Principia philosophiae cartesianae

Principia philosophiae cartesianae

First edition title page, Published in 1663.
Author	Benedictus de Spinoza

Principia philosophiae cartesianae or Renati Descartes Principia Philosophiae, More Geometrico Demonstrata is a philosophical work of Baruch Spinoza published in Amsterdam in 1663. In the preface to this work, Ludovic Meyer explains that it is a reconstruction of René Descartes' Principles of Philosophy in the Euclidean or "geometric" fashion. In the appendix, a series of non-geometric prose passages entitled Metaphysical Thoughts [Cogitata Metaphisica], Spinoza explicates Descartes' views on traditional metaphysical topics (including essence, existence, idea, potential, necessity, contingency, duration, and time) while furtively interpolating some of his own.