Method
Instead
of the great number of precepts of which logic is composed, I believed
that the four following would prove perfectly sufficient for me,
provided I took the firm and unwavering resolution never in a single
instance to fail in observing them.
The first was never to accept anything for true which I did not
clearly know to be such; that is to say, carefully to avoid
precipitancy and prejudice, and to comprise nothing more in my
judgement than what was presented to my mind so clearly and distinctly
as to exclude all ground of doubt.
The second, to divide each of the difficulties under examination into
as many parts as possible, and as might be necessary for its adequate
solution.
The third, to conduct my thoughts in such order that, by commencing
with objects the simplest and easiest to know, I might ascend by
little and little, and, as it were, step by step, to the knowledge of
the more complex; assigning in thought a certain order even to those
objects which in their own nature do not stand in a relation of
antecedence and sequence.
And the last, in every case to make enumerations so complete, and
reviews so general, that I might be assured that nothing was omitted.
Discourse on the Method, Descartes, 1637
