![]() The opening page of Ethics, in the posthumous Latin first edition | |
Author | Baruch Spinoza |
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Language | Latin |
Genre | Philosophy |
Publication date | 1677 |
Publication place | Dutch Republic |
Original text | Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order at Latin Wikisource |
Translation | Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order at Wikisource |
Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order (Latin: Ethica, ordine geometrico demonstrata), usually known as the Ethics, is a philosophical treatise written in Latin by Baruch Spinoza (Benedictus de Spinoza). It was written between 1661 and 1675[1] and was first published posthumously in 1677.
The book is perhaps the most ambitious attempt to apply Euclid's method in philosophy. Spinoza puts forward a small number of definitions and axioms from which he attempts to derive hundreds of propositions and corollaries, such as "When the Mind imagines its own lack of power, it is saddened by it",[2] "A free man thinks of nothing less than of death",[3] and "The human Mind cannot be absolutely destroyed with the Body, but something of it remains which is eternal."[4]