Spinoza, Baruch

"Self-love is not shameful when it is the foundation of self-respect and virtue."

"The human mind can be of such a nature that the part which we have shown to perish with the body is of no account in relation to what remains."

"The striving to persevere in one's being is the first and only foundation of virtue."

"To understand something is to have overcome it."

"Patience is not passive; it is the active work of maintaining one's composure."

"The more we are determined by external causes, the more we are subject to passion."

"All discrimination arises from ignorance; knowledge dissolves prejudice."

"The human mind is eternal in so far as it understands."

"Joy is the emotion through which a man passes to greater perfection."

"We are determined partly by internal causes and partly by causes external to our nature."

"Love is joy accompanied by the idea of an external cause."

"Power of thinking and power of the body are one and the same thing."

"The order and connection of ideas is the same as the order and connection of things."

"To live is to persist in one's own being; to die is to cease this persistence."

"Adequate ideas come from understanding the universal nature of things."

"The perfection of a thing is measured by its power of acting."

"God or Nature acts from the same necessity by which it exists."

"The mind is eternal to the extent that it understands the eternal aspects of things."

"Envy arises from comparing one's fortune with that of another."

"The person who understands things truly is thereby freed from false opinions."

"To increase one's power is to increase one's perfection and one's happiness."

"Generosity flows from the recognition of our interdependence with all things."

"Those who are guided by reason love those who are perfect."

"The more we endeavor to live according to reason, the more we endeavor to persevere in our being."

"Understanding is the method by which we transform passive experience into active knowledge."

"Pride arises from comparing oneself favorably to others; humility from the opposite."

"Appetite is the very essence of man insofar as it is determined to do anything."

"The more one is determined by external forces, the greater one's servitude."

"To love is to affirm the value of what is loved in its own being."

"Hatred can never spring from love, though love may arise from hatred."