Abstract
The topic of this chapter is Spinoza’s notion (or, more accurately, notions) of essence. I argue for a spectrum interpretation of essences in Spinoza, distinguishing between common essences at the level of attribute and infinite mode at one extreme, singular essences at the level of finite individuals at the other extreme, and species essences in the middle (which, I argue, exist only as beings of reason). I also clarify Spinoza’s notions of formal essence and actual essence and address the sense in which the essences of finite things enjoy non-durational (or eternal), as well as durational, existence. I argue that the essences of finite things exist both durationally and non-durationally as finite, not infinite, modes.
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Notes
- 1.
Curley (1:635) cites Descartes’ conception of essence in terms of the “principal attribute” of a thing (CSM 1:210) as exemplifying the target of Spinoza’s criticism in E2p10s. For instance, for Descartes, extension constitutes the essence of any corporeal substance, since it is impossible to conceive the latter except as extended. This is actually similar to one of the notions of essence that I will attribute to Spinoza below (i.e., common essence), though there is no doubt that Spinoza does in fact criticize this conception in E2p10s. As we will see, Spinoza’s usage of “essence” is not always consistent—hence, my distinction between different Spinozan conceptions.
- 2.
In this, I follow other commentators who similarly use qualifiers to distinguish Spinoza’s E2d2 conception of essence from the conception of essences as shared or common to multiple individuals that Spinoza appears to espouse in other places. Hübner (2016), Soyarslan (2016), and Martin (2008), for instance, speak of “unique essences,” on the one hand, and of “shared essences” (Soyarslan 2016) or “species essences” (Martin 2008; Hübner 2016), on the other. Below, I distinguish between essences common to all individuals of a given attribute (which I call “common essences”) and essences common to only some individuals (which I call “species essences”).
- 3.
Examples include E2p10c/G 2:93 and E4d8/G 2:210.
- 4.
Hübner 2016.
- 5.
Hübner 2016, 59.
- 6.
One notable discrepancy between my reading and Hübner’s is that whereas I have argued that notions adequately derived from common notions can only be true in form, for reasons laid out in past chapters, Hübner characterizes them as true simpliciter (Hübner 2016, 79).
- 7.
Cf. Hübner (2016, 76) for a different reading of this passage. Hübner emphasizes the qualification “insofar as it is conceived abstractly” in arguing that the conception of will that is perceived as common to all ideas is mind-dependent. As I explain below, if by “will” we mean an absolute faculty of willing, then this is certainly abstract. But if we mean the affirmation that all ideas must involve qua ideas, then I think this is a common property of ideas and exists in the idea just as extension exists in any body (and not just mind-dependently).
- 8.
See E2pp23–30.
- 9.
Curley regarded modes as the “wrong logical type” to be properties of substance. See Curley 1969, 18 (and , more generally, 1–44). For more recent discussion of the mode-attribute-substance relation, and criticism of Curley’s view, see Melamed 2013, 3–60. As suggested by my claim (above) that attributes have modes as their properties, I incline toward the view, defended by Melamed contra Curley , that modes do relate to attributes as predicate to subject in addition to relating to them as effects to causes. (Cf. Lin 2019, 102–36.) It is not clear to me that the dispute regarding the mode-substance relation has much consequence for interpreting Spinoza’s epistemology. (Hence, I have not felt the need to treat this subject in any systematic manner in this study.) I think there is a reasonably good explanation for the lack of apparent significance: while the cause-effect relationship between attribute and mode is of paramount importance for Spinoza’s epistemology (as should be very clear by now), it is not clear how much epistemological import the subject-predicate relationship has (assuming it obtains). Since the cause-effect relationship is agreed to by all parties, the implications of that relationship for the epistemology remain unaffected by any resolution of the dispute concerning the substance-mode relationship one way or the other.
- 10.
