<b>Ethics by Benedictus de Spinoza</b>&nbsp;<i><b>Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order</b></i>&nbsp;(Latin:&nbsp;<i>Ethica, ordine geometrico demonstrata</i>), usually known as the&nbsp;<i><b>Ethics</b></i>, is a philosophical&nbsp;treatise&nbsp;written in Latin by&nbsp;Baruch Spinoza&nbsp;(Benedictus de Spinoza). It was written between 1661 and 1675 and was first published&nbsp;posthumously&nbsp;in 1677.<br /><br />The book is perhaps the most ambitious attempt to apply the&nbsp;method of Euclid&nbsp;in philosophy. Spinoza puts forward a small number of definitions and&nbsp;axioms&nbsp;from which he attempts to derive hundreds of&nbsp;propositions&nbsp;and&nbsp;corollaries, such as &quot;When the Mind imagines its own lack of power, it is saddened by it&quot;, &quot;A free man thinks of nothing less than of death&quot;, and &quot;The human Mind cannot be absolutely destroyed with the Body, but something of it remains which is eternal.&quot;<br /><br />The first part of the book addresses the relationship between God and the&nbsp;universe. Spinoza was engaging with a&nbsp;Tradition&nbsp;that held: God exists outside of the universe; God created the universe for a reason; and God could have created a different universe according to his will. Spinoza denies each point. According to Spinoza, God&nbsp;<i>is</i>&nbsp;the natural world.<br /><br />Spinoza concludes the following: God is the substance comprising the universe, with God existing in itself, not somehow outside of the universe; and the universe exists as it does from necessity, not because of a divine theological reason or will.<br /><br />Spinoza argues through propositions. He holds their conclusion is merely the necessary logical conclusion from combining the provided Definitions and Axioms. He starts with the proposition that &quot;there cannot exist in the universe two or more substances having the same nature or attribute.