Anyone who seriously intends to become a philosopher must "once in his life" withdraw into himself and attempt, within himself, to overthrow and build anew all the sciences that, up to then, he has been accepting. Philosophy - wisdom (sagesse) - is the philosopher's quite personal affair. It must arise as his wisdom, his self-acquired knowledge tending toward universality, a knowledge for which he can answer from the beginning, and at each step, by virtue of his own absolute insights… [The Cartesian Meditations] draw the prototype for any beginning philosopher's necessary meditations…¹