{
    "schema": "prokopton42-public-passage-v1",
    "id": "spinoza.letters_en",
    "canonical_url": "https://prokopton42.com/en/works/spinoza/letters-en/reference-section-0018/",
    "language": "en",
    "title": "Spinoza’s Correspondence: Spinoza-Authored Letters, English Manifestation",
    "author": "Baruch Spinoza",
    "date": "surviving correspondence, 1661-1676",
    "summary": "These letters written by Spinoza answer questions about God, infinity, freedom, the Bible, optics, and works in progress. Epistolary form reveals thought adjusted to particular correspondents rather than a continuous treatise.",
    "learning": "Distinguish Spinoza’s voice from correspondents, contextualize a reply, and compare epistolary formulation cautiously with published work.",
    "long_summary": "Spinoza clarifies a definition, refuses an objection, recommends an experiment, or explains disagreement with a friend. Correspondence connects metaphysics, science, and political caution while showing concepts before or after published formulation.\n\nThis projection preserves Spinoza’s letters and should not assign correspondents’ questions to him. Absent addressees, documentary loss, and translation limit context. A familiar or polemical sentence does not automatically have the status of a proposition demonstrated in the Ethics.",
    "historical_context": "The corpus manifests do not yet establish the precise place and circumstances of composition. The images below document the author’s world or the text’s transmission. They do not claim to show the exact scene of writing.",
    "material_world_label": "Europe and the Atlantic, 15th-17th centuries",
    "material_world": {
        "technology": "Printing, artillery, clocks, ocean-going sail, and navigational instruments change the scale of states, trade, and travel.",
        "science": "Instrumented observation, calculation, anatomy, and astronomy gradually challenge inherited frameworks. Practice remains mixed with ancient authority.",
        "medicine": "Dissection, surgery, plants, and pharmacopoeias expand, but infection, pain, and epidemics remain poorly controlled.",
        "transport": "Walking, horses, coaches, river boats, and great sailing ships. Crossing an ocean takes weeks or months and remains dangerous.",
        "agriculture": "Grain, livestock, and gardens predominate; Atlantic exchange moves maize, potatoes, tomatoes, sugar, and animals with major consequences.",
        "communication": "Printed books, broadsheets, letters, and regular posts speed circulation without making it instant.",
        "clothing": "Doublets, breeches, structured dresses, caps, ruffs, and cloaks use wool, linen, silk, and lace; rank strongly controls silhouette."
    },
    "material_world_scenes": [
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/19-1610-ce/world-01.webp",
            "title": "Technology, science, and care",
            "description": "Printing, artillery, clocks, ocean-going sail, and navigational instruments change the scale of states, trade, and travel. Instrumented observation, calculation, anatomy, and astronomy gradually challenge inherited frameworks. Practice remains mixed with ancient authority. Dissection, surgery, plants, and pharmacopoeias expand, but infection, pain, and epidemics remain poorly controlled."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/19-1610-ce/world-02.webp",
            "title": "Travel and communication",
            "description": "Walking, horses, coaches, river boats, and great sailing ships. Crossing an ocean takes weeks or months and remains dangerous. Printed books, broadsheets, letters, and regular posts speed circulation without making it instant."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/19-1610-ce/world-03.webp",
            "title": "Farming and food",
            "description": "Grain, livestock, and gardens predominate; Atlantic exchange moves maize, potatoes, tomatoes, sugar, and animals with major consequences."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/19-1610-ce/world-04.webp",
            "title": "Clothing, women and men",
            "description": "Doublets, breeches, structured dresses, caps, ruffs, and cloaks use wool, linen, silk, and lace; rank strongly controls silhouette."
