Abstract
This chapter is devoted to the philosophy of Henricus Regius, a Dutch philosopher and one of the first followers of Descartes. Regius’ philosophy presents an original version of Cartesianism insofar as it relies on a certain number of Cartesian principles and on many particular Cartesian explanations in natural philosophy, while at the same time rejecting Descartes’ metaphysics. Regius’ empiricist theory of knowledge is precisely intended to replace Descartes’ metaphysics. I first explore this original empiricist theory by relying on a systematic comparison of the three editions of Regius’ main work. The expression of this empiricism becomes more and more radical and goes hand in hand with a limited skepticism. I show that it leads Regius to a new conception of vision that, although close to that of Descartes, has to account for the visual perception of the geometrical and spatial properties of objects without any innate ideas. Then I present the consequences of Regius’ empiricist theory of knowledge on the way the principles of natural philosophy can be grasped and on the role that can be attributed to experience in the explanation of natural phenomena.
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Notes
- 1.
AT XI 675: “À la distance où nous sommes aujourd’hui, nous pouvons ne point penser que Regius ait eu tellement tort, théoriquement: la partie solide, celle qui subsiste, de l’œuvre de Descartes, est bien la physique telle qu’il l’entendait, c’est-à-dire l’application de la mathématique à la physique; et sans doute il n’était pas besoin pour cela de tant de métaphysique, ni surtout d’une métaphysique comme celle de Descartes” (“Seen from a distance today, Regius does not seem to have been so mistaken, in theoretical terms: the solid part of Descartes’ work, the enduring part, is indeed physics as he intended it, that is, the application of mathematics to physics; this didn’t really require so much metaphysics, especially a metaphysics such as Descartes’”).
- 2.
For a discussion of how the Rationalist-Empiricist distinction can cause us to misunderstand or underestimate seventeenth-century philosophers, see Chap. 1 by Dobre and Nyden.
- 3.
- 4.
Mouy 1934, 71: “Or, par une singulière destinée, dans l’école cartésienne proprement dite, aussi bien à Paris qu’en Hollande, il n’y aura pas d’expérimentateur. Le seul vrai physicien, Rohault, mourra trop jeune pour donner sa mesure. Et précisément l’originalité des disciples se marquera bien plus par leurs théories relatives à la métaphysique du système cartésien ou par leurs solutions du problème psycho-physiologique que par leurs recherches expérimentales.…nous verrons les disciples toujours à la remorque des recherches expérimentales d’autrui, et très préoccupés de les intégrer, et, si l’on ose dire, de les digérer.”
- 5.
Verbeek 1993a, viii: “un mariage, parfois assez mal assorti, entre une physique essentiellement rationaliste et une épistémologie empiriste.”
- 6.
De Vrijer himself acknowledged his lack of competence in this area, when it came to undertaking a thorough analysis of Regius’ physics and medicine: “Het is mij dus niet mogelijk dan zeer bescheiden te handelen over Regius als physicus en medicus” (De Vrijer 1917, 201: “It is therefore not possible for me to deal with Regius as physicist and physician more than in a very modest way”). On the contrary, there are a certain number of studies on the nature of the soul and its relation with the body in Regius: Rodis-Lewis 1993; Wilson 2000; Clarke 2010; Kolesnik-Antoine 2012. For the historical context, see Verbeek 1988, 1992, 1993b.
- 7.
- 8.
Theo Verbeek quotes a passage of the Brevis explicatio, written by Petrus Wassenaer, in which are listed a variety of topics in natural philosophy, including the human mind, the laws of motion, the motions of the animals, the forces of machines, the vortexes of the skies, the Sun, the fixed stars, the daily and annual motion of the planets, the sea tides, comets, magnets, the nature of meteors, minerals, plants, animals, men, and a lot of other things regarding physiology and medicine (see Verbeek 1994, 541, n46). But Theo Verbeek points to the fact that the Physiologia is still “very sketchy on cosmological and purely physical issues” (Verbeek 1994, 544).
- 9.
Letter to Dinet, AT VII 582–583.
- 10.
See Mouy 1934, 84.
- 11.
Geneviève Rodis-Lewis therefore rightly notes: “Regius and Voetius reduce intellectual thought to an abstraction from the sensible” (Rodis-Lewis 1993, 44: “Regius et Voetius réduisent la pensée intellectuelle à une abstraction à partir du sensible”). His opponents will not reproach Regius for his adherence to empiricism. On the commitment to sense experience in Dutch universities, see Verbeek 1992, 6–9, 21–23, 35. Theo Verbeek emphasizes “a general tendency to stress the empiricist elements in Peripatetic doctrine” in the Low Countries at the time. Voetius precisely criticized the rejection of the senses by Descartes: see Verbeek 1992, 56.
- 12.
Regius 1661, 419: “Atque hinc recte olim dixit Aristoteles, quod mens hominis recens nati sit instar tabulae rasae, cui nihil inscriptum, sed quaevis inscribi possunt” (“Hence Aristotle once rightly said that the soul of a newly born man is like a blank slate on which nothing has been written, but on which one can write anything”). This late addition might correspond to Regius’ wish to give an authoritative support to his empiricism, even if his is far from being identical to Aristotle’s. In De anima, III, 4, 430a, Aristotle compares the intellect to a blank writing tablet.
- 13.
- 14.
Examining the fundamental concepts constituting the core of Regius’ general physiology in his 1641 Physiologia, Klaus Dechange rightly notes that the representation of the senses served as a criterion of organization (Dechange 1966, 24). At the time, “physiologia” was often taken, in accordance with its etymological meaning, as a synonym of “natural philosophy”: see Des Chene 1996. But Regius considers the term to refer to the “knowledge of health,” as the subtitle of his work Physiologia indicates (Physiologia sive cognitio sanitatis).
- 15.
See Dibon 1990.
- 16.
- 17.
