“Besides common rules”: avoiding error and regulating the mind in Arnauld and Nicole’s Logic or the Art of Thinking

Though Arnauld and Nicole title their famous pedagogical textbook La logique ou l’art de penser, little scholarly attention has been paid to what the Port-Royalists mean by the term “art.” In this article, I examine Arnauld and Nicole’s definition of the art of thinking and argue that the rare art of thinking consists in skilled practice and understanding. How is an epistemic agent to acquire the understanding and practice necessary to possessing the art of thinking and/or avoid epistemic error? In addition to believing that an individual must regulate the mind through the rules of logic to develop a coherent and reasoned capacity to think, Arnauld and Nicole present insights besides common rules. I conclude by showing examples from the Port-Royal Logic of abilities, traits, and dispositions that play a constitutive role in thinking well and reasoning artfully, and are key to recognising the source of our cognitive errors.