Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione et de Via: Qua Optime in Veram Rerum Cognitionem Dirigitur
- 96 pages
- 4 hours of reading
William Hale White Book order (chronological)
William Hale White, writing under the pseudonym Mark Rutherford, was a British author and civil servant. His work delves into profound introspective themes, often exploring the complexities of the human psyche. White was known for his subtle observations and his ability to portray the psychological depth of his characters. His writing is valued for its honesty and penetrating insights into life.
Ethics
- 400 pages
- 14 hours of reading
Translated by W.H.White and A.K.Stirling. With an Introduction by Don Garrett. Benedict de Spinoza lived a life of blameless simplicity as a lens-grinder in Holland. And yet in his lifetime he was expelled from the Jewish community in Amsterdam as a heretic, and after his death his works were first banned by the Christian authorities as atheistic, then hailed by humanists as the gospel of Pantheism. His Ethics Demonstrated in Geometrical Order shows us the reality behind this enigmatic figure. First published by his friends after his premature death at the age of forty-four, the Ethics uses the methods of Euclid to describe a single entity, properly called both 'God' and 'Nature', of which mind and matter are two manifestations. From this follow, in ways that are strikingly modern, the identity of mind and body, the necessary causation of events and actions, and the illusory nature of free will.