Regius 1654, 335: “[Actiones cogitativae] omnes, quae non sunt ex revelatione divinâ, sunt sensationes, vel à sensatione originem ducunt. Nam nihil possumus velle, dijudicare, reminisci, nec de quoquam imaginari, nec quicquam aliter percipere, nisi ejus idea per sensationem, mediatè, vel immediatè, in nobis antea producta, vel postea excitata, & menti oblata fuerit” (“All mental acts that do not come from divine revelation are sensations or originate from sensation. Indeed we cannot wish, judge or remember anything, nor imagine, nor otherwise perceive anything, unless the idea of that thing has previously been produced in us, either indirectly or directly, or afterwards excited and brought before the mind, by sensation”). The 1661 edition adds: “Atque hinc patet sensum aliquem omnis cognitionis, reliquarumque actionum cogitativarum esse principium: Ac proinde non esse omnis cognitionis principium, sive primum cognitum, Cogito; nedum, Cogito, ergo sum. hi enim sunt conceptus generales, qui ex speciali aliquo sensu primam originem duxerunt” (Regius 1661, 399: “And so it appears that some sense or other is the principle of all knowledge as well as of the remaining mental acts: and hence I think is not the principle of all knowledge or the first thing known; and even less so I think, therefore I am. These are indeed general notions which have drawn their first origin from some specific sense”). This passage is summed up as follows in the table of contents (unpaginated): “[Actiones cogitativae] sunt sensationes, vel ab iis ortae. Hic vel ille sensus est omnis cognitionis principium: non vero cogito; vel cogito ergo sum” (“[Mental acts] are sensations or originate from them. This or that sense is the principle of all knowledge: and not in fact I think or I think therefore I am”). The critical mention of the cogito is absent in the Fundamenta physices and in the 1654 edition of the Philosophia naturalis. Regius 1654, 343 (about the necessary role of the brain in the activity of thinking): “Atque hoc ex eo patet, quod ut de corporeis, ita etiam de divinis & spiritualibus rebus non nisi corporeâ sensatione & imaginatione de humanis & corporeis rebus praecedente…” (“And this appears from the fact that, as with corporeal things, we can only think something about the divine and spiritual things insofar as we have previously had a corporeal sensation and imagination of human and corporeal things…”); Regius 1661, 407.
- 18.
Regius 1646, 251: “Nullis videtur menti ad cogitandum opus esse ideis, imaginibus, notionibus, vel axiomatis innatis; sed sola innata cogitandi facultas ipsi ad omnes actiones cogitativas peragendas sufficit; quod in doloris, coloris, saporis, aliorumque similium perceptione est manifestum, quae à mente rectè percipiuntur, quamvis nullae eorum ideae menti sint innatae. Nec est ulla ratio, cur unae ideae magis à natura sint insitae, quàm aliae” (“It seems that, in order to think, the mind does not need any innate ideas, imaginations, notions or axioms; but the innate faculty of thinking itself alone suffices to perform all mental acts; this is manifest in pains, colors, tastes and in the perception of other similar things, which are perceived correctly by the mind, although none of their ideas are innate to the mind. Nor is there a reason why some ideas would be more innate by nature than some others”). The paragraph is entitled “Mens non indiget ideis innatis” (“The mind does not need any innate ideas”).
- 19.
CSM I 304: “So much so that there is nothing in our ideas which is not innate to the mind or the faculty of thinking, with the sole exceptions of those circumstances which relate to experience, such as the fact that we judge that this or that idea which we now have immediately before our mind refers to a certain thing situated outside us.…Hence it follows that the very ideas of the motion themselves and of the figures are innate in us. The ideas of pain, colours, sounds and the like must be all the more innate if, on the occasion of certain corporeal motions, our mind is to be capable of representing them to itself, for there is no similarity between these ideas and the corporeal motions” (AT VIIIb 358–359).
- 20.
Regius 1654, 354: “Non est itaque, quod ullas luminis, colorum, sonorum, odorum, saporum, vel figurae ideas nobis innatas esse fingamus: cum illae in mente, ratione jam explicatâ, ab objectis recens producantur, vel antea ab iis in ea productae, ab objectis vel eorum notis, excitentur.” Regius 1661, 419–420.
- 21.
This is only made explicit in the 1654 Philosophia naturalis.
- 22.
This excludes any purely intellectual activity as, for example, the cogito.
- 23.
See Regius 1646, 251.
- 24.
Regius 1654, 355: “Illas autem omnes, similesque alias quaslibet, ex observationibus rerum, primò per singularem individuorum perceptionem, & deinde per multorum singularium collectionem, & inde factam inductionem, universales notiones inferentem, ipsi formavimus, vel ex alienâ traditione illas ab aliis accepimus. Atque hoc cuivis, qui primam notionum istarum in animis nostris nascentium productionem rectè mecum consideraverit, est manifestum” (“Regarding all these [ideas] and any other similar ones, we ourselves have formed them from observations of things, at first through the singular perception of individuals, and then through the collection of many particulars, and thence, by performing an induction and inferring universal notions; or we have received them through a foreign tradition from others. And this is manifest to whoever has rightly considered with me the first production of these notions that are born in our souls”). The 1661 edition introduces a few modifications, specifying that the observations are “probable,” that an innate faculty of the mind is involved in the process, and that the general notions are useful in various ways in life: see Regius 1661, 420–421.
- 25.
Regius 1654, 355, 1661, 421: “Nam puer ille non de communi & universali notione, sed re singulari interrogatur, eaque sensibus ipsius praesens cognoscenda proponitur, iisque ab ipso percipitur, & deinde imaginatione ejus augetur, & imminuitur, aliterque mutatur” (“For that child is not questioned about the common and universal notion, but about the particular thing, and one places before him this [object of knowledge], which is present to his senses, which is perceived by him through the senses, and then is augmented, diminished and changed in other ways by his imagination”). The child referred to here is the παῖς in Plato’s Meno (82b–86c). The passage is not to be found in the Fundamenta physices.
- 26.
Regius 1654, 353–354, 1661, 419: “[imagines] mens sive cogitandi facultas deinde considerat, perpendit, examinat, componit, dividit, inter se confert, aliisque modis tractat; atque ita sibi alias necessarias ideas & notiones, ad omnes alias posteriores suas cogitationes perficiendas, ita sufficienter ex iis conficit, ut nulla ratio, nec ulla necessitas, ad ullarum talium idearum vel notionum menti innatarum subsidium nobis confugiendum esse, suadeat” (“Then the mind or the faculty of thinking considers [these images], it assesses them carefully, examines, composes, divides them, compares them to each other and handles them in other ways; and thus from them it makes for itself the other ideas and notions that are necessary to carry out all its other later thoughts, so that no reason and no necessity urges us to appeal to the help of any such ideas or notions innate to the mind”). Regius does not give any more detailed genetical account of the diversity of our ideas.
- 27.
