Seventeenth Century Intellectualism

Article 2. Seventeenth Century Intellectualism

a) Descartes; b) Malebranche; c) Spinoza. Descartes, whose doctrine won many admirers in Holland and France in the 18 century, may justly be called “The Father of Intellectualism.” Though connected with the Intellectualiste School, Malebranche and Spinoza developed new systems of philosophy wholly alien to the mind of Descartes.

a) René Descar t es (1596-1650).

Life: René Descartes, whose name in Latinized form is Renatus Cartesius, was born in 1596 at La Haye, in Touraine, an ancient province of France, now Indre-et-Loire. He made his studies with the Jesuits at La Flèche, where he showed a special ability in mathematics. His studies in philosophy interested him without convincing him, and, after much puzzling meditation and discussion, he decided to abandon philosophy for a military career. But he could not keep his mind away from the alluring topic of philosophy, and, during a winter’s inactivity in camp he sketched a plan for the complete reconstruction of science. Withdrawing from the army, he travelled through Europe, and finally settled in Holland, where he spent most of his remaining years in study and writing. His works evoked the most acrid criticism, Protestants and Catholics alike declaring that they savored of atheism, skepticism, and other great errors. To escape the heckling of critics he was glad to accept an invitation from Queen Christina of Sweden to a place in her court. He went to Stockholm in 1649, and died there the following year. Descartes is remembered as the inventor of Analytical Geometry. In passing, English-speaking students should notice that the Latin form of this philosopher’s name (Tartesius) is generally used adjectivally in reference to his doctrine, which is called Cartesian.

Works: Descartes wrote: A Dissertation on Method; Meditations on First Philosophy ; Principles of Philosophy; Treatise on the Passions.

Doctrine: Descartes was a great and constructive mathematician and physicist, but we shall speak of him only in his character as philosopher. We find him beset with philosophic doubts even in his student days, and he remained unsettled until he had excogitated an original method of arriving at truth and certainty. Descartes’ early skepticism has a threefold explanation: (i) he had a mathematical mind, and he believed that philosophy should be a body of clear-cut, evident, and generally accepted truths, just as mathematics is; (2) he knew Scholastic Philosophy slightly enough to condemn it as a useless muddle of doctrine, while, on the other hand, (3) he found nonScholastic philosophies a clashing chorus of disagreements. Thus, Descartes felt that existing philosophies could offer him no safe guide to truth; and yet he was convinced that philosophy could be formulated with such mathematical clarity and exactness that it must appeal to all minds as indisputably true. Had he known Scholasticism thoroughly, or had he had that sympathy and acumen which would have led him to study it thoroughly, he would doubtless have been a notable Scholastic. He had a very laudable desire of knowing the sure method of arriving at truth ; but, unfortunately for himself and for philosophy, he based his doctrine upon a false assumption, and then developed it into a system of absurdities with all the ardor and logic of a wholly sincere and unusually keen mind. That is the tragedy of Descartes. It is to be remembered that Descartes preserved throughout life the deepest reverence for Revelation, and tried constantly (with success, as he thought) to harmonize his theories with Catholic dogma. We speak briefly here of Descartes’ Logic or Method, his Cosmology, Psychology, and Natural Theology.