While I think no one would object to the claim that Spinoza did not work out the details of a biology, some scholars have justifiably stressed Spinoza’s significance and achievement as a proto-biological thinker, nevertheless, drawing attention in particular to the conatus doctrine and the modal theory of individuality, which can be understood in functional terms. See Hampshire 2005, xli–xlix; and Jonas 1965. (Diderot’s short Encyclopédie entry on “Spinosiste” is interesting as an early forerunner of biological interpretations of Spinoza (or at least Spinozism).)
- 11.
See also CM 1.2: “the formal essence neither is by itself nor has been created, for both these presuppose that the thing actually exists. Rather it depends on the divine essence alone, in which all things are contained. So in this sense we agree with those who say that the essences of things are eternal” (G 1:239). Spinoza’s claim here that formal essence is contained in the divine essence foreshadows E2p8, but other elements of this text, such as the doctrine of creation, represent elements of Descartes’ philosophy, rather than Spinoza’s, rendering it problematic for interpreting the latter.
- 12.
Spinoza tries to illustrate his point with an example anyway, and the example he uses is, notably, geometrical (from Euclid’s Elements, Book 3, Proposition 35). For discussion of the example, see Viljanen 2011, 25–26.
- 13.
Spinoza talks of the “formal being of ideas” in E2p5 and invokes the formal/objective distinction in E2p7c, stating, “whatever follows formally from God’s infinite nature follows objectively in God from his idea.” In these passages, Spinoza appears to be drawing on the distinction that Descartes draws in Meditation Three between the formal and objective reality of ideas (CSM 2:28). (It is generally thought that Suárez’s distinction between formal and objective concepts influenced Descartes here.) Spinoza explicitly defends, and appears to endorse, Descartes’ distinction between the formal and objective reality of ideas (albeit not using those terms) in Ep. 40 (G 4:198b–99b). See also TIE 35/G 2:15 (which we discussed in Chap. 2).
- 14.
The attribute of thought appears to exhibit a number of peculiar properties of which Spinoza’s doctrine of idea ideae (ideas of ideas) is one example. One set of interpretive issues concerns reconciling these peculiarities with the parallelism (and parity) of the attributes . I discuss these issues in Homan 2016.
- 15.
See also CM 1.2: “we can give no definition of anything without at the same time explaining its essence” (G 1:239).
- 16.
See Della Rocca 1996b, 200–2.
- 17.
On the absurdity of a thing’s self-limitation, see E1p8dem, where Spinoza argues that substances must be infinite because there is nothing else of the same nature to limit them. The tacit implication of Spinoza’s argumentation is that substances cannot limit themselves. This is further explicated in the scholium of E1p8: “Since being finite is really, in part, a negation, and being infinite is an absolute affirmation of the existence of some nature, it follows from P7 alone that every substance must be infinite” (G 2:49).
- 18.
See Ep. 60/G 4:271, where Spinoza characterizes his definition of God in E1d6 as expressive of the efficient cause of God (which in this case is an internal, rather than external, efficient cause).
- 19.
Schliesser (2014, 13) puts the problem this way: “The apparent paradox looks like this: (i) proximate causes are contained in the definition of a thing; (ii) proximate causes involve extrinsic properties; (iii) definitions include essences; but (iv) extrinsic properties are not involved in the essence.”
- 20.
Della Rocca 1996a, 89.
- 21.