Regius 1646, 285: “Perceptio universalium ad imaginationem pertinet. Universalia enim sunt singularia, in abstracto, sine notis individuationis, hoc, hîc, nunc, ut loquuntur Scholastici, considerata” (“The perception of universals belongs to imagination. Indeed, universals are particulars considered in an abstract way, without any mark of individuation such as this, here, now, as the Scholastics say [similar things to which are found, or at least can be found, in many other things]”); Regius 1654, 401, 1661, 473. Regius 1654, 355, 1661, 421: “omnis cognitio singularium ex sensibus oritur, & quaecumque alia ibi fuerit, ea imaginatione sensus sequente recens formatur” (“All knowledge of particulars originates from the senses; and any other knowledge there is, it is newly formed by the imagination drawing on the senses”). The passage is not to be found in the Fundamenta physices. One could see Regius’ conception of imagination in the line of the Scholastic theories of sensation in which the imagination plays a role of generalization in a whole process of abstraction from the impressions received by the sense organs. But the process, as described by Scholastic psychology in its various forms, ends up by a specific operation assigned to the intellect. See Tachau 1988. Regius does not endorse this final step of the process, but rather displaces it and attributes it to imagination and judgment. This distinguishes him clearly from Scholastic psychology.
- 28.
Regius 1654, 355–356: “Neque mirum est, quòd, ex paucorum singularium à nobis observatorum collectione, universales notiones inferri possint. Nam notiones illae, ex singularium quorundam observatione per inductionem collectae & acquisitae, eatenus tantum sunt universales, quatenus illae propter similitudinem, quam habere creduntur cum aliis quibusvis singularibus, quae à nobis per sensus non fuerunt observata, universis, hoc est, quibusvis aliis similibus singularibus, competere judicantur. Neque hoc ullam etiam admirationem meretur. Vniversalia enim nihil aliud sunt quam singularia quaelibet, absque notis individuationis, hoc, hic, nunc, per imaginationem detractoriam, considerata, quorum similia in aliis inveniuntur, vel saltem inveniri possunt.…Nam singulares immediate à sensibus; universales verò mediante, ut jam dixi, imaginatione & judicio ab iisdem originem ducunt” (“And one should not be surprised that universal notions can be inferred from the collection of a few particulars observed by us. For those notions, which have been collected and acquired through induction from the observation of some particulars, are universal insofar as we judge them to agree with all the other similar particulars because of a similarity that we believe they have with all the other particulars that have not been observed by us through the senses. And this does not even deserve any admiration. Universals are indeed nothing other than particulars considered, through a subtraction of the imagination, without any mark of individuation such as this, here, now, similar things to which are found, or at least can be found, in other things.…Indeed particulars immediately draw their origin from the senses; while universals, as I have already said, also draw their origin from the senses, but indirectly, by means of imagination and judgment”); Regius 1661, 421–422.
- 29.
- 30.
Regius 1646, 252, 1654, 361, 1661, 428: “[Perceptio] triplex est; sensus cogitativus, reminiscentia, & imaginatio” (“Perception is threefold: cogitative sense, reminiscence, and imagination”). Regius 1646, 285: “Imaginatio est perceptio, qua è vestigiorum cerebri varia mutatione, vel spirituum animalium certa dispositione & motu, novae imagines gignuntur, animaeque offeruntur” (“Imagination is a perception by which, from the modification of the traces of the brain or from a certain disposition and motion of the animal spirits, new images arise and are brought before the soul”). Regius 1654, 399–400: “Imaginatio est perceptio, quâ novae imagines & ideae, è vestigiorum cerebri variâ mutatione, vel spirituum animalium certâ dispositione & motu, vel aliâ novâ imaginum & idearum antea perceptarum oblatione, genitae vel productae, menti offeruntur” (“Imagination is a perception by which new images and ideas, from the modification of the traces of the brain or from a certain disposition and motion of the animal spirits, or from another new presentation of images and ideas which had previously been perceived, arise, are produced and brought before the mind”); Regius 1661, 471–472.
- 31.
Regius 1646, 285: “Mutatio illa vestigiorum cerebri sit, dum vestigia ista vel composita, vel separata, vel detorta menti objiciuntur” (“This modification of the traces of the brain occurs while those traces are presented to the mind either united or separated or distorted”); Regius 1654, 400, 1661, 472: “Mutatio illa vestigiorum cerebri sit, dum vestigia ista vel composita, vel ampliata, vel imminuta, vel separata, vel detorta, vel inter se comparata aut collata, menti objiciuntur” (“This modification of the traces of the brain occurs while those traces are presented to the mind, either united or enlarged or diminished or separated or distorted or compared or opposed to one another”).
- 32.
Regius 1661, 426: “Nulla enim alia alicujus rei idea unquam in mente nostra datur, quam quae est imago, simulacrum, vel similitudinis quaedam nota, in mente hominis existens…” (“For there is never any other idea of any thing in our mind than an image, a likeness or a certain sign of resemblance that exists in the mind of man”).
- 33.
See Regius 1654, 400, 1661, 472–473. Only in the 1661 edition does Regius evoke in this passage “innatam quandam peculiarem mentis facultatem passivam” (“a certain particular passive innate faculty of the mind”). The 1661 edition adds the following paragraph: “Haec autem innata peculiaris mentis facultas passiva menti, ut facultas intelligendi, volendi, spirituumque motum in hanc vel illam partem determinandi, per ejus essentiam inest: ita ut de unius origine & natura non magis, quam de cujusvis alterius facultatis mentis, ipsi per se competentis, ortu & essentia hic sit quaerendum” (“Now, this particular passive innate faculty of the mind belongs to the mind by its own essence, as does the faculty of understanding, willing, and determining the motion of the spirits towards this or that part: so that one does not have to search more for the origin and nature of the former than for the source and essence of the latter faculty of the mind, which is by itself proper to the mind”).
- 34.
- 35.
On the apparent variations in Regius’ statements of a thoroughgoing empiricism, see Bos 2013. Bos convincingly shows how in his 1641 Physiologia, Regius reintroduced, under Descartes’ pressure, the category of inorganic perception through which the soul can perceive incorporeal things, like God, without being aided by the body. In his Explicatio mentis humanae, this category of inorganic perception is absent. See Descartes, Notae in programma quoddam (AT VIIIb 363–364, CSM I 307), where Descartes identifies Regius’ theory of knowledge as a wholehearted empiricism which does not open up the possibility for the soul to conceive by itself immaterial objects. Even if Regius acknowledges that the soul is a substance in itself, and thus is distinct from the body, as Revelation teaches us, it does not mean that this ontology has any impact on Regius’ psychology and theory of knowledge. On the contrary, in his Philosophia naturalis where he replies to Descartes’ criticisms as formulated in the Notae in programma quoddam, Regius claims that, as long as the soul is united to the body during this life, it cannot perform any operation without being assisted therein by the body (see Regius 1654, 342–343, 356–357). On Descartes’ letter to Regius [first half of May 1641], see also Bos 2002, 71n5.
