Descartes: A Biography

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Death in Sweden 

remain in Sweden beyond the following summer. Thus, within a week

of his arrival, Descartes was already planning for his departure as soon

as possible. Elizabeth reinforced his conviction by agreeing that even the

queen could not keep him in Sweden, and by discussing the possibility of

his departure ‘this winter’.

Queen Christina, however, had different plans. She thought up various

inducements to change his mind, such as naturalizing him as a Swedish

subject or inducting him into the Swedish nobility. This seems to have

had the opposite effect to what was intended and to have made him even

more anxious to depart, to France, to the Palatinate, or to the United

Provinces, and to consider an earlier departure date, such as January–

exploiting the excuse that this was a suitable time for sea voyages from

Sweden.Christina must have noticed the reluctance that even Descartes

could no longer camouflage by his customary diplomatic language. She

therefore excused him from all court duties, apart from giving her phi-

losophy lessons, and she recommended that he take four to six weeks to

become acquainted with his new country of residence. That meant that,

beginning about the middle of October, Descartes was left to reside with

Madame Chanut and her family, with no significant role at the royal court,

and with little opportunity to pursue the incomplete projects that he had

brought with him from Holland. The loneliness and bleakness of his situ-

ation must have been too much even for someone who notoriously relished

the solitude of Egmond.

One slight source of relief was that, among the letters from Chanut

that awaited his arrival in Stockholm, there was an indirect invitation

from Pascal to continue the barometric observations that they had been

making in parallel. If Chanut and Descartes were to co-operate, there

would then be three complementary sets of observations, in Stockholm,

Paris, and the Auvergne.Since Chanut was still in Paris, Descartes had

to assume responsibility for these observations until the end of.He

was also distracted temporarily from boredom when he heard about the

publication ofThe Passions of the Soul,inlateNovember, which Brasset

and his daughter were happy to receive as a gift through the intervention

of Van Zurck.Descartes arranged with his friends in Leiden and Paris to

distribute further copies of the new book on his behalf. The beneficiaries

included the chancellor in Paris, the duke of Luynes, Abbe d’Estr ́ ees ́

(who had arranged the reconciliation with Gassendi), Habert de Montmor,

and others.