The Ethics by Benedictus de Spinoza (most important books of all time .txt) 📖

beloved object, conceives the beloved thing as

affected by hatred, in other words (III. xiii.), by pain ;

consequently he is himself affected by pain accompanied by the

idea of the hater of the beloved thing as cause ; that is, he

will hate him who hates anything which he himself loves (III.

xiii. note). Q.E.D.

 

PROP. XLVI. If a man has been affected pleasurably or painfully

by anyone, of a class or nation different from his own, and if

the pleasure or pain has been accompanied by the idea of the said

stranger as cause, under the general category of the class or

nation : the man will feel love or hatred, not only to the

individual stranger, but also to the whole class or nation

whereto he belongs.

Proof.-This is evident from III. xvi.

 

PROP. XLVII. Joy arising from the fact, that anything we hate is

destroyed, or suffers other injury, is never unaccompanied by a

certain pain in us.

Proof.-This is evident from III. xxvii. For in so far as we

conceive a thing similar to ourselves to be affected with pain,

we ourselves feel pain.

Note.-This proposition can also be proved from the Corollary

to II. xvii. Whenever we remember anything, even if it does not

actually exist, we regard it only as present, and the body is

affected in the same manner ; wherefore, in so far as the

remembrance of the thing is strong, a man is determined to regard

it with pain ; this determination, while the image of the thing

in question lasts, is indeed checked by the remembrance of other

things excluding the existence of the aforesaid thing, but is not

destroyed : hence, a man only feels pleasure in so far as the

said determination is checked : for this reason the joy arising

from the injury done to what we hate is repeated, every time we

remember that object of hatred. For, as we have said, when the

image of the thing in question, is aroused, inasmuch as it

involves the thing’s existence, it determines the man to regard

the thing with the same pain as he was wont to do, when it

actually did exist. However, since he has joined to the image of

the thing other images, which exclude its existence, this

determination to pain is forthwith checked, and the man rejoices

afresh as often as the repetition takes place. This is the cause

of men’s pleasure in recalling past evils, and delight in

narrating dangers from which they have escaped. For when men

conceive a danger, they conceive it as still future, and are

determined to fear it ; this determination is checked afresh by

the idea of freedom, which became associated with the idea of the

danger when they escaped therefrom : this renders them secure

afresh : therefore they rejoice afresh.

 

PROP. XLVIII. Love or hatred towards, for instance, Peter is

destroyed, if the pleasure involved in the former, or the pain

involved in the latter emotion, be associated with the idea of

another cause : and will be diminished in proportion as we

conceive Peter not to have been the sole cause of either emotion.

Proof.-This Prop. is evident from the mere definition of love

and hatred (III. xiii. note). For pleasure is called love

towards Peter, and pain is called hatred towards Peter, simply in

so far as Peter is regarded as the cause of one emotion or the

other. When this condition of causality is either wholly or

partly removed, the emotion towards Peter also wholly or in part

vanishes. Q.E.D.

 

PROP. XLIX. Love or hatred towards a thing, which we conceive to

be free, must, other conditions being similar, be greater than if

it were felt towards a thing acting by necessity.

Proof.-A thing which we conceive as free must (I. Def. vii.)

be perceived through itself without anything else. If,

therefore, we conceive it as the cause of pleasure or pain, we

shall therefore (III. xiii. note) love it or hate it, and shall

do so with the utmost love or hatred that can arise from the

given emotion. But if the thing which causes the emotion be

conceived as acting by necessity, we shall then (by the same Def.

vii. Part I.) conceive it not as the sole cause, but as one of

the causes of the emotion, and therefore our love or hatred

towards it will be less. Q.E.D.

Note.-Hence it follows, that men, thinking themselves to be

free, feel more love or hatred towards one another than towards

anything else : to this consideration we must add the imitation

of emotions treated of in III. xxvii., xxxiv., xl. and xliii.

 

PROP. L. Anything whatever can be, accidentally, a cause of hope

or fear.

Proof.-This proposition is proved in the same way as III.

xv., which see, together with the note to III. xviii.

Note.-Things which are accidentally the causes of hope or

fear are called good or evil omens. Now, in so far as such omens

are the cause of hope or fear, they are (by the definitions of

hope and fear given in III. xviii. note) the causes also of

pleasure and pain ; consequently we, to this extent, regard them

with love or hatred, and endeavour either to invoke them as means

towards that which we hope for, or to remove them as obstacles,

or causes of that which we fear. It follows, further, from III.

xxv., that we are naturally so constituted as to believe readily

in that which we hope for, and with difficulty in that which we

fear ; moreover, we are apt to estimate such objects above or

below their true value. Hence there have arisen superstitions,

whereby men are everywhere assailed. However, I do not think it

worth while to point out here the vacillations springing from

hope and fear ; it follows from the definition of these emotions,

that there can be no hope without fear, and no fear without hope,

as I will duly explain in the proper place. Further, in so far

as we hope for or fear anything, we regard it with love or hatred

; thus everyone can apply by himself to hope and fear what we

have said concerning love and hatred.