i. Logic or Method.— Rejecting Aristotelean Logic as useless, Descartes formulates four rules of method for the guidance of thought. These rules are: (1) To begin with, nothing is to be taken as true that the deliberate mind does not perceive to be so absolutely certain that it can in no wise be doubted. (2) Difficulties are to be grouped into as many classes as will be helpful to their complete and facile solution. (3) Strict order must be observed in the formulation and expression of true doctrine, the general observance being procedure from the simple to the complex; and from the less complex to the more complex. (4) Nothing is to be omitted ; every circumstance that can possibly affect a subject of discussion must have due and thorough consideration. Putting these rules into practice, Descartes looked about for his starting-point, viz., “some fact so absolutely certain in the deliberate mind that it can in no wise be doubted.” (1) The Starting-point.— In youth we have all held opinions as certainly true which maturer experience has shown us to be false. Such opinions were accepted unquestioningly upon authority, or were derived from fallacious sensations. We must not look to authority, then, nor to sensation, as the starting-point of the quest for truth. Of our intellectual possessions, the axioms of mathematics seem, at first glance, to be indubitably true; yet even these can be doubted by an effort of mind (Methodic Doubt}. The starting-point we seek is, therefore, not to be found in mathematics. Can we formulate a Methodic Doubt, then, of all things? No, we cannot doubt that we doubt; we cannot, even by an effort of mind however valiant, escape from the absolutely certain conviction that we are making an effort of mind. In a word, we are indubitably certain that we think. And if we are certain that we think, we are certain of ourselves as thinking. The certainty of thought coordinately postulates the certainty of existence of the thinker. Descartes sums this up in the famous formula, Cogito, ergo sum— I think, therefore I exist. This is not an inference; it does not mean that the certainty of existence is achieved by reasoning directly from the certain fact of thought: it means that thinking and existent thinker are equally indubitable in the deliberate mind. The basis of all science and philosophy, the starting-point of the quest for truth, consists in the two truths, I exist and I think. (ff) Progress from the Starting-point.— I know, then, that I exist and that I think. To know more about myself I must analyze and study the thinking process. This process has three acts: formation of ideas, consciousness of affections (i. e., appetites, emotions, etc., which affect the thinking subject), and pronouncement of judgment. Now ideas are true in themselves ; they are what they are; I have certainty of so much. If ideas do not truly represent the things for which they stand, this is the fault of judgment which pronounces them representative, and not falsity in ideas themselves. Affections are likewise true in themselves ; though I consciously experience a tendency or appetite for the impossible, it is nevertheless true that I do experience the tendency. If I err in determining the nature or cause or circumstances of affections, this is an error in the judgment I pronounce upon these matters. Affections, like ideas, are to be rated as true and certain in themselves. The possibility and the danger of error consequently lies in judgment. If I am to achieve certainty, I must learn to avoid erroneous judgments. Such judgments must ordinarily be pronouncements upon the agreement or disagreement of my ideas with that which they represent ; in other words, if I err, I err most often in pronouncing (judging”) as objectively real what my ideas so represent, but which, as a matter of fact, is not objectively real. Therefore I must investigate ideas so that I may know how accurately and to what extent things in nature correspond to them. (5) Examination of Ideas.— Ideas are innate, adventitious, or fictitious. Innate ideas are born in me; they belong to my nature. Such ideas are, for example, those of being, truth, thought. Adventitious ideas come to me from without; they are formed with the cooperation of sensation. Fictitious ideas are those which I consciously “make up,” such as my idea of Sinbad the Sailor, the Lorelei, a dragon. All ideas are of the same nature as modes of the intellect; but in their character as representations of things they are of diverse values. The ideas that are inborn in me I directly and inevitably recognize as true ; fictitious ideas I understand as self-caused, but adventitious ideas come to me without the interference or cooperation of my own will, and must therefore have a cause outside myself. Such ideas are effects in me and have their cause outside me. Now if there is perfection in the effect (idea) there must be perfection in the cause (the extramental thing which the idea represents). Some adventitious ideas exhibit a greater degree of reality than others. The idea of substance, for example, represents a much greater degree of reality than the idea of quality or other accident. Therefore substance as object (represented in idea) must actually have a greater degree of reality than accident, considered objectively. But ideas may come from other ideas. Granted, but the chain of such ideas is not infinite ; one must attain at the last to the highest idea of all, beyond which there is no other idea that can efficiently cause it in the mind. But this highest idea, uncaused by other ideas, is not caused by myself, for its perfection could not come from my obviously imperfect and limited faculties. Therefore, it must come from a really existent object which has the perfection represented in the idea. Now, as a matter of fact, I have the idea of infinity, limitless perfection : and this, by reasons given, must have been caused in me by an infinitely perfect Being who actually exists. This being is God. Therefore God exists. The existence of God is certainly known, and is an important factor in the further development of the doctrine of certitude. (4) Corollaries of God’s Existence.— I find myself absolutely certain (after recognizing the fundamental certitude of my thought and my existence) of the really representative character of many ideas that have no material existence in bodily nature. I know, for instance, what a triangle is and must be. Of other mathematical figures and formulas I have the same certitude. Now this certitude must be genuine, for I find that the very nature of my understanding requires me to accept it, and God, the author of my nature, would be deceiving (and not all-perfect, which is absurd!) if things which I must naturally hold as true were not actually true. In the matter of sensation, I find that sensations (sense-knowledge of external bodily things) are not self-produced. If I look at an object, for example, I see it, whether I will to see it or not : my will does not affect the perception. Does the object then exist? If it does not, my faculties deceive me, and this, in view of the existence of an all-perfect and non-deceiving God who gave me faculties, is an impossible conclusion. Therefore the external world exists. Does it exist precisely as I perceive it? Not altogether, perhaps, for sense-perception is often obscure and confused. But at least all things exist in external or objective reality which are comprised in the scope of pure mathematics,—e. g., all things which have extension. ii. Cosmology.— As the essence of the mind is thought (because thinking is that in and by which we are primarily aware of mind) so the essence of bodies is extension according to the threefold dimension. This is so because we can conceive of a body without rest, motion, weight, and other properties; but we cannot conceive of a body without extension. Therefore matter (bodily reality) is extension. But space is also extension. Therefore space and matter are identical. It is consequently absurd to regard the world as composed of matter and vacuum intervals—since vacuum means space without matter, and space and matter are identical. It is also absurd to imagine space beyond the limits of the bodily world. But, as a matter of fact, we can and do imagine the limits of the world extended limitlessly; and what is truly imaginable must be true : hence the world (material world) has no limits. What makes bodies different? Every body is made of atoms of the same nature, form, and size. God set these in motion in the beginning, and they formed swirling groups which came together to form bodies of different weight, size, and movement, and thus the bodily world was formed. iii. Psychology.— The only soul is the thinking soul. Therefore plants and brutes have no souls, no life-principle. The seemingly vital activity of plants and brutes comes from the harmonious balance of parts in their “organism” and has no intrinsic substantial principle unifying and directing operations. Plants and brutes are only splendid pieces of machinery. Man’s soul is united with the body (which, in itself, is a mechanical union of parts) in an intimate manner, but not substantially. The soul directs bodily operations in man, and receives impressions through bodily senses. Although the soul in-forms the whole body, it resides in the brain, and particularly in the pineal gland, whence it directs man’s functions of understanding, imagination, and sensation. Sensation is not the function of soul and body together, but of the soul alone, though the soul requires the services of the body in acquiring external impressions. Different sets of nerves for each kind of sensation (seeing, hearing, taste, etc.) carry these external impressions to the soul. iv. Natural Theology.— Descartes’ theory of certitude involves his (“ontological”) proof of the existence of God. God really exists. God is a substance. More : God is the only true substance, for substance is “that which requires nothing beyond itself in order to exist.” What we call “substance” in reference to matter or spirit other than God is not truly substance, and we call it so metaphorically. All things outside God require His concurrence in order to exist, and thus fall short of the requirements of substance. God is thus self-existing, and absolutely independent. All things depend upon God’s constituting will : e. g., a triangle has three sides, and three angles equalling i8o° because God wills it so; an action is good or bad because God wills it so.

