Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 133.djvu/142

136 consolation in such a crisis as this — history makes no mention relating to this epoch. From their conduct later on it may be inferred that they now joined the hue and cry against the "atheist." The fury of the Jews may have been increased by the suspicion that the apostate was about to embrace the creed of Christianity. According to one account there was a recrudescence of zeal on the part of the synagogue, in the time that followed the excommunication.


 * Morteira, in particular, after the affront that he had received from his disciple, could not suffer that he should even remain in the same city with him. Procuring himself to be escorted by another rabbin of similar temper, he came before the magistrates, to whom he represented that if he had excommunicated M. de Spinoza, it was for no common cause, but on account of most execrable blasphemies against Moses and against God. He exaggerated this falsehood in all the ways that an holy hatred can suggest to an irreconcilable heart, and in conclusion demanded that the accused should be banished from Amsterdam. At the sight of the rabbin's passion it was easy to see that it was less a pious zeal than a secret rage that was urging him to vengeance; and, in fact, the judges, seeing this, endeavored to elude his demands, and referred him to the clergy. These, having examined the affair, found themselves in great embarrassment. After the manner in which the accused justified himself, they were unable to discover anything impious in him; yet the accuser was a rabbin, and the rank he held bid them be mindful of their own rank; so that, after all due consideration, they were unable without outrage to their cloth to absolve a man that one of their order wished to ruin; and this reason, good or bad, caused them to conclude in favor of the rabbin. . . . The magistrates, not daring to contradict them, for reasons which it is easy to divine, condemned the accused to an exile of some months.

This account, for which Lucas is responsible, is corroborated by the fact that Spinoza retorted to the excommunication by writing a certain volume of "Apology," now no longer extant, in which the Jews were "severely handled." Colerus says, "Il protesta contre cet acte d'excommunication, et y fit une response en espagnol qui fut adressée aux rabbins, et qu'ils reçurent comme nous le marquerons dans la suite." (It is unfortunate that the worthy author forgets to "marquer dans la suite" the matter in question, and never mentions it again.) It is evident that such an act of defiance might of itself constitute a sufficient reason for the reprisals which ended in Spinoza's exile.

We must stop for a moment to consider this "Apologia para Justificarse de sa Abdicacion de la Synagoga," the first fruits of Spinoza's pen. We have already stated that it is no longer extant. Rienwertz states that he had had the manuscript in his possession, and that it was a large book, in which the Jews were severely handled. A more satisfactory indication of its nature is afforded by the statement of Bayle, that the argument of it may be found in the twentieth chapter of the "Tractatus Theoiogico-Politicus." The thesis of that chapter is, "that in a free state (republic) it is lawful for every man to think in his own way, and to publish that which he thinks." Thought, from its very nature, is incapable of being bound by laws — is incapable of being given over to reigning powers, with those other "natural rights "that Spinoza allows, with Hobbes, may be so made over to the sovereign; and if thought cannot be bound, neither can speech, though of course the latter is susceptible of a measure of coercion; but no sooner has the author laid down this principle, than he proceeds to limit its application by considering how far the liberty of speech may usefully be conceded — that is, how far the exercise of such coercion as is possible may be desirable. Now the end of a state is the security of liberty to its subjects ("Finis reipublicæ revera libertas est"). Spinoza therefore concludes that all opinions should be allowed to be published, except seditious opinions. Seditious opinions he defines as those "which being accepted would nullify the contract by which the citizen has yielded up the right of acting according to his individual will (ex proprio suo arbitrio)." From such a latitude of the liberty of speech he allows that inconveniences would arise; but it must be conceded, nevertheless; "for those things that cannot be prohibited" (he means, "whose prohibition is not supported by a sufficient sanction") "must necessarily be conceded, even though ills do thence arise." Proceeding to examine the ills that arise from the illegal and tyrannous persecution by the State of the liberty of speech, he shows that such persecution falls, not on the unworthy members of society, "the greedy, the timeserving, and the otherwise impotent in character, who have no care for truth and piety, for whom blessedness consists in contemplating the gold in their coffers, and having their bellies gorged (nummus in arce contemplari et ventres distentos habere)," but on those whom a good education, integrity of morals, and the practice