122 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



it is quite as necessary, for the understanding of this 

 remarkable movement, to go back to Spinoza,^ who, if 

 not forgotten, was certainly neglected and egregiously, 

 not to say shamefully, misrepresented ^ by eminent 

 writers in both countries. And, anticipating, we may 

 go a step further in mapping out philosophical 

 currents on the Continent, notably in Germany, by 

 remarking that the current of philosophic thought 

 which set in, in the middle of the nineteenth cen- 

 tury, in opposition to the Hegelian attitude, may not 



^ This interest in Spinoza pro- 

 duced four important publications. 

 Leaving out what was done by G. 

 H. Lewes, who was probably led to 

 Spinoza when writing his ' Life of 

 Goethe,' and by F. D. Maurice, who 

 inherited Coleridges interest in 

 him, also Matthew Arnold's brill- 

 iant Essay (1865), we meet with 

 the first fairly impartial and lucid 

 exposition of Spinoza's teaching in 

 J. A. Fronde's article in the ' West- 

 minster Review,' 1854. But fore- 

 most among all stands the work of 

 Sir Frederick Pollock, from which 

 I have just quoted. It appeared 

 in the year 1880, and gives in addi- 

 tion to an account of his life and 

 philosophy a complete bibliography 

 of English and foreign books on 

 Spinoza in the Introduction, and a 

 history of Spinozism in the twelfth 

 chapter, " Spinoza and Modern 

 Thought." Almost simultaneously 

 James Martineau had occupied 

 himself with Spinoza, and brought 

 out in 1882 'A Study of Spinoza.' 

 In the last chapter of this treatise 

 special attention is drawn to 

 his work as a critic approach- 

 ing the biblical records from an 

 historical as well as a philoso- 

 phical point of view. A few years 

 later, 1888, there appeared in 

 Blackwood's Philosophical Class- 



ics a volume on Spinoza by John 

 Caird. This treatise, which deals 

 with the "apparent inconsisten- 

 cies " and ''underlying unity" of 

 his system, is written from a 

 point of view influenced by Hegel- 

 ian thought, which at that time 

 was prominently represented in 

 this country by the author and his 

 brother, Edward Caird. These 

 four works in the English language 

 may be said to have corrected the 

 many misrepresentations and mis- 

 understandings regarding Spinoza's 

 person and teaching which abound- 

 ed in the earlier literature of this 

 country. 



- Thei'e seems no doubt that 

 Malebranche and Bayle between 

 them must be blamed for having, 

 through their superficial treatment 

 of Spinoza, prevented for a long 

 time an adequate estimation of the 

 importance of his doctrine, not 

 onlj' among their countrymen — 

 such as Voltaire, Montesquieu, and 

 the Encyclopeedists — but also in 

 this country, where, for instance, 

 even so temperate a thinker as 

 David Hume betrays a lamentable 

 ignorance of the subject, calling 

 Spinoza a "famous atheist " and his 

 fundamental principle a " hideous 

 hypothesis " ('Treatise of Human 

 Nature,' part 4, sec. 5). 



