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In the Will to Power Nietzche quotes Descartes

omne illud verum est, quod clare et distincte percipitur

However I cannot find the quoted source. Can anyone identify it?

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    I can't find 'percipitur' in the Meditations or the Principles but I haven't checked the Replies to Objections. It looks as if Nietzsche was either misquoting from memory or giving his own gloss, without textual exactitude, on Descartes' tenet.
    – Geoffrey Thomas
    Jun 11, 2018 at 19:15

2 Answers 2

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Descartes' Meditations (1641), III.2 :

illud omne esse verum, quòd valde clare & distincte percipio.

John Veitch English translation of 1901 :

all that is very clearly and distinctly apprehended (conceived) is true.


See also Principia Philosophiae (1644), Pars prima, XXX :

omnia qua clare percepimus, vera esse.

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    Accepted answer. Still Veitch translation from Latin is a bit loose. Percipio means "I perceive": the personal perspective is very important in Descartes reasoning... Jun 12, 2018 at 7:35
  • @GiacomoTesio - Agreed. But also the French transl of 1647 (presumably known to D) sound "impersonal" : "toutes les choses que nous concevons fort clairement et fort distinctement, sont toutes vraies." Jun 12, 2018 at 7:43
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In Descartes's Meditations, I found

illud omne esse verum, quòd valde clare & distincte percipio.

MEDITATIO III; De Deo, quòd existat; par. 2. http://www.wright.edu/~charles.taylor/descartes/meditation3l.html

Another source puts the quote in Meditations III, par. 1. http://www.unicaen.fr/puc/sources/prodescartes/consult/descartes/Oeuvres/Oeuvres_Descartes/meditationes.xml/meditationes_objection_5_3

That is the closest example I could find. Perhaps Descartes wrote a similar quote elsewhere.

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