contents · contents acknowledgements viii maps ix ... spinoza’s work can be analysed fruitfully...

Contents

Acknowledgements viii

Maps ix

Introduction 1

1 The Revolt 21The history of the Revolt of the Netherlands 21Political thought during the Revolt 46

2 The Dutch Republic 65The date of the Dutch Republic 65Political thought in 1648 74

3 De Witt’s Republicanism 88

4 English and Dutch Republicanism 117English republican writings 133

5 Dutch Republicanism 154The significance of the Dutch mentality 154The Holland-centric factor 162

6 Spinoza’s Dutch Perspective 168The political works 169Spinoza’s Marrano status 191

7 Liberty and Sovereignty in the Political Works 200Liberty 201Sovereignty 220

8 Spinoza’s Republicanism 237The reception of Spinoza’s political works 237The character of Spinoza’s republicanism 246

Epilogue 257

Bibliography 262

Index 277

vii

Introduction

Seventeenth-century Dutch political practice and thought, and inparticular Dutch republicanism, set against the background of itshistory and political traditions, represents a crucially importantcontext in which to discuss Spinoza’s political philosophy.

Several modern commentators place Spinoza in a self-confidentrepublican tradition dating from 1579 when, it is said, the UnitedProvinces asserted its independence from Spain, embracing politicalchange along with economic innovation and colonial expansion. Suchchange and innovation are seen as the foundation of the success of thenorthern Netherlands in the seventeenth century, when Dutch self-assurance resulted, so the story goes, in a Golden Age of wealth,prosperity, and the status of a major European power. In this GoldenAge, a proud republicanism is depicted as given a definitive statementby Spinoza, and an unprecedented cultural flowering, for instance inpainting, is seen as giving rise to a tradition richly diverse enough toembrace the genius and technical skill of both Rembrandt andVermeer.

But in closer focus, a series of curious features emerge from thishistory. The Dutch republic is an interestingly difficult term to define,and for almost a hundred years – almost a whole century after its ‘inde-pendence’ in 1579 – the politics of the United Provinces exhibits aprofound mismatch between practice and theory. The disjunction isbetween (for the most part, a stubbornly unacknowledged) republicanpractice on the one hand, and, on the other, orthodox theory as taughtin the universities, which continued to centre on an analysis ofmonarchy as the best form of government. Within the context of thisunacknowledged lack of correspondence between theory and practice,political debate was elliptical at times and also demonstrated a

1

mismatch. However, neither dimension of this second anomaloussituation conformed directly to either practice or theory, revolvinginstead around a substance-and-form dichotomy. The substance ofpolitical debate was often engrossed with the powers of the provincialregent oligarchies, the pre-eminent position held by Holland amongthe seven provinces, and with the strengths of shifting pro- and anti-Orangist factions. But this substance was often framed in the languageand fiercely held convictions of the confrontation betweenRemonstrant and counter-Remonstrant adherents. The lack of fitbetween theory and practice helped to mask the fact that UnitedProvinces politics took place in the context of an intense fragmentationof loyalties.

Spinoza’s work can be analysed fruitfully in a rich variety of con-texts, as the history of commentary on Spinoza attests. A range ofscholars have placed him within a narrative about the rise of liberalpolitical theory; Wolfson regarded him as the last of the great medievalphilosophers; and Gebhardt considered Spinoza in the light of theMarrano experience. In recent years Spinoza’s political writings havebeen the subject of important scholarly investigation by three groupsof writers. Philosophers interested in tracing the connections betweenthe Ethics and the political works, such as Lloyd, Gatens, van Bungeand others, have seen these texts as contexts for each other. In particu-lar they have related the key categories Spinoza developed in the Ethicsto his idea of political community and the values that inform it. Muchvaluable work has been done in illuminating Spinoza’s politics throughthe connections between the Ethics and the political works, but that isnot the focus of the present work. Moreover, Jonathan Israel’s recentRadical Enlightenment: Philosophy and the Making of Modernity1650–1750 sees Spinoza and especially Spinozism as central to anintegrated conception of the European Enlightenment encompassingthe mainstream ‘French’ perspective, an English Enlightenment focus-ing on Locke and Newton and other ‘national’ examples, together witha radical and until now recessive Enlightenment in which Spinoza haslatterly been seen as a key figure. Israel in Radical Enlightenment isdealing with Spinoza’s philosophy seen as inaugurating a distinctivelymodern view, for whom ‘nothing is based on God’s Word or com-mandment…the only legitimacy in politics is the self-interest of theindividual’, according to a near-contemporary (Israel 2001, 5).

Historians of political thought interested in classical republicanism,such as Skinner, Pocock, van Gelderen, Haitsma Mulier and others,have explored another important context in which to view Spinoza’s

2 Spinoza and Republicanism

political works. This enterprise intersects with a large and lively literat-ure on English republicanism by Worden, Scott, Sharpe and others.‘Classical republicanism’ refers not to ancient republicanism but toearly modern writings that draw upon ancient Greek and Romanrepublican authors. Over the past two or three decades historians ofpolitical thought have been involved in tracing the use of primarilyRoman and Italian Renaissance reflections on republican theory andpractice in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century European contexts, andwider eighteenth-century transatlantic contexts. Recently Hankins hasdeveloped an argument that casts doubt on civic humanism and class-ical republicanism as constituting ‘a distinct tradition or language ofpolitical discourse’ (Hankins 2000, 3). His recommendation has been to‘slice up Pocock’s long republican tradition into unrelated sections’(Hankins 2000, 5), and he cautions against reifying both ‘classicalrepublicanism’ and Pocock’s notion of tradition. NotwithstandingHankins’ reservations, this school of thought continues to recoverimportant insights into the meaning of early modern texts, to makevaluable connections between writers, and to remind political theoristsof the thriving republican tradition of thought and practice prior tothe development of liberal political theory in Europe. In particular,Skinner’s series of interventions, documenting as Hankins says, the‘long prehistory of the ideas in medieval scholastic and rhetorical tradi-tions’ (Hankins 2000, 5), and his redefinition of classical republicans asneo-Romans, are very important. Skinner’s most recent contribution isfound in his co-edited two-volume and immensely illuminating work,Republicanism: A Shared European Heritage (2002). The study contains awealth of important scholarship devoted to the project of reclaimingthe classical intellectual inheritance enriching the meaning of earlymodern republicanism. However, this literature is not the primary onewithin which the current project seeks to locate itself.

Together with these two contextual organising frameworks, centringon the philosophical text and on the ‘classical republican’ tradition,there is a third tradition. This third organising framework is indebtedto the work of Kossmann, Price, Israel, van Deursen and others, andhighlights the distinctiveness of theory and practice in politics in theNetherlands in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It is to thisthird tradition that the present book on Spinoza’s political works seeksprimarily to contribute. It is well known that Spinoza took an activeinterest in the public domain and politics, as part of the spirit of philo-sophical inquiry with which he viewed the world. This book draws outthe extent of his interest in the conduct of political relations in the

Introduction 3

United Provinces in particular. The current work highlights the extentto which Spinoza’s political works seek to defend and update theDutch way of doing politics.

