Descartes' Dream

One of the most difficult things for traditional Catholics to accept is the reality that modernism did not suddenly take over Catholic institutions after Vatican II but gradually eroded the faith of Catholic intellectuals over a period of more than 250 years. One of the Catholic intellectuals who did the most to subvert the traditional faith and piety of Catholic intellectuals in Europe was Rene’ Descartes (1596-1650) whose uniformitarian naturalism set the stage for the widespread acceptance of Lyellian geology, Darwinian biology, and Big Bang cosmology and the denial of Scriptural inerrancy except in matters of faith or morals. From time to time, we receive criticism from traditional Catholics who believe that we have gone overboard in our characterization of Descartes as an instrument of the demonic forces. In this newsletter we will defend that characterization and offer an illuminating analysis of the “mystical dreams” which Descartes himself identified as the occasion of his having been “possessed” by “the Spirit of Truth.”