Philosophical views of the highly influential rationalist philosophers Benedict (or Baruch) Spinoza (1632-1677) and G. W. Leibniz (1646-1716). Topics to be treated include: the nature of God and the question of his providential care for human beings, the concept of substance and its extension, the ontological relation of finite beings to God, the mental and its relation to the corporeal, and the nature of human freedom.