xlviii INTRODUCTION does not force me to do anything which I would not have done of my own accord, had I not been afraid of a scandal." But the last words of this expression of his natural resentment only seem to confirm the suggestion about his previous anxiety to avoid a complete rupture, if he could do so honestly. It was partly perhaps also for this reason that even after his excommunication he addressed to the Synagogue authorities an Apology (written in Spanish) in which he probably sought to defend his heretical views by showing that they had the support of some of the most eminent Rabbis, and to condemn the iniquity of fastening on him " horrible practices and other enormities" because of his neglect of mere ceremonial observances. Unfortu nately, this document has not yet been recovered, though some of its contents are said to have been subsequently in corporated in his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus. It would throw a flood of light on Spinoza's mental history. How ever, the Apology did not mend matters. Cut off from his community, without kith or kin, he stood alone, but firm and unshaken. Unlike da Costa, he never winced. He seems to have got into touch with Jews again afterwards; but it was they who had to seek him.
§5. THE LAST YEARS OF SPINOZA'S STAY IN AND NEAR AMSTERDAM— 1656-1660 Banished from Amsterdam, Spinoza went to live in Ouwerkerk, a little village to the south of Amsterdam. Possibly he had some Christian friends there who had influence with the civil authorities; and apparently he meant to return to Amsterdam at the earliest opportunity. Maybe also he was not altogether uninfluenced by the thought that the Jewish cemetery was there, and that his mother, his sister, his father, THE LIFE OF SPINOZA xlix and others once dear to him, had found their last restingplace in it.
For his support he had to rely on the lenses which he made — an art which he had mastered during the years immediately preceding his exile. He made lenses for spec tacles, microscopes, and telescopes, and his friends sold them for him. The work suited his tastes well enough, be cause it kept him in touch with his scientific studies. And he evidently excelled in it, for later on his fame as an optician attracted the notice of Huygens and Leibniz, among others. But it was an unfortunate occupation otherwise. The fine glass-dust which he inhaled during his work must have been very injurious to his health, especially when we bear in mind that he eventually died of consump tion, and that he probably inherited the disease from his mother, who died so young. For the time being, however, it was a congenial occupation, and, with his frugal habits, left him sufficient time to pursue his scientific and philo sophic studies.
As already suggested, Spinoza did not stay long in Ouwerkerk, but returned, after a few months, to Amsterdam, where he remained till 1660. Of the events which happened during this period (1656-1660) we possess the most meagre information. Apparently he gave some private lessons in philosophy, and pursued his studies unremittingly. At the end of this period he had already left Descartes behind him, and had thought out the essentials of his own philosophy.
From Spinoza's subsequent correspondence, we obtain a glimpse of his friends and associates during this period, while the opening pages of his Improvement of the Under standing at once enlighten and mystify us about his life during those last years in Amsterdam.
After leaving Amsterdam in 1660 Spinoza continued a friendly correspondence with several residents in Amster dam, whom he also visited for a short time in 1663. These 1 INTRODUCTION correspondents must therefore have been known to him during his stay in Amsterdam, and what is known about them helps to throw some light on this obscure period in Spinoza's life-history. They were Pieter Balling, Jarig Jelles, Dirck Kerckrinck, Lodewijk Meyer, Simon Joosten de Vries, and Jan Rieuwertsz.
Pieter Balling had acted for some time as the representa tive or agent of various Spanish merchants. And it is just possible that Spinoza's knowledge of Spanish first brought him into touch with him. Balling was a Mennonite, and a pronounced enemy of dogmatism. In 1662 he published a book entitled The Light on the Candlestick, in which he attacked religion based on stereotyped dogmas, and advo cated a religion, partly rationalistic, partly mystical, based on the inward light of the soul. The whole spirit of the book might be summed up in the familiar lines of Matthew Arnold: " These hundred doctors try To preach thee to their school. We have the truth, they cry.
And yet their oracle, Trumpet it as they will, is but the same as thine.
" Once read thy own breast right, And thou has done with fears. Man gets no other light, Search he a thousand years. Sink in thyself: there ask what ails thee, at that shrine."
In 1664 he translated into Dutch Spinoza's version of Descartes' Principia. In a letter written in the same year, we see Spinoza trying to console Balling on the loss of his child, and dealing tenderly with Balling's " premonitions " of his impending loss.
Jarig Jelles was at one time a spice-merchant in Amster dam, but feeling that " knowledge is better than choice gold, that wisdom is better than rubies, and all the things THE LIFE OF SPINOZA li that may be desired are not to be compared to her/' he left his business in the charge of a manager, and devoted him self to study. He wrote a book to show that Cartesianism did not lead to atheism, but was, on the contrary, quite compatible with the Christian religion. Spinoza seems to have helped him in the composition of this book. Jelles was one of the friends who persuaded Spinoza to publish his version of Descartes' Principia, and even defrayed the cost of its publication. He also took an active share in the publication of Spinoza's posthumous works, the preface to which is so similar in tone to the book of Jelles that he is regarded as its author by some very competent authorities.
