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The French King Who Believed He Was Made of Glass
- schoen 9y agoHuh, this is discussed at the beginning of Descartes's Meditations on First Philosophy but I didn't realize it was such a widespread phenomenon in the time leading up to it. ... nisi me forte comparem nescio quibus insanis, quorum cerebella tam contumax vapor ex atra bile labefactat, ut constanter asseverent vel se esse reges, cum sunt pauperrimi, vel purpura indutos, cum sunt nudi, vel caput habere fictile, vel se totos esse cucurbitas, vel ex vitro conflatos; sed amentes sunt isti, nec minus ipse demens viderer, si quod ab iis exemplum ad me transferrem. ... unless maybe I would compare myself to some sort of madmen whose brains have been weakened by such a persistent vapor of black bile that they constantly claim either that they're kings (when they're very poor), or that they're wearing purple (when they're naked), or that they have clay heads, or that they're pumpkins, or that they're blown from glass; but these people are crazy, and I wouldn't seem less mad myself if I applied some example from their situation to my own.