Key Arguments

• He acknowledges that it is "difficult to rid one's self so promptly of an opinion to which one has been long accustomed," recognizing the psychological inertia of sense-based beliefs.
• Therefore, even after discovering that "bodies themselves are not properly perceived by the senses nor by the faculty of imagination, but by the intellect alone" and that "there is nothing more easily or clearly apprehended than my own mind," he judges it "desirable to tarry for some time at this stage" to consolidate this new insight.
• The recommendation of "long continued meditation" indicates that this is not merely a theoretical point but requires repeated reflection to overcome entrenched habits of thinking that privilege the senses.

Source Quotes

And there are besides so many other things in the mind itself that contribute to the illustration of its nature, that those dependent on the body, to which I have here referred, scarcely merit to be taken into account. But, in conclusion, I find I have insensibly reverted to the point I desired; for, since it is now manifest to me that bodies themselves are not properly perceived by the senses nor by the faculty of imagination, but by the intellect alone; and since they are not perceived because they are seen and touched, but only because they are understood [or rightly comprehended by thought], I readily discover that there is nothing more easily or clearly apprehended than my own mind. But because it is difficult to rid one's self so promptly of an opinion to which one has been long accustomed, it will be desirable to tarry for some time at this stage, that, by long continued meditation,

But, in conclusion, I find I have insensibly reverted to the point I desired; for, since it is now manifest to me that bodies themselves are not properly perceived by the senses nor by the faculty of imagination, but by the intellect alone; and since they are not perceived because they are seen and touched, but only because they are understood [or rightly comprehended by thought], I readily discover that there is nothing more easily or clearly apprehended than my own mind. But because it is difficult to rid one's self so promptly of an opinion to which one has been long accustomed, it will be desirable to tarry for some time at this stage, that, by long continued meditation,

Key Concepts

• for, since it is now manifest to me that bodies themselves are not properly perceived by the senses nor by the faculty of imagination, but by the intellect alone; and since they are not perceived because they are seen and touched, but only because they are understood [or rightly comprehended by thought], I readily discover that there is nothing more easily or clearly apprehended than my own mind.
• But because it is difficult to rid one's self so promptly of an opinion to which one has been long accustomed, it will be desirable to tarry for some time at this stage, that, by long continued meditation,

Context

Final sentences of the provided section of Meditation II, where Descartes draws together his conclusions about intellect, body, and mind, and prescribes sustained meditation to loosen the grip of sensory prejudice.