- 36.
Regius 1646, 287, 1654, 403, 1661, 476: “An autem satis clarè & distinctè rem perceperimus & examinaverimus, mens secundùm apparentiam tantùm dijudicat” (“The mind judges only according to the appearance whether we have perceived and examined the thing clearly and distinctly enough”). See Descartes to Mersenne, November 23, 1646; CSMK 301: “You are right in supposing that I do not share Regius’ opinion…that we know nothing except by appearance; for in my writings I have said exactly the opposite” (AT IV 566). On the question of moral certainty, see Chap. 9 by Dobre, Chap. 10 by Nyden, Chap. 11 by Hatfield.
- 37.
On Regius’ skepticism, see Kolesnik-Antoine forthcoming b (thanks to Delphine Kolesnik-Antoine for having shared with me the unpublished manuscript of her article).
- 38.
See Regius 1646, 249. The section is entitled “Quia mens nostra non tantum a veris, sed etiam ab imaginaris potest affici, ideo dependet certitudo et veritas nostrarum cogitationum a revelatione in Verbo Dei facta” (“Because our mind can be affected not only by true things, but also by imaginary ones, the certainty and truth of our thoughts depend on the Revelation made in the Word of God”). The argument and the tendency towards a natural doubt on the existence of material things is developed and reinforced in the Philosophia naturalis: see Regius 1654, 346–351, 1661, 411–416.
- 39.
- 40.
Regius 1654, 351, 1661, 416, summed up as follows in the table of contents (unpaginated): “Cum fides sit testibus adhibenda; idcirco ea magis nostris sensibus, & iis quae inde recte deducta sunt, debetur” (“Since one has to give credit to witnesses, it follows that one has to give credit all the more to our senses and to the things that have thence been rightly deduced from them”).
- 41.
Regius 1654, 351, 1661, 417: “hinc jam facile intelligimus, qualem fidem circumspecta nostra, quantum fieri potest, judicia, à nostris sensibus & diligentibus rerum observationibus ac traditionibus petita, mereantur.…Certè, cum nostrum ipsorum testimonium apud nos ipsos multo pluris sit, quam alienum, cui fidem tamen adhibendam jam probavi…” (“Hence we also easily understand what credit our judgments deserve, as circumspect as they can be, insofar as we have reached them through our senses and through the careful observations of things and traditions.…Certainly, since our own testimony is of much higher value for us than that of someone else, to which nevertheless we have to give credit, as I have already shown…”).
- 42.
- 43.
Regius 1654, 350, 1661, 416: “Cum enim nullum totum, nulla pars, nullus circulus, nullum centrum, nullus triangulus, nulla essentia vel existentia, cogitatione & rerum apparentiâ exceptâ, sit indubitabiliter cognita; cum horum cognitio a sola sensuum verisimilitudine dependeat; nihil etiam quicquam de iis certò & indubitabiliter à quoquam enunciari potest” (“Since indeed we do not know without any doubt any whole, part, circle, center, triangle, essence or existence, except for thought and the appearance of things, and since the knowledge of these things depends only on the verisimilitude of the senses, we cannot assert anything with certainty and indubitability about them”).
- 44.
Dechange 1966, 61.
- 45.
Regius 1646, 1, 1654, 2, 1661, 2: “Sic mens humana est principium internum, corporeum; quia sensationes, imaginationes, & alia plurima, sine corpore peragere non potest” (“Thus the human mind is an internal bodily principle, because it cannot produce sensations, imaginations and several other things without the body”). Regius 1654, 343: “Atque hoc ex eo patet, quod ut de corporeis, ita etiam de divinis & spiritualibus rebus non nisi corporeâ sensatione & imaginatione de humanis & corporeis rebus praecedente, & corporeis memoriae notis cerebro impressis adjuvantibus, spiritibusque animalibus auxiliantibus, quicquam cogitare possumus./Quid autem…spiritus animales hîc juvent, ex eo est manifestum, quod justâ illorum quantitate deficient, nulla de Deo vel aliâ re, sive corporeâ, sive incorporeâ, à mente fiat cogitatio, ut in somno profundo, apoplexiâ, & magnâ lipothymiâ, passim observatur. Ita ut vel solus spirituum animalium defectus, cogitationes in homine penitus tollens, sufficiens organicae mentis constitutionis, sive ipsius organorum ad cogitandum indigentiae, sit argumentum” (“And this appears from the fact that we cannot think anything whatsoever, neither about corporeal things, nor about divine and spiritual things, unless we have beforehand some corporeal sensation and imagination of human and corporeal things, and unless the corporeal memory traces impressed in the brain contribute and the animal spirits be of assistance./Now, the assistance provided by the animal spirits is manifest from the fact that, when they are below the right quantity, the mind has no thought of God or of anything else, be it corporeal or incorporeal, as it is observed here and there in deep sleep, in apoplexy and in great faintness. So that the mere absence of animal spirits, which removes entirely thoughts in man, is a sufficient proof of the organic constitution of the mind or of the fact that it needs those organs in order to think”); Regius 1661, 407.
- 46.
Regius 1641, 233: “Sensus nostri falluntur cum organum est vitiatum, aut medium ineptum; aut objectum nimis vehementer vel leniter agit; aut justo intervallo non est dissitum; aut simile aliquod requisitum sentiendi deest. Si nulla harum conditionum deficit, nulla fit sensuum fallacia.” All the references to this work are to Bos’ edition.
- 47.
- 48.
Regius 1641, 224: “sensus externus, quo ex motu fibrillarum nervi optici in cerebrum delato, anima Lumen, colorem, situm, distantiam, magnitudinem et figuram rerum objectarum percipit.”
- 49.
Regius 1641, 226.
- 50.
Regius 1641, 204: “Atque ita omnes aliae qualitates sensibiles ex solo motu, figura, magnitudine et situ particularum insensibilium clarissime possent explicari…” (“And thus all the other sensible qualities could be very clearly explained from only the motion, shape, magnitude and situation of insensible particles…”).
- 51.
