Baruch Spinoza Quotes

It may easily come to pass that a vain man may become proud and imagine himself pleasing to all when he is in reality a universal nuisance. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Many errors, of a truth, consist merely in the application of the wrong names of things. For if a man says that the lines which are drawn from the centre of the circle to the circumference are not equal, he understands by the circle, at all events for the time, something else than mathematicians understand by it. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Those, who are believed to be most self - abased and humble, are generally in reality the most ambitious and envious ~ Baruch Spinoza

I do not believe anyone has reached such perfection, surpassing all others, except Christ, to whom God immediately revealed - without words or visions - the conditions which lead to
salvation. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Yet nature cannot be contravened, but preserves a fixed and immutable order. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Academies that are founded at public expense are instituted not so much to cultivate men's natural abilities as to restrain them. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Things which are accidentally the causes either of hope or fear are called good or evil omens. ~ Baruch Spinoza

According as each has been educated, so he repents of or glories in his actions. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Of all the things that are beyond my power, I value nothing more highly than to be allowed the honor of entering into bonds of friendship with people who sincerely love truth. For, of things beyond our power, I believe there is nothing in the world which we can love with tranquility except such men. ~ Baruch Spinoza

No matter how thin you slice it, there will always be two sides. ~ Baruch Spinoza

True knowledge of good and evil as we possess is merely abstract or general, and the judgment which we pass on the order of things and the connection of causes, with a view to determining what is good or bad for us in the present, is rather imaginary than real. ~ Baruch Spinoza

All our contemporary philosophers perhaps without knowing it are looking through eyeglasses that Baruch Spinoza polished. Spinoza was a philosopher who earned his livelihood by grinding lenses. ~ Heinrich Heine

The ultimate aim of government is not to rule, or restrain by fear, nor to exact obedience, but to free every man from fear that he may live in all possible security ... In fact the true aim of government is liberty. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Such things as are good simply because they have been commanded or instituted, or as being symbols of something good, are mere shadows which cannot be reckoned among actions that are the offspring, as it were, or fruit of a sound mind and of intellect. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Freedom is absolutely necessary for the progress in science and the liberal arts. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The order and connection of ideas in the same as the order and connection of things ~ Baruch Spinoza

Everything in nature is a cause from which there flows some effect. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The greatest pride, or the greatest despondency, is the greatest ignorance of one's self. ~ Baruch Spinoza

He who loves God cannot endeavor that God should love him in return. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Love is nothing but Joy with the accompanying idea of an external cause (Ethics, part III, proposition 13, scholium). ~ Baruch Spinoza

Men believe themselves to be free, simply because they are conscious of their actions, and unconscious of the causes whereby those actions are determined. ~ Baruch Spinoza

To know the order of nature, and regard the universe as orderly is the highest function of the mind. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Desire is the essence of a man. ~ Baruch Spinoza

In regard to intellect and true virtue, every nation is on a par with the rest, and God has not in these respects chosen one people rather than another. ~ Baruch Spinoza

We feel and experience ourselves to be eternal. ~ Baruch Spinoza

If we conceive that anyone loves, desires, or hates anything which we ourselves love, desire, or hate, we shall thereupon regard the thing in question with more steadfast love, etc. On the contrary, if we think that anyone shrinks from something that we love, we shall undergo vacillation of the soul. ~ Baruch Spinoza

I should attempt to treat human vice and folly geometrically ... the passions of hatred, anger, envy, and so on, considered in themselves, follow from the necessity and efficacy of nature ... I shall, therefore, treat the nature and strength of the emotion in exactly the same manner, as though I were concerned with lines, planes, and solids. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The less the mind understands and the more things it perceives, the greater its power of feigning is; and the more things it understands, the more that power is diminished. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Indulge yourself in pleasures only in so far as they are necessary for the preservation of health. ~ Baruch Spinoza

[Believers] are but triflers who, when they cannot explain a thing, run back to the will of God; this is, truly, a ridiculous way of expressing ignorance. ~ Baruch Spinoza