        }
    ],
    "intellectual_tradition": {
        "id": "modern-philosophy",
        "label": "Modern and contemporary philosophy"
    },
    "period": {
        "id": "modern",
        "label": "Modern era"
    },
    "languages": [
        "en",
        "fr"
    ],
    "manifestations": [
        {
            "coverage": "complete",
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/spinoza/letters_en/representations/en.ndjson",
            "language": "en",
            "records": 114,
            "role": "complete_source_selection",
            "sha256": "cc2ed3e9377f16911b0e73279be0227e741c3146b54e9728d6041feb73311fee",
            "source_id": "letters_en"
        },
        {
            "coverage": "complete",
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/spinoza/letters_en/representations/ai-generated/fr-gpt-5-6-sol-corpus-passage-translation-v1.ndjson",
            "generated_on": "2026-09-11",
            "language": "fr",
            "model": "gpt-5.6-sol",
            "official_status": "non_official",
            "prompt_version": "corpus-passage-translation-v1",
            "provider": "codex_subscription",
            "records": 114,
            "role": "ai_generated_translation_non_official",
            "sha256": "4d6830a619437164f74de4b6cb82dadafb5f31b4f142c4d65d146a670e176543",
            "source_id": "prokopton42-codex-translation:gpt-5.6-sol:corpus-passage-translation-v1",
            "translation_type": "ai_generated_translation"
        }
    ],
    "concepts": [
        {
            "id": "attribute",
            "label": "Attribute"
        },
        {
            "id": "courage",
            "label": "Courage"
        },
        {
            "id": "desire",
            "label": "Desire"
        },
        {
            "id": "education",
            "label": "Education"
        },
        {
            "id": "ether_field",
            "label": "Ether and field"
        },
        {
            "id": "family",
            "label": "Family"
        },
        {
            "id": "fear",
            "label": "Fear"
        },
        {
            "id": "freedom",
            "label": "Freedom"
        },
        {
            "id": "god",
            "label": "God"
        },
        {
            "id": "judgment",
            "label": "Judgment"
        },
        {
            "id": "knowledge",
            "label": "Knowledge"
        },
        {
            "id": "law",
            "label": "Law"
        },
        {
            "id": "love",
            "label": "Love"
        },
        {
            "id": "mode",
            "label": "Mode"
        },
        {
            "id": "nature",
            "label": "Nature"
        },
        {
            "id": "necessity",
            "label": "Necessity"
        },
        {
            "id": "reason",
            "label": "Reason"
        },
        {
            "id": "sin",
            "label": "Sin"
        },
        {
            "id": "spirit",
            "label": "Spirit"
        },
        {
            "id": "substance",
            "label": "Substance"
        }
    ],
    "source_work_ids": [
        "spinoza.letters_en"
    ],
    "passages": 114,
    "word_count": 34964,
    "word_counts_by_language": {
        "en": 34964,
        "fr": 34642
    },
    "editorial_status": "gpt_5_6_semantic_draft_v1",
    "structure": {
        "citation_scheme": "source-section-v1",
        "kind": "native",
        "levels": [
            {
                "key": "section",
                "label_fr": "Section",
                "label_en": "Section"
            }
        ],
        "leaf_fr": "Section",
        "leaf_en": "Section"
    },
    "canonical_passage_id": "passage:spinoza.letters_en:section-0018",
    "canonical_ref": "section-0018",
    "canonical_parent_ref": null,
    "canonical_parent_id": null,
    "representations": [
        {
            "language": "en",
            "text": "Distinguished Sir,—\nWhen I said in my former letter that we are inexcusable, because we are in the power\nof God, like clay in the hands of the potter, I meant to be understood in the sense, that\nno one can bring a complaint against God for having given him a weak nature, or\ninfirm spirit. A circle might as well complain to God of not being endowed with the\nproperties of a sphere, or a child who is tortured, say, with stone, for not being given a\nhealthy body, as a man of feeble spirit, because God has denied to him fortitude, and\nthe true knowledge and love of the Deity, or because he is endowed with so weak a\nnature, that he cannot check or moderate his desires. For the nature of each thing is\nonly competent to do that which follows necessarily from its given cause. That