Spinoza had ample opportunities of practising this difficult art of combining the wisdom of the serpent with the harmlessness of the dove; and all that we know of his life suggests that he acquired great skill in it. He always avoided giving provocation or seeking martyrdom; yet, when the occasion arose, he displayed a calm heroic courage in face of a murderous patriotic mob. And he was equally successful in "the long littleness of life". He shared the joys and sorrows of the simple people among whom he lived in a perfectly natural un-self-conscious way; and he tolerated and respected in them beliefs and practices which would have been impossible for himself. In the meanwhile he earned his own living by his skill as a practical optician, and was a burden to no one. He thus accomplished one of the hardest of all tasks, viz., to be a prophet without being a prig and to be a saint without being a sponger.
(C. D. Broad, Five Types of Ethical Theory [London and Henley: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1930], 51)
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 