he lived by* a stove and threathened the power of catholic religion as a whole with his famous "if God exist and is as you (the catholic priests) say, God is good and therefore won't try to mess with me or deceive me, hence all my observations of Nature and the world and the logical deductions i can make from them are right and in fact the very expression of god's well thought out plan" at the start of his
Discours de la méthode. He then proceeds to deconstruct absolutely all the stupid pseudo scientific ideas spread by the very same religious people without them being able to say anything, because it would look like they are questioning god's plan.
One of the most exquisite troll ever accomplished.
edit : It's René Descartes. We do not have double capitalization of last names in french. Descartes not DesCartes, Dubois not DuBois, Dupont not DuPont, etc.