The State of the Soul after Death

Abstract

I have tried so far to make known the nature of the human mind, firstly in itself insofar as it it a thing which thinks, and then in relation to the body insofar as it is united with it. I have also tried to explain what this union is and what are all the different thoughts of the mind which originate from it. Although I have discussed all these things rather briefly, I think nevertheless that there are few questions which could be raised in this context which could not be resolved very easily by the principles which I have established, which are so evident and follow so clearly from the first truths which Mr Descartes demonstrated that, even if I could not locate all of them in the books which he left us, there would still be no room to doubt that they are consequences drawn from his principles. That is why nothing more remains to be done except to show what we can discover by the natural light alone, without the assistance of faith (because nothing I have said in this treatise depends on things revealed by faith), about the state of our soul after this life and how we should guide the perceptions of our understanding and the determinations of our will during this life in order to be as happy as possible in this world.