Descartes: A Biography

c CUNYB/Clarke     December, :

Metaphysics in a Hornet’s Nest (–) 

wished to have a surgeon present and therefore asked that De Wilhem

and his child remain until the following day at Gillot’s house, where they

promised to apply their medicinal skills as best they could.Twoweeks

later, Descartes writes on behalf of Van Hogelande that he could send

medication for the infant to The Hague, but that he could better judge

the strength of the dose required if he could examine the young patient

again.

During this period at Leiden, three of Descartes’ relatives died. His

daughter, Francine, died onSeptember, and his father died just

overamonthlater.At about the same time, Descartes’ sister, Jeanne,

died. She was three years older than he and one of his closest companions

during his early years. Descartes evidently knew nothing of his father’s

death, since he wrote ten days after his death to explain the delay in visiting

France and the reasons why he preferred to live in Holland (to avoid the

attention of scholastic philosophers who targeted him as a critic of their

philosophy). It took some time for news of his father’s death to reach

Leiden, in a letter from his brother, Pierre. Pierre also informed Descartes

about their father’s will. This prompted the exiled philosopher to appoint

oneofhis friends to act on his behalf in this matter, and to complain eight

years later of Pierre’s conflict of interest in claiming to act impartially on

behalf of his absent brother.In writing a letter of condolence to Pollot,

onthe death of his brother, in January, Descartes was reminded of his

ownrecent bereavements: ‘I recently experienced the loss of two people

who were very close to me’ (iii.). While this may refer to Francine’s

death, it more likely alludes to the deaths, at about the same time, of

Descartes’ father and of his sister, Jeanne.

One assumes that Descartes’ daily life during this period was relatively

unaffected by the major political events and minor social distractions in

his immediate environment. He acknowledges in the autumn ofthat

Huygens has had a ‘very bad campaign with the army’, and mentions

the severe weather, when winter seems to return in Marchand local

people are forced to get about on sleighs.He has infrequent visitors, one

of whom was certainly Claude Picot (–), who visited in March

and remained in the United Provinces until the following summer.

Picot is an enigmatic character who is usually referred to as the Abbe ́

Picot. The title ‘abb ́e’ simply indicates that he was a Catholic priest,

although the date of Picot’s alleged ordination is unknown. If he was in fact

the libertine who lived in the bohemian company of others, such as Jacques