ABSTRACT
The correspondence of Spinoza is deeply interesting in many ways. It presents a pageant of the leading types of seventeenth-century mentality. It affords contemporary glimpses of important scientific researches and discoveries. It brings us into touch with some of the social and political events and tendencies of the period. It throws a flood of light on the pains and vicissitudes which accompanied the birth of the modern spirit and the emancipation of Western thought from the chains of authority and tradition, to which it had grown so accustomed as almost to dread to venture on the uncharted sea of Freedom. The letters contain things of first-rate importance for the correct interpretation of the philosophy of Spinoza; and, above all, they help one to realize something of the greatness and strength of his character—one of the greatest in the whole history of mankind.