Dirck Kerckrinck was seven years younger than Spinoza, whom he first met at Van den Enden's school (? 1652-6). He studied medicine, and became the author of various medical treatises. Colerus relates some gossip to the effect that Spinoza and Kerckrinck were rivals for the hand of Clara Maria, the gifted daughter of Van den Enden, and that she accepted Kerckrinck because he was rich, while Spinoza was poor. But as Clara Maria was born in 1644, this very natural attempt to introduce a touch of romance into Spinoza's life of single blessedness is an utter failure. Clara Maria was barely sixteen when Spinoza left Amster dam for good in 1660, and he had ceased to be her father's pupil in 1654 or, at the latest, in 1656. As an inmate in her father's house he may have been fond of her as a mere child, and some expression of endearment uttered in that sense probably gave rise to this pretty tale. It is true, how ever, that Kerckrinck did marry her in 1671, as already mentioned. Spinoza possessed several of the medical works of Kerckrinck, who had, no doubt, sent them to him as an old friend of his.
Lodewijk Meyer was a medical practitioner in Amsterdam. He was about two years older than Spinoza, and a man of versatile talents. He had studied not only medicine but Hi INTRODUCTION also philosophy and theology, made his bid as poet and dramatist, lexicographer and stage -manager, and was the moving spirit in a certain literary society, the name and motto of which was (as we need scarcely be surprised to hear) Nil volentibus arduum. It was he who wrote the interesting preface to Spinoza's version of Descartes' Principia.
Simon Joosten de Vries was an Amsterdam merchant.
He was only about a year younger than Spinoza, though his attitude towards Spinoza was always that of a humble disciple. He studied medicine under the direction of Spinoza, and his attachment to Spinoza is evident from a letter of his written in 1663, after Spinoza had left Amster dam. " For a long time," he writes, " I have been longing to be with you; but the weather and the hard winter have not been propitious to me. Sometimes I complain of my lot in being removed from you by a distance which separates us so much. Happy, most happy, is your companion Casearius, who lives with you under the same roof, and who can converse with you on the most excellent topics during dinner, or supper, or on your walks. But although we are so far apart in the body, yet you have constantly been present to my mind, especially when I take your writings in my hand, and apply myself to them." In the same letter he reports about a philosophical society for the study of Spinoza's philosophy, as communicated to de Vries and others in manuscript form, and asks for further elucidation of some difficult points. The sincerity and extent of his devotion was further shown by his offer of a gift of 2000 florins to Spinoza, which was, however, declined. Later on, Simon de Vries, whose health was even less satisfactory than Spinoza's, feeling that his end was drawing nigh, desired to make Spinoza his heir. Again the philosopher dissuaded him, urging the prior claims of the testator's own kindred. On the death of Simon de Vries his brother THE LIFE OF SPINOZA liii offered to Spinoza an annuity of 500 florins, but Spinoza declined to take more than 300 florins.
Jan Rieuwertsz was a bookseller at Amsterdam, and some fifteen years older than Spinoza. He was a Collegiant, and very liberal in his views. His shop enjoyed the evil reputation of being the seat of scoffers. He published and stocked the works of many authors of unorthodox repute, including those of Descartes, Balling, Jelles, and Spinoza. His son also was a devoted admirer of Spinoza.
Such were some of the men with whom Spinoza stood in friendly relationship during his last years in Amsterdam. Further details are wanting. Possibly he had given private tuition to Simon de Vries (who speaks of him as " master "), Balling, and others; or he may have held some kind of seminar or class for the informal discussion of religious and philosophical questions. If so, the substance of his Meta physical Thoughts (which were subsequently appended to his version of Descartes' Principia) and of his Short Treatise on God, Man and his Well-being must have been elaborated during these years, and for these purposes. This would also account for the continuation or revival of similar meetings for the discussion of Spinoza's views, as reported in the letter of Simon de Vries.
Little as is known of these years, there can be no doubt that they were years of storm and stress in the mental history of Spinoza. This much may be gathered from the impres sive pages with which he opens his Treatise on the Improve ment of the Understanding.
