Descartes’s Theodicy <i>avant la lettre</i>

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>Descartes holds, clearly for the first time, that judgment is a function not of the intellect, but of the will. This view makes all error, cognitive no less than moral, a matter of our responsibility. Even so, he holds the Platonic view that to know the true is to accept the true as such, and to know the good is to do the good. The knowledge in both cases is, or involves, clear and distinct perception. When it is not so might be a special case for the will’s role—but not by having it assent to what is perceived to be false, or by pursuing what is perceived to be evil.</jats:p>