ns is founded solely
upon this, that they are clearly conceived in accordance with the rules
I have already laid down. In the next place, I perceived that there was
nothing at all in these demonstrations which could assure me of the
existence of their object: thus, for example, supposing a triangle to be
given, I distinctly perceived that its three angles were necessarily
equal to two right angles, but I did not on that account perceive
anything which could assure me that any triangle existed; while on the
contrary, recurring to the examination of the idea of a Perfect Being, I
found that the existence of the Being was comprised in the idea in the
same way that the equality of its three angles to two right angles is
comprised in the idea of a triangle, or as in the idea of a sphere, the
equidistance of all points on its surface from the centre, or even still
more clearly; and that consequently it is at least as certain that God,
who is this Perfect Being, is, or exists, as any demonstration of
geometry can be.

THE IDEA OF GOD

From the 'Meditations'

There only remains, therefore, the idea of God, in which I must consider
whether there is anything that cannot be supposed to originate with
myself. By the name God I understand a substance infinite, eternal,
immutable, independent, all-knowing, all-powerful, and by which I
myself, and every other thing that exists,--if any such there be,--were
created. But these properties are so great and excellent, that the more
attentively I consider them, the less I feel persuaded that the idea I
have of them owes its origin to myself alone. And thus it is absolutely
necessary to conclude, from all that I have before said, that God
exists; for though the idea of substance be in my mind owing to
this,--that I myself am a substance,--I should not however have the idea
of an infinite substance, seeing I am a finite being, unless it were
given me by some substance in reality infinite.

And I must not imagine that I do not apprehend the infinite by a true
idea, but only by the negation of the finite, in the same way that I
comprehend repose and darkness by the negation of motion and light:
since, on the contrary, I clearly perceive that there is more reality in
the infinite substance than in the finite, and therefore that in some
way I possess the perception (notion) of the infinite before that of the
finite, that is, the perception of God before that of myself; for how
could