" After experience had taught me [so he writes] that all things which are ordinarily encountered in common life are vain and futile, and when I saw that all things which occasioned me any anxiety or fear had in themselves nothing of good or evil, except in so far as the mind was moved by them; I at length determined to inquire if there were anything which was a true good capable of im parting itself, and by which alone the mind could be affected to the liv INTRODUCTION exclusion of all else; whether, indeed, anything existed by the dis covery and acquisition of which I might have continuous and supreme joy to all eternity, I say that / at length determined: for at first sight it seemed unwise to be willing to let go something certain for something that was yet uncertain. I saw, forsooth, the advantages which are derived from honour and riches, and that I should be obliged to abstain from the quest of these if I wished to give serious application to something different and new: and if, perchance, supreme happiness should lie in them, I saw clearly that I should have to do without it; but if, on the other hand, it did not lie in them, and I applied myself only to them, then I should also have to go without the highest happiness. I, therefore, re volved in my mind whether, perchance, it would not be possible to arrive at the new plan of life, or, at least, some certainty about it, without any change in the order and usual plan of my life, a thing which I have often attempted in vain. Now the things which one mostly meets with in life, and which, so far as one may gather from their actions, men esteem as the highest good, are reducible to these three, namely, riches, honour, and pleasure. By these three the mind is so distracted that it can scarcely think of any other good...When, therefore, I saw that all these things stood in the way of my applying myself to any new plan of life; in fact, that they were so opposed to it that one must necessarily abstain either from the one or from the other, I was forced to inquire which would be the more useful to me; for, as I have already said, I seemed to be willing to let go a sure good for something uncertain.
But after brooding a little over this subject I found, in the first place, that if I let go those things and devoted myself to the new plan of life I should be letting go a good uncertain by its very nature...for one which was uncertain, not in its nature...but only as regards its attainment. After unremitting reflection I came to see that, if I could only make up my mind thoroughly, then I should give up sure evils for a sure good...Not with out reason did I use the words, if I could only make up my mind thoroughly. For although I saw this so clearly in my mind, yet I could not thus put aside all avarice, sensuous pleasure, and the desire for fame. This one thing I saw, that so long as my mind revolved these thoughts, so long, did it turn away from those things, and consixjer seripusly the new plan of life. This was.a great comfort THE LIFE OF SPINOZA Iv to me...And although at first these periods were rare and only of very brief duration, yet as the true good gradually became better known to me so these periods grew more frequent and longer."
The above " confession" was written by Spinoza in 1661. The inner struggle between worldly allurements and the beck of the spirit was over then. Indeed already his earlier work, the Short Treatise, which was completed in 1660, bears unmistakable evidence of the peace which crowned that inward conflict. This conflict must therefore be referred to the years immediately preceding 1660. His last years in Amsterdam, when he made his first acquaintance with real life and the struggle for existence, must have brought home to him often enough the desirableness of worldly goods, and the hardships of poverty and obscurity. After all, he was human, and he could scarcely escape the common lot of mortals — the conflict between the two souls which dwell in mortal breast. But Spinoza was not given to speak about himself. He lifts but a corner of the veil, behind which we may well conjecture scenes of storm and stress during the period intervening between his excommunication in 1656 and his departure from Amsterdam in 1660. Early in that year, weary of the whir and the worldliness of that com mercial centre, he went to dwell among unworldly folk with old-world virtues in an out-of-the-world village — Rijnsburg. He withdrew from the madding crowd, but not in disgust or misanthropy. He had caught a glimpse of the highest good of man, and he wanted to strengthen his hold thereon under more favourable conditions. He had discovered that the sorrows of man "arise from the love of the transient," while "love for an object eternal and infinite feeds the mind with unmixed joy, free from all sorrow."
Ivi INTRODUCTION Rijnsburg is a village some six or seven miles north-west of Leyden. Its modest cottages, narrow lanes, quiet water ways, and quaint medieval church still present an old-world appearance very much as in the days of Spinoza — except, of course, for the clumsy, though convenient, steam-trams which pass by on their way to and from Leyden and Katwijk — or Noordwijk-aan-Zee. Within easy walking dis tance from it, on the road to Leyden, is Endgeest, a nice rural little place where Descartes once stayed for a number of years, but now noted chiefly for its lunatic asylum.
During the seventeenth century Rijnsburg was the head quarters of the Collegiants. This sect, whose origin has already been explained above, repudiated infant baptism, and insisted on adult baptism by immersion. And Rijnsburg, on the old Rhein, was their place of baptism. That was the reason why the Collegiants were also commonly called the " Rijnsburgers." Now Spinoza, as we have seen, numbered several Collegiants among his friends, and it was probably on the suggestion of one of his Collegiant friends that he went to live there. At all events, early in the year 1660 he seems to have taken up his quarters there, probably with a surgeon of the name Hermann Homan, in a newly built little cottage standing in a narrow lane, which has since then come to be known as Spinoza Lane. Some time after wards, apparently, the landlord's pious humanitarianism led him to inscribe or to have inscribed on a stone in the cottage wall the well-meant message expressed in the concluding stanza of Kamphuyzen's May Morning: " Alas! if all men would be wise, And would be good as well, The Earth would be a Paradise, Now it is mostly Hell."