every\nman cannot be brave, and that we can no more command for ourselves a healthy body\nthan a healthy mind, nobody can deny, without giving the lie to experience, as well as\nto reason. “But,” you urge, “if men sin by nature, they are excusable;” but you do not\nstate the conclusion you draw, whether that God cannot be angry with them, or that\nthey are worthy of blessedness—that is, of the knowledge and love of God. If you say\nthe former, I fully admit that God cannot be angry, and that all things are done in\naccordance with His will; but I deny that all men ought, therefore, to be blessed—men\nmay be excusable, and, nevertheless, be without blessedness and afflicted in many\nways. A horse is excusable, for being a horse and not a man; but, nevertheless, he\nmust needs be a horse and not a man. He who goes mad from the bite of a dog is\nexcusable, yet he is rightly suffocated. Lastly, he who cannot govern his desires, and\nkeep them in check with the fear of the laws, though his weakness may be excusable,\nyet he cannot enjoy with contentment the knowledge and love of God, but necessarily\nperishes. I do not think it necessary here to remind you, that Scripture, when it says\nthat God is angry with sinners, and that He is a Judge who takes cognizance of human\nactions, passes sentence on them, and judges them, is speaking humanly, and in a way\nadapted to the received opinion of the masses, inasmuch as its purpose is not to teach\nphilosophy, nor to render men wise, but to make them obedient.",
            "translator": "R. H. M. Elwes",
            "source_id": "source-1",
            "translation_type": "historical_translation"
        },
        {
            "language": "fr",
            "text": "Distingué Monsieur,\nLorsque j'ai dit dans ma précédente lettre que nous sommes inexcusables parce que nous sommes au pouvoir de Dieu comme l'argile entre les mains du potier, je voulais être compris en ce sens que nul ne peut se plaindre à Dieu de lui avoir donné une nature faible ou un esprit infirme. Un cercle pourrait aussi bien se plaindre à Dieu de ne pas avoir reçu les propriétés d'une sphère, ou un enfant tourmenté, par exemple, par la pierre, de ne pas avoir reçu un corps sain, qu'un homme d'esprit faible se plaindre que Dieu lui ait refusé la force d'âme ainsi que la vraie connaissance et le véritable amour de la Divinité, ou de ce qu'il est doué d'une nature si faible qu'il ne peut réprimer ou modérer ses désirs. Car la nature de chaque chose n'est apte à faire que ce qui suit nécessairement de sa cause donnée. Que tout homme ne puisse être courageux et que nous ne puissions pas davantage nous commander un corps sain qu'un esprit sain, nul ne peut le nier sans démentir l'expérience aussi bien que la raison. « Mais, objectez-vous, si les hommes pèchent par nature, ils sont excusables. » Vous n'indiquez toutefois pas la conclusion que vous en tirez : soit que Dieu ne puisse être irrité contre eux, soit qu'ils soient dignes de la béatitude, c'est-à-dire de la connaissance et de l'amour de Dieu. Si vous dites la première chose, j'admets pleinement que Dieu ne peut être irrité et que toutes choses se font conformément à sa volonté ; mais je nie que tous les hommes doivent pour autant être bienheureux. Les hommes peuvent être excusables et néanmoins privés de béatitude et affligés de bien des manières. Un cheval est excusable d'être un cheval et non un homme ; il doit néanmoins nécessairement être un cheval et non un homme. Celui qui devient enragé par la morsure d'un chien est excusable, et pourtant on l'étouffe à juste titre. Enfin, celui qui ne peut gouverner ses désirs et les contenir par la crainte des lois, quoique sa faiblesse puisse être excusable, ne peut cependant jouir avec contentement de la connaissance et de l'amour de Dieu, mais périt nécessairement. Je ne crois pas nécessaire de vous rappeler ici que l'Écriture, lorsqu'elle dit que Dieu est irrité contre les pécheurs et qu'il est un Juge qui prend connaissance des actions humaines, prononce une sentence sur elles et les juge, parle humainement et d'une manière adaptée à l'opinion reçue de la multitude, puisque son but n'est pas d'enseigner la philosophie ni de rendre les hommes sages, mais de les rendre obéissants.",
            "translator": "Codex gpt-5.6-sol",
            "edition": "Prokopton42 non-official AI translation, 2026-09-11",
            "source_id": "prokopton42-codex-translation:gpt-5.6-sol:corpus-passage-translation-v1",
            "translation_type": "ai_generated_translation",
            "official_status": "non_official",
            "generation_model": "gpt-5.6-sol"
        }
    ],
    "content_checksum": "b526c1319840bd39aeabdc4859b5cdc55156d8870f07d3d680443a4c485bc10f"
}