Key Arguments

• His experience with objections shows that critics rarely raise points he has not already considered, except those far from the subject.
• He judges his critics to be less rigorous or less equitable than himself.
• He has never observed disputations in the schools to bring unknown truths to light, because participants focus on winning and making the best of mere likelihood rather than weighing reasons on both sides.

Source Quotes

For I have already had frequent proof of the judgments, as well of those I esteemed friends, as of some others to whom I thought I was an object of indifference, and even of some whose malignancy and envy would, I knew, determine them to endeavor to discover what partiality concealed from the eyes of my friends. But it has rarely happened that anything has been objected to me which I had myself altogether overlooked, unless it were something far removed from the subject: so that I have never met with a single critic of my opinions who did not appear to me either less rigorous or less equitable than myself. And further, I have never observed that any truth before unknown has been brought to light by the disputations that are practised in the schools; for while each strives for the victory, each is much more occupied in making the best of mere verisimilitude, than in weighing the reasons on both sides of the question; and those who have been long good advocates are not afterwards on that account the better judges.

But it has rarely happened that anything has been objected to me which I had myself altogether overlooked, unless it were something far removed from the subject: so that I have never met with a single critic of my opinions who did not appear to me either less rigorous or less equitable than myself. And further, I have never observed that any truth before unknown has been brought to light by the disputations that are practised in the schools; for while each strives for the victory, each is much more occupied in making the best of mere verisimilitude, than in weighing the reasons on both sides of the question; and those who have been long good advocates are not afterwards on that account the better judges. As for the advantage that others would derive from the communication of my thoughts, it could not be very great; because I have not yet so far prosecuted them as that much does not remain to be added before they can be applied to practice.

Key Concepts

• it has rarely happened that anything has been objected to me which I had myself altogether overlooked
• I have never met with a single critic of my opinions who did not appear to me either less rigorous or less equitable than myself.
• I have never observed that any truth before unknown has been brought to light by the disputations that are practised in the schools; for while each strives for the victory, each is much more occupied in making the best of mere verisimilitude, than in weighing the reasons on both sides of the question

Context

Part 6, lines 1030–1157: Descartes assesses the limited epistemic value of objections and scholastic disputation as a reason not to expect benefit from publishing his principles.