Spinoza never believed a sound metaphysics was, for the masses, the indispensable basis of a good moral life. The multitude, he was firmly convinced, are controlled by their passions and desires, not by knowledge and reason. The coercive law of the State and Nature, not philosophy, keep them living within the bounds necessary for social order and human well-being. Far from it being necessary to tell the masses only the truth Spinoza believed, as did Plato before him, that it may even be necessary in order to rule the masses successfully in the ways of wisdom and virtue to deceive them to a greater or lesser extent. Such deception is, as a political expediency, morally justified, for the rulers would be lying in the interests of virtue and truth. Spinoza did not suffer from the fond contemporary delusion that the salvation of mankind will come about when philosophers become like all other people. He knew, as Plato did, that the day of ultimate, universal happiness will dawn rather when all other people become like philosophers. In the meantime, it is the height of moral and political folly to act as if that day had arrived or else could be ushered in by morning. Spinoza had nothing but contempt for facile-tongued, feather-brained Utopians. He loved humanity too sincerely to mislead humanity or himself that way. And so we find in Spinoza's _Ethics_ as in his _Tractatus_ two systems of morals--one for the many who are called, and one for the few who are chosen. In the _Tractatus_, the religion of the many is summarily called "obedience"; in the _Ethics_ it is more fully shown to consist of utilitarianism in the conduct of our affairs, high-mindedness towards our fellows, and piety towards Nature or God. To this is added, as the rare religion of the few, what is designated in both treatises alike as the intellectual love of Nature or God. X Spinoza's religion is as naturalistic as his ethics. By making God and Nature equivalent terms Spinoza was not merely resorting to equivocation to escape the penalty of his views. The identification of God and Nature fully embodies Spinoza's doctrine that there is no supernatural realm; and therefore if man is to have a God at all, Nature must be that God. To contend, as so many do, that "true religion" must be based upon the existence of a supernatural realm, no matter whether or not such a realm exists, is as absurd as to contend that "true morality" must be based upon man's "free-will" no matter whether or not man has "free-will." Spinoza's system has been called pantheistic. But it is pantheistic only in the sense that whatever man considers Godlike must be found in Nature, for no other realm exists, and there are no gods.