Schliesser (2014, 12–14) and LeBuffe (2018, 19–37) both give interesting alternative solutions to the tension between the doctrine of definitions and E1p8s2, but ones that are incompatible with fundamental commitments of my interpretation. (Part of my attraction to Della Rocca’s solution is its neutrality on substantive metaphysical and epistemological matters.) Schliesser suggests that the essences of things do not exist in space and time, and so, giving a causal explanation of these (eternal) objects (which he associates with types as opposed to tokens) does not in fact introduce extrinsic properties (which attach to durational instantiation). I agree with Schliesser’s proposal from an epistemological standpoint, insofar as I agree that we finite beings can only ever hope to define what he is calling “types” (i.e., what I have called species essences) not “tokens” (i.e., what I have called individual essences). But from a metaphysical standpoint, this proposal (if I understand it correctly) solves the problem by restricting essences to the species, or “type,” level, whereas in my view we must also recognize individual, or “token,” essences. Indeed, whereas there is some doubt about the extra-mental reality of species essences or “types” (such as “human”) in Spinoza’s philosophy, as I discussed at the end of Chap. 4, there is no doubt about the reality of individuals. Whatever the case may be regarding species essences, individual essences (in my view) have an eternal existence in God’s attributes and cannot be relegated to space and time alone. I say more about the durational and non-durational existence of essences below when I discuss “actual” essence and conatus .
For his part, LeBuffe argues that finite things in fact are causa sui, like God; what distinguishes finite things from God is only that their existence may be impeded by external things (unlike God with respect to whom nothing is external). But LeBuffe concedes that while a finite thing has internal reasons, so to speak, for its existence, it also has external reasons (creating the problem under discussion). In response, LeBuffe has recourse to the view that reality and, correlatively, adequacy, admits of degrees. (So, inasmuch as a finite thing is not causa sui, it does not exist, and we cannot have an adequate idea of it.) I discussed (critically) the notion of degrees of adequacy at the end of Chap. 4.
- 22.
Hobbes 1991, 42.
- 23.
Kant 2000, 279.
- 24.
See also Spinoza’s discussion of definitions in Ep. 9 (G 4:42–44), where he distinguishes between definitions of real things (such as “the Temple of Solomon”) and definitions of our own creations or conceptions (such as “some temple which I want to build”), saying that only the former need be “true.” Spinoza is using “true” here to mean correspondence with an object. As I explained in Chap. 2, he also calls genetically conceived figures “true,” despite the fact that they correspond with no object in nature (similar to the imagined temple). My distinction between true-in-form ideas and robustly true ideas is intended to clarify this. In light of this distinction, the definition of the imagined temple need not be robustly true, but it does need to be true in form.
- 25.
In Ep. 59, Tschirnhaus expresses interest in Spinoza’s method of “acquiring knowledge of unknown truths.” In reply (Ep. 60), Spinoza says that he has not yet fully worked out the aforementioned method. However, as Goldenbaum (2011, 38–39) discusses, Christian Wolff reports that Tschirnhaus had been impressed by the “Erfindungskunst,” or method of discovery, that he had learned from Spinoza, and which was based on Spinoza’s theory of definition. This suggests that Spinoza may eventually have divulged more to Tschirnhaus about this method. Unfortunately, any further details are unknown.
- 26.
Tschirnhaus presses Spinoza on a similar issue in Ep. 82, proposing that in mathematics, contrary to what Spinoza claims, he is able to infer only one property from a given definition on its own, and in order to infer other properties, the defined thing needs to be related to other things. Spinoza’s tentative response—he admits that “perhaps this is correct for very simple things, or beings of reason (under which I include shapes also)” (Ep. 83/G 4:335)—suggests that he might not have been entirely clear on the matter himself.
- 27.
For a fuller discussion of E3p6dem, see Viljanen 2011, 91–104.
- 28.
- 29.
Garrett 2009, 286.
- 30.
Christopher Martin (2008) also defends a view of formal essences as infinite modes and actual essences as finitely existing in duration.
- 31.
