Quotes By Baruch Spinoza

I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them.

Peace is not an absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice.

The world would be happier if men had the same capacity to be silent that they have to speak.

Nothing exists from whose nature some effect does not follow.

Happiness is a virtue, not its reward.

Desire is the essence of a man.

True virtue is life under the direction of reason.

To give aid to every poor man is far beyond the reach and power of every man. Care of the poor is incumbent on society as a whole.

Pride is pleasure arising from a man's thinking too highly of himself.

Will and intellect are one and the same thing.

I would warn you that I do not attribute to nature either beauty or deformity, order or confusion. Only in relation to our imagination can things be called beautiful or ugly, well-ordered or confused.

None are more taken in by flattery than the proud, who wish to be the first and are not.

Self-complacency is pleasure accompanied by the idea of oneself as cause.

Do not weep; do not wax indignant. Understand.

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

Sin cannot be conceived in a natural state, but only in a civil state, where it is decreed by common consent what is good or bad.

Ambition is the immoderate desire for power.

All happiness or unhappiness solely depends upon the quality of the object to which we are attached by love.

We feel and know that we are eternal.

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.

Blessedness is not the reward of virtue but virtue itself.

God is the indwelling and not the transient cause of all things.

Peace is not the absence of war, but a virtue based on strength of character.

The greatest pride, or the greatest despondency, is the greatest ignorance of one's self.

Whatsoever is contrary to nature is contrary to reason, and whatsoever is contrary to reason is absurd.

Fear cannot be without hope nor hope without fear.

Fame has also this great drawback, that if we pursue it, we must direct our lives so as to please the fancy of men.

Those who are believed to be most abject and humble are usually most ambitious and envious.

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

I do not know how to teach philosophy without becoming a disturber of established religion.