It is difficult to know why Descartes ever went to Sweden. One possible reason is that he could not resist the temptation of being honoured by Queen Christina, and that he was led to a premature death by vanity. Had he been asked directly, he would hardly have accepted that interpretation of events. He might have argued instead that he was predestined to die in Sweden and that it was impossible for him to avoid his fate. These twin themes, of destiny and the passions, were among the subjects of his philosophical reflections during the summer of 1649, when he was struggling with competing desires of unequal strength – a dominant desire to remain in Egmond, and a reluctant willingness to travel to Stockholm.

During those months, Descartes was editing the Passions of the Soul and was drafting the material that appeared in the final part of that book. One of the topics that arose naturally in that context was the influence of fortune in human lives. He had nothing but contempt for the suggestion that there is some kind of world power called ‘fortune’ that determines our fate and over which we have no influence.