Epistolae (Benedictus de Spinoza)
- Language:
- Latin
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- Clean text
- Extent:
- ~20,800 words · 99 passages
Cite this work
- APABaruch Spinoza. (n.d.). Epistolae (Benedictus de Spinoza). SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/baruch-spinoza/epistolae-benedictus-de-spinoza
- MLABaruch Spinoza. "Epistolae (Benedictus de Spinoza)." SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/baruch-spinoza/epistolae-benedictus-de-spinoza.
- ChicagoBaruch Spinoza. Epistolae (Benedictus de Spinoza). SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/baruch-spinoza/epistolae-benedictus-de-spinoza.
What it is about
The Latin original of Spinoza's correspondence, published by his friends in the 'Opera posthuma' of 1677.
Context and history
The editors chose the letters that had doctrinal value and cut what was personal, so this is not Spinoza's life but his thought tested by real correspondents: Oldenburg, secretary of the Royal Society, questioning and taking fright at once; Blyenbergh, the Calvinist merchant with whom evil is argued out in the letters that remain its best exposition; Boxel, with whom the subject is ghosts; Tschirnhaus, who asks the sharpest questions about the 'Ethics'. In the letters one sees what the treatises hide: Spinoza doubting, correcting himself, refusing to publish. Whoever wants to know what certain theses of the 'Ethics' really mean must often come looking here.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
ARG. Spinozae scientia et humanitate laudata Oldenburgius mentionem facit colloquii Rhenoburgi de Deo, de extensione al. habiti, super quibus rebus ut fusius exponat philosophum enixe rogat. Clarissimo viro B. D. S. H E N R I C U S O L D E N B U R G I U S. CLARISSIME DOMINE, AMICE COLENDE, Tam aegre nuper, cum tibi in secessu tuo Rhenoburgi adessem, a latere tuo divellebar, ut quam primum in Angliam factus sum redux, tecum rursus uniri, quantum fieri potest, commercio saltem epistolico annitar. Rerum solidarum scientia, coniuncta cum humanitate et morum elegantia (quibus omnibus natura et industria amplissime te locupletarunt) eas habent in semet ipsis illecebras, ut viros quosvis ingenuos et liberaliter educatos in sui amorem rapiant. Age itaque, vir praestantissime, amicitiae non fucatae dextras iungamus, eamque omni studiorum et officiorum genere sedulo colamus. Quod quidem a tenuitate mea proficisci potest, tuum iudica. Quas tu possides ingenii dotes, earum partem, cum sine tuo id fieri detrimento possit, me mihi vindicare sinas. 2. Habebamus Rhenoburgi sermonem de Deo, de extensione et cogitatione infinita, de horum attributorum discrimine et convenientia, de ratione unionis animae humanae cum corpore; porro de principiis philosophiae Cartesianae et Baconianae. 3. Verum cum quasi per transennam et in transcursu duntaxat de tanti momenti argumentis tunc loqueremur, atque interim ista omnia menti meae crucem figant, ex amicitiae inter nos initae iure tecum agere nunc aggrediar, ac peramanter rogare, ut circa subiecta praememorata tuos conceptus nonnihil fusius mihi exponere, imprimis vero in hisce duobus me edocere non graveris, videlicet, primo, qua in re extensionis et cogitationis verum discrimen ponas; secundo, quos in Cartesii et Baconis philosophia