Ethics Quotes
"The essence of man is constituted by certain modifications of the attributes of God."
"God is the one and only cause of all things, both of their essence and of their existence."
"That which is really a cause it considers as an effect, and vice versa."
"The knowledge of an effect depends on and involves the knowledge of a cause."
"Substance is by nature prior to its modifications."
"God acts by the same necessity as that by which he understands himself."
"The actual being of ideas owns God as its cause, only in so far as he is considered as a thinking thing."
"The being of substance does not appertain to the essence of man."
"All things are conditioned by the necessity of the divine nature, not only to exist but also to exist and operate in a particular manner."
"The order and connection of ideas is the same as the order and connection of things."
"Nature's laws and ordinances, whereby all things come to pass and change from one form to another, are everywhere and always the same."
"The emotions of hatred, anger, envy, and so on, considered in themselves, follow from the same necessity and efficacy of nature."
"Mind and body are one and the same thing, conceived first under the attribute of thought, secondly, under the attribute of extension."
"The mind's imaginations, regarded in themselves, do not involve error."
"The body can by the sole laws of its nature do many things which the mind wonders at."
"No one knows how or by what means the mind moves the body."
"The mind is more or less liable to be acted upon, in proportion as it possesses inadequate ideas."
"Every idea of every body, or of every particular thing actually existing, necessarily involves the eternal and infinite essence of God."
"The mind is determined to wish this or that by a cause, which has also been determined by another cause, and this last by another cause, and so on to infinity."
"The doctrine that the mind has absolute control over its actions is a misconception."
"The activities of the mind arise solely from adequate ideas; the passive states of the mind depend solely on inadequate ideas."
"Nothing can be destroyed, except by a cause external to itself."
"Everything, in so far as it is in itself, endeavours to persist in its own being."
"The endeavour, wherewith everything endeavours to persist in its own being, is nothing else but the actual essence of the thing in question."
"The mind, both in so far as it has clear and distinct ideas, and also in so far as it has confused ideas, endeavours to persist in its being for an indefinite period, and of this endeavour it is conscious."
"We strive for, wish for, long for, or desire anything, not because we deem it to be good, but we deem a thing to be good because we strive for it, wish for it, long for it, or desire it."
"Pleasure signifies a passive state wherein the mind passes to a greater perfection."
"Desire is appetite with consciousness thereof."
"Hope is nothing else but an inconstant pleasure, arising from the image of something future or past, whereof we do not yet know the issue."
"Hatred is nothing else but pain accompanied by the idea of an external cause."
"We can easily gather from what has been said, that this depends in great measure on education."
"Pride is thinking too highly of one's self from self—love."
"Self—abasement is thinking too meanly of one's self by reason of pain."
"Honour is pleasure accompanied by the idea of some action of our own, which we believe to be praised by others."
"Shame is pain accompanied by the idea of some action of our own, which we believe to be blamed by others."
"Regret is the desire or appetite to possess something, kept alive by the remembrance of the said thing."
"Thankfulness or Gratitude is the desire springing from love, whereby we endeavour to benefit him, who with similar feelings of love has conferred a benefit on us."
"Benevolence is the desire of benefiting one whom we pity."
"Anger is the desire, whereby through hatred we are induced to injure one whom we hate."
"Revenge is the desire whereby we are induced to injure one who, with similar feelings, has injured us."
"The mind does not express the actual existence of its body, nor does it imagine the modifications of the body as actual, except while the body endures."
"The more this knowledge, that things are necessary, is applied to particular things, the greater is the power of the mind over the emotions."
"The highest virtue of the mind is to know God."
"The mind feels those things that it conceives by understanding, no less than those things that it remembers."
"The intellectual love of God, which arises from the third kind of knowledge, is eternal."
"There is nothing in nature, which is contrary to this intellectual love, or which can take it away."
"Blessedness is not the reward of virtue, but virtue itself."
"The part of the mind which endures, be it great or small, is more perfect than the rest."
"Whence it appears, how potent is the wise man, and how much he surpasses the ignorant man, who is driven only by his lusts."
"For the ignorant man is not only distracted in various ways by external causes without ever gaining the true acquiescence of his spirit, but moreover lives, as it were unwitting of himself, and of God, and of things."
"Whereas the wise man, in so far as he is regarded as such, is scarcely at all disturbed in spirit, but, being conscious of himself, and of God, and of things, by a certain eternal necessity, never ceases to be."
"Needs must it be hard, since it is so seldom found."
"How would it be possible, if salvation were ready to our hand, and could without great labour be found, that it should be by almost all men neglected?"
"But all things excellent are as difficult as they are rare."