In a letter of 1663, Simon de Vries asked Spinoza to explain more precisely the text we know today as the Scholium to Proposition 10 of the first part of the Ethics. In this Scholium Spinoza argues that the existence of an infinite number of attributes that are all conceived in themselves does not compromise the monism he generally advocated regarding the substance. De Vries, however, thought that an attribute could, according to what are today the first ten propositions of the Ethics, emancipate and thus satisfy the criteria of substantiality: in this way, we would have in Spinoza's system an infinite number of substances. De Vries thus raised a question that cuts to the very core of Spinozism. The thesis first examines the synchronic and diachronic origins of this problem, then looks at its treatment in the early reception of Spinoza's philosophy (up to the end of the 17th century), and finally seeks to offer a resolution; first through a historical treatment of the development of the concepts of substance and attribute in Spinoza, and then in their immanent relation in the Ethics.
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