These three forms of context are not mutually exclusive and are inplaces overlapping and mutually enriching. However, at times in whatfollows, it is necessary to distinguish the present endeavour from thoseother undertakings. The current work will attempt to show how thisthird context can throw further light on the meanings of Spinoza’spolitical works. These three domains of reflection on political theory,while overlapping, are irreducible and spring from different, equallylegitimate, questions.

One example of the difference in approach of the current perspectivefrom the ‘classical republicanism’ perspective concerns, for want of lessanachronistic terms, the national and international characters of sev-enteenth-century forms of republicanism. In the seventeenth century,before the pattern had been established of the self-determination ofnations to gain statehood and before the consolidation of Europe as agroup of nation-states, the terms ‘nations’, ‘states’, ‘Europe’, and ‘inter-national’ did not have their current meanings. Pocock indicates thatwhile ‘Europe’ was an ancient term, it was not used as a self-description by the Romans – theirs was a Mediterranean empire.‘Europe’ as a continent needs to be clearly distinguished from ‘Europe’as a civilisation (Pocock 2002, 59). The term ‘Christendom’ was thedominant political one to describe the area of modern Europe, delin-eating the realm of Latin Christians (Jordan 2002, 74–5), and it wasonly from the sixteenth century, with the construction of overseasempires, that ‘worlds beyond Europe’ were encountered in detail(Pagden 2002, 10), and a new distinction between Europe and theinternational was established. Pagden also notes (2002, 13) that it wasonly the treaties of 1648 that ‘put a final end to the Church’s role asarbiter in international affairs’. Over the following century an interna-tional politics inflected by national churches, the multiplicity of otherchurches, and based on the idea of a balance of power settlementbetween states emerged. ‘Europe’ as a secular civilisation developedonly with the Enlightenment in the eighteenth century and the 1713Treaty of Utrecht (Pocock 2002, 64).

Writers like Scott, Velema and Armitage quite legitimately explorethe trans-European connections between republican writers, thoughwithout always clarifying the different meanings of ‘international’ inseventeenth-, twentieth- and a possibly-transformed twenty-first-century usage. They examine the common and so in that sense


‘international’ features of the intellectual inheritances or, asCastiglione and Hampsher-Monk put it (2001, 2), the ‘universalist andcosmopolitan ideals’ shared by such writers. Velema, for instance,contends that there were ‘few if any early modern European nationswith totally and entirely exclusive traditions of political thought orlanguage’, though his conclusion that the ‘dominant early modernpolitical languages were, to a large extent, international’ may be anoverstatement (Velema 2002, 10). This contemporary school ofthought charts the rich vein of affinities in the classical education andcommon language of Latin shared by educated elites across Europe,aware of each others’ writings, forming a much stronger ‘internationalrespublica literatum’ (Boralevi 2002, 261) network than exists inknowledge and learning today. Classically educated writers in theseventeenth century used that classical inheritance, to a greater orlesser extent, to inform their reflections on contemporary events, andexploited its rhetorical potential to do so.

For the current project, however, the phrase, ‘to a greater or lesserextent’ is crucial. While it is useful to draw links and recover similar-ities and resemblances as Velema and others do, a different but equallyvalid emphasis is concerned to specify the distinctiveness of specificwriters and practices in a particular political society in order to under-stand their illocutionary force. In the Dutch case, more strongly thanin some others, the ‘national’ character of political culture can beclearly identified. Within this context the illocutionary force of a writerlike Spinoza can be (at least partly and illuminatingly) specified withinthe ‘deeply communicative’ (Castiglione and Hampsher-Monk 2001, 4)Dutch tradition of political thought and action, taken to have stablemeanings. For instance, Curley notes that the reason Spinoza put theEthics to one side to write the Tractatus Theologico-Politicus has ‘muchto do with political and social conditions in the Netherlands at thattime’ (Curley in Spinoza 1985, 350). Klever describes Spinoza as one‘who so loved his country and its much-praised freedom’ (Klever 1996,45), and observes that ‘Amsterdam…was a positive example in the eyesof Spinoza’ (Klever 1996, 38). Because of Spinoza’s attachment to thestrong and particular identity of the Dutch case, it makes sense toexplore the purpose of a line of argument developed by a writer likeSpinoza in terms of his political society and culture, as well as in termsof his intellectual peers and predecessors.

It is also pertinent to raise the national/international distinction inthe light of the approach taken by some philosophers. Philosopherscommitted to a mono-contextual meaning for Spinoza in the Tractatus

Introduction 5

Theologico-Politicus (TTP), as only a member of an international ‘repub-lic of letters’, seek to deny the significance of his interest in local pol-itics, as well as being led to make inflated claims. For such philosophersLetter 23 is taken as definitive proof that Spinoza saw himself not as aUnited Provinces resident or a Jew but as a philosopher withoutnational context, and Letter 30 is taken as Spinoza’s own statement asa philosopher of why he felt compelled to write the TTP. However inLetter 23, Spinoza’s description of ‘a pure philosopher’ who ‘has noother touchstone of truth than the natural intellect and not theology’(Spinoza 1985, 387), and his stricture that ‘while we are speakingphilosophically we must not use theological ways of speaking’ (Spinoza1985, 388), refer to the separation between philosophy and theology inthe TTP, and do not rule out Spinoza’s interest in contributing torepublican debate in the United Provinces. In Letter 30, as Curley notes(Spinoza 1985, 350), Spinoza sets out his reasons for writing the TTP –the ‘prejudices of the theologians, for I know of no greater obstacle tomen’s applying their minds to philosophy’, and the ‘opinion ordinarymen have of me. They never stop accusing me of atheism, and I amforced to rebut this accusation as much as I can’. Curley observes thatSpinoza aimed, in the TTP, to free ‘people from their reliance onScripture as a guide to the truth about speculative matters’, before pub-lishing the Ethics (Spinoza 1985, 350). Again, these reasons do not ruleout others, including a desire to model his vision of a ‘free state’ on thepolitical practice of the country in which he was born and lived.Indeed, the annotation to Letter 30 shows that Spinoza was motivatedby an engagement with Dutch politics as much as with philosophicaldifferences with Calvinist divines. Elwes relates that when an excitedcrowd suspected Spinoza of being a spy, Spinoza cried out, ‘I am a goodrepublican’, adding that he had ‘never had any aim but the welfareand good of the State’ (Elwes 1883, xii). Moreover even the chiefcollections (Spinoza 1883, 1982, 1985, 1966) from Spinoza’s 88 letters,where the criterion of selection has been to highlight his philosophicalcorrespondence, show not only an appetite for philosophical debateand of spirited clarification of critics’ mistakes but also a keen interestin optical lenses and other scientific matters and current affairs. Non-philosophical correspondence was destroyed after his death.