But if men would give heed to the nature of substance they would doubt less concerning the Proposition that Existence appertains to the nature of substance: rather they would reckon it an axiom above all others, and hold it among common opinions. For then by substance they would understand that which is in itself, and through itself is conceived, or rather that whose knowledge does not depend on the knowledge of any other thing. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Those who wish to seek out the cause of miracles, and to understand the things of nature as philosophers, and not to stare at them in astonishment like fools, are soon considered heretical and impious, and proclaimed as such by those whom the mob adores as the interpreters of nature and the gods. For these men know that, once ignorance is put aside, that wonderment would be taken away, which is the only means by which their authority is preserved. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The greater emotion with which we conceive a loved object to be affected toward us, the greater will be our complacency. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The purpose of the state is really freedom. ~ Baruch Spinoza

He who would distinguish the true from the false must have an adequate idea of what is true and false. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The world would be happier if men had the same capacity to be silent that they have to speak. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Falsity consists in the privation of knowledge, which inadequate, fragmentary, or confused ideas involve. ~ Baruch Spinoza

A free man, who lives among ignorant people, tries as much as he can to refuse their benefits.. He who lives under the guidance of reason endeavours as much as possible to repay his fellow's hatred, rage, contempt, etc. with love and nobleness. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The body is affected by the image of the thing, in the same way as if the thing were actually present. ~ Baruch Spinoza

What everyone wants from life is continuous and genuine happiness. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The proper study of a wise man is not how to die but how to live. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Love is nothing but joy accompanied with the idea of an eternal cause. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Nothing in the universe is contingent, but all things are conditioned to exist and operate in a particular manner by the necessity of the divine nature. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Nothing comes to pass in nature, which can be set down to a flaw therein; for nature is always the same and everywhere one and thesame in her efficiency and power of action; that is, nature's laws and ordinances whereby all things come to pass and change from one form to another, are everywhere and always; so that there should be one and the same method of understanding the nature of all things whatsoever, namely, through nature's universal laws and rules. ~ Baruch Spinoza

People] find - both in themselves and outside themselves - many means that are very helpful in seeking their own advantage, e.g., eyes for seeing, teeth for chewing, plants and animals for food, the sun for light, the sea for supporting fish … Hence, they consider all natural things as means to their own advantage. And knowing that they had found these means, not provided them for themselves, they had reason to believe that there was someone else who had prepared those means for their use. For after they considered things as means, they could not believe that the things had made themselves; but from the means they were accustomed to prepare for themselves, they had to infer that there was a ruler, or a number of rulers of nature, endowed with human freedom, who had taken care of all things for them, and made all things for their use.

And since they had never heard anything about the temperament of these rulers, they had to judge it from their own. Hence, they maintained that the Gods direct all things for the use of men in order to bind men to them and be held by men in the highest honor. So it has happened that each of them has thought up from his own temperament different ways of worshipping God, so that God might love them above all the rest, and direct the whole of Nature according to the needs of their blind desire and insatiable greed. Thus this prejudice was changed into superstition, and struck deep roots in their minds. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Statesman are suspected of plotting against mankind, rather than consulting their interests, and are esteemed more crafty than learned. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Self-preservation is the primary and only foundation of virtue. ~ Baruch Spinoza

I care not for the girdings of superstition, for superstition is the bitter enemy of knowledge & true morality. Yes; it has come to this! Men who openly confess that they can form no idea of God, & only know him through created things, of which they know not the causes, can unblushingly accuse philosophers of Atheism. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Surely human affairs would be far happier if the power in men to be silent were the same as that to speak. But experience more than sufficiently teaches that men govern nothing with more difficulty than their tongues, and can moderate their desires more easily than their words. ~ Baruch Spinoza

True virtue is life under the direction of reason. ~ Baruch Spinoza

God is not He who is, but That which is. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Those who know the true use of money, and regulate the measure of wealth according to their needs, live contented with few things. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Don't cry and don't rage. Understand. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The intellectual love of a thing consists in understanding its perfections. ~ Baruch Spinoza

I have resolved to demonstrate by a certain and undoubted course of argument, or to deduce from the very condition of human nature, not what is new and unheard of, but only such things as
agree best with practice. ~ Baruch Spinoza

