100 Most Inspiring Quotes by Baruch Spinoza

Along with several other important thinkers, Baruch Spinoza laid the principles of the Enlightenment and of the contemporary ideas regarding the state and democracy. Without losing his spirituality, this 17th century Dutch philosopher of Sephardi/Portuguese origin expressed criticism in the way the Bible used to be interpreted by considering it should be analyzed as an important book of scientific knowledge instead of one of “truth by revelation”.

His work is also important for the adoption of a new human relationship of nature, as he believed that nature is everything. Nowadays, with regard to climate change and the questions posed by it, Spinoza’s quotes acquire a new meaning and can help to bring people and other living creatures closer together in nature.

Short Quotes by Baruch Spinoza

We affirm and deny many things because the nature of words, not the nature of things, makes us to do so.
Peace is not the absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition of benevolence, confidence, justice.
The highest activity a human being can attain is learning for understanding, because to understand is to be free.

No matter how thin you slice it, there will always be two sides.
Apply yourself with real energy to serious work.
If you want the present to be different from the past, study the past.
There is no hope unmingled with fear, and no fear unmingled with hope.
I call him free who is led solely by reason.
Only in relation to our imagination can things be called beautiful or ugly, well-ordered or confused.

The highest activity a human being can attain is learning for understanding, because to understand is to be free. Spinoza.

The superstitious know how to reproach people for their vices better than they know how to teach them virtues, and they strive, not to guide men by reason, but to restrain them by fear, so that they flee the evil rather than love virtues. Such people aim only to make others as wretched as they themselves are, so it is no wonder that they are generally burdensome and hateful to men.
Nature offers nothing that can be called this man’s rather than another’s; but under nature everything belongs to all.
Will and intellect are one and the same thing.
Reason is no match for passion.
The less the mind understands and the more things it perceives, the greater its power of feigning is; and the more things it understands, the more that power is diminished.

Don’t cry and don’t rage. Understand.
The prideful love the company of parasites or flatterers, and hate the company of those of noble spirit.
Rarely do people live by the guidance of reason; instead, we are generally disposed to envy and mutual dislike.
Knowledge of evil is inadequate knowledge.
The real slave lives under the sway of pleasure and can neither see nor do what is for their own good.
Vice will exist so long as people exist.

To understand is to be free.

Spinoza Quotes about Truth

Reason alone has asserted its claim to the realm of truth.
Truth more than anything else has the power to effect a close union between different sentiments and dispositions.
I am at a loss to understand the reasoning whereby it is considered that chance and necessity are not contraries.
A thing does not cease to be true because it is not accepted by many.

We are so constituted by nature that we are ready to believe what we hope and reluctant to believe what we fear.

The investigation of Nature in general is the basis of philosophy.
In demonstrating the truths of Nature does not truth reveal its own self?
Reflection on the deceptiveness of the senses induces doubt.
Reason is in reality the light of the mind, without which the mind sees nothing but dreams and fantasies.
Truth becomes a casualty when in trials attention is paid not to justice or truth but to the extent of a person’s wealth.
Superstition is founded on ignorance.

Freedom is of the first importance in fostering the sciences and the arts.
Everywhere truth becomes a casualty through hostility or servility when despotic power is in the hands of one or few.
We affirm and deny many things because the nature of words, not the nature of things, makes us to do so.

Life Quotes by Baruch Spinoza

Emotional distress and unhappiness have their origin mostly in excessive love toward a thing subject to considerable instability.
Healthy people take pleasure in food and thus enjoy a better life than those who eat to merely avoid death.
The more you struggle to live, the less you live. Give up the notion that you must be sure of what you are doing. Instead, surrender to what is real within you, for that alone is sure….you are above everything distressing.

When a man is prey to his emotions, he is not his own master.
Everything excellent is as difficult as it is rare.
I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them.
The endeavor to understand is the first and only basis of virtue.
Pride is pleasure arising from a man’s thinking too highly of himself.
What Paul says about Peter tells us more about Paul than about Peter.
He alone is free who lives with free consent under the entire guidance of reason.
It is the part of a wise man, I say, to refresh and restore himself in moderation with pleasant food and drink, with scents, with the beauty of green plants, with decoration, music, sports, the theater, and other things of this kind, which anyone can use without injury to another.
Everyone endeavors as much as possible to make others love what he loves, and to hate what he hates… This effort to make everyone approve what we love or hate is in truth ambition, and so we see that each person by nature desires that other persons should live according to his way of thinking.

Rarely do people live by the guidance of reason; instead, we are generally disposed to envy and mutual dislike.
The wise are richest by nobly despising riches instead of greedily pursuing them.
If we could live by reason as much as we are led by blind desire, all would be led by reason and would order their lives wisely.
People possess nothing more excellent than understanding, and can suffer no greater punishment than their folly.
People are quite incapable of distracting their minds from thinking of any other goods besides riches, honor, and sensual pleasure.
Evil is that which hinders a person’s capacity to perfect reason and to enjoy a rational life.