In the light of the modern national/international dichotomy, whichonly in the eighteenth century became the dominant way of conceiv-ing home–foreign relations, it is important to make clear how the sev-enteenth-century United Provinces differs from a modern territorialnation-state. The Netherlanders do not form a nation in terms of


having a stable territory, or a homogeneous language, religion orethnic background. The United Provinces is nevertheless clearly anation in the sense of having a shared political society and culture, andshared and relatively stable terms of contestation in political debate. InCastiglione and Hampsher-Monk’s important work, The History ofPolitical Thought in National Context (2001), a group of writers discuss arange of issues that arise from the different meanings of ‘national’political thought. The early modern United Provinces is still aneglected area of the history of political thought.

This book is concerned to add to our understanding of Spinoza’spolitical works by explicating an important dimension of Spinoza’sintended meaning, which was primarily local and particularistic, ratherthan to recover evidence of classical learning in his political works orlinks with the Ethics as a guide to meaning. Moreover this dimensionof Spinoza’s intended meaning was a contribution to a political societypreoccupied with a local and particularistic discourse for articulatingpolitical reactions and policies. Asserting the distinctiveness or evenuniqueness of Dutch republicanism and so accenting the diversitybetween different republican forms does not lead, however, to awithdrawal to a ‘nominalist’ position (Dunn 1994, 207), the view thateach example can only be studied on its own. Neither does it entailsubscription to a view of ‘national’ republican traditions. Indeed thecomparison with English republicanism in Chapter 4 is designed toilluminate both cases and provide insights through comparison notavailable when cases are studied in isolation. Moreover it can be arguedthat Velema is setting up something of a straw man in his repudiationof a ‘totally and entirely exclusive tradition’. Specifically Velemaregards Kossmann as instrumental in proposing ‘a purely Dutch andentirely original form of anti-monarchism’ (Velema 2002, 10).However, Kossmann is not guilty of this accusation, and it would bedifficult to recall any historian of political thought suggesting a ‘totallyand entirely exclusive tradition’. The current work is certainly notarguing for a ‘pure’ form of political theory in Spinoza or the UnitedProvinces. But it is seeking to discover what is notable and character-istic about the meaning of republicanism in this context, on thegrounds that terms like ‘republicanism’ and ‘anti-monarchism’ meantsomething different (as well as something similar) in their differentconfigurations in different national (not nation-state) and otherpolitical communities.

In short the term ‘republicanism’ in this context refers to much morethan a simple anti-monarchism (and the identification of the Princes

Introduction 7

of Orange with the monarchical component is by no means a simpleone), and only secondarily involves a moral ideal of self-governmentand only doubtfully a notion of civic participation. ‘Republicanism’ inthe Dutch context has most to do with, it will be argued, things likeregional complementarity and Holland-centricity, provincial insularityand independence, traditionalist practice and the claim about thedefence of privileges, the political dominance of the regents, and DeWitt’s ‘True Liberty’ policy expressed in the loosest of polycentric con-federal alliances – none of which figure in the abstract definition of‘classical republicanism’. The legitimacy of this approach is strength-ened by Sharpe’s, Pocock’s and Worden’s evidence, discussed inChapter 4, for the novelty of republican ideas in England after the regi-cide, and by Conti’s statement highlighting the insularity of theItalians. He notes that in ‘sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Italy, theword “republic” was all but a synonym for Venice. When “republic”was mentioned, Venice was automatically evoked’ (Conti 2002, 73).

Having identified some of the organising frameworks in the currentliterature in which Spinoza and republicanism can be studied, andhaving thereby established more fully the context in terms of whichthis book seeks to contribute, we return to the present endeavour.Spinoza’s contribution to the political culture of the UnitedProvinces, while extensive and serious, appears as in important waysthat of an outsider to the real issues of political life, as he wrote froma perspective that was outside both the university establishment andthe ruling regent class. And while he was seen as lending support toDe Witt’s republican government, in particular through his publishedinterventions, the publication of the Tractatus Theologico-Politicus(TTP) in 1670 was regarded as untimely, and the Tractatus Politicus(TP) in 1677 was too late to prevent De Witt’s vision of ‘True Liberty’being overpowered.

But in other ways, and this becomes clear with historical focus,Spinoza’s is the clearest statement that was made, during the 1660s and1670s, of the moral, political, and constitutional implications of therepublic’s identity. It was, however, supported by an abstract theor-etical system that the Dutch distrusted and found unpalatable.Spinoza’s formulation also incorporates two traditional Dutch elementsof crucial importance – a Holland-centric view of political arrangementsin the United Provinces, and an emphasis on the role of practice, as tra-ditionally understood, as the primary means of sanctioning politicalaction. This second point is particularly important, in several respects,in understanding the nature of the ‘Dutch Republic’. It is in terms of


the peculiarly Dutch understanding of traditional practice, as applied topolitics, that we can make sense of the reluctance on the part of theDutch to theorise the republican character of their state. It is also interms of this understanding that we can account for their distrust ofSpinoza for undertaking such theorisation, and their unwillingness toaccept Italian, English or other forms of republicanism as models tofollow or emulate. The Holland-centric perspective and the role ofpractice also help to account for the eclectic mixture of elements to beultimately found in Dutch republican formulations at the end of theseventeenth century.

The Dutch predisposition toward practice is not confined totraditional practice. While, during this period, in politics and govern-ment the northern Netherlanders favoured recourse to traditionalforms of practice, they also embraced and excelled at a range of newscientific and technological practices. Under the demands of trade andwar, important new developments were made in the practices offortifications, surveying, navigation, mathematics, cartography, print-ing, optics, astronomy, shipbuilding, commerce, trade, manufacture,and cultural practices like painting and architecture. Descartes, forinstance, was known first as a mathematician. Many of these newpractices were important on a global scale and fostered world marketsfor the Dutch.

Thus what can be understood by republicanism in theory and prac-tice, in the seventeenth century in the United Provinces, and Spinoza’srole in it, turns out to be a fascinating and complex subject. Foralthough 1579 marks the beginning of a process by which the sevennorthern provinces became in practice a republic, comprehensivelyrepublican ideas were not put forward, let alone accepted, until almosta hundred years later. For almost a century the United Provincesseemed at pains to deny a republican character. Spinoza published theTTP in 1670, and the Ethics and TP were published after his death in1677. But to understand these works and the political climate of the1660s and 1670s in the United Provinces in which they were written,we are constantly dragged back into the turmoil of the Dutch Revolt ofthe previous century. For this reason, it is important here to rehearsethe character of the theory and practice of political life in the UnitedProvinces from the time of the Dutch Revolt onwards, before Spinoza’scontribution can be adequately understood. The history of the Revoltand its aftermath provide the appropriate antecedent conditions, inthis study, for evaluating Spinoza’s political contribution, but are notregarded as deterministically causal. The examination of the evidence

Introduction 9

relating to the character of the theory and practice of politics duringthis period will not only disclose a more accurate picture of the back-ground to Spinoza’s contribution. That examination will also undercutany assumption of a ‘natural’ reciprocal expression between theory andpractice, in politics in the United Provinces at this time.

