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Benedict de Spinoza may be the first person I have read about that was excommunicated from Judaism. It is admirable that he stuck by his beliefs even though he faced persecution from his family and religious leaders and peers. Other philosophers saved themselves from prosecution by arguing things they probably did not actually personally believe. For example, when Descartes told his readers to set aside the notion of God to understand his famous meditations on dreaming and the evil genius, he followed it up by basically reiterating the ontological argument for the existence of God invented by St. Anselm. I feel that he did this to save himself from any persecution. But Spinoza, on the other hand, was not too concerned with pleasing others by going against his beliefs, and so he was excommunicated for his understanding of God and nature being one in the same, and that God did not actually have a personality. This devotion to the topic is what sets Ethics apart from other serious works to me. His assuredness in his own beliefs that he reasoned from scratch shows that Spinoza had a strong personal character and was surely underappreciated in his time.

Spinoza’s idea of God is probably close to what I would subscribe to if I could bother with being spiritual. It relies heavily on logic, does not have anything to do with any type of incredible mythology, and does not deal with a set of strict rules nor arbitrary obligations. What it does seem to offer is a précised system of belief that uses common sense and everyday morals. Spinoza saw the Hebrew Bible not as fact, but as a collection of allegories to show by example the nature of God/natural existence. I feel that even if religions were debunked, they still can teach valuable lessons about ethics. I think Spinoza shows how religion could be found useful within a secular view.

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Just as fallow lands, when rich and fertile, are seen to abound in hundreds and thousands of different kinds of useless weeds so that, if we would make them do their duty, we must subdue them and keep them busy with seeds specifically sown for our service; and just as women left alone may sometimes be seen to produce shapeless lumps of flesh but need to be kept best by a semen other than her own in order to produce good natural offspring, so too with our minds. If we do not keep them busy with some particular subject which can serve as a bridle to reign them in, they charge ungovernably about, ranging to and fro over the wastelands of our thoughts:

Sicut aquae tremulum labris ubi lumen ahenis
Sole repercussum, aut radiantis imagine Lunae
Omnia pervolitat late loca jamque sub auras
Erigitur, summique ferit laquearia tecti.

[As when ruffled water in a bronze pot reflects the light of the sun and the shining face of the moon, sending shimmers flying high into the air and striking against the panelled ceilings.]

      Then, there is no madness, no raving lunacy, which much agitations do not bring forth:

velut aegri somnia, vanae
Finguntur species.

[they fashion vain apparitions as in the dreams of sick men.]

When the soul is without a definite aim she gets lost; for, as the say, if you are everwhere, you are nowhere.

Quisquis ubique habitat, Maxime, nusquam habitat.

[Whoever dwells everywhere, Maximus, dwells nowhere at all.]

      Recently I retired to my estates, determined to devote myself as far as I could to spending what little life I have left quietly and privately; it seemed to me then that the greatest favor I could do for my mind was to leave it in total idleness, caring for itself, concerned only with itself, calmly thinking of itself. I hoped it could do that more easily from then on, since with the passage of time it had grown mature and put on weight.
      But I find -

Variam semper dant otia mentis

[Idleness always produces fickle changes of mind]

- that on the contrary it bolted off like a runaway horse, taking far more trouble over itself than it ever did over anyone else; it gives birth to so many chimeras and fantastic monstrosities, one after another, without order or fitness, that, so as to contemplate at my ease their oddness and their strangeness, I began to keep a record of them, hoping in time to make my mind ashamed of itself.

---

      And that, in the words of Michel de Montaigne, is what inspired me to begin this journal.

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Michel de Montaigne goes on about the sanctity of a friendship so true that both parts share one will; a friendship with which he was so used to being one of two that without his counterpart he felt but a half. He also says that this true friendship can only be shared with one person because the self should be given up so completely that there is nothing left to give to another. The reason that I have a hard time subscribing to this is that I do not feel there is a finite amount of love or friendship to be handed out; that is to say, one would run out of friendliness after giving out twenty-five percent to each of four friends, or in Michel’s case, one-hundred percent to one friend. I feel friendship is relative to only each individual acquaintance and should not be restricted or limited based on prior engagement to others. If the former idea were the case, it would certainly be a rarer occurrence for one to take a better liking to a new friend, spontaneous or gradual as it may be, when in fact this happens quite naturally and frequently with most people, especially in adolescence. Why should great friendship be exclusive to only one other person? Eudamidas seemed to have the right idea by splitting his will between Charixenus and Aretheus, who were probably his two best friends and, regardless of whether it was Charixenus or Aretheus that died, either would have honored his good friend’s will. Michel asks rhetorically which of two friends simultaneously asked a favor would receive priority to make the case that there should be one friendship that overrules all others, but this can easily be decided by granting favors in an alternating fashion, a random choice, or any other way that one could determine which friend to help. The notion that only one friend should take priority seems somewhat limiting to a characteristic of human nature that I feel should be shared infinitely.

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I can't get it out of my head that I'm ham. I'm afraid I'm going to eat myself. It keeps getting more serious. I don't want to snap, but even worse, I'm so hungry for ham. Actually, I want to snap, because then I'll deserve to eat myself.

That's the ham talking.

The ham wants you to hate me. The ham wants you to hate it. The ham grows off of your derision. It grows saltier, greasier, fattier. It slumbers under a birch with the sweat of the sun beading in its blemishes, laughing. The ham has hands to choke you with, teeth to chew you with.

Grab the handle and push the button.

Actually, the ham has hands to hug you with, teeth to smile at you hospitably. The twine wrapped around keeps the slices in place. That will come off later when the ham and I eat myself.

What the ham doesn't know is: We are a turkey.

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I lose myself somewhere along desert road. Desert road tangos. Wind slaps me, with hitchèd song. Voice, full and tragic, tragedy on mount; Siren at air's expense. It dives in my back, a knife in my shoulderblade, smooth cusp piercèd membrane seething, snarling-gargling crimson saliva. Tackles me, presses, grinds me, lick the asphalt, taste my sand, I own this land. I shape it needs me. I lead it dogs me. I speak Who Am I? Friend nor foe. I swallow curling wind, and song dies, dries.

Desert road fox trots. No, waltzes. Anyway, it dances. I don't.

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