Benedictus de Spinoza

“ The central controlling idea of Spinoza's philosophy is that all things are necessarily determined in Nature, which he conceives to be an absolutely infinite unified and uniform order. Instead of maintaining that God is like man magnified to infinity, who has absolute, irresponsible control of a universe which is external to him—the rather rude anthropomorphic account of the ultimate nature of the universe contained in the Bible—Spinoza maintains that God is identical with the universe and must be and act according to eternal and necessary laws. ”

“ Obedience has regard to the will of a ruler, not to necessity and truth. Now as we are ignorant of the nature of God's will, and on the other hand know that everything happens solely by God's power, we cannot, except through revelation, know whether God wishes in any way to be honored as a sovereign.
Again; we have shown that the Divine rights appear to us in the light of rights or commands, only so long as we are ignorant of their cause: as soon as their cause is known, they cease to be rights, and we embrace them no longer as rights but as eternal truths ”

“ How much more, then, should free thought be granted, seeing that it is in itself a virtue and that it cannot be crushed! Besides, the evil results can easily be checked, as I will show, by the secular authorities, not to mention that such freedom is absolutely necessary for progress in science and the liberal arts: for no man follows such pursuits to advantage unless his judgment be entirely free and unhampered.
But let it be granted that freedom may be crushed, and men be so bound down that they do not dare to utter a whisper, save at the bidding of their rulers ”

“ Further, it follows from Postulate iv., Part II., that we can never arrive at doing without all external things for the preservation of our being or living, so as to have no relations with things which are outside ourselves. Again, if we consider our mind, we see that our intellect would be more imperfect, if mind were alone, and could understand nothing besides itself. There are, then, many things outside ourselves, which are useful to us, and are, therefore, to be desired. Of such none can be discerned more excellent, than those which are in entire agreement with our nature. ”

“ If intellect belongs to the divine nature, it cannot be in nature, as ours is generally thought to be, posterior to, or simultaneous with the things understood, inasmuch as God is prior to all things by reason of his causality (Prop. xvi., Coroll. i.) . On the contrary, the truth and formal essence of things is as it is, because it exists by representation as such in the intellect of God. Wherefore the intellect of God, in so far as it is conceived to constitute God's essence, is, in reality, the cause of things, both of their essence and of their existence. ”

“ But the ideas which in any mind are adequate are adequate in God in so far as He forms the essence of that mind, while those again which are inadequate in the mind are also adequate in God, not in so far as He contains the essence of that mind only, but in so far as He contains the ideas of other things at the same time in Himself. Again, from any given idea some effect must necessarily follow, of which God is the adequate cause, not in so far as He is infinite, but in so far as He is considered as affected with the given idea. ”

“ Spinoza's character, manifested in his life, has won the high admiration of every one not bitterly hostile to him. And even his enemies maintained and justified their hatred only by inventing calumnious falsehoods about him. Unfounded rumors of an evil nature began to circulate during his lifetime, and naturally increased in virulence and volume after his death. At that period in human history, it was popularly recognized that nothing good could be true, and nothing vile could be false of an atheist—which was what Spinoza, of course, was reputed to be. ”

“ I know indeed that there are many who think themselves able to demonstrate that intellect of the highest order and freedom of will both pertain to the nature of God, for they say that they know nothing more perfect which they can attribute to Him than that which is the chief perfection in ourselves. But although they conceive God as actually possessing the highest intellect, they nevertheless do not believe that He can bring about that all those things should exist which are actually in His intellect, for they think that by such a supposition they would destroy His power. ”

“ For example, if twenty men exist in the universe (for simplicity's sake, I will suppose them existing simultaneously, and to have had no predecessors) , and we want to account for the existence of these twenty men, it will not be enough to show the cause of human existence in general ; we must also show why there are exactly twenty men, neither more nor less : for a cause must be assigned for the existence of each individual. Now this cause cannot be contained in the actual nature of man, for the true definition of man does not involve any consideration of the number twenty. ”

“ So, also, those who confuse the two natures, divine and human, readily attribute human passions to the deity, especially so long as they do not know how passions originate in the mind. But, if people would consider the nature of substance, they would have no doubt about the truth of Prop. vii. In fact, this proposition would be a universal axiom, and accounted a truism. For, by substance, would be understood that which is in itself, and is conceived through itself—that is, something of which the conception requires not the conception of anything else ”

“ If, therefore, anything happened in nature at large repugnant to its universal laws, this would be equally and necessarily repugnant to the decrees and intelligence of God; so that any one who maintained that God acted in opposition to the laws of nature would at the same time be forced to maintain that God acted in opposition to his proper nature, an idea than which nothing can be imagined more absurd. I might show the same thing, or strengthen what I have just said, by referring to the truth, that the power of nature is in fact the Divine Power ”

“ But it is said that if God wished us to perceive those things, it would be necessary for Him to give us a larger faculty of perception, but not a larger faculty of will than He has already given us, which is the same thing as saying that if God wished us to understand an infinite number of other beings, it would be necessary for Him to give us a greater intellect, but not a more universal idea of being (in order to embrace that infinite number of beings) , than He has given us. ”

“ For no one is solicitous or anxious about anything, unless he loves it ; neither do wrongs, suspicions, enmities, &c. arise, except in regard to things whereof no one can be really master. We may thus readily conceive the power which clear and distinct knowledge, and especially that third kind of knowledge (II. xlvii. note) , founded on the actual knowledge of God, possesses over the emotions : if it does not absolutely destroy them, in so far as they are passions (V. iii. and iv. note) ; at any rate, it causes them to occupy a very small part of the mind (V. xiv.) ”

