O ARCO DA LIBERDADE NAS MEDITAÇÕES METAFÍSICAS : o exercício meditativo sob a lente filosófica de “ um outro” Martial Gueroult

 This article examines the meditative exercise in Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy through the philosophical lens of Martial Gueroult, emphasizing freedom as the structural core of the Cartesian system. In Philosophy of the History of Philosophy (1979), Gueroult posits freedom as the fundamental law of philosophical systems—a thesis not explicitly developed in his analysis of Descartes but inferable from the order of reasons. The study demonstrates that the trajectory of the Meditations (particularly the First to Third) and its rational framework also reflect a volitional act, revealing the meditator’s persistent pursuit of autonomy. In the First Meditation, freedom manifests as both the radical negation of prejudices and the capacity to affirm or deny representations; in the Second, as self-knowledge (constitution of the cogito); and in the Third, as the overcoming of solipsism through the demonstration of God’s existence. The Meditations thus trace an “arc of freedom” wherein the will, by negating and grounding truths, establishes Cartesian metaphysics.