Thus the long prelude to discussion of Spinoza is required in order toconsider a whole range of crucially relevant questions. For instance,why were the United Provinces so reluctant to use their republicantitle? And why was Spinoza’s theoretical justification of a century ofmore or less republican practice received so poorly? Why had a morecentralised and unified political and administrative structure not devel-oped in line with the United Provinces’ status as a major Europeanpower? Why had Holland, obviously the wealthiest and most powerfulprovince, not come to express its dominance in constitutional terms ofinstitutional change, given the centralising tendencies at workelsewhere in Europe? The United Provinces is a notable exception to‘that general drift towards absolutism which has often been taken asthe theme par excellence of the century’ (Stoye 1969, 19).

And how is it that Holland was overruled by weaker provinces, andaccepted being overruled, at strategic points? Why did the UnitedProvinces, as a major European power, not seek to increase its territoryin Europe? In this way the United Provinces was going against thegrain of the practice of France, Spain, Sweden and the Habsburgs – thatis, going against the grain of the aggressively territorial ambitions ofother major powers in seventeenth-century Europe. All the puzzlingquestions about the reluctance of the United Provinces to accept theirrepublican status positively, and to develop a unified constitutionalstructure, draw us back to the previous century when the Netherlandsbegan its eighty years’ struggle against the Spanish.

But here more and more puzzles arise. Even in the 1570s, whilestaunchly fighting the Spanish, the northern Netherlanders stillregarded Philip II as their overlord. Why did the Union of Utrecht in1579 not announce the independence of the United Provinces, butinstead emphasise the separateness and autonomy from Spain of theprovinces that signed it, while protesting their allegiance to a trueprince? Why did the Abjuration of Spanish rule in 1581 still notcontain a statement of independence? Why, even after the Abjuration,did the United Provinces cast around among various European states(Anjou, France, England), inviting them to take on the overlordship ofthe United Provinces? Why wasn’t the States General regarded as a sov-ereign body, when it was able to behave with such power over affairs?


Why didn’t Holland attempt to dominate and unify at this point? Howis it that the Calvinists did not establish a national church in thenorthern Netherlands, and yet the Calvinist fervour of the Sea Beggarswas a decisive factor in being able to defeat the Spanish in the yearsleading up to the Truce? Why were influential sections of the UnitedProvinces so opposed to the Truce with Spain in 1609, when a trucewould seem to have been in their interests?

Furthermore, why did the United Provinces not exploit Spanishweaknesses and force a peace treaty before 1648? Again it wouldseem to have been in their interests. Why did the United Provincesreject the overtures of German princes to join them in 1648? Andwhy did the United Provinces not seek to at least reunify theNetherlands by taking over the Spanish southern Netherlands in1648? Why, in a republican state, was a monarchical form of govern-ment recommended and advocated in university political theorycourses in the seventeenth century? And how can we account for thestrength and power of the Calvinist feeling in the northernNetherlands, in the light of the provisions enshrined in the Union ofUtrecht of 1579 for religious toleration, which allowed Calvinists toworship freely? In what follows I hope some light will be cast onthese questions and so on the character of the political backgroundagainst which Spinoza wrote. Kossmann’s excellent ‘Introduction’provides a valuable general context for the discussion (Kossmannand Mellink 1974).

Seventeenth-century Dutch political thought and practice, and inparticular Dutch republicanism, represents an important historicalcontext for understanding Spinoza’s political philosophy. Twofactors support the argument put forward here for contributing to a‘political’ reading of Spinoza’s political works. First, Spinoza’smetaphysical philosophy and the other-worldly aspect of his reputa-tion have led some commentators to discount all contexts for hiswritings other than that in which to establish the precise nature ofhis place in a dehistoricised Descartes-to-Kant rationalist canon. The‘political’ reading of Spinoza’s political theory is designed to enrichthe view of him as a philosopher. In addition, Spinoza’s two politicaltreatises are not widely known among an English-speaking audience,his name being most often associated with the modern history ofmetaphysics. However in recent years the narrowly metaphysicalinterest in the Ethics has been supplemented, by writers likeGenevieve Lloyd (1994, 1996), Moira Gatens (1996a, 1996b), andLloyd and Gatens (1999) with a growing interest in the rich ethical,

Introduction 11

ontological and epistemological theories of the Ethics, and theirpolitical implications. In the second place, Spinoza’s Jewish upbring-ing, complicated by his Marrano status, also render complex hisrelation to Dutch seventeenth-century history and politics. The‘political’ interpretation of Spinoza’s two political texts seeks tounderstand how these aspects of his background might impact onhis thinking as well as on the public reception of his works. The casefor studying Spinoza’s political works in the context of seventeenth-century Dutch political thought and practice, and especially Dutchrepublicanism, is supported in this respect by the fact of Spinoza’sown great and enthusiastic interest in political affairs in Holland.The connections between Spinoza’s political philosophy and thetimes in which he lived are what are being explored here.

Even this context is an ambitious one to undertake. The scope of allthe aspects of theory and practice which it encompasses – all theramifications and influences and further reaches of expression in con-temporary texts and pamphlets – cannot hope to be comprehensivelyexplored here. However the context has been examined in sufficientdetail to demonstrate the soundness of the central propositions aboutthe character of political life in the United Provinces in the 1660s and1670s and the role of Spinoza’s contribution to it.

The central theme of this book concerns the character of republican-ism in the United Provinces in its ‘golden age’, and the assessment ofSpinoza’s contribution to that meaning of republican government.Liberty and sovereignty are key concepts for understanding theparameters and form of republican dominion that Spinoza developed.These conceptions are developed in Chapter 7. Another major theme isto explore and highlight the meaning, for understanding Spinoza’spolitical thought, of the way in which the Dutch characteristicallydemonstrated a reluctance to theorise. This affected both politicalpractice and political theory in the United Provinces and is the subjectof Chapters 3 and 5. In terms of political practice, the way in whichpolitical and constitutional reform was not undertaken to bring it intoline with events during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuriesrequires particular attention. In terms of political theory it is worthexamining the way in which the closest one comes to political theorybefore Spinoza, and to the use by political leaders of political theory, isrepresented in the pragmatic approach of the works of the De la Courtbrothers. The significance of the theoretical character of Spinoza’sreflections on politics, and their impact on political practice, isdiscussed in Chapter 6. In addition, the significance of the strands


established by the historical material adduced in the earlier chapters,strands about the character of Dutch political life, is utilised in Chapter8 on Spinoza’s republicanism.

