least it was there that his daughter Francine died in 1640, at the age of five. Amsterdam, where he often lodged, Leeuwarden in Friesland, and Dort were also residences. He once settled near Utrecht, as well as in the town; but the three spots which seem to have been most attractive were Endegeest, a country house more than a mile north-west of Leyden, of which Sorbiere has given a pleasing description in one of his letters, and the two villages of Egmond op den Hoef and Egmond the Abbey, situated between Zaandam and the ocean, in one of the prettiest localities of North Holland. The time thus spent seems to have been on the whole happy, even allowing for some warm discussions with the mathematicians and metaphysicians of France, and for some harassing controversies in the Netherlands. Friendly agents chiefly Catholic priests were the intermediaries who forwarded from Dort, Haarlem, Amsterdam, and Leyden his correspondence to his proper address, which he wished kept completely secret ; and Father Mersenne was only too willing to send him loads of objections and questions. During the first twenty years of his life his health had been weak 2 and his complexion pale. After that time the disease in his frame seems to have worked itself off, not without some effervescence. This is the period of his camp life (due, as he himself says, to &quot; heat in the liver &quot;), 3 of his wanderings, enthusiasm, dreams, and vows. With his thirtieth year this struggle seems at an end ; his health seems established ; and the washed-out vermilion of his prime gives place to a dark olive complexion in his riper manhood. It is touch ing to hear his delight in the freedom from intruders. &quot; I sleep here ten hours every night,&quot; he writes from Amsterdam, &quot; and no care ever shortens my slumber.&quot; &quot; I take my walk every day through the confusion of a great multitude with as much freedom and quiet as you could find in your rural avenues.&quot; 4 At his first coming to Franeker he arranged to get a cook acquainted with French cookery ; but, to prevent misunderstanding, it may be added that his diet was mainly vegetarian, and that he rarely drank wine. New friends gathered round him who took a keen interest in his researches. Once only do we find him taking an interest in the affairs of his neigh bours, to ask pardon from the Government for a homicide. 5 He continued the profession of his religion. Sometimes from curiosity he went to the ministrations of anabaptists, 6 to hear the ranting of peasants and artisans. He carried few books to Holland with him, but a Bitle and the Siimma of Thomas Aquinas were amongst them. 7 One of the recom mendations of Egmond the Abbey was the free exercise there allowed to the Catholic religion. At Franeker his house was a small chateau, &quot; separated by a moat from the rest of the town, where the mass could be said in safety.&quot; 8 And one motive in favour of accepting an invitation to England lay in the alleged hanings of Charles L to the older church. The best account of Descartes s mental history during his life in Holland is contained in his letters, which extend 1 (Euvr. vi. 214. 4 (Euvr. ix. 203. 3 (Euvr. viii. 70. 4 (Euvr. vi. 199. 5 (Euvr. viii. 59. 6 (Euvr. vii ;. 173. 7 (Euvr. viii. 181. 8 (Euvr. vi. 123.

