The Remaining Works of Benedictus de Spinoza

The second volume of Spinoza's works, which we now share with scholars, contains the posthumous remnants, first published under the title B. d. S. Opera Posthuma, the list of which is exhibited after the preface, in the year 1677 (614 pages in quarto). It was edited in such a way that, after the index of subjects, there follows a Compendium of Hebrew Grammar of 112 pages. Our previous volume anticipated the collection of letters, which in that first edition fills pages 395 through 614, so that the volumes might be made sufficiently equal. All other remaining works are now carefully reprinted and brought to light anew.

Among these is the Ethics, a more extensive and pure interpreter of that philosophy which, contrary to the author's wish, is called Spinozistic, and which is to be pondered especially through the repeated meditations of wise men. The way by which the author progressed toward discovering this Ethics is discerned from the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect, even though it was not brought to an end. Having considered this, if anyone should shrink from or even abstain from the principles of the author for a very long time