It is nevertheless possible to show that the notion of resemblance still plays an operative role in Descartes’ theory of vision, but in a new way. On that, see Descartes 1997, 335–336; Fichant 1998; Bellis 2010, 347–367. It is very significant that Regius does not even try to take up this refined aspect of Descartes’ theory of vision to give support to his empiricism. His solution is more radical, but maybe also more fragile from an epistemological point of view.
- 52.
- 53.
Regius 1654, 354; Regius 1661, 420: “Vti nec obest, quod saepe alias de rerum figuris ideas mente nostrâ concipiamus, quam sunt earum imagines, quae in fundo oculorum nostrorum pinguntur. Hoc enim non ex ideis innatis, sed menti, per perceptiones antea aliter factas, impressis, ut posteà magis patebit, contingit.”
- 54.
- 55.
- 56.
Regius 1661, 426–427: “Nulla enim alia alicujus rei idea unquam in mente nostra datur, quam quae est imago, simulacrum, vel similitudinis quaedam nota, in mente hominis existens, & rem aliquam menti utcunque repraesentare apta. Haec idea cum etiam citra intellectus operationem in mente existat, hinc patet illam pro ipsa intellectus operatione non esse ponendam. Cumque illa idea nihil aliud sit quam imago rem menti repraesentans, vel utcunque repraesentare potens, hinc illam pro re, per operationem intellectus ope istius ideae repraesentata, vel repraesentanda, nequaquam esse sumendam, etiam est manifestum” (“In fact, there is never any other idea of a particular thing in our mind than that which is an image, a likeness or a certain sign of resemblance, which exists in the mind of man and is fit for representing a certain thing to the mind in a certain way. Since this idea also exists in the mind without the operation of the intellect, it appears that this idea should not be regarded as the very operation of the intellect. And since that idea is nothing else than an image representing the thing to the mind, or which can represent it in a certain way, it is also manifest that that idea should by no means be taken for the thing which has been represented, or should be represented, through the operation of the intellect with the help of this idea”). This is an addition of the 1661 edition.
- 57.
In the 1661 edition, Regius nevertheless claims that there is a confused (confusa) resemblance between the motions causing our sensations and the sensible ideas: see Regius 1661, 430. The 1654 edition was already a bit ambiguous, stating that the traces imprinted on the brain by the motions of the animal spirits often (saepe) have no resemblance or only a weak (exiguam) resemblance with the external objects perceived: see Regius 1654, 399, 1661, 471. But this confused, weak and rare, albeit objective, resemblance (of the motions in the brain with the external objects or with our sensible ideas of them) can in no way provide a solid epistemological foundation for the reliability and for a realist interpretation of sensation.
- 58.
Regius insists on the fact that the absence of a perfect resemblance between our sensible ideas and the motions in the brain that cause them does not imply the need for innate ideas in order to explain sensation: see Regius 1661, 430. This is certainly a reply to Descartes: see Notae in programma quoddam, AT VIIIb 358–359, CSM I 304.
- 59.
- 60.
AT VI 137–138, CSM I 170: “In the second place, we know distance by the relations of the eye to one another. Our blind man holding the two sticks AE and CE (whose length I assume he does not know) and knowing only the distance between his two hands A and C and the size of the angles ACE and CAE, can tell from this knowledge, as if by a natural geometry, where the point E is. And similarly, when our two eyes A and B are turned towards point X, the length of the line AB and the size of the two angles XAB and XBA enable us to know where the point X is.…And this is done by a mental act which, though only a very simple act of the imagination, involves a kind of reasoning quite similar to that used by surveyors when they measure inaccessible places by means of two different vantage points.”
- 61.
See AT VII 381–382.
- 62.
- 63.
This also applies to mathematical ideas such as that of the triangle: we know that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles because such a triangle exists in nature. See Regius 1654, 358, 1661, 424. This paragraph echoes the discussion of the Fifth Objections and Replies (AT VII 381–382). Here Regius clearly sides with Gassendi.
- 64.
Regius 1646, 254: “Porrò varii isti motus, organis recepti, & menti in sensorio communi oblati, diversas tales sensationum cogitationes nullam aliam ob causam excitant, quàm quia à natura ita comparati sumus” (“Moreover these various motions, which have been received by the organs and brought before the mind in the common sense, excite such diverse thoughts of sensations for no other cause than because we have been thus disposed by nature”). In the Philosophia naturalis, we have the following addition: “that the mind is consciously so variously affected by those various motions” (Regius 1654, 362: “ut mens ab illis variis motibus ita varie cum conscientiâ afficiatur”; Regius 1661, 429).
- 65.
Regius 1661, 426–427: “Haec idea cum etiam citra intellectus operationem in mente existat, hinc patet illam pro ipsa intellectus operatione non esse ponendam” (“Since this idea also exists in the mind without the operation of the intellect, it appears that this idea should not be posited as the very operation of the intellect”).
- 66.
Regius 1661, 430: “Nulla itaque est causa, ut ullas qualitatum sensibilium ideas, ad sentiendum necessarias, menti innatas esse dicamus; praesertim cum nullae tales imagines in mente deprehendantur, nisi illae foris ab objectis adveniant; & ipsa objectorum afficiendi vis, mentisque ab illis patiendi facultas, ad illarum excitationem, & perceptionem, sufficiant” (“Therefore there is no cause to say that any of the ideas of the sensible qualities, necessary with respect to sense, are innate to the mind; especially since we do not discover any such images in the mind, unless they are brought forth by external objects; and the force that the objects have to affect the mind, and the faculty of the mind to be affected by them, are sufficient to produce the excitation and perception of those ideas of the sensible qualities”). This is an addition of the 1661 edition.
- 67.
Regius 1646, 285: “Universalia dico esse singularia.…Universalia itaque nihil aliud sunt, quàm tam singularia, quorum similia in multis aliis inveniuntur, vel saltem inveniri possunt” (“I say that universals are particulars.…This is why universals are nothing else than particulars, of which similar things are found, or at least can be found, in many other things”); Regius 1654, 401, 1661, 473: “Vniversalia dico esse singularia: alioqui enim de singularibus affirmari non possent, quod tamen rectè de iis fit…” (“I say that universals are particulars: for otherwise we could not attribute them to particulars, which we nevertheless rightly do…”).
- 68.
See Dioptrique, AT VI 137, CSM I 170.
- 69.
- 70.
- 71.
- 72.
- 73.
