All the objects pursued by the multitude not only bring no remedy that tends to preserve our being, but even act as hinderances, causing the death not seldom of those who possess them, and always of those who are possessed by them.
Baruch SpinozaThe more intelligible a thing is, the more easily it is retained in the memory, and counterwise, the less intelligible it is, the more easily we forget it.
Baruch SpinozaThe more a government strives to curtail freedom of speech, the more obstinately is it resisted; not indeed by the avaricious, ... but by those whom good education, sound morality, and virtue have rendered more free.
Baruch SpinozaThe mind has greater power over the emotions, and is less subject thereto, insofar as it understands all things to be necessary.
Baruch Spinoza