"Descartes himself is perhaps only the most conspicuous representative of a way of thought which was irresistibly gaining ground as the century proceeded, and we must now, therefore, ascribe to him all the consequences of that thought. But the fact remains that by the beginning of the eighteenth century religion has sunk to deism, while poetry has been reduced to catering for 'delight' -- the providing embellishments which might be agreeable to fancy, but which were recognized by the judgment as having no relation to 'reality'."
-- The Seventeenth Century Background: The Thought of the Age in Relation to Religion and Poetry, Basil Willey, 1934, p. 93.
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