Letter from Descartes to Regius. July 1645, AT IV 239: “Cumque meminerim me multa legisse in tuo compendio Physico, à vulgari opinione planè aliena, quae nudè ibi proponuntur, nullis additis rationibus, quibus lectori probabiles reddi possint…” (“And since I remembered having read a lot of things in your compendium of physics which are completely contrary to the common opinion and which are proposed there alone and without any additional reasons by means of which they could be rendered probable to the reader…”). AT IV 248–249, CSMK 254: “I admit that [my opinions] can be correctly presented through definitions and divisions, proceeding from the general to the particular, but I deny that proofs ought in that case to be omitted.”
- 74.
Letter from Descartes to Regius. July 1645, AT IV 257: “ibi nihil de tuo addis, praeter ordinem & breuitatem, quae duo, ni fallor, ab omnibus benè sentientibus culpabuntur; neminem enim adhuc vidi, qui meum ordinem improbaret, quique non potiùs me nimiae breuitatis quam prolixitatis accusaret.”
- 75.
CSM I 189 (my emphasis): “Last year he published a book entitled The Foundations of Physics in which, as far as physics and medicine are concerned, it appears that everything he wrote was taken from my writings—both from those I have published and also from a still imperfect work on the nature of animals which fell into his hands. But because he copied down the material inaccurately and changed the order and denied certain truths of metaphysics on which the whole of physics must be based, I am obliged to disavow his work entirely” (AT IXb 19).
- 76.
CSMK 314: “It contains nothing on physics except for my assertions in a jumbled order and without their true proofs. As a consequence they appear paradoxical, and what comes at the beginning can be proved only by what comes towards the end” (AT IV 625).
- 77.
AT V 170: “Regium autem quod attinet, ejusdem demonstratio nulla est; et quod mirum, in Physicis ille semper auctoris opiniones, etiam ubi eas nesciebat, sequi et conjicere studuit; in Metaphysicis autem auctori quantum potuit et ejus opiniones novit, contradixit.”
- 78.
See Regius 1646, 76.
- 79.
As the title of his 1646 Fundamenta physices indicates, Regius intends to provide the foundations or principles of nature, as Aristotle had done in the first three books of his Physics and as they are to be found in Scholastic textbooks of natural philosophy. These principles traditionally include the notion of nature itself, matter and form, the four causes, and natural change (including motion). In the Fundamenta physices, the chapter on the principles of nature which apply to all natural beings (Chap. I) is followed by an explanation of the various natural things according to the following traditional order: simple bodies which are either incorruptible (i.e., heavenly bodies: Chap. II) or corruptible (elements: Chaps. III–V), composite bodies, either inanimate (i.e., meteors and fossils: Chaps. VI–VII) or animate (plants, animals, beasts, and man: Chaps. VIII–XII). On late Aristotelian textbooks in natural philosophy, see Des Chene 1996 (in particular 9–10).
- 80.
See Descartes’ letter to Regius from July 1645 in which Descartes insists on the need for “probationes” (AT IV 245).
- 81.
On this text, its structure, and its relation with the first part of the Principia philosophiae, see de Buzon and Carraud 1994.
- 82.
See Principia philosophiae II 4. AT VIIIa 42, CSM I, 224 where Descartes distinguishes “the nature of matter, or body considered in general” (namely the extension in length, breadth and depth) from that “which affects the senses in any way.”
- 83.
This was already noticed by Theo Verbeek: see Verbeek 2000, 154.
- 84.
Regius 1646, 2: “Hujus essentia in solâ in longum, latum, & profondum extensione, quae ratione tantùm à corpore differt; non autem in duritie, mollitie, colore, sapore, odore, vel aliis similibus qualitatibus consistit. Hae enim omnes à corpore, salvâ ejus essentiâ, facilè tolluntur, ut quotidiana docet experientia. Nam res dura emolliri; mollis indirari; colorata colorem perdere; sapida sapore privari; & odorata omni odore destitui potest: atque ita de caeteris.” The 1654 and 1661 editions add continuity and contiguity to the qualities which do not constitute the essence of body because they can be removed from it: see Regius 1654, 3, 1661, 3.
- 85.
Regius 1646, 246: “quod docet experientia in apoplexia, epilepsia et similibus aliis capitis gravibus affectibus, in quibus rerum phantasmata et imagines, seu debiti motus, menti, ob sensorii communis laesionem, a corpore offerri non possunt” (“That is what experience teaches in apoplexy, epilepsy, and similar other severe affections of the head, in which the phantasms and images of things or the appropriate motions cannot be presented to the mind by the body because of an injury of the common sense”).
- 86.
Regius 1646, 2: “Si verò extensio ab illo tolleretur, mox corpus cessaret esse corpus; quia non esset ampliùs substantia extensa.”
- 87.
Regius 1646, 95 (my emphasis): “praeter haec [situs, figura, quantitas, motus, quies partium insensibilium] enim clarissimè intelligibilia, nil ad res constituendas in rerum naturâ dari vel observari potest; eaque ad earum constitutionem omnino sufficiunt; cùm per ea natura & effecta earum rectè explicentur.”
- 88.
Gariepy claims that, “Regius, like other materialists, offered no experimental observations to warrant the existence of his insensible particles” (Gariepy 1990, 125). But Regius does rely on experience to infer by analogy that insensible parts have the same properties as sensible parts.
- 89.
Regius 1646, 2: “Haec duplex est: Materia rerum naturalium, earumque Forma.”
- 90.
See Regius 1646, 29.
- 91.
Regius 1646, 4: “Forma generalis, (quae vulgò materialis nuncupatur, & omnibus rebus naturalibus competit,) est comprehensio motus vel quietis, item sitûs, figurae & magnitudinis partium, rebus naturalibus constituendis conveniens” (“The general form (which is commonly called material and which is applicable to all natural things) includes motion or rest, situation, the shape and magnitude of the parts, all things that are appropriate to the constitution of natural things”). See Regius 1654, 8, 1661, 10.
- 92.
See Descartes, Principia philosophiae I 56, 61; II 23. In these texts, Descartes conceives of motion not as a property of bodies which is apparent in experience, but as a modal dependence of extension and as a way through which matter can receive various “affections” or “forms.”
- 93.
