Tractatus Politicus
- Language:
- Latin
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~39,200 words · 186 passages
Cite this work
- APABaruch Spinoza. (n.d.). Tractatus Politicus. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/baruch-spinoza/tractatus-politicus
- MLABaruch Spinoza. Tractatus Politicus. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/baruch-spinoza/tractatus-politicus.
- ChicagoBaruch Spinoza. Tractatus Politicus. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/baruch-spinoza/tractatus-politicus.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
Spinoza's last piece of writing, cut short by his death in 1677 just as it reached democracy.
Context and history
It is a politics written without any indignation: it begins by saying that philosophers conceive men not as they are but as they would like them to be, and that their theories are therefore fit only for a golden age. Spinoza wants something else: institutions so calculated that they work even if those who fill them are bad, because what is asked of a state is not virtue but stability. From this comes his analysis of monarchy and of aristocracy, with councils, numbers and offices set out in detail. The chapter on democracy, which was where the whole thing was going, breaks off on its second page: Spinoza died writing it, and the book ends in the middle of a sentence about who has the right to vote. This is the text Rousseau read and the one modern republicanism took up again.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
IV. Praeterea concipere etiam non possumus, quod unicuique civi liceat Civitatis decreta, seu jura interpretari. Nam si hoc unicuique liceret, eo ipso sui judex esset; quandoquidem unusquisque facta sua specie juris nullo negotio excusare, seu adornare posset, et consequenter ex suo ingenio vitam institueret, quod (per Art. praeced.) est absurdum. V. Videmus itaque, unumquemque civem non sui, sed Civitatis juris esse, cujus omnia mandata tenetur exequi, nec ullum habere jus decernendi, quid aequum, quid iniquum, quid pium, quidve impium sit sed contra, quia imperii corpus una veluti mente duci debet, et consequenter Civitatis voluntas pro omnium voluntate habenda est, id quod Civitas justum, et bonum esse decernit, tanquam ab unoquoque decretum esse, censendum est; atque adeo, quamvis subditus Civitatis decreta iniqua esse censeat, tenetur nihilominus eadem exequi. VI. At objici potest, an non contra rationis dictamen est, se alterius judicio omnino subjicere, et consequenter, an status civilis rationi non repugnat; ex quo sequeretur statum civilem irrationalem esse, nec posse creari nisi ab hominibus ratione destitutis, at minime ab iis, qui ratione ducuntur. Sed quoniam ratio nihil contra naturam docet, non potest ergo sana ratio dictare, ut unusquisque sui juris maneat, quamdiu homines affectibus sunt obnoxii (per Art. 15. praeced. Cap.), hoc est (per Art. 5. Cap. I.), ratio hoc posse fieri negat. Adde, quod ratio omnino docet pacem quaerere, quae quidem obtineri nequit, nisi communia Civitatis jura inviolata serventur, atque adeo quo homo ratione magis ducitur, hoc est (per Art. 11. praeced. Cap.), quo magis liber est, eo constantius Civitatis jura servabit, et summae potestatis, cujus subditus est, mandata exequetur. Ad quod accedit, quod status civilis naturaliter instituitur ad metum communem adimendum, et communes miserias propellendum, ac proinde id maxime intendit, quod unusquisque, qui ratione ducitur, in statu naturali conaretur, sed frustra (per Art.…