Spinoza

spe-no'za (1632-1677), a Dutch philosopher. He was of Jewish descent. His parents fled from Portugal to escape persecution. He was born and educated at Amsterdam. He became noted for his views as a thinker in the field of philosophy. Though offered a professor's chair at Heidelberg, and later a pension by Louis XIV, he preferred to support himself by his trade of lens making. He lived a lonely, frugal, gentle life. In the history of philosophy he follows Descartes and precedes the German philosophers Fichte, Hegel, etc. His writings are credited with having exerted a peculiar influence on the thought of Goethe and Schiller. His theological views were pantheistic, that is to say, instead of denying the existence of God, he asserted that whatever is, is God.