Summary This volume provides a more exhaustive interpretation of René Descartes' medical views and its reception in the seventeenth century. Filling the gap in the recent scholarship, the contributions in the volume follow four axes: exegetical, textual, philosophical, and contextual. Authors in this book deal with Descartes' physiology, anatomy, and therapy by reconstructing Cartesian texts, detailing possible medical and philosophical sources, discussing medical collaborations and oppositions, and exploring obscurities and failures in Descartes' medicine. In laying bare the more promising issues of Cartesian programme and discussing the reception and opposition in the seventeenth century, the volume also uncovers the limitations within his interpretation, ultimately revealing a more nuanced application of his methodology to a field of natural philosophy. While medical studies play a not secondary role in Descartes' entire work, the volume aims to discuss in detail the importance of medicine as a suitable field to understand Cartesian philosophy from a significant perspective in seventeenth-century Europe. TABLE OF CONTENTS Fabrizio Baldassarri, Introduction: Lights & Shadows in Descartes's Medicine Part 1. Descartes's Medical Philosophy: Sources and Texts, Dissections and Reflections Gideon Manning, Descartes's Cartesian Medicine: Past, Present, and Future Simone Guidi, Epigenesis and Generative Power in Descartes's Late Scholastic Sources Jil Muller, Ambroise Paré and René Descartes on Sensation in Amputated Limbs Annie Bitbol-Hespériès, Anatomical Debates on Hearts and Brains and Philosophical Issues from Descartes's Writing of L'Homme to its Posthumous Publications Tawrin Baker, The Medical Context of Descartes's Dioptrique Fabrizio Baldassarri, A Medicine in the Shadows: The Bio-Medical Manuscripts and a Compendium Descartes Never Published Carmen Schmechel, Fermentation as 'Heat-Rarefaction' and Animal Spirits in Descartes's Medical Philosophy Lynda Gaudemard, What Descartes's Embryology Tells us about his Dualism Clément Raymond, From the Animal Instinct to the Mind's Acknowledgment of the (In)Commoda in Descartes Jan Forsman, Madness and Dream in Descartes's First Meditation Franco A. Meschini, Malattie e metafisica. La prova patologica (with an abstract in English) Part 2. Reception and Opposition: Cartesian Medicine and Cartesianism Erik-Jan Bos, Mercurius Cosmopolita alias Andreas of Habernfeld: The Hermetic Response to Descartes Benjamin Goldberg, The Rules of Anatomy: On the Empiricisms of Descartes and Harvey Andrea Strazzoni, The Lost Dictata of Henricus Regius Daniel Samuel, A British Response to The Passions of the Soul Mihnea Dobre, Jacques Rohault on Medicine Elena Rapetti, On Cartesian Embryology: A Debate on Monsters at the Bourdelot Academy Nabeel Hamid, The Cartesian Physiology of Johann Jakob Waldschmidt Stefano Gulizia, Cartesianism between Northern Europe, Germany, and the Medici Court: Charting a New Map Maria Conforti, "Se fusse meno cartesiano lo stimarei molto": Anti-Cartesian Motifs in Italian Medicine Aaron Spink, Embodied Difference and the Cartesian Soul: Pierre-Sylvain Régis and the Pineal Gland Problem Laurynas Adomaitis, Beyond Mechanical Life: Biological Processes in the Seventeenth Century