By emotion I mean the modifications of the body, whereby the active power of the said body is increased or diminished, aided or constrained, and also the ideas of such modifications. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Men govern nothing with more difficulty than their tongues, and can moderate their desires more than their words. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The greatest good is the knowledge of the union which the mind has with the whole nature. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Freedom is self-determination. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Things could not have been brought into being by God in any manner or in any order different from that which has in fact obtained. ~ Baruch Spinoza

He alone is free who lives with free consent under the entire guidance of reason. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The real disturbers of the peace are those who, in a free state, seek to curtail the liberty of judgment which they are unable to tyrannize over. ~ Baruch Spinoza

I believe that a triangle, if it could speak, would say that God is eminently triangular, and a circle that the divine nature is eminently circular; and thus would every one ascribe his own attributes to God. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The idea, which constitutes the actual being of the human mind, is not simple, but compounded of a great number of ideas. ~ Baruch Spinoza

If a man had begun to hate an object of his love, so that love is thoroughly destroyed, he will, causes being equal, regard it with more hatred than if he had never loved it, and his hatred will be in proportion to the strength of his former love. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The object of the idea constituting the human mind is the body ~ Baruch Spinoza

The more you struggle to live, the less you live. Give up the notion that you must be sure of what you are doing. Instead, surrender to what is real within you, for that alone is sure ... you are above everything distressing. ~ Baruch Spinoza

He that can carp in the most eloquent or acute manner at the weakness of the human mind is held by his fellows as almost divine. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Nature offers nothing that can be called this man's rather than another's; but under nature everything belongs to all. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Reality and perfection are synonymous. ~ Baruch Spinoza

After experience had taught me that all the usual surroundings of social life are vain and futile; seeing that none of the objects of my fears contained in themselves anything either good or bad, except in so far as the mind is affected by them, I finally resolved to inquire whether there might be some real good having power to communicate itself, which would affect the mind singly, to the exclusion of all else: whether, in fact, there might be anything of which the discovery and attainment would enable me to enjoy continuous, supreme, and unending happiness. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Men, in so far as they live in obedience to reason necessarily do only such things as are necessarily good for human nature, and consequently for each individual man. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The things ... are esteemed as the greatest good of all ... can be reduced to these three headings: to wit, Riches, Fame, and Pleasure. With these three the mind is so engrossed that it cannot scarcely think of any other good. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The superstitious, who know how to reprove vices rather than how to teach virtues, and who strive, not to lead people by reason, but to restrain them by fear in such a way that they flee what is bad rather than love the virtues, simply intend all other people to be as miserable as they are, and so it is not surprising that they are for the most part irksome and hateful to human beings. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Nothing forbids man to enjoy himself, save grim and gloomy superstition ~ Baruch Spinoza

[T]hese instances are enough to show, that the body can by the sole laws of its nature do many things which the mind wonders at. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Thus we see, that the mind can undergo many changes, and can pass sometimes to a state of greater perfection, sometimes to a state of lesser perfection. These passive states of transition explain to us the emotions of pleasure and pain. By pleasure therefore in the following propositions I shall signify a passive state wherein the mind passes to a greater perfection. By pain I shall signify a passive state wherein the mind passes to a lesser perfection. Further, the emotion of pleasure in reference to the body and mind together I shall call stimulation (titillatio) or merriment (hilaritas), the emotion of pain in the same relation I shall call suffering or melancholy. But we must bear in mind, that stimulation and suffering are attributed to man, when one part of his nature is more affected than the rest, merriment and melancholy, when all parts are alike affected. What I mean by desire I have explained in the note to Prop. ix. of this part; beyond these three I recognize no other primary emotion; I will show as I proceed, that all other emotions arise from these three. ~ Baruch Spinoza

... The power which the common people ascribe to God is not only a human power (which shows that they look upon God as a man, or as being like a man), but that it also involves weakness. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The superstitious know how to reproach people for their vices better than they know how to teach them virtues, and they strive, not to guide men by reason, but to restrain them by fear, so that they flee the evil rather than love virtues. Such people aim only to make others as wretched as they themselves are, so it is no wonder that they are generally burdensome and hateful to men. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Philosophers conceive of the passions which harass us as vices into which men fall by their own fault, and, therefore, generally deride, bewail, or blame them, or execrate them, if they
wish to seem unusually pious. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Laws which prescribe what everyone must believe, and forbid men to say or write anything against this or that opinion, are often passed to gratify, or rather to appease the anger of those who cannot abide independent minds. ~ Baruch Spinoza