Remarks: Descartes’ Method (or Logic) falsely assumes the fact of thinking and the coordinate fact of existence of the thinker as the one absolutely certain basis of science. Now, he cannot be sure of self-existence, even by thinking, unless he admit the reliability or validity of his thought, and also the Principle of Contradiction. Descartes declares that he doubts {methodically, not really} everything but the fact of thought and the coordinate fact of existence. Here he contradicts himself at the outset, for he declares that he doubts the veracity or validity of the very thought by which he is aware of himself as a thinking existence. In other words, his universal doubt includes a doubt of his own capacity for valid thought at the very moment he asserts thought as validly existent. In his discussion of ideas leading to the proof of God’s existence, Descartes employs the principle of causality, which, for him, must be of doitbtful value by his hypothesis of universal doubt. He is guilty of a “vicious circle” in the fact that he proves God’s existence by thought, and then proves thought valid by the perfection of the existing God.—In Cosmology, Descartes falsely places the essence of bodily being in extension, for extension defines quantity, and quantity is an accident. Again, he falsely posits homogeneous matter and local motion as the constituting principle of bodies. This is pure atomism. —In Psychology Descartes errs in his mechanistic explanation of animal and plant life ; and also in asserting the mere accidental union of soul and body in man.—In Natural Theology (or Theodicy} he rightly asserts God’s independence; and his doctrine of God’s metaphysical essence may easily be interpreted as the true one. But he falsely makes God the only substance, falsely defines substance itself, falsely asserts the will of God instead of the Divine Reason as the ultimate norm of morality, and falsely attributes the essential being and relations of things to the arbitrary decision of God. The falsity of his norm of morality appears in a contradiction involved in his theories of God’s veracity and His arbitrary determination of morality. For if God’s arbitrary decision be the ultimate determinant of good and evil, might not such a decision render our deception good? Thus the whole Cartesian argument for the validity of thought is destroyed. Cartesianism was received with enthusiasm by many philosophers of the 17 century. It had much about it to attract. It was new ; it seemed exact, clear-cut, logical ; it offered at least the possibility of achieving satisfaction of mind and rest in the truth, while older systems had been found inadequate. Scholasticism was imperfectly known and perfectly despised. English Empiricism and Sensism had not yet invaded continental Europe. Thus Descartes’ philosophy had no great rival system on the ground to oppose it. Important Cartesians in Holland and Germany in the 17 century were: i. Christopher Wittich (1625-1687), professor at the University of Lyons. He rejected the authority of Scripture, made philosophy wholly independent of Revelation, and defended the Physics of Descartes against those who found it in disagreement with Scripture. ii. John Clauberg (1625-1665), a German philosopher, stressed the Cartesian distinction between soul and body, and minimized their relations or interactions, and so prepared the way for Occasionalism, a doctrine which makes God the direct operator in all actions of His creatures, and gives to creatures merely the faculties for arranging the occasion for divine intervention. He also perverted Cartesian metaphysics, and made the relation of Creator and creature analogous to that of the mind and its thought (pantheism). iii. Arnold Geulincx (1625-1669), sometime professor at Louvain, denied all relation of activity between body and soul, teaching that the senses do not supply the mind (soul) with external impressions, and attributing these to the direct act of God. Geulincx inclined towards a type of pantheism that was later explained and professed by Spinoza. Exponents of Cartesianism in France were: Antony Ar-nauld (1612-1694) and Peter Nicole (1625-1695). Among French Thomists who show the influence of Cartesianism in their works were the great orators, James Benignus Bossuet (1627-1704), Bishop of Meaux; and Francis Fénelon (1651— 1715), Archbishop of Cambrai. The chief opponent of Cartesianism in Holland was Gisbert Voet (1589-1676), professor of Protestant theology in the University of Utrecht. English Protestants who opposed Descartes’ doctrines were: Ralph Cudworth (1617-1688), Henry More (1614-1687), and Isaac Newton (1642-1727). In France, opponents of Cartesian philosophy were : Daniel Huet (1633-1721) and Peter Gassendi (1592-1655).