“ Spinoza had nothing but contempt for facile-tongued, feather-brained Utopians. He loved humanity too sincerely to mislead humanity or himself that way. And so we find in Spinoza's Ethics as in his Tractatus two systems of morals—one for the many who are called, and one for the few who are chosen. In the Tractatus, the religion of the many is summarily called "obedience"; in the Ethics it is more fully shown to consist of utilitarianism in the conduct of our affairs, high-mindedness towards our fellows, and piety towards Nature or God. ”

“ Lastly, almost all the prophets exhibit a very confused idea of God's providence, and are evidently at a loss to make the order of nature and the events that happen in the world agree with such ideas as they entertained. Nevertheless, the matter has always presented itself clearly enough to the philosopher who strives to comprehend it, not by means of miracles, but by forming clear conceptions of God and nature; to the philosopher who conceives true happiness to consist in virtue and peace of mind alone, and who studies to obey nature, not to make nature bend to him ”

“ Whatever any one, regarded as under the empire of nature only, deems useful to himself, therefore, whether led to do so by right reason or by an impulse of appetite, that he desires by a supreme law of nature, and it is lawful for him by force, by cunning, by entreaty — in short, in any and every way, to obtain possession thereof, and to hold as an enemy whoever opposes him in the satisfaction of his desire. From the above it follows that the law or institute of nature, under which all are born, and for the most part live, prohibits nothing but that which no one desires, and no one can desire ”

“ He is thus bound to live according to his own laws, not according to any one else's, and to recognize no man as a judge, or as a superior in religion. Such, in my opinion, is the position of a sovereign, for he may take advice from his fellow men, but he is not bound to recognize any as a judge, nor any one besides himself as an arbitrator on any question of right, unless it be a prophet sent expressly by God and attesting his mission by indisputable signs. Even then he does not recognize a man, but God Himself as his judge. ”

“ For, as all alike, whether in possession of their reason or not, are bound by the divine command to love their neighbour as themselves, it seems impossible to live according to the laws of more appetite and not do injury or injustice to others. To this objection, however, if the natural state only be regarded, we can readily find an answer; for the natural state, both in itself and in time, is anterior to religion. No one knows by nature that he owes any obedience to God; this knowledge follows from no reason, but can only be enforced upon every one by revelation confirmed by signs. ”

“ In the same manner it is demonstrated that in the mind there exists no absolute faculty of understanding, desiring, loving, etc. These and the like faculties, therefore, are either altogether fictitious, or else are nothing but metaphysical or universal entities, which we are in the habit of forming from individual cases. The intellect and will, therefore, are related to this or that idea or volition as rockiness is related to this or that rock, or as man is related to Peter or Paul. The reason why men imagine themselves to be free we have already explained. ”

“ To contend, as so many do, that "true religion" must be based upon the existence of a supernatural realm, no matter whether or not such a realm exists, is as absurd as to contend that "true morality" must be based upon man's "free-will" no matter whether or not man has "free-will." Spinoza's system has been called pantheistic. But it is pantheistic only in the sense that whatever man considers Godlike must be found in Nature, for no other realm exists, and there are no gods. ”

“ But the very doctrine which Spinoza placed at the heart of his philosophy because of the inestimable ad [xxxvi] vantages man could derive from it, people loudly objected to on the ground that it robbed man's life of all moral and religious value. Determinism, they exclaimed, reduces man to the rank of inanimate Nature; without "free-will" man is no better than a slave, his life doomed by an inexorable fate. True enough, nothing is more abhorrent or more deadly to the striving soul of man than to be bound in a fatalistic doctrine. ”

“ Matter is, in its nature, no more hostile to spirit than body is alien to mind. Paradise is not a non-or super-physical realm; it is a physical realm made harmonious with the ideality of the soul. Spirit is an appreciation, a transmutation of matter. For the lover, the physical embrace is a spiritual revelation. [lv]
The fundamental metaphysical law from which Spinoza's ethical system flows is that everything endeavors to persist in its own being. This law is the metaphysical equivalent of the first law of motion in physics which is itself the equivalent of the law of identity in logic. ”

“ Now these do not require dogmas that are absolutely true, but such only as are needful to obedience and to strengthen the mind in neighbourly love, in which sense alone can any man be said to be in God, and God in him, as the Apostle John has it.
Since, therefore, the faith of every man is to be held good and profitable, or the contrary, as it conduces to obedience or to disobedience, and not as it is in itself either true or false, and no one questions the great diversities that occur in the general dispositions of men, — that all cannot by their nature alike agree in all things ”

“ He, consequently, who would make Scripture harmonize with philosophy will have to fasten many things on the prophets which they did not imagine even in their dreams, and will often have to interpret their meaning much amiss. He, on the other hand, who attempts to make reason and philosophy the hand-maids of theology will find himself forced to recognize the prejudices of the vulgar of old as divine things, and with these to fill and obscure his understanding ”

“ The reason for Spinoza's magnificent influence is not difficult to discover: his philosophy deals in a grand, illuminating way with all that is of profoundest importance in human life. There is no material the universe offers for man's life but Spinoza seeks to understand and explain its rational function and utility. For Spinoza set before himself the hard task of laying down the principles whereby men may guide themselves aright in all the affairs of life—the lowest as well as the highest. ”