A recalcitrant text for my interpretation is the following from the Short Treatise: “But our body had a different proportion of motion and rest when we were unborn children, and later when we are dead, it will have still another. Nevertheless, there was before our birth, and will be after our death, an Idea, knowledge, etc., of our body in the thinking thing, as there is now. But it was not, and will not be at all the same, because now it has a different proportion of motion and rest” (KV 2pref; G 1:52). Since a given proportion of motion and rest defines an individual body, and since the definition, as I have argued, gives the essence of a thing, a given proportion of motion and rest should give the essence of an individual body. Moreover, I have argued that that essence is the same whether or not the thing exists in duration. In this passage, however, Spinoza appears to contradict my claim, insofar as he appears to deny that the idea of the motion and rest of an existing individual is the same as that of a non-existing individual. The meaning of the text is not entirely clear, however. It seems paradoxical to speak of the proportion of motion and rest of my body when I am dead (or before I am born), since, presumably, death is precisely the destruction of the proportion of motion and rest that defines my body. One possibility is that Spinoza is referring to the particles (or particular bodies) that come together to constitute my body when I am born and proceed to constitute other bodies when I die. In other words, he is speaking of a knowledge of the order of nature that precedes and succeeds my existence. When he says that there is knowledge of my body before I am born, he might be referring to the fact that to know the causes of my coming into being is a manner of knowing my being. But this raises the issue—discussed earlier—of conflating the external causes of the nature of a thing with the nature of the thing itself. To know the causes of my coming into existence is only knowledge of me if it is a manner of grasping my proportion of motion and rest. In that case, though, I do not see how the proportion of motion and rest thereby conceived would actually differ from my pre-existence to my existence.
- 32.
See D. Garrett 2009, 289–90.
- 33.
In his paper, “Spinoza on the Essence of the Human Body and the Part of the Mind That Is Eternal” (2009), Garrett speaks of formal essences as infinite modes without specifying whether he is talking about immediate infinite modes or mediate infinite modes. (The same is true in Garrett 2010.) In conversation, however, Garrett clarified to me that he understands the formal essences of things to be mediate infinite modes, and, moreover, that there are infinite mediate infinite modes (correlating to infinite formal essences). This means that formal essences can be more specific than would be the case if they were immediate infinite modes alone. While I do not think multiple mediate infinite modes are impossible, I interpret E1p22 along with Letter 64 to suggest that there is only a single mediate infinite mode (for each attribute). However, I admit that the text is certainly obscure enough to be open to various interpretations, including Garrett’s. In this light, I would appeal to Ockham’s razor to support my preference for a single mediate infinite mode along with a single immediate infinite mode. Since the latter includes what is required to individuate modes (i.e., motion and rest) and the former includes the individual existents themselves, I see no need to multiply beings any further. In any case, I will argue below that formal essences should not be identified with the mediate infinite mode (as I interpret it) any more than with the immediate infinite mode.
- 34.
See the previous note.
- 35.
E1d2 reads: “That thing is said to be finite in its own kind that can be limited by another of the same nature” (G 2:45). I owe this point to John Grey.
- 36.
This determination is, I take it, what Yovel speaks of in terms of logical (as opposed to mechanical) “cosmic particularization.” See Yovel 1991, 92–3.
- 37.
Leibniz 1989, 169.
- 38.
See Garrett 1991, 197 for a defense of the attribution of this maximalist proposition to Spinoza.
- 39.
This interpretation of the logico-causal relationship between the finite modes that comprise the second kind of infinite mode, on the one hand, and the attribute and first kind of infinite mode, on the other, is necessitarian. That is, given the nature of the attribute (and the first kind of infinite mode), the natures of the finite modes comprising the second kind of infinite mode follow by necessity, and therefore are in principle knowable a priori by an infinite intellect. While I take this to be more or less the standard way of reading the modality of finite modes, the necessitarian interpretation is not without its detractors. See, in particular, Curley 1988, 47–50. The classic articulation of the necessitarian view is Garrett 1991. For a helpful overview of the issue, see Newlands 2018.
- 40.
See n. 16 in Chap. 4 for discussion of the distinction between properties that follow from the nature of a thing as opposed to properties that are caused (at least partially) by external things.
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Homan, M. (2021). Spinoza’s Notions of Essence. In: Spinoza’s Epistemology through a Geometrical Lens. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-76739-6_6
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