b) Nicol e Mal ebr anche (1638-1715).

Life: Malebranche was born of noble parentage at Paris. He studied at the Sorbonne, and at the age of twenty-two entered the Congregation of the Oratory. He was deeply interested in history and philology, but devoted himself to the study of Cartesian philosophy after he had read some treatises of the great Descartes. He wrote much, and had a place of prominence in the scientific controversies of his time.

Works: Malebranche wrote many books. The following are important for philosophy: The Search for Truth; Tract on Ethics; Dissertation on Metaphysics and Religion; Treatise on the Created Infinite.

Doctrine: Malebranche rightly perceived that Descartes’ proof for the existence of God proceeds from the Principle of Causality—a principle not available for Descartes, since he had made it subject to doubt. Malebranche carefully avoided this blunder and asserted that God’s existence needs no proof, but is directly and immediately (intuitively) known by our intellect. This doctrine not only relieved the philosopher of the necessity of formulating a clumsy proof for God’s existence, but it simplified the puzzling matter of the origin of ideas. Malebranche emphasized and extended the Cartesian doctrine of mere accidental union between soul and body, and asserted that no creature is the efficient cause of its own operations, all these being the direct products of God’s intervention. We may express all the foregoing points by saying that Male-branche’s doctrine is characterized by Ontologism and Occasionalism. i. Ontologism.— Things which have objective being outside the mind are not directly known, but are known only in their ideas. The mind (soul) knows ideas rather than things. Descartes allowed as much, but declared that the senses furnish the soul with external impressions which are used in the formulation of ideas. Malebranche rules out this service of the senses, and makes the soul perceive all its ideas in its idea of God. He reaches this conclusion by way of elimination: he says that there are six possible explanations of the origin of ideas ; these he examines, rejecting five, and asserting as true the doctrine already explained. The six possible theories on the origin of ideas are: (1) Objects outside us give off or exhale something which the soul receives as the material for ideas. False ; such exhalations would be material, and could not come into intimate conjunction with the spiritual soul. (2) Our soul has the power of evolving its own ideas without outside influence. False; for ideas possess reality, and if the soul could evolve such reality, it could create, which is absurd. (3) God, in creating our soul, produced in it the ideas of things. False; for God could not infuse an infinite number of ideas in a finite soul, and the soul can form ideas indefinitely;