Regius 1646, 5: “Cùm autem haec accidentia dicimus esse efficacia & sufficientia naturae principia, non de singulis, sed conjunctis; neque de quibuslibet, sed justis & convenientibus loquimur: ut apparet in vecte, trochleâ, & aliis machinis, in quibus nec quaevis figura, nec situs omnis, nec quaelibet magnitudo, per se sunt efficaces; sed si ea sint justa, & sufficiens motus iis addatur, & illa omnia vel pleraque simul sumantur. Qui itaque his accidentibus omnem energian [sic] denegant, manifestissimae experientiae adversantur” (“Now, when we say that these accidents are effective and sufficient principles of nature, we do not speak about them taken separately but conjointly, nor do we speak about them indiscriminately, but only about the right and appropriate ones; as it appears with the lever, the pulley, and other machines, in which neither just any shape, nor just any situation or any magnitude are effective by themselves, but only if they are in the right measure and if enough motion is imparted to them, and if all those things, or a certain number of them, are taken simultaneously. That is why those who deny all efficacy to these accidents are against the most manifest experience”). See Regius 1654, 9, 1661, 10–11. Regius 1646, 11, 1654, 25, 1661, 28: “ut videmus fieri in vecte, plano inclinato, trochleâ, & aliis machinis” (“as we see it happen with the lever, the inclined plane, the pulley and other machines”). On the relation between natural and artificial bodies, see also Regius 1646, 45–47, 1654, 68–70, 1661, 76–78.
- 94.
This question is linked to but remains distinct from that of the individuation of bodies by motion, since it is dealt with by Regius only at the macroscopic level of the properties of bodies. On the problem of individuation of bodies which arises in Cartesian physics, see Dobre 2010.
- 95.
See Verbeek 2000, 157.
- 96.
Regius 1641, 199: “Sanitas est dipositio partium humani corporis actionibus recte perficiendis apta.…4. Pars humani corporis est quaelibet corporea substantia illud complens, actionibusque perficiendis comparata. 5. Estque vel insensibilis vel sensibilis” (“Health is the disposition of the parts of the human body such that it is able to perform its actions in the right way.…4. A part of the human body is a certain corporeal substance that completes that body and is disposed so as to perform its actions. 5. And it is either insensible or sensible”).
- 97.
Regius 1646, 3–4 (my emphasis): “Insensibiles sunt, quae, propter exiguitatem aut parvitatem sensus fugientes, solo intellectu in omnibus rebus naturalibus observantur. tales sunt ramosae, ex. gr. particulae, oleum; oblongae & flexiles, aquam constituentes, de quibus postea acturi sumus./Hae ex subtilitate, crassitie, acrimoniâ, lenitate, fluiditate, oleaginositate, aquositate, salsedine, aliisque innumeris corporum qualitatibus, postea explicandis, manifestè colliguntur. Nam his positis, clara & distincta illarum est explicatio; quae iis negatis est obscura, vel confusa” (“The insensible [parts] are those that, escaping the senses because of their smallness or minuteness, are observed only by the intellect in all natural things. Such are, for example, the branch-like particles which constitute oil and the oblong and flexible particles which constitute water, which we will address in what follows./These [parts] are manifestly gathered from the subtlety, thickness, sharpness, smoothness, fluidity, oily or watery quality, saltiness and other innumerable qualities of bodies, which are to be explained in what follows. For once we have assumed these parts, we can give a clear and distinct explanation of those qualities, whereas the explanation is obscure or confused if we deny them”).
- 98.
Regius displays a certain realism in his corpuscular theory which can recall Bacon’s preoccupation to consider the real particles actually present in bodies and not fictitious particles. The parallel is established by Paolo Farina: see Farina 1977, 140.
- 99.
Regius nevertheless refers to matter as immutable in itself because it was created by God. Regius 1646, 7: “Ut materia universi, à Deo creata, in eo statu, in quo est, ex lege immutatibilitatis naturae, perpetuò manet; ita motus, in creatione variis materiae universae partibus certâ quantitate inditus, perseverat, ex eadem lege, in eodem quantitatis gradu” (“As the matter of the universe that was created by God remains perpetually in the state in which it is, according to the law of the immutability of nature, so the motion that was introduced in a certain quantity in the various parts of the matter of the universe at the time of Creation persists, according to the same law, in the same degree of quantity”). Regius then applies this general principle to the particular case of motion. Regius 1646, 7–8: “Et ut nullum corpus, nisi per accessum vel decessum materiae antea existentis, augetur vel imminuitur; ita nullum mobile, nisi per accessum vel decessum motûs antea existentis, magis vel minùs moveri incipit vel desinit” (“And just as no body increases or diminishes, except through the addition or substraction of a pre-existing matter, no movable body begins or ceases to move, more or less, except through the addition or substraction of a pre-existing motion”).
- 100.
Regius 1646, 8 (my emphasis): “Et mobile semel motum, perpetuò moveri, donec motum suum alii corpori communicaverit. Atque hoc in globulis se mutuò prodrudentibus satis clarè apparet: dum enim unus in alterum impellitur, si ipsum propellat, iste sistitur, vel tardiùs movetur; sin ipsum intactum praetereat, pergit celeriter moveri.”
- 101.
See Regius 1646, 8.
- 102.
AT IXb 20, CSM I 189.
- 103.
AT IXb 20, CSM I 190.
- 104.
On these missing fifth and sixth parts of the Principles, see Gaukroger 2002, 180–246.
- 105.
Discours de la méthode VI, AT VI 64–65, CSM I 144.
- 106.
Letter to Morin [July 13, 1638], AT II 198, CSMK 106 (my emphasis).
- 107.
De Vrijer 1917, 168.
- 108.
Regius 1654, 441, 1661, 522 (my emphasis): “Cum enim problema aliquod in Physicis proponitur solvendum, primo excogitanda est causa intelligibilis, qua effectum, in problemate proposito observatum, commode & intelligibiliter peragi possit. Deinde circumspiciendum, an non alia commodior vel aeque commoda queat inveniri. Quae si inveniatur, commodior priori est praeferenda; aequalis vero ipsi aequiparanda. Sin alia commodior vel aeque commoda excogitari nequeat, solutioni inventae tamdiu acquiescendum, donec melior vel aequalis alia fuerit inventa” (“Indeed when one proposes to solve a problem in physics, one first has to find an intelligible cause by which the effect observed in the proposed problem could be suitably and intelligibly produced. Then one has to look around to see whether it is not possible to find another more suitable or equally suitable cause. If such a cause is to be found, the more suitable has to be given preference over the first one; but an equally suitable [cause] has to be given equal standing with this first cause. If, on the contrary, it is not possible to find another more suitable or equally suitable cause, one has to be satisfied with the discovered solution until another better or equal one is discovered”). This is not to be found in the Fundamenta physices.
