“Is it moral to take advantage of the evil of others?” (II) Iter hispanicum of an Italian theme: from Luis de León to Cervantes (and Spinoza)

Iter hispanicum de un tema italiano: de fray Luis de León a Cervantes (y Spinoza)

Abstract

The main purpose of this article is to edit the translation of a fray Luis de León’s lesson recently published and, as a tribute to this fact, to present the text by offering the reader the path of the question it raised, with a previous trajectory in Italy, in the XVII Century Spanish thought. This path has two great landmarks: Cervantes and Spinoza. Cervantes, from a direct reading of Fray Luis' text, reflected in his quixotic novel El curioso impertinente. Spinoza, rather as a philosopher steeped in Spanish culture and its moral thought, from which he detaches himself, as the previous reflection on Cervantes will show, by embracing in his beginings the Cartesian framework of thought as it is displayed in the Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione