Routledge History of Philosophy Volume IV

280 RENAISSANCE AND SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY RATIONALISM
TP
TTP
Tractatus Politicus
Tractatus Theologico-Politicus
Other works
CSM J.Cottingham, R.Stoothoff and D.Murdoch (eds.) The
Philosophical Writings of Descartes (Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press, 3 vols, 1985, 1991).
NOTES
1 Nicolaus Steno (the Danish scientist Niels Stensen). The phrase occurs in an open
letter published by Stensen in 1675; the original letter had been written four years
previously. (See M.Walther (ed.) Baruch de Spinoza: Briefwechsel (Hamburg,
Meiner, 1977), p. 410.) The text is published as No. 67a of Spinoza’s
correspondence (G iv, 292–8).
2 Wolf son [8.43], vol. I, p. vii.
3 For a brief survey of the dispute, see H.G.Hubbeling, Spinoza (Freiburg/ Münich,
Alber, 1978), pp. 81–2.
4 For this and other valuable information about Spinoza’s youth, see A.M.Vaz Dias
and W.G.van der Tak, Spinoza, Mercator et Autodidactus (The Hague, Nijhoff,
1932), pp. 56ff.
5 For the circumstances of this excommunication, and in particular the relation
between Spinoza and Dr Juan de Prado, see C.Gebhardt, ‘Juan de Prado’,
Chronicon Spinozanum 3 (1923) 269–91; Révah [8.23]; Révah [8.24]; Yirmiyahu
Yovel, Spinoza and other Heretics (Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press,
1989), vol. I, The Marrano of Reason, pp. 57–83.
6 Thijssen-Schoute [8.27], 210.
7 Révah [8.23], 43. On the libertins, see A.Adam, Les libertins an 17e siècle (Paris,
Buchet/Chastel, 1964: a selection of texts), and Popkin [8.22], 87–109.
8 Jarig Jelles, Preface to Spinoza’s Posthumous Works. See C.Gebhardt, Spinoza:
Lebensbeschreibungen und Gespräche (Leipzig, Meiner, 1914), p. 3. On the
Mennonite Jelles, cf. Siebrand [8.26], 25, 35–49.
9 Révah [8.23], 31–2, 36.
10 See Ep 6 (G iv, 36); also Joachim [8.45], 5–7, 14–15.
11 A useful summary of scholarly discussions of this work may be found in Curley [8.
4], 46–53.
12 KV I, 3.
13 Cogitata Metaphysica, II, 12 (G i, 279); cf. Gueroult [8.55], 245n.
14 KV I, 8–9; E I P29S; cf. Gueroult [8.55], 564, and note 71 below.
15 It is hardly necessary to add that Descartes, too, sometimes used scholastic
terminology. On Spinoza’s use of the works of Heereboord, see H.de Dijn,
‘Historical Remarks on Spinoza’s Theory of Definition’, in J.G.van der Bend (ed.)
Spinoza on Knowing, Being and Freedom (Assen, Van Gorcum, 1974), pp. 41–50.
16 Ep 13 (G iv, 63).