This book explores Spinoza’s political theory, his conception ofrepublicanism, and the story of the interaction between Spinoza’sand Dutch republicanism. This exploration provides an opportunityto address the concept and tradition of republicanism more widely.The evidence which this book studies adds weight to the convictionof the diversity and specificity of meanings of republican theory andpractice. As described earlier, the revival of scholarly interest inrepublicanism in recent years has been led by Skinner’s retrieval ofthe meaning and utility of the concept of liberty in republicanwritings prior to its adoption and redefinition in liberal politicaltheory. Skinner’s important body of work on ‘liberty beforeliberalism’, in part building upon Pocock’s portrayal of a classicalrepublican tradition stretching from Machiavelli to the AmericanFounding Fathers, and Hans Baron’s recovery of a ‘civic humanist’tradition, have stimulated an interest in republican politicalprinciples among political theorists like Pettit. ‘Classical republican-ism’ is thereby contrasted both with ‘ancient republicanism’, andwith ‘modern representative democracy’, ‘modern constitutional’ ordemocratic and liberal republican values ‘reinvented’ in eighteenth-century America and France. In the course of his lively andprogrammatic work, intended to attract liberals, communitarians andothers to the contemporary relevance of the ‘republican project’,Pettit (1997, 120) outlines a number of features of republicanism.These include the rejection of arbitrary government, the notion offreedom as non-domination, specific linkages with equality,community, civic virtue, constitutionalism and the checking ofgovernment, a radical set of social policies, and democracy.

In order to support his modern republican project Pettit presents astory of a tradition, heavily indebted to Pocock’s work, incorporatingorigins in classical Rome, resurrection in the Renaissance, the EnglishCivil War and Commonwealth, culminating in eighteenth-centuryEnglish, French and American republican writings (Pettit 1997, 5–6)and its overshadowing by the development of liberal political theoryand practice. Pettit describes a confidently transhistorical republicanprimary ‘theme’ of a ‘belief in freedom from non-domination whichbinds together thinkers of very different periods and very differentbackground philosophies’ (Pettit 1997, 10–11). If Pettit’s depiction iscorrect, then his work does a service in illuminating, albeit indirectly,

Introduction 13

the very distinctive insularity of Spinoza and the Dutch in only seekinglegitimation for their republicanism from their own local tradition.Spinoza and Republicanism centres on Spinoza’s engagement with theconcept of republicanism, in terms of his chosen context of the UnitedProvinces in the seventeenth century. The present work’s title alludesto the importance of recognising how and in what ways the notion ofrepublicanism that Spinoza engaged with and contributed to, wasdistinct and particular.

In Chapter 8 specific elements of Spinoza’s republicanism are dis-tinguished from a key feature of Pettit’s model. These elements drawon the discussions of Chapters 6 and 7. One of the things thatemerges clearly from those discussions is that Spinoza was a republi-can but not a democrat. Pettit’s work is most useful in bringing tolife a republican alternative to modern liberal political theory, andalso in highlighting for the purposes of this book the specificity ofthe historical inflection of republicanism in the Dutch case. Dutchand even English republicanism, when looked at closely, do not fitneatly into Pettit’s schematisation. It may well be the case that otherinstances within ‘the republican tradition’ (Pettit 1997, 20) Pettitconstructs were more selfconscious than were the Dutch aboutdrawing upon external republican examples to reinforce their con-temporaneous claims. It may also be that Pettit’s ideal model ofrepublicanism rests on categories important in modern politicaldebate – democracy and individualism figure large, and universalsuffrage is taken as critical to grounding a society without divisions –which cannot accommodate either the specificity of the earlymodern Dutch case without anachronism or its peculiarity. Model-building in the form of Pettit’s ‘ideal type’, as well as Pocock’snotion of a ‘tradition’ of political discourse, can be problematic ifthey lead to the suppression of differences and heterogeneity whichare key to understanding a particular case or conception, and also ifthey reify their subject.

In order to understand the Dutch case more fully it is important tostart by looking backwards rather than forwards, because that iswhat the Dutch did. By tracing their practice, we find that theperspective of their political culture and mentality was backward-looking in a positive sense. It characterises their political practicethroughout the spectacular success of the Dutch ‘golden age’. Wewill tend to misunderstand Dutch republicanism if we attempt onlyto assimilate it, either to models of things that came after (‘bourgeoisliberal republicanism’) or to the past in a place that was not central


for them (Italian Renaissance city-states). The method undertaken in the present work, supporting the location of Spinoza’s meaning inthe context of his chosen and local political culture, employs thefollowing transcendental argument.1 The Dutch could not haveengaged in politics in the form they did, through an engagementwith traditional political arguments about the location of authorityin the privileges, without the assumption that there was an ongoingpolitical discourse based on tradition in this sense. The transcenden-tal argument distances to one remove the question of whether ornot this political culture ‘really’ depended so crucially on thedefence of privileges through a traditionalist practice or not. Thatquestion cannot be answered conclusively one way or the other, butwhat remains quite clear are the Dutch perception of what they weredoing, and Spinoza’s primary intention in contributing to politicaldebate in the United Provinces. The commitment to taking Spinoza’slocal and particularistic political culture seriously is addressed anddeveloped in more detail in Chapter 5 when the Dutch mentality isdiscussed.

In contributing to the third organising framework in which tounderstand Spinoza and republicanism in the Dutch context, the novelor innovative aspects of the current work include a fresh understand-ing of the role of traditional practice and Holland-centricity inSpinoza’s political theory, and especially a reappraisal of Spinoza’s esti-mation of democracy and of his understanding of sovereignty. Thesereinterpretations, through a ‘political’ reading of Spinoza, arise in partfrom redressing the neglect of Spinoza’s second political treatise. Themeaning of the Dutch appeal to the privileges is developed, in the lightof the changing claims made about them and the unacknowledgedslippage of meaning involved. The ambiguous meaning of the DutchRepublic’s constitution is also explored. Claims about the privileges ofthe cities and provinces, together with the international treaty of theUnion of Utrecht of 1579, are the central elements of the de facto con-stitutional status of the Dutch Republic. Ideas about the role ofregional complementarity in the success of the polycentric republic(which could be of interest to those theorising European integration inthe twenty-first century), and about the mismatch between theory andpractice, are developed further. The detailed examination of dates for

Introduction 15

1 I am indebted to Gary Browning for pointing out the value of this transcendentalargument and its ‘fit’ with the significance which their political culture andmentality held for the Dutch and for Spinoza.

the establishment of the Dutch Republic, and the comparison ofEnglish and Dutch republicanism, both represent more systematicanalyses of their kind than have been undertaken previously. The bookseeks to bring together the insights into Spinoza’s understanding ofrepublicanism in the light of the Dutch context. It draws upon polit-ical theory, the history of political thought, and history, and therebyintroduces to an English-speaking audience a specific case-study of thiscombined approach.

Several notes on terminology are appropriate at the beginning. First,when the term ‘Dutch Republic’ is used, it refers specifically andprecisely to its use during the period from the Treaty of Münster in1648 to the end of the eighteenth century. This identification is in linewith the usage of the inhabitants of the northern Netherlands them-selves. Several modern commentators use the term ‘Dutch Republic’ torefer to the United Provinces from various dates going back to 1579. Itis one of the major contentions of this book that such a usage creates aserious misunderstanding about the character of political life in thesixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Chapter 2 discusses in detail theissues involved in attempting to date the inauguration of the ‘DutchRepublic’, on the basis of the framework of evidence presented in thefirst chapter that the term ‘Dutch Republic’ does not most accuratelyrefer to the period 1579–1648.

