PhilosophersBaruch Spinoza

Baruch Spinoza

God, that is, Nature: everything follows by necessity.

Rationalism1632 – 1677 NetherlandsRationalistThinker of God-or-NatureDeterministDefender of freedom of thought
Deus seu Natura
God, or Nature.
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oculis apertis somniant
Those who believe they act from a free decision of the mind dream with their eyes open.
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Homo liber de nulla re minus quam de morte cogitat
A free man thinks of death least of all things.
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Sed omnia præclara tam difficilia quam rara sunt.
But all things excellent are as difficult as they are rare. The last sentence of the Ethics.
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et sentire, quae velit, et quae sentiat, dicere
Think what you like and say what you think.
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Misconceptions

Nuanced
Spinoza was an atheist.

He sets out to prove that God necessarily exists and puts the love of God at the summit of the Ethics. But his God is not a person: it wills nothing, chooses nothing, loves no one in the human sense. That is why he was accused of atheism in his lifetime. The debate is still open: pantheist, atheist in disguise, or mystic of reason.

False
For Spinoza, God is matter.

He denies it himself: those who think he identifies God with "a certain mass or corporeal matter" are wholly wrong. Matter (extension) is only one of God's attributes; thought is another, and there are infinitely many.

False
Spinoza preaches resignation: everything is written, so why act.

His ethics is one of the power to act and of joy. The free man meditates on life, not death, and seeks what is truly useful to him. Understanding necessity means ceasing to be tossed about by passions, not ceasing to act.