Baruch Spinoza

“Nothing in nature is contingent, but all things are from the necessity of the divine nature determined to exist and act in a certain way.”

“I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them.”

“All things excellent are as difficult as they are rare.”

“Desire is the very essence of man.”

“Do not be astonished at new ideas; for it is well known to you that a thing does not therefore cease to be true because it is not accepted by many.”

“If you want the present to be different from the past, study the past.”

“Whatsoever is, is in God, and without God nothing can be, or be conceived.”

“Men are deceived in thinking themselves free, a belief that consists only in this, that they are conscious of their actions and ignorant of the causes by which they are determined.”

“Peace is not an absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice.”

“There is no hope without fear, and no fear without hope.”

“God is the indwelling and not the transient cause of all things.”

“Will and intellect are one and the same.”

“The more clearly you understand yourself and your emotions, the more you become a lover of what is.”

“The highest activity a human being can attain is learning for understanding, because to understand is to be free.”

“Happiness is a virtue, not its reward.”

“Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it.”

“The endeavor to understand is the first and only basis of virtue.”

“Pride is pleasure arising from a man's thinking too highly of himself.”