besides, even if the soul had an infinite number of ideas, this theory would not explain its determination, its actual conscious acceptance, of certain of these ideas and its neglect or rejection of others. (4) God successively creates ideas in the soul as often as the soul thinks. False; for sometimes the intellect, being ignorant of a certain object, applies itself to the study of that object; this theory leaves unexplained the actual choice and application of the soul in reference to a definite object. (5) The soul contains in itself the perfections of all things knowable, and in studying itself it perceives these and so forms ideas. False : for the soul is limited, and obviously does not contain the perfections of all things knowable. The scope of things knowable is unlimited; the soul, on the other hand, is limited. (6) The soul possesses the idea of the most perfect Being (God), which contains in Itself the representations or exemplars of all things; viewing this Perfect Being, ideally represented, the soul can contemplate all things in It. True; we see (intellectually) all things in God, who is immediately present to every soul. The soul does not create or determine its own activity in viewing God, but is illumined by God to know other things existing (in exemplar and cause) in God. Why assert this doctrine (Ontologism’) as true? Because it is quite clear that all men wish to know all things ; and such a wish is inexplicable unless the soul has an impulse to this wish in a general presence of all things. Again, the objects of abstract ideas (universals) are not found as such in reality about us; only God’s presence and illumination can explain such ideas in the soul. Furthermore, we have an idea of the infinite; such an idea cannot be developed by adding finite to finite, and yet the limited soul could not of itself achieve anything but the finite; only the presence and illumination of God in the soul will explain this idea. This doctrine (Ontologism’) does not mean that we perceive God’s Essence, but that we behold Him as participated in creatures; or, more properly, that in the idea of God we behold the ideas of other things (creatures) which exist in Him as in their exemplary cause. ii. Occasionalism.— Malebranche thinks that belief in any efficient power outside God is a doctrine both pagan and polytheistic. For, he says, the idea of supreme power is the idea of divinity itself; and the idea of inferior powers must be the idea of inferior divinities. All operative activity is directly from God. Man’s soul, for example, only seems to move his body ; it is God who contributes the actual movement. One body often seems to communicate movement to another; but this is only seeming, for God produces the movement. Creatures then, bodily and spiritual, are without proper activity; they are merely the occasion suitable for the communication of activity by God.

Remarks: Malebranche’s Ontologism contradicts consciousness and reason, and gratuitously denies the abstractive power of the intellect. It contradicts consciousness, for we are quite aware that we do not perceive God immediately, but reach an idea of God through His creatures. It contradicts reason, for it asserts that we perceive some perfections in God without perceiving His Essence; and reason declares that the infinite Being is indivisible and that all perfections in Him are of His Essence. Occasionalism conflicts with the infinite power of God in assuming that God could not, as Prime Mover, give to a creature the power of efficiently affecting another. This doctrine leads to ruinous consequences : ( 1 ) It easily induces pantheism; for if the divine substance alone is active, individual existences may easily be regarded as its mere appearances and manifestations. (2) It leads to the denial of free will in man (Determinism), for if man be not the efficient cause of his actions, he is not free, and not responsible for his actions.

c) Bar uch Spinoza (1632-1677).

Life: Spinoza was a Jew. He was born at Amsterdam. In youth he studied only the Scriptures and Hebrew literature, but later he was instructed in Latin and Greek and in Cartesian philosophy. He rejected his Jewish religion and attacked its tenets. Expelled from the synagogue, and hounded by the civil power for certain expressions of monstrous opinion, he spent some years in rather aimless wandering through European cities. He finally settled at The Hague and adopted a humble employment which was sufficient to supply his few wants and left him time for study and writing.

Works: Spinoza wrote The Principles of Descartes Expounded According to Geometry; Theologico-Political Treatise; On the Improvement of the Understanding ; Ethics Expounded according to Geometry.