- 109.
Regius 1646, 251 summed up as follows in the table of contents: “Notiones nobis insculptae, ex rerum observationibus sunt ortae” (“The notions which are inscribed in us originate from the observations of things”).
- 110.
Regius 1646, 287, 1654, 403, 1661, 476: “An autem satis clare & distincte rem perceperimus & examinaverimus, mens secundum apparentiam tantum dijudicat. Illique tamdiu acquiescendum, donec contrarium vel aliud, per experientiam, vel alia ratione, fuerit probatum” (“The mind judges only according to the appearance whether we have perceived and examined the thing clearly and distinctly enough. And we have to be satisfied with that [judgment] until the contrary or something else is proven, either through experience or by another reason”).
- 111.
See Regius 1641, 199: “Pars sensibilis est, quae ex multis insensibilibus composita sub sensum cadit” (“A sensible part is one composed of numerous insensible [parts] and which falls under the sense”).
- 112.
This is not to say that Descartes does not also have a place for imagination in his theory of knowledge and in his physics. See Lüthy 2006; Zittel 2009; Bellis 2010, 588–668. But I want to suggest that Regius’ empiricism forces him to make explicit the relation between imagination and sensation in a way that was not so prominent in Descartes. In Regius, there is a specific insistence on the continuity between both faculties of the mind.
- 113.
Regius 1654, 4, 1661, 4: “Et quamvis in tenuissimis & subtilissimis corporibus, intervalla partium, corporaque subtilissima intercurrentia & egredientia sensibus non percipiantur, illa tamen, mentis imaginantis & judicantis aciem minimè effugiunt” (“And although, in very thin and subtle bodies, one does not perceive by the senses the space between the parts and the very subtle bodies that travel through them and go out of them, they do not escape at all the keenness of mind which imagines and judges”). The Fundamenta physices do not mention imagination but only, in a more general way, “the keenness of mind” (Regius 1646, 3: “mentis aciem”).
- 114.
Regius 1654, 6, 1661, 6: “Insensibiles partes sunt, quae, propter exiguitatem aut parvitatem, sensus fugenties, solo imaginationis & judicii intellectu in omnibus rebus naturalibus observantur” (“The insensible parts are those that, escaping the senses because of their smallness or minuteness, are observed in all natural things only by the perception of imagination and judgment”). Here again, the Fundamenta physices are less precise and only mention “solo intellectu” (Regius 1646, 3). But this intellect already enables one to “observe” the insensible parts; it is a proto-imagination. From 1654 onwards, Regius replaces the soul or the intellect by imagination and judgment. Thus, he makes his theory of mental faculties coherent with his epistemology which had already deprived the intellect of its constituent role in knowledge (because of his rejection of innate ideas).
- 115.
Regius 1646, 30, 1654, 46, 1661, 51: “calor accidentarius aquae (qui est varia & vehemens ejus particularum agitatio, ut in aquâ fervidâ ad oculum apparet, & in tepidâ facillimè imaginatione intelligitur) motum suum, seu calorem vehementiorem, vicino aëri aliisque propinquis corporibus communicet…” (“Heat being accidental to water (which is a varied and violent agitation of its particles, as it appears to the eye in boiling water and as it is understood very easily by the imagination in tepid water) communicates its motion, or the more violent heat, to the neighboring air and to the other proximate bodies…”).
- 116.
Regius 1646, 249: “hinc sequitur per naturam dubium esse, vera an falsa, seu imaginaria, mente percipiamus & dijudicemus” (“From this it follows that, by nature, it is doubtful whether we perceive true, false or imaginary things and distinguish between them with the mind”); Regius 1654, 347: “Hinc videtur manifestum, quod mens nostra aequè evidenter ab imaginariis, atque à veris, in perceptione affici possit; quodque ideo, non moralem sive probabilem verisimilemque, sed exquisitam, accuratam, & indubitabilem veritatis cognitionem quaerenti, per naturam mentis jam propositam, dubium & incertum sit, an ulla vera corpora, an verò imaginaria tantum phantasmata à nobis percipiantur…” (“From this it seems manifest that our mind can be affected with equal evidence by the perception of both imaginary and true things; and that for that reason, for the one who seeks well-scrutinized, accurate and indubitable knowledge of truth, and not moral, probable or likely knowledge, it is doubtful and uncertain, from the nature of the mind that we have already proposed, whether we perceive any true bodies or only imaginary phantasms…”); Regius 1661, 412. On the contrary, after a first skeptical step, Descartes will strive to establish a demarcation, albeit not a clear-cut one, between the two: see Meditationes, AT VII 75, CSM II 52.
- 117.
- 118.
- 119.
Nouvelles de la République des Lettres, October 1686, quoted in Mouy 1934, 95 (“Il y a beaucoup d’expériences [dans ce livre] qui n’ont pas été touchées par M. Rohault, ou éclaircies par des figures comme elles le sont ici”).
- 120.
- 121.
- 122.
- 123.
These arguments were commonly discussed, for example by Giordano Bruno, Tycho Brahe or Clavius.
- 124.
Regius does not seem to have performed the experiments himself and tackles the problem from a theoretical point of view, as Galileo had done, when he presented these arguments against and in favor of the movement of the Earth in the Second Day of his Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo tolemaico e copernicano (Galileo 1897, 255, 283–284, 288). Gassendi was the first to perform the experiment in 1641 in Provence. He reported it in De motu impresso a motore translato epistolae duae (Gassendi 1642). While he could have relied on this experimental support, Regius does not mention this text.
- 125.
- 126.
- 127.
- 128.
Regius 1661, 513–514.
- 129.
See Paganini 2008 (in particular Chap. IV, 171–227).
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Acknowledgments
Research for this article was made possible by a Rubicon grant (446-10-031) funded by NWO (the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research) and the Marie Curie Cofund Action. I would like to thank Raphaël Chappé, Mihnea Dobre, Delphine Kolesnik-Antoine, and Tammy Nyden for their useful suggestions on earlier versions of this article. I would also like to thank Gideon Manning and Lucian Petrescu for their help with the translation into English of the Latin quotations, and Charles Wolfe for his help with the translation into English of the French quotations, as well as for his emendations to my English text. All translations are the author’s except where otherwise noted.
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Bellis, D. (2013). Empiricism Without Metaphysics: Regius’ Cartesian Natural Philosophy. In: Dobre, M., Nyden, T. (eds) Cartesian Empiricisms. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol 31. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7690-6_7
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