BENEDICT DE SPINOZA: Theological-Political Treatise

The Hebrew state in the time of Moses
There is no need to survey all of this here, as everyone knows what
wrongdoing people are often moved to commit because they cannot stand
their present situation and desire a major upheaval, how blind anger and
resentment of their poverty prompt men to act, and how much these
things occupy and agitate their minds.To anticipate all this and construct
a state that a¡ords no opportunity for trouble-making, to organize everything
in such a way that each person, of whatever character, prefers
public right to private advantage, this is the real task, this the arduous
work. 3 The necessity for this has compelled people to seek many stratagems.
But they have never succeeded in devising a form of government
that was not in greater danger from its own citizens than from foreign foes,
and which was not more fearful of the former than of the latter.
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[5] An example of this is the Roman state, wholly undefeated by its
enemies, but so often overwhelmed and wretchedly oppressed by its own
citizens, especially in the civil war of Vespasian against Vitellius; on this
seeTacitus, at the beginning of book 4 of the Histories, where he paints a
most miserable picture of the city. Alexander, more simply, (as Curtius
says at the end of book 8) rested his reputation on his enemies’ judgment
rather than that of his own citizens, believing his greatness could be
more readily ruined by his own men, etc. 4 Fearing his fate, he makes this
prayer to his friends: ‘Only keep me safe from internal treachery and the
plots of my court, and I will face without fear the dangers of war and
battle. Philip was safer in the battle line than in the theatre; he often
escaped the violence of the enemy, he could not avoid that of his own
citizens. Look at the ends of other kings, you will ¢nd that they were
more often killed by their own people than by the foe’ (see Quintus
Curtius, 9.6). 5
[6] This is why in the past kings who usurped power tried to persuade
their people they were descended from the immortal gods, their motive
surely being to enhance their own security. They evidently believed their
subjects would willingly allow themselves to be ruled by them and readily
submit only if their subjects and everyone else regarded them not as
equals but as gods. Thus, Augustus persuaded the Romans that he
3 Virgil, Aeneid, 6.129.
4 Quintus Curtius, History of Alexander, 8.14.46.
5 Quintus Curtius, History of Alexander, 9.6.25^6.
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