Doctrine: Spinoza’s philosophy is pantheism. In method he resembles Descartes. Both Spinoza and Descartes are idealistic, putting no trust in sensation, but proceeding a priori upon the evidence of ideas. Descartes begins with the indubitable fact of thinking existence and ascends to the idea of God. Spinoza begins with the idea of the Absolute (God) and descends to other things, following a sort of geometric plan. He begins each treatise with definitions ; then come axioms ; then demonstrations; then corollaries; and finally, scholia. We shall sketch his doctrine on God, the human mind and body, and morality. i. God.— Spinoza defines substance as that which is conceived in and of itself ; that which does not require the concept of any other thing in order to be understood. This means that the concept of a substance does not in any manner involve the concept of any other thing, even of any other substance. That which constitutes substance is called attribute; that which accidentally affects it is called mode. Everything existent is either substance (attribute) or mode of substance. Divine Substance is an absolutely infinite Being; it is made up of infinite attributes, each of which expresses an eternal and infinite essence. Since no substance requires anything of another substance in its concept, there is absolutely nothing in common between substances; therefore one could not have caused another; it follows that all substances are necessary beings, and hence eternal. Now is there in nature a variety of substances? No, for there can be no two substances of the same essence (attribute), and all attributes are infinitely possessed by God, the Divine Substance. Therefore, God is the only substance {pantheism}. All things other than God, in our understanding of them, are merely modes of the Divine Substance. ii. The Human Mind and Body.— A body is a mode of the unique Divine Substance which expresses in a determinate manner this Divine Substance as really extended. Thought (mind) is a mode which expresses the Divine Substance as thinking. Thought and extension are attributes of and in the Divine Substance, but what we know as bodies and as our thoughts (processes of mind) are but modes expressing these Divine Attributes. Man is, therefore, made up of two modes of the Divine Substance, viz., the mode of extension and the mode of thought. All things in the world come from God just as man does. As soon as a mode arises in the Divine Attribute of extension, a mode which recognizes or represents it arises in the Divine Attribute of thought. Thus modes of extension and thought proceed from God in perfect parallels, and make up the bodily universe. Now these modes (of thought and extension) have real existence. Hence Spinoza teaches a doctrine of pantheistic realism, or of real pantheistic manifestation. God’s manifestations proceed from Him by necessity. iii. Morality.— Since all things come necessarily from the Divine Substance, and since all things are in their ultimate nature one with that Substance, there is no room in Spinoza’s theory for freedom, responsibility, or action directed to a final end. In a word, there is no room for morality. Still, Spinoza tries to establish a rational basis for Ethics. He says human nature is marked by the desire for continued existence ; this desire in the mind constitutes will; in the body, it constitutes cupidity or appetite or tendency. When the mind achieves a high plane of existence (i. e., when it functions thoroughly in its thinking) it experiences joy; contrariwise, it suffers sadness. Things are good, or evil inasmuch as they make for joy or sadness. Now individual man is not self-sufficient; he needs society; therefore he finds that the perfection of existence and its continuance (tendency to which is the basis of morality) involves the necessity of striving for unanimity among men, for such social agreement as would be possible if the whole of society were one body and one mind. Thus Spinoza seeks (on a utilitarian basis) to preserve the individual and social virtues. He lauds the moral excellence of learning, for the more we know of things, the more we shall know of God in whom all things are ultimately found, and with whom they are identified. Such full knowledge as learning affords gives man the greatest and most perfect understanding of continued existence in God, and hence arouses the greatest peace and joy—and this constitutes happiness.

Remarks: Spinoza’s pantheism springs, first and foremost, from his false definition of substance. He tried to save certain things from the sweeping embrace of his pantheism, but vainly—and thus his assertion of the immortality of the soul, for example, contradicts his fundamental doctrine of a Single Divine Substance, and also conflicts with his teaching that the soul is only a mode of thought recognizing the body as existent: for when the body perishes, the recognizing mode of thought must also cease. Spinoza’s doctrines brought persecution upon him. He was denounced as an atheist, a blasphemer, an impious and infernal schemer; he was even called “the scourge of the human race.” His lot in the acceptance of immediate posterity was not more favorable; the 18 century philosophers, notably the rationalists and Encyclopedists, rejected his doctrine as atheistic. But after Kant, and particularly in Germany, Spinoza’s doctrines were received with favor, and their author was extravagantly lauded by philosophers and poets alike. Goethe was much pleased with his doctrine, and Schleiermacher was so entranced with it that he called Spinoza, “a new incarnation of the Holy Spirit.”