We are correct to call inhuman those who are moved neither by reason nor by pity to render help to others. Spinoza

Desire that arises from reason cannot be excessive.
If someone loves, desires, or hates something as we do, that very fact will cause us to love, desire, or hate it more.

Inspirational Quotes by Baruch Spinoza

The more clearly you understand yourself and your emotions, the more you become a lover of what is.
Those who know the true use of money, and regulate the measure of wealth according to their needs, live contented with few things.

Be not astonished at new ideas; for it is well known to you that a thing does not therefore cease to be true because it is not accepted by many.
In so far as the mind sees things in their eternal aspect, it participates in eternity.
Happiness is not the reward of virtue, but is virtue itself; nor do we delight in happiness because we restrain from our lusts; but on the contrary, because we delight in it, therefore we are able to restrain them.
Extreme pride, or self-abasement, indicates extreme weakness of spirit.
People under the guidance of reason seek nothing for themselves that they would not desire for the rest of humanity.
Hatred is increased by being reciprocated, and can on the other hand be destroyed by love. Hatred which is completely vanquished by love, passes into love; and love is thereupon greater than if hatred had not preceded it.
Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it.
Minds are conquered not by arms, but by love and nobility.
self-preservation is the primary and only foundation of virtue.
Ignorance of true causes makes for total confusion.
The better part of us is in harmony with the order of the whole of Nature.
Conduct that brings about harmony is that which is related to justice, equity, and honorable dealing.

If you want the present to be different from the past, study the past.

Baruch Spinoza Quotes about love

All happiness or unhappiness solely depends upon the quality of the object to which we are attached by love.
Hatred is increased by being reciprocated, and can on the other hand be destroyed by love.
Love is nothing but Joy with the accompanying idea of an external cause (Ethics, part III, proposition 13, scholium).
Marriage agrees with reason if its cause is not merely physical beauty but especially freedom of the spirit.
People’s hearts are conquered not by arms but by love and nobility.
Devotion is love toward one at whom we wonder.

It is in the nature of reason to perceive things in the light of ETERNITY.

Quotes by Baruch Spinoza about God, Eternity and the Universe

Most people parade their own ideas as God’s Word, mainly to compel others to think like them under religious pretexts.
In so far as the mind sees things in their eternal aspect, it participates in eternity.
We feel and experience ourselves to be eternal.
The mind of God is all the mentality that is scattered over space and time, the diffused consciousness that animates the world.
In practical life we are compelled to follow what is most probable ; in speculative thought we are compelled to follow truth.
Outside Nature, which is infinite, there is, and can be, no being.
A miracle–either contrary to Nature or above Nature–is mere absurdity.
In the universe there is only one substance.
God does not exist for an end, and so God does not act for an end.
Nothing exists from whose nature an effect does not follow.
Everyone should be allowed freedom of judgment and the right to interpret the basic tenets of their faith as they think fit.
The eternal part of the mind is the intellect, through which alone we are said to be active.

I do not know how to teach philosophy without becoming a disturber of the peace.

Quotes by Baruch Spinoza about Democracy

Only free people are truly grateful to one another.
In isolation no one has the strength to defend themselves and acquire the necessities of life.
The supreme mystery of despotism, its prop and stay, is to keep men in a state of deception, and with the specious title of religion to cloak the fear by which they must be held in check, so that they will fight for their servitude as if for salvation.
Men are mistaken in thinking themselves free; their opinion is made up of consciousness of their own actions, and ignorance of the causes by which they are determined.
When all decisions are made by a few people who have only themselves to please, freedom and the common good are lost.

The mind is passive only to the extent that it has inadequate or confused ideas.

The ultimate aim of government is not to rule, or restrain by fear, nor to exact obedience, but to free every man from fear that he may live in all possible security. In fact the true aim of government is liberty.
All laws which can be violated without doing any one any injury are laughed at. Nay, so far are they from doing anything to control the desires and passions of men that, on the contrary, they direct and incite men’s thoughts the more toward those very objects, for we always strive toward what is forbidden and desire the things we are not allowed to have. And men of leisure are never deficient in the ingenuity needed to enable them to outwit laws framed to regulate things which cannot be entirely forbidden… He who tries to determine everything by law will foment crime rather than lessen it.
Those who take an oath by law will avoid perjury more if they swear by the welfare & freedom of the state instead of by God.
A society will be more secure, stable & less exposed to fortune, which is founded & governed mainly by people of wisdom and vigilance.
The free person never acts with deceit, but always with good faith.
Those who cannot manage themselves and their private affairs will far less be capable of caring for the public interest.

In adversity there is no counsel so foolish absurd or vain which people will not follow.

The basic purpose of democracy is to keep people rational, as far as possible, in order to live in peace and harmony.
It is far better for the honest policies of a state to be open to enemies than for the guilty secrets of tyrants hidden from citizens.
States must necessarily be created so that all people–both rulers and ruled; willing and unwilling–will act for the common welfare.
An entire people will never transfer its rights to a few people or to one person if they can reach agreement among themselves.

Read More about Baruch Spinoza on Wikipedia