 

PROP. LI. Different men may be differently affected by the same

object, and the same man may be differently affected at different

times by the same object.

Proof.-The human body is affected by external bodies in a

variety of ways (II. Post. iii.). Two men may therefore be

differently affected at the same time, and therefore (by Ax. i.

after Lemma iii. after II. xiii.) may be differently affected by

one and the same object. Further (by the same Post.) the human

body can be affected sometimes in one way, sometimes in another ;

consequently (by the same Axiom) it may be differently affected

at different times by one and the same object. Q.E.D.

Note.-We thus see that it is possible, that what one man

loves another may hate, and that what one man fears another may

not fear ; or, again, that one and the same man may love what he

once hated, or may be bold where he once was timid, and so on.

Again, as everyone judges according to his emotions what is good,

what bad, what better, and what worse (III. xxxix. note), it

follows that men’s judgments may vary no less than their

emotions10, hence when we compare some with others, we

distinguish them solely by the diversity of their emotions, and

style some intrepid, others timid, others by some other epithet.

For instance, I shall call a man intrepid, if he despises an evil

which I am accustomed to fear ; if I further take into

consideration, that, in his desire to injure his enemies and to

benefit those whom he loves, he is not restrained by the fear of

an evil which is sufficient to restrain me, I shall call him

daring. Again, a man will appear timid to me, if he fears an

evil which I am accustomed to despise ; and if I further take

into consideration that his desire is restrained by the fear of

an evil, which is not sufficient to restrain me, I shall say that

he is cowardly ; and in like manner will everyone pass judgment.

Lastly, from this inconstancy in the nature of human

judgment, inasmuch as a man often judges things solely by his

emotions, and inasmuch as the things which he believes cause

pleasure or pain, and therefore endeavours to promote or prevent,

are often purely imaginary, not to speak of the uncertainty of

things alluded to in III. xxviii. ; we may readily conceive that

a man may be at one time affected with pleasure, and at another

with pain, accompanied by the idea of himself as cause. Thus we

can easily understand what are Repentance and Self-complacency.

Repentance is pain, accompanied by the idea of one’s self as

cause ; Self-complacency is pleasure, accompanied by the idea of

one’s self as cause, and these emotions are most intense because

men believe themselves to be free (III. xlix.).

 

PROP. LII. An object which we have formerly seen in conjunction

with others, and which we do not conceive to have any property

that is not common to many, will not be regarded by us for so

long, as an object which we conceive to have some property

peculiar to itself.

Proof.-As soon as we conceive an object which we have seen in

conjunction with others, we at once remember those others (II.

xviii. and note), and thus we pass forthwith from the

contemplation of one object to the contemplation of another

object. And this is the case with the object, which we conceive

to have no property that is not common to many. For we thereupon

assume that we are regarding therein nothing, which we have not

before seen in conjunction with other objects. But when we

suppose that we conceive an object something special, which we

have never seen before, we must needs say that the mind, while

regarding that object, has in itself nothing which it can fall to

regarding instead thereof ; therefore it is determined to the

contemplation of that object only. Therefore an object, &c.

Q.E.D.

Note.-This mental modification, or imagination of a

particular thing, in so far as it is alone in the mind, is called

Wonder ; but if it be excited by an object of fear, it is called

Consternation, because wonder at an evil keeps a man so engrossed

in the simple contemplation thereof, that he has no power to

think of anything else whereby he might avoid the evil. If,

however, the object of wonder be a man’s prudence, industry, or

anything of that sort, inasmuch as the said man, is thereby

regarded as far surpassing ourselves, wonder is called Veneration

; otherwise, if a man’s anger, envy, &c., be what we wonder at,

the emotion is called Horror. Again, if it be the prudence,

industry, or what not, of a man we love, that we wonder at, our

love will on this account be the greater (III. xii.), and when

joined to wonder or veneration is called Devotion. We may in

like manner conceive hatred, hope, confidence, and the other

emotions, as associated with wonder ; and we should thus be able

to deduce more emotions than those which have obtained names in

ordinary speech. Whence it is evident, that the names of the

emotions have been applied in accordance rather with their

ordinary manifestations than with an accurate knowledge of their

nature.

To wonder is opposed Contempt, which generally arises from

the fact that, because we see someone wondering at, loving, or

fearing something, or because something, at first sight, appears

to be like things, which we ourselves wonder at, love, fear, &c.,

we are,