A related problem concerns the most accurate term to describe thecountry or state of the United Provinces after 1648. Thus ‘DutchRepublic’ and ‘United Provinces’ overlap to some extent. The ‘northernNetherlands’ and the ‘Seven Provinces’ can also be used. The term ‘LowCountries’ refers to both the southern and northern Netherlands orwhat is now comprised by Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg and FrenchFlanders. It is significant that these titles are in the plural, for theyreflect both the intended distinctiveness of the parts and theunintended fragmentation of the area. Moreover, Blockmans confirmsthat only in the middle of the sixteenth century did ‘people attempt togive a name to these Seventeen Provinces’, and then it came in threelanguages – ‘Nederland’ or ‘Nederlanden’ in Dutch, ‘Pais Bas’ inFrench, and ‘Belgique(s)’ from the Latin (Blockmans 1999, 119). It isinteresting that, roughly speaking, what is now commonly known as‘Holland’ was in Spinoza’s time the United Provinces, one of theprovinces of which was Holland. The term ‘country’ is also locally usedinterchangeably with province.

A second note concerns the use of terms to refer to the inhabitantsof this country, especially in the second half of the seventeenth


century, where the attention of this book is focused. The problem isthat there is no immediately accessible term by which to refer to thepopulation of the United Provinces, or of the Dutch Republic.Consequently I have resorted to using the terms ‘northernNetherlanders’, ‘Netherlanders’ and ‘the Dutch’, though fully awarethat strictly speaking, ‘the Dutch’ are the inhabitants only ofHolland, just one of the seven provinces. In order to avoid confusionhere, I have used the term ‘Hollanders’ when wishing to refer onlyto the inhabitants of Holland. In the same way a term like ‘Dutchpolitical practice’ is taken to refer to the political practice of those inthe United Provinces.

Two further cases of terminological awareness concern some institu-tional terms used by the northern Netherlanders and shared bymodern Dutch commentators. Prime among these terms are ‘StatesGeneral’ (or ‘Estates General’) and ‘States’, which refer to the politicalassemblies of the United Provinces and of the separate provincesrespectively. These councils combined some legislative and executivefunctions, but do not correspond fully to parliamentary and primeministerial duties. The United Provinces was not a modern state but aloose confederation of provinces comprised of independent city-states.As Blom notes, it ‘seems inadequate to label the Republic a federalstate…because it possessed no detailed regulation of the respectiverights and duties of its different parts’ (Blom 2002, 97). It is in thislight that the functions of the States and States General need to beread. Price accurately captures the character of the States General whenhe describes it as ‘a conference of ambassadors from separate countriesrather than a parliament’ (Price 1994, 211). As I shall argue, the Unionof Utrecht of 1579, together with claims about the defence ofprivileges, is the closest the United Provinces came to a constitution,and this was not very close. The Union of Utrecht remained an inter-national legal and military treaty between the separate provinces, andthe (changing) significance of the privileges lay in the claims madeabout them.

The States General had direct control over foreign relations, thearmed forces and the administration of the Generality Lands, that is,parts of Flanders, Brabant and Limburg annexed by the north duringthe Revolt (Price 1994, 210). Price confirms that the ‘precise constitu-tional position’ of the States General ‘was never absolutely clear’ (Price1994, 4), and that its powers were greater in practice than in theory.The States General represented two ‘estates’ or social orders – repre-sentatives from the college of Nobles, and delegations from the Town

Introduction 17

Councils and Colleges of Magistrates – which together were taken torepresent ‘the whole state and entire body of the inhabitants’. TheStates General contained delegations of deputies from the States ofGelderland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Overijssel, Friesland, Groningen, andHolland, and each province had a single vote. The delegations fromthe provinces were chosen by different, locally determined, methods(Price 1994, 211). The States General met in permanent session, unlikethe provincial States. Its administrative functions were undertaken bya Raadpensionaris, who was also the Pensionary of the States ofHolland, the most powerful province. The towns (also known ascities), in Vranck’s authoritative description of 1587, were ‘indepen-dent self-governing political entities, governed by a college of towncouncillors’ (van Gelderen 1993, xxix). The Southern (Spanish andlater Austrian) Netherlands contained its own set of States and its ownStates General.

Likewise, and holding a position separate from but often in tensionwith the States and States General, was the office of ‘Stadholder’. The Stadholder historically had a leadership role as the emperor’sprovincial governor, physically ‘standing in for’ him and controllingsome appointments on town councils and the provincial States. TheStadholdership was historically associated with the House of Orangefrom the time of William the Silent (1533–84) (Blom 1995, 41).Moreover the association was with the extended House of Orange,including uncles and other family members who might hold titles indifferent Dutch provinces, and not just with the current Count.Velema says that the Stadholder in the form of the princes of theHouse of Orange was the ‘hereditary head (not monarch though)who was supreme military commander’ (Velema 2002, 19). But thesituation was somewhat more complicated. From 1579 the postceased to be hereditary since the Stadholder’s appointment nowdepended upon the separate provincial States (rather than on theStates General), and the Stadholder was an agent of the States,although he could be appointed captain-general of the army by theStates General. There were also two important ‘Stadholderless’periods, the first of which between 1650 and 1672 largely coincidedwith De Witt’s republican government. Although the post ofStadholder had been abolished by most of the Northern Provincesafter the death of William II in 1650, in fact Friesland and Groningencontinued to have Stadholders throughout this period. Thus, strictlyspeaking, the first Stadholderless period was nothing of the kind. But


because of the power and authority wielded by the province ofHolland during this time, his absence there was decisive. Speckrecounts that although William III revived the post in 1672, ‘andeven got it to be made hereditary, he died childless in 1702’, whichthereby inaugurated the second Stadholderless period of 1702 to1747 (Speck 1995, 174).

As Speck notes, a Stadholder ‘was not a monarch but the occupantof a post devised before the Dutch Revolt to represent the absenteeHabsburg monarchs, being equivalent to viceroy or lieutenant’. Itfollows that the post was ‘therefore something of an anomaly afterthe successful movement to throw off the Habsburgs and establish arepublic’ (Speck 1995, 174). But the post was not abolished at thatpoint and the anomaly was at times exploited to decisive politicaladvantage by the House of Orange. During the Dutch Revolt whenresistance to the monarchical component of the regnum mixtum wasfocused upon the Spanish king, the Princes of Orange were oftenallied with and at times played a leading role in the defence of theNetherlands. But with the emergence of the Dutch Republic tensionsin the relation between the regents, States General and States on theone side and the House of Orange on the other, always under strain,became more marked. For now the strategic significance of theStadholderate changed, being as Speck says, ‘the one agency whichhad the potential to focus authority at the centre rather than theperipheries’ (Speck 1995, 174). The House of Orange thus repre-sented a further and at times very strong focus for anti-monarchicalsentiment, particularly in the light of its centralising ambitions athome and appetite for war abroad. In this way the ambiguity aboutwhether the Stadholder was the monarchical component of a mixedconstitution, or whether he harboured monarchical ambitions andaspired to the role of the Habsburg kings in the NorthernNetherlands, is a distinctive feature of Dutch politics throughoutthis period.

