 Anticipated in this passage are the core ideas of Descartes’ ethics: the notion of virtue, as a disposition of the will to judge in accordance with reason’s representations of the good, and the notion of happiness, as a state of mental well-being that is achieved through the practice of virtue. In his correspondence with Princess Elisabeth, Descartes will elaborate on the relationship between these two ideas. Here is it worth noting that while it is virtue that links ethics to the broader goal of the cultivation of reason, Descartes gives no less weight to the importance of happiness, in the form of tranquility. This is made clear near the end of the Discourse, when he explains why, in spite of his reservations, he has published the book under his own name: “I am not excessively fond of glory—indeed if I dare to say so, I dislike it in so far as I regard it as opposed to that tranquility which I value above everything else…. [I]f I had done this [sc. concealed his identity] I thought I would do myself an injustice, and moreover that would have given me a certain sort of disquiet, which again would have been opposed to the perfect peace of mind I am seeking” (AT VI 74/CSM I 149).