Ethics, Part IV, Axiom 1

There is no individual thing in nature, than which there is not another more powerful and strong. Whatsoever thing be given, there is something stronger whereby it can be destroyed.

Benedict de Spinoza, The Ethics (Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata), translated from the Latin by R. H. M. Elwes.

First published in The Chief Works of Benedict de Spinoza, vol. II (London: George Bell and Sons, 1884).

This translation is out of copyright in the United States, where it was published in 1884, and wherever the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less; its translator died in 1892.

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Digital text: Project Gutenberg eBook #3800