For though men be ignorant, yet they are men ~ Baruch Spinoza

Whatsoever is contrary to nature is contrary to reason, and whatsoever is contrary to reason is absurd. ~ Baruch Spinoza

If men were born free, they would, so long as they remained free, form no conception of good and evil. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Things are not more or less perfect, according as they delight or offend human senses, or according as they are serviceable or repugnant to mankind. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Laws which can be broken without any wrong to one's neighbor are a laughing-stock; and such laws, instead of restraining the appetites and lusts of mankind, serve rather to heighten them. Nitimur in vetitum semper, cupimusque negata [we always resist prohibitions, and yearn for what is denied us]. ~ Baruch Spinoza

In the state of nature, wrong-doing is impossible ; or, if anyone does wrong, it is to himself, not to another. ~ Baruch Spinoza

I would warn you that I do not attribute to nature either beauty or deformity, order or confusion. Only in relation to our imagination can things be called beautiful or ugly, well-ordered or confused. ~ Baruch Spinoza

God is a thing that thinks. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Scriptural doctrine contains not abstruse speculation or philosophic reasoning, but very simple matters able to be understood by the most sluggish mind. ~ Baruch Spinoza

It is the part of a wise man, I say, to refresh and restore himself in moderation with pleasant food and drink, with scents, with the beauty of green plants, with decoration, music, sports, the theater, and other things of this kind, which anyone can use without injury to another. ~ Baruch Spinoza

Peace is not the absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition of benevolence, confidence, justice. ~ Baruch Spinoza

It will be said that, although God's law is inscribed in our hearts, Scripture is nevertheless the Word of God, and it is no more permissible to say of Scripture that it is mutilated and contaminated than to say this of God's Word. In reply, I have to say that such objectors are carrying their piety too far, and are turning religion into superstition; indeed, instead of God's Word they are beginning to worship likenesses and images, that is, paper and ink. ~ Baruch Spinoza

He who seeks to regulate everything by law is more likely to arouse vices than to reform them. It is best to grant what cannot be abolished, even though it be in itself harmful. How many evils spring from luxury, envy, avarice, drunkenness and the like, yet these are tolerated because they cannot be prevented by legal enactments. ~ Baruch Spinoza

The multitude always strains after rarities and exceptions, and thinks little of the gifts of nature; so that, when prophecy is talked of, ordinary knowledge is not supposed to be included. Nevertheless it has as much right as any other to be called Divine. ~ Baruch Spinoza

In a democratic state nobody transfers his natural right to another so completely that thereafter he is not to be consulted; he transfers it to the majority of the entire community of which he is part. In this way all men remain equal, as they were before in a state of nature. ~ Baruch Spinoza

But, after men began to form general ideas, to think out types of houses, buildings, towers, &c., and to prefer certain types to others, it came about, that each man called perfect that which he saw agree with the general idea he had formed of the thing in question, and called imperfect that which he saw agree less with his own preconceived type, even though it had evidently been completed in accordance with the idea of its artificer. This seems to be the only reason for calling natural phenomena, which, indeed, are not made with human hands, perfect or imperfect: for men are wont to form general ideas of things natural, no less than of things artificial, and such ideas they hold as types, believing that Nature (who they think does nothing without an object) has them in view, and has set them as types before herself. Therefore, when they behold something in Nature, which does not wholly conform to the preconceived type which they have formed of the thing in question, they say that Nature has fallen short or has blundered, and has left her work incomplete. ~ Baruch Spinoza

[The] right of the individual is co-extensive with its determinate power. ...
Nature's bounds are not set by the laws of human reason which aim only at man's true interest and his preservation ... man is but a particle. ~ Baruch Spinoza

We strive to further the occurrence of whatever we imagine will lead to Joy, and to avert or destroy what we imagine is contrary to it, or will lead to Sadness. ~ Baruch Spinoza