As early as the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect, it was clear that the philosopher, according to Spinoza, would necessarily end up being concerned with politics. In Paragraph 14 of that work, in fact, having just claimed to have conceived, as an ideal model, a perfect human nature – perfect, that is, as powerful as possible – consisting in the ‘union that the mind has with the whole of Nature’, Spinoza immediately added: the end that I pursue is ‘to acquire such a nature, and to strive that many acquire it with me. That is, it is part of my happiness to take pains that many others may understand as I understand.’ From which he concludes, a little farther on: for that, it is necessary ‘to form a society of the kind that is desirable, so that as many as possible may attain it as easily and surely as possible’.

To be sure, if we take this text in isolation, it doesn't yet prove that politics is at issue. But now let us consider what he had said earlier, throughout the first eleven paragraphs of the same treatise, concerning pleasures, honours and riches. These external goods, having previously appeared to Spinoza in succession first as certain goods, then as uncertain goods and then as certain evils, acquire their definitive status in Paragraph 11: these are conditional goods, which are only evil for us if they are pursued for themselves, but which, insofar as they are mere means, can contribute greatly to the acquisition of the true good. Now, if we connect this passage to the preceding one, the implication is clear; for if one wants the same end for everyone, one also wants the same means for everyone. Therefore what Spinoza implicitly wants is the formation of a society in which the greatest possible number of people could peacefully enjoy the pleasures of the senses (without being disturbed by this or that religious authority), where the greatest possible number of people live in economic comfort (which implies at least that the regime of property must not be too inegalitarian), and where honours would be spread among the greatest possible number of people (which implies at least a certain degree of democratisation of political institutions).