Baruch de Spinoza or Benedictus de Spinoza (1632–1677), a highly controversial, influential and significant figure in the history of Western and Jewish thought,<ref> Moses Mendelssohn: "...Before the transition from the Cartesian to the Leibnizian philosophy could occur, it was necessary for someone to take the plunge into the monstrous abyss lying between them. This unhappy lot fell to Spinoza. How his fate is to be pitied! He was a sacrifice for the human intellect, but one that deserves to be decorated with flowers. Without him, philosophy would never have been able to extend its borders so far." (Philosophical Writings, 1755–77) [original in German] Georg Friedrich Hegel: "...It is therefore worthy of note that thought must begin by placing itself at the standpoint of Spinozism; to be a follower of Spinoza is the essential commencement of all Philosophy." (Lectures on the History of Philosophy) [original in German] Georg Friedrich Hegel: "...The fact is that Spinoza is made a testing-point in modern philosophy, so that it may really be said: You are either a Spinozist or not a philosopher at all." (Lectures on the History of Philosophy) [original in German] Friedrich Wilhelm Schelling: "...It is unquestionably the peacefulness and calm of the Spinozist system which particularly produces the idea of its depth, and which, with hidden but irresistible charm, has attracted so many minds. The Spinozist system will also always remain in a certain sense a model. A system of freedom — but with just as great contours, with the same simplicity, as a perfect counter-image (Gegenbild) of the Spinozist system — this would really be the highest system. This is why Spinozism, despite the many attacks on it, and the many supposed refutations, has never really become something truly past, never been really overcome up to now, and no one can hope to progress to the true and the complete in philosophy who has not at least once in his life lost himself in the abyss of Spinozism. [...] Spinoza in particular belongs to the immortal authors. He is great because of the sublime simplicity of his thoughts and his way of writing, great because of his distance from all scholasticism, and, on the other hand, from all false embellishment or ostentation of language." (On the History of Modern Philosophy, 1833) [original in German] Heinrich Heine: "...We must mention the providential man who, at the same time as Locke and Leibnitz, had educated himself in the school of Descartes, had for a long time been viewed only with scorn and hatred, and who nevertheless today is rising to exclusive supremacy in the world of intellect. I am speaking about Benedict Spinoza. One great genius shapes himself by means of another, less through assimilation than through friction." (On the History of Religion and Philosophy in Germany, 1833) [original in German] Moses Hess: "...Kant is erroneously viewed as the founder of German philosophy, and an ingenious poet-philosopher, Heinrich Heine, has even drawn a parallel between the different phases of the French Revolution and those of German philosophy, putting next to each other as analogous phenomena Kant and Robespierre, Fichte and Napoleon, Schelling and the Restoration, Hegel and the July [1830] Revolution. But the true founder of German philosophy – if one wishes to name a personal representative for the spirit of the age [Zeitgeist] – is none other than [the thinker] whose world view lies equally at the foundation of French social philosophy – Spinoza; and as far as Heine's analogy goes, it is only Kant and Robespierre, i.e. the religious revolution, who are analogous phenomena." (The Holy History of Mankind, 1837) [original in German] Ludwig Feuerbach: "Spinoza is the Moses of modern free-thinkers and materialists." (Principles of the Philosophy of the Future, 1843) [original in German] George Henry Lewes: "...A brave and simple man, earnestly meditating on the deepest subjects that can occupy the human race, he produced a system which will ever remain as one of the most astounding efforts of abstract speculation — a system that has been decried, for nearly two centuries, as the most iniquitous and blasphemous of human invention; and which has now, within the last sixty years, become the acknowledged parent of a whole nation's philosophy, ranking among its admirers some of the most pious and illustrious intellects of the age." (A Biographical History of Philosophy [Vol. 3 & 4], 1846) James Anthony Froude: "...We may deny his conclusions; we may consider his system of thought preposterous and even pernicious, but we cannot refuse him the respect which is the right of all sincere and honourable men.