LEIBNIZ AND SPINOZA
On a trip to San Francisco, to visit my daughter Laura who wined and dined me to undeserved points, I bought this book in a small bookshop in Alameda. It is profusely underlined and highlighted, like all my books. I have been interested in Leibniz and Spinoza since my early teens and have recommended both, and philosophy in general, instead of the self-help books that those sitting below the salt are wont to read. Allow me a quotation from this book: "Philosophy, as Spinoza understands it, does not peddle in temporary cheer, modest improvements in well-being, or chicken soup for the soul; it seeks and claims to find a basis of happiness that is absolutely certain, permanent, and divine. The principal -indeed the sole- of his mature philosophy, as expressed in his masterpiece the Ethics , is to achieve this kind of blessedness or salvation." Mathew Stewart, The Courtier and the Heretic, Leibniz, Spinoza, and the Fate of God , W.W. Norton, 2006.