Descartes' Discours de la méthode was published in 1637 and is still today considered being one of the most influential works in history associated with enlightenment thinking. In this essay I will show, by using examples of the text, that Descartes expresses two very different sides of himself in this work. On one hand one can see his immoderate ambition to finding the truth and one the other hand his extreme caution and permanent justification of his thoughts and theories.
The title and the introduction of Discours de la méthode gives the reader a first impression of the tone of voice that Descartes uses throughout the work. The full title: « Discours de la méthode pour bien conduire sa raison et chercher la vérité dans les sciences » already shows that Descartes had immense ambitions to find out things that nobody has ever found out before and revolutionise the way of thinking. In the introduction he describes the way he has structured the discourse. One gets the impression that Descartes is fairly confident that he has successfully found the truth, a great method to conduct one's reason and even the proof of the existence of God. In my opinion one comes very quickly to the conclusion that this is the work of an extremely if not even overly ambitious man.
When looking at the six parts one can see a climax in the structure. Descartes starts very careful by describing the way he developed the method, then goes on to describing the method itself and his discourse comes to a climax in part three where Descartes claims to have found proof of the existence of God with the help of his new method. In part five he then goes on to explaining the movement of the human heart and the difference between the human soul and the soul of animals. By explaining exactly why he p ...