Quotes About Spinoza

Spinoza is more than happy with this conclusion: he is a thorough-going determinist 'Experience tells us clearly that men believe themselves to be free simply because they are conscious of their actions and unconscious of the causes whereby these actions are determined; further, it is plain that the dictates of the mind are simply another name for the appetites that vary according to the varying state of the body.

Interestingly, Spinoza's philosophy is both mystical, rational and theistic. Yet he was excommunicated from the Jewish community for his views, denounced as an atheist by Christians and declared so wicked that at one time his books were publicly burnt. Leibniz, who owes a great deal to him, rarely acknowledges the debt. Despite the rigour and integrity of his work, Spinoza remains one of the lesser studied and least regarded of all the rationalist philosophers.

Spinoza dit qu'il ne se peut pas que l'homme n'ait pas de passions, mais que le sage forme en son âme une telle étendue de pensées heureuses que ses passions sont toutes petites à côté.

Nature has no goal in view, and final causes are only human imaginings.

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

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.

Of all heroes , Spinoza was Einstein 's greatest. No one expressed more strongly then he a belief in the harmony , the beauty , and most of all the ultimate comprehensibility of nature.

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

The mind has greater power over the emotions, and is less subject thereto, insofar as it understands all things to be necessary.

[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.

I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind... to Rabbi Herbert Goldstein (1929)

So, Spinoza went off, not as a victim or a pariah but as an independent Portuguese person living in Amsterdam. In so doing, he became one of the first people to live outside of any religious affiliation.

Spinoza was introduced to the Quaker leader in the Netherlands, William Ames, and was described by Peter Serrarius as a "Jew who by the Jews hath been cast out.

My atheism like that of Spinoza is true piety towards the universe and denies only gods fashioned by men in their own image to be servants of their human interests.

A prominent rabbi sent Einstein an exasperated telegram: "Do you believe in God? Stop. Answer paid. Fifty words." Einstein replied, "I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals himself in the lawful harmony of all that exists, but not in a God who concerns himself with the fate and the doings of mankind.

Einstein said, "I believe in Spinoza's god, who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a god who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings.

Résister « Se priver du bonheur de l'union sacrée » « Il court-circuite l'enthousiasme » Le Dieu et l'idole Spinoza, philosophe du plaisir et de la joie Du monisme au dualisme Refus du matérialisme et du Dieu-Objet Refus du fatalisme « L'existence n'est pas Dieu » Désespoir ou idolâtrie ? Simone Weil

Measure, time and number are nothing but modes of thought or rather of imagination.

I like mathematics because it is not human and has nothing particular to do with this planet or with the whole accidental universe - because, like Spinoza's God, it won't love us in return.

In practical life we are compelled to follow what is most probable ; in speculative thought we are compelled to follow truth.

Spinoza wrote the last indisputable Latin masterpiece, and one in which the refined conceptions of medieval philosophy are finally turned against themselves and destroyed entirely. He chose a single word from that language for his device: caute – 'be cautious' – inscribed beneath a rose, the symbol of secrecy. For, having chosen to write in a language that was so widely intelligible, he was compelled to hide what he had written.

Contact with secular and Christian ways of thinking increased Spinoza's dissatisfaction with the biblical interpretations he received from the rabbis, who in turn frowned on his interest in natural science, and on his study of the pernicious Latin language, in which so much heresy and blasphemy had been so engagingly expressed.

Some of the greatest achievements of modern philosophy result from the attempt to reconcile the belief in human freedom with the eternal laws of God's nature, and among these achievements Spinoza's is not only the most imaginative and profound, but perhaps the only one that is truly plausible.

The picture of a universe of infinitely many wholly unrelated substances is at least as hard to understand as the monism of Spinoza, and far less easy to reconcile with appearances.