References to Spinoza’s Tractatus Theologico-Politicus (TTP) andTractatus Politicus (TP) are to the unabridged Elwes translation of1951. A new translation of the TTP by Samuel Shirley was publishedin 1991. While the Shirley edition has much to recommend it thereare three reasons for staying with the Elwes translation. Shirley hastranslated the TTP but not the TP and for the purposes of this bookit is important to retain the consistency afforded by using the Elwesedition of both political treatises. Second, not all of Shirley’s notes

Introduction 19

to contemporaneous events are reliable – see for instance the finalnote on p. 218, which identifies Spinoza’s reference to ‘the lastcount’ as Philip II of Spain, when the reference is more probably toWilliam II’s attempted coup d’etat of 1650. Finally the benefit of theShirley translation’s modern updating of the language in a mannerthat makes it more accessible to students, comes at the cost of someof the nuances of the earlier translation.


Abjuration of Spanish rule 1581, 10,33, 36, 55, 67, 76, 104, 116, 118

Allison, H.E., 200Althusius, 50, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 236Arendt, H., 210Armitage, D., 4

Balibar, E., 169Baron, H., 13Berlin, I., 201–3van der Bijl, M., 33, 70, 90, 96, 97,

99, 100, 101, 104, 105, 107, 108,162

Black, J., 38, 66, 69, 70, 111Blockmans, W. P., 16, 22, 25, 26, 27,

28, 29, 32, 33, 34, 36, 52, 63, 68,79, 164, 166, 167

Blom, H., 17, 18, 54, 60, 71, 98, 99,104, 105–6, 137, 145, 146, 147,200, 207, 208, 232, 237, 242,246–8, 250–2, 253, 255, 260

Bödeker, H. E., 200Bodin, 34, 56, 59, 224den Boer, H., 194Boone, M., 75, 76Boralevi, L.C., 5Boscherini, E.G., 181Boxer, C.R., 104, 108, 194Braudel, F., 39, 40, 67, 90, 104–5, 106,

109, 131–2, 156, 160, 167, 192Browning, A., viiiBrowning, C., vBrowning, E., vBrowning, G., viii, 15Browning, H., viiiBruneel, C., 257van Bunge, W., 2, 22, 25, 40, 58, 106,

112, 113, 220, 243, 244, 245, 248,261

Burgersdijk, F., 60Burgess, G., 134, 149Burke, P., 38, 165Buys, P., 57, 59

Carver, T., viiiCastiglione, D., 5, 7, 155Colie, R., 240–1Condren, C., viii, 214Conti, V., 8De la Court, P. and J., 12, 60, 70, 83,

94, 96–104, 107, 112–13, 115,162, 169, 184, 195, 219, 242–4,247, 252, 259

Cox, R., 224Curley, E., 5, 6, 181, 200

Davids, K., ixDavis, J.C., 151Delahunty, R.J., 200Deleuze, G., 196, 220van Deursen, A. T., 3, 31, 34, 38, 39,

40, 41, 42, 44, 58, 68, 89, 90, 91,95, 102, 107, 109, 123, 127, 130–1,162, 164, 165, 178, 251–2, 258

van Dillon, J. G., 216Duff, R., 200Duke, A., 23, 24, 27, 34, 35, 36, 37,

45, 163Dunn, J., 7Dutch Republic, date of, 65–75,

257–61Dzelzainis, M., 136, 142–3, 149

Elwes, R.H.M., 6, 19, 197, 208, 237,238–9, 243, 244, 245

Erasmus, 50–2, 54, 61, 84

Feldman, S., 181, 191–2, 196, 197,237, 240, 252

Feuer, L., 178Fontana, B., 255Foreman-Peck, L., viii

Gatens, M., 2, 11, 155, 170, 173, 200Gebhardt, 2van Gelderen, M., 2, 18, 23, 24, 25,

28, 31, 33, 34, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49,

277

Index

50, 53, 55, 57, 58, 59, 61, 62, 63,64, 75, 83, 84, 85, 100, 112, 154,157, 247, 250

Geyl, P., 29, 30, 67, 82, 116Gildin, H., 181, 220Golden Age, 1, 12, 14, 75Grotius, 50, 57–9, 68, 75, 84, 85, 97,

113, 130, 162, 191, 220Gullan-Whur, M., 194–5, 244

Haitsma Mulier, E., 2, 54, 60, 64, 65,82, 100, 112, 175, 243, 247, 259,260

Hampsher-Monk, I., 5, 7, 155, 157Hampshire, S., 180, 200, 220Hankins, J., 3, 255Harline, C., 41, 52, 72, 86Harrington, J., 33, 70, 71, 124, 134,

139–42, 144, 148, 150, 231Harris, E., 180, 200Harris, T., 150Hibben, C.C., 43, 55, 154Hoak, D., 129Hobbes, T., 33, 60, 74, 97, 99, 103,

125, 136, 137, 139, 141, 149, 169,172, 184, 186–7, 188–9, 190, 191,195, 196, 198, 200, 201, 202, 206,208, 212, 215, 217, 219, 220–4,228, 232, 233, 234–6, 241–2, 248

Hooft, P., 61, 75, 84, 162Horton, J., viii

Israel, J.I., 2, 3, 39, 41, 42, 97, 108, 193,194, 196, 197, 211, 217, 240, 248

Jones, J.R., 108–9, 117Jordan, W.C., 4de Jouvenal, B., 200

Kaiser, W., 66, 67Kedourie, E., 192Kelsey, S., 150Kishlansky, M., 129van de Klashorst, G.O., 54, 60, 260Klever, W.N.A., 5, 240Kossmann, E.H., 3, 7, 11, 21, 28, 30,

31, 32, 41, 47, 48, 49, 50, 54, 56,57, 58, 59, 60, 63, 64, 65, 71, 74,79, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 91, 92, 95,

97, 99, 100, 102, 103, 105, 112,113, 142, 160, 165, 166, 218, 220,229, 243, 244, 250, 254, 259, 260

Lipsius, 50, 53, 56, 60, 84Lloyd, G., 2, 11, 155, 170, 173, 200Locke, 147, 184, 186–7, 191, 201,

217, 230, 240–1Lockyer, A., 69Lockyer, R., 77, 78, 88, 108, 109, 118Lucassen, J., ix

MacCallum, G.C., 201, 202McShea, R., 200, 232Machiavelli, 13, 33, 50, 53, 61, 62, 97,

100, 101, 102, 135, 139, 201, 215,236, 242

Mack Crew, P., 31Malcolm, N., 98, 111, 218, 233Martineau, J., 200Mastellone, S., 112Mellink, A.F., 11, 28, 32, 47, 54, 63, 91Miller, D., 201, 203Milton, J., 118, 134, 137, 139, 142–4,

