By which is not meant an infinite
extension of galaxies in space, but the co-existence and, so to speak,
interpenetration of an infinity of modes of existence imperceptible to
us.
[Sidenote: God Is Identical with the Whole of Being.]
To Spinoza, then, God is the totality of Being. But it is not to be
inferred that he identified God with the visible, or with any
conceivable Universe. For either of these must fall far short of
infinity, and the Being of God is infinite. All I mean, when I say that
Spinoza identifies God with the totality of existence, is that he
regards the deity as that Perfect Being without beginning or end, whose
essence it is to be, and of whom all that exists, whether known to us or
not, is separately a partial, and comprehensively a perfect expression.
[Sidenote: His Doctrine of Man.]
Of more practical interest to us perhaps is Spinoza's doctrine of man,
though it would have been impossible to explain that without first
indicating his idea of God. In his view, then, man is a finite mode of
the two divine attributes, extension and thought. Thus both the extended
body and the conscious mind have their substance and reality in God.[18]
But the essence of man does not necessarily involve his separate
existence as the essence of God implies Being. Of course the substance
of man is imperishable because it is of God's substance. Nay, there is a
sense in which each man, being an eternal thought of God, has an aspect
towards eternity or exists "sub specie eternitatis.
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