Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers. Watts JohnЧитать онлайн книгу.
to it. But by modification they would understand that which is in another thing, the conception of which is formed by the conception of the thing in which it is, or to which it belongs. We can have, therefore, correct ideas of non-existent modifications, because, although out of the understanding they have no reality, yet their essence is so comprehended in that of another, that they can be conceived through this other. The truth of substance (out of the understanding) lies nowhere but in itself, because it is conceived per se. If therefore any one says he has a clear idea of substance, and yet doubt whether such substance exist, this would be as much as to say that he has a true idea, and nevertheless doubts whether it be not false (as a little attention sufficiently manifests;) or if any man affirms substance to be created, he at the same time affirms that a true idea has become false, than which nothing can be more absurd. Hence it is necessarily confessed that the existence of substance, as well as its essence, is an eternal truth. And hence we must conclude that there is only one substance possessing the same attribute, which requires here a fuller development. I note therefore – 1. That the correct definition of a thing includes and expresses nothing but the nature of the thing defined. From which follows – 2. That no definition includes or expresses a distinct number of individuals, because it expresses nothing but the nature of the thing defined; ergo, the definition of a triangle expresses no more than the nature of a triangle, and not any fixed number of triangles. 3. There must necessarily be a distinct cause for the existence of every existing thing. 4. This cause, by reason of which anything exists, must either be contained in the nature and definition of the existing thing (viz., that it pertains to its nature to exist,) or else must be beyond it – must be something different from it.
"As therefore it pertains to the nature of substance to exist, so must its definition include a necessary existence, and consequently from its sole definition we must conclude its existence. But as from its definition, as already shown in notes two and three, it is not possible to conclude the existence of many substances —ergo, it necessarily follows that only one substance of the same nature can exist."
It will be necessary for the reader to remember that Spinoza commenced his philosophical studies at the same point with Descartes. Both recognized existence as the primal fact, self-evident and indisputable.
But while Descartes had, in some manner, fashioned a quality – God and God-created substance – Spinoza only found one, substance, the definition of which included existence. By his fourth proposition ("of things which have nothing in common, one cannot be the cause of the other, ") he destroyed the creation theory, because by that theory God is assumed to be a spirit having nothing in common with matter, yet acting on matter; and Lewes speaks of the fourth proposition in the following terms: – "This fallacy has been one of the most influential corrupters of philosophical speculation. For many years it was undisputed, and most metaphysicians still adhere to it. The assertion is that only like can act upon like; but although it is true that like produces (causes) like, it is also true that like produces unlike; thus fire produces pain when applied to our bodies; explosion when applied to gunpowder; charcoal when applied to wood; all these effects are unlike the cause." We cannot help thinking that in this instance, the usually thoughtful Lewes has either confused substance with its modes, or, for the sake of producing a temporary effect, has descended to mere sophism. Spinoza's proposition is, that substances having nothing in common, cannot act on one another. Lewes deals with several modes of the same substance as though they were different substances. Way, more, to make his argument the more plausible, he entirely ignores in it that noumenon of which he speaks as underlying all phenomena, and uses each phenomenon as a separate existence. In each of the instances mentioned, however varied may be the modification, the essence is the same. They are merely examples of one portion of the whole acting upon another portion, and there is that in each mode which is common to the whole, and by means of which the action takes place.
Much has been said of Spinoza's "God" and "Divine Substance," and we must refer the reader to Definition Six, in which God is defined as being "infinite substance." Now, although we should be content to strike the word "God" out of our own tablet of philosophical nomenclature, as being a much misused, misrepresented, and entirely useless word, yet we must be very careful, when we find another man using the word, to get his precise definition, and not to use any-other ourselves while in his company.
Spinoza, when asked "What name do you attach to infinite substance?" says, "God." – If he had said any other word we could not have quarrelled with him so long as he defined the word, and adhered strictly to the terms of his definition, although we might regret that he had not either coined a word for himself, or used one less maltreated by the mass. Spinoza said, "I can only take cognizance of one substance (of which I am part) having infinite attributes of extension and thought. I take cognizance of substance by its modes, and in my consciousness of existence. Every thing is a mode of the attribute of extension, every thought, wish, or feeling, a mode of the attribute of thought. I call this, substance, with infinite attributes, God." Spinoza, like all other thinkers, found himself overpowered by the illimitable vastness of the infinite when attempting to grasp it by his mental powers, but unlike other men he did not endeavor to relieve himself by separating himself from that infinite; but, knowing he was a part of the whole, not divisible from the remainder, he was content to aim at perfecting his knowledge of existence rather than at dogmatising upon an indefinable word, which, if it represented anything, professed to represent an incomprehensible existence far beyond his reach.
We ought not to wonder that in many parts of Spinoza's writings we find the word "God" treated in a less coherent manner than would be possible under the definition given in his "Ethics," and for these reasons: – Spinoza, from his cradle upwards, had been surrounded with books and traditions sanctified by the past, and impressed on his willing mind by his family, his tutors, and the heads of his church; a mind like his gathered all that was given, even more quickly than it was offered, still craving for more – "more light" – "more light" – and at last light came bursting on the young thinker like a lightning flash at dark midnight, revealing his mind in chains, which had been cast round him in his nursery, his school, his college, his synagogue. By a mighty effort he burst these chains, and walked forth a free man, despite the entreaties of his family, the reasonings of the rabbis, the knife of the fanatic, the curse of his church, and the edict of the state. But should it be a matter of surprise to us that some of the links of those broken chains should still hang on the young philosopher, and, seeming to be a part of himself, almost imperceptibly incline to old ways of thinking, and to old modes of utterance of those thoughts! Wonder not that a few links bang about him, but rather that he ever succeeded in breaking those chains at all. Spinoza, after his secession from his synagogue, became logically an Atheist; education and early impressions enlarged this into a less clearly-defined Pantheism; but the logic comes to us naked, disrobed of all by which it might have been surrounded in Spinoza's mind. If that logic be correct, then all the theologies of the world are false. We have presented it to the reader to judge of for himself. Many men have written against it; of these some have misunderstood, some have misrepresented, some have failed, and few have left us a proof that they had endeavored to deal with Spinoza on his own ground. Maccall says, "In the glorious throng of heroic names, there are few nobler than Spinoza's. Apart altogether from the estimate we may form of his philosophy, there is something unspeakably interesting in the life and the character of the man. In his metaphysical system there are two things exceedingly distinct. There is, first, the immense and prodigious, but terrible mathematical skeleton, which his subtle intellect binds up and throws as calmly into space as we drop a pebble into the water, and whose bones, striking against the wreck of all that is sacred in belief, or bold in speculation, rattle a wild response to our wildest phantasies, and drive us almost to think in despair that thinking is madness; and there is, secondly, the divinest vision of the infinite, and the divinest incense which the intuition of the infinite ever yet poured forth at the altar of creation."
The "Treatise on Politics" is not Spinoza's greatest work; it is, in all respects, inferior to the "Ethics," and to the "Theologico-Political Treatise." But there are in politics certain eternal principles, and it is for setting forth and elucidating these that the Treatise of Spinoza is so valuable.
In the second chapter of that Treatise, after defining what he means by nature, etc., he, on the sixth section, proceeds as follows: – "But many believe that the