148, 151Misrahi, R., 181Monaldi, R., 129Montag, W., 170, 200Morrall, J.B., 78Morrill, J., 132, 148

Nadler, S., 194, 197Nederman, C.J., 255Nedham, M, 134, 139Negri, A., 180Nenner, H., 126van Nierop, H.F.K., 24, 80Nippel, W., 255Norbrook, D, 136

Oldenbarnevelt, 35, 38, 39, 40, 41,57, 58, 59, 64, 75, 80, 88, 89, 106,113, 114, 162, 163, 250, 258

Onuf, N., 120O’Sullivan, N., viiiO’Sullivan, L., viii

Pagden, A., 4Parker, G., 22, 71, 72, 76

278 Index

Pavord, A., 43Peace of Utrecht 1713, 257Peltonen, M., 136, 149Petry, M.J., 169Pettit, P., 13, 14, 246, 248, 254Philp, M., viiiPlant, R., 201, 202Pocock, J. G. A., 2, 3, 4, 8, 13, 14, 71,

120, 121, 122, 124, 128, 135, 136,138, 139, 140, 142, 148, 149,216–17, 231

political theory, meaning of, 48–50political thought in 1648, 74–87

Batavian myth, 83–5protection of privileges, 75–82sovereignty of provincial

assemblies, 82–3uninterrupted peace, continuity of

independence of Holland, 85–7Pontalis, A.F., 107Popkin, R.H., 245Prak, M., 75, 76Price, J.L., 3, 17, 18, 37, 38, 39, 73, 89,

91, 105, 120–1, 122, 123, 160, 164‘privileges’, meaning of, 15, 45–6, 63,

75–82, 114, 155, 156, 187, 203,218, 234, 250

Prokhovnik, R., 138Prokhovnik, S., viii

van Raalte, E., 70Radcliffe, A., viiiReid, J., viiireligion

role of in the Revolt, 30–2, 39–41,105, 218

in Dutch Republic, 105–6, 115Remonstrant/Counter-Remonstrant

conflict, 2, 30, 39, 42, 43, 75, 89,106, 112, 240, 252

Renier, G.J., 30republicanism

English and Dutch, 117–33,149–53, 254–5

English writings, 133–53Dutch, 154–67, 260–1Dutch mentality, 154–62Holland-centricity, 162–7

Revolt of the Netherlands

history of, 21–46political thought during, 46–64

Roorda, D.J., 71, 79, 80, 92, 104, 105,114, 115, 163, 165

Rorty, R., 161Roth, L., 181Rowen, H.H., 38, 68, 76–7, 93, 98, 99,

100, 133, 159

Schama, S., 70Schöffer, I., 25, 32, 52, 53, 54, 58, 75,

84Scott, J., 3, 4, 21, 49, 65, 106, 117,

118–19, 120, 123, 124, 126, 127,128, 129, 133, 137, 139–40, 141,144, 145, 149, 217

Scruton, R., 200Sharpe, K., 3, 8, 119, 121, 126, 127,

134, 137, 138, 144–5, 155, 157Shaw, C., 207Shetter, W., 35, 38, 155Shirley, S., 19Sidney, A., 118, 134, 135, 137, 144,

145–8, 151Siebrand, H. J., 245Skinner, Q., viii, 2, 3, 13, 50, 101,

136–7, 201, 202, 207Smit, J.W., 30, 73, 82, 89, 90, 91, 95,

96, 108, 110, 111, 113, 130, 191Smith, S., 170, 193Sorti, G., 129Speck, W., 19, 128–9, 135, 152–3Spinoza, B.

‘absolute’ dominion, 229–32aristocracy, 171–5, 177–181, 184–5,

229, 230–1, 249challenge to university political

theory, 60, 83democracy, 171–5, 177–81, 207,

208–10, 213, 215, 221–3, 224,249

Dutch perspective, 94, 154, 155,156, 158, 168–99, 249–56; inthe political works, 98, 103–4,169–91

equality, 208–13, 223Ethics, 2, 5, 6, 7, 9, 11, 170, 195,

203, 205, 211, 215, 218, 219,220, 226, 238, 245

Index 279

(Spinoza, B. continued)Letters, 6liberty, 201–20Marrano status, 2, 11, 191–9, 218,

251reason, 205–8, 215, 228reception, 237–46religion, 105–6, 170–1, 172, 184,

203–6, 218–19, 220, 223–4,232, 237–41, 245–6, 251–2

republicanism, 105–6, 216–17, 237,246–56, 260–1

sovereignty, 220–36toleration, 103, 175, 203, 217–19,

223, 230Tractatus Politicus, 8, 9, 19, 169–99,

195, 205–36, 243, 245Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, 5, 8, 9,

19, 169–99, 195, 196, 203–36,237–45

Springborg, P., 248Stoye, J., 10, 93, 101, 109, 110, 111,

116Strauss, L., 200, 241Stuart–Orange alliance, 117–18,

127–9, 176–7Swart, K. W., 27

Taylor, C., 156, 201, 202Temple, W., 70, 85, 107Thompson, C., viiiTilmans, K., 51, 52, 84, 115toleration, 102–3, 105, 106, 175,

217–18transcendental argument, 15, 156Treaty of Münster 1648, 16, 41, 69,

70, 90, 117, 133, 162Treaty of Utrecht 1713, 4Truce with Spain 1609, 11, 38, 40, 41,

58, 68Tuck, R., 97, 142

Union of Arras 1579, 28, 29, 33Union of Utrecht 1579, 10, 11, 15, 17, 28,

29, 32, 33, 44, 62, 67, 90, 159, 162den Uyl, D., 170, 180, 200, 229, 232

Velema, W.R.E., 4, 5, 7, 18, 50, 83,100, 104

van Velthuysen, L., 60, 99, 242Vermeer, 1, 65–7, 196Vlekke, B.H.M., 197Vranck, 18, 47, 50, 55–6, 59, 67, 85,

104, 159

de Waele, M., 70Wansink, H., 32, 40, 90, 94, 109–10,

114, 159, 162–3, 166, 167, 258Warner, S., 181, 229Welu, J., 65Wernham, A.G., 180, 200West, D., 249West, T.G., 127, 145Wienpahl, P., 193, 197, 226, 238Wildenberg, I. W., 96Wilson, C., 241Wingate Foundation, viiiDe Witt, J.

fall from power, 106–11foreign policy, 90–4republicanism, 112–16True Liberty ideology, 94–106

Wolfson, H.A., 2, 200Woltjer, J.O., 45, 46, 81, 109, 218Wood, D., 66, 67Worden, B., 3, 8, 120, 122, 124, 125,

133, 134, 136, 137–8, 139, 140–1,143, 146–7, 148, 149, 150–1, 152

Yovel, Y., 170, 193, 194, 195, 200

Zac, S., 181Zook, M., 127

280 Index

contents · contents acknowledgements viii maps ix ... spinoza’s work can be analysed fruitfully...

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