THE LIFE OF SPINOZA Ivii And it was by this inscription that, on the authority of an old tradition, the cottage has been identified. It is still in existence, and is still surrounded by open fields rich in garden produce and bulbs. Restored, and equipped with all that diligent search could find and that money could procure in the way of things interesting to students of Spinoza, the cottage is now known as the Spinoza-huis or Spinoza Museum, and serves as a kind of shrine sacred to the memory of the philosopher, and many pilgrims bend their footsteps there to pay homage to a profound mind and lofty character, and feel something of his calm of mind in that haunt of ancient peace.
One reason which prompted Spinoza to seek a quiet retreat was probably the desire to write down his thoughts in some systematic form. Dissatisfied with the Scholastic philosophy still in vogue then, he and his friends had turned eagerly to the writings of Descartes. The opposition of the strict Calvinists to the Cartesian philosophy rather tended to recommend it to the Remonstrants (including the Collegiants), and, indeed, to all who had suffered from, or were opposed to, the religious intolerance of the dominant Reformed Church. The cry for impartiality and an open mind in the interpretation of Scripture was felt to have a certain kinship with the Cartesian method of philosophising, his preliminary doubt of whatever could be reasonably disputed. Hence there was a gradual coalition between liberal religion and Cartesian philosophy. Spinoza's friends were mostly Cartesians, and remained such to the end. Whether Spinoza himself was ever a thoroughgoing Cartesian is not known. That Descartes' writings exercised a very potent influence on Spinoza there is no doubt what ever. By 1660, however, Spinoza had already outgrown the fundamentals of Cartesian Metaphysics, though he still con tinued to follow Descartes in his Physics. Now we have already remarked that, during his last years in Amsterdam, Iviii INTRODUCTION Spinoza seems to have acted as teacher or leader of a small philosophical circle. Its members, including Spinoza him self, were primarily interested in religious questions at first.
They approached philosophy from the side of religion, and only in so far as religious problems led up to philosophical considerations. God and His attributes, Nature and Crea tion, Man and his Well-being, the nature of the Human Mind and the Immortality of the Soul — these were the topics which chiefly interested them, and on which, we may assume, Spinoza had accumulated various notes for those informal talks with them. These notes he wanted to elaborate and to systematise. This was the first task which occupied him at Rijnsburg, and it resulted in the Short Treatise on God, Man and his Well-being. But he continued to keep in touch with his Amsterdam friends and sent them the parts of the manuscript as he completed them. Though Cartesian in appearance, and partly also in substance, the Short Treatise, Spinoza's very first philosophical essay, already marks a definite departure from the philosophy of Descartes, in its identification of God with Nature, and its consequent determinism and naturalism. Spinoza himself fully realised the extent of his deviation from Descartes, and the novelty of his views even as compared with the novelties of Cartesianism, which was at that time " the new philo sophy " par excellence. So he begged his friends not to be impatient with his novel views, but to consider them carefully, remembering that "a thing does not therefore cease to be true because it is not accepted by many."
He also realised that some of these views were liable to prove rather dangerous to minds more eager for novelty than for truth. He was therefore careful about the kind of people to whom he communicated his views, and also begged his trusted friends to be careful likewise. Caution was also necessary on account of the unremitting vigilance of heretic-hunters.
[Conclusion of Spinoza's letter to Oldenburg. October 1661. S« p. cxxiii.]
THE LIFE OF SPINOZA Ixi "As the character of the age in which we live [Spinoza adds] is not unknown to you, I would beg of you most earnestly to be very careful about the communication of these things to others. I do not want to say that you should absolutely keep them to yourselves, but only that if ever you wish to communicate them to others, then you shall have no other object in view except only the happiness of your neighbour; being at the same time clearly assured that the reward of your labour will not disappoint you therein."
Having finished the first draft of his Short Treatise Spinoza felt that he had attacked all the great problems of religion and of philosophy, without any preliminary account of the requirements of philosophic method, without any adequate justification of his own mode of treatment. To this problem, accordingly, he turned his attention next, and began his Treatise on the Improvement of the Under standing. In a letter dated October 1661, in reply to some questions of Henry Oldenburg, Spinoza states that he had written a complete little treatise on the origin of things, and their relation to the first cause, and also on the improvement of the understanding, and that he was actually busy just then copying and correcting it. It would appear from this that Spinoza's intention at that time may have been to combine the Short Treatise and the Treatise on the Improve ment of the Understanding. What actually happened, how ever, is not quite certain. The editors of Spinoza's posthumous works only had a fragment of the Treatise on the Improvement of the Understanding, and apparently nothing of the Short Treatise, of which we only possess at present two Dutch versions, discovered about 1860. The editors of the Opera Posthuma say that the Treatise on the Improvement of the Understanding was one of Spinoza's earliest works, and that he had never finished it, but they appear to be uncertain whether it was only want of time or the inherent difficulties of the subject which prevented him from finishing it.
Ixii INTRODUCTION