_Against the Fourth Meditation, Of Truth and Falshood._
* _By Which I understand that Error (as it is Error) is not a Real Being,
Dependent on God, but is only a Defect; and that therefore to make me Err
there is not requisite a Faculty of Erring Given me by God._
’Tis Certain that _Ignorance_ is only a _Defect_, and that there is no
Occasion of any _Positive Faculty_ to make us _Ignorant_. But this
position is not so clear in Relation to _Error_, for Stones and Inanimate
Creatures cannot _Err_, for this Reason only, because they have not the
_Faculties_ of _Reasoning_ or _Imagination_; from whence ’tis Natural
for us to Conclude, That to _Err_ there is requisite a _Faculty_ of
_Judging_, or at least of _Imagining_, both which _Faculties_ are
_Positive_, and given to all _Creatures_ subject to Error, and to Them
only.
Moreover _Des-Cartes_ says thus, _I find_ (my Errors) _to Depend on two
concurring Causes_, viz. _on my Faculty of Knowing, and on my Faculty of
Choosing, or Freedom of my Will_. Which seems Contradictious to what he
said before; And here also we may note, that _Freedom of Will_ is assumed
without any Proof contrary to the Opinion of the Calvinists.