The Man Behind the Stuffed Frog Mask:

What Spinoza's Ethics can tell us about Reginald Jeeves







"Sorry to keep you waiting, Jeeves," I said.

"Oh no sir, thank you. I was quite happy with my Spinoza."

"Eh?"

"The copy of Spinoza's Ethics which you kindly gave me some time ago."

"Oh, ah, yes, I remember. Good stuff?"

"Extremely, sir."



"I suppose it turns out in the end that the Butler did it."

-From Jeeves in the Offing





When a character is only known through the eyes of an imperfect first-person narrator, their inner life is often an enigma. Such is the case with P.G. Wodehouse's Reginald Jeeves. Throughout the majority of the stories in which he appears, readers see Jeeves as depicted by his effervescent, adoring but "mentally negligible"[1] employer, Bertram Wooster. Consequently, we only know Jeeves at a distance mediated by Bertie's concerns and limited awareness.



What, then, do we know about the enigmatic Reginald Jeeves? We know that he has an encyclopedic knowledge on all subjects ranging from hangover cures to Shakespeare, that he enjoys fishing, Robert Burns' poetry and "the great Russians.”[2] We also know that his favorite philosopher is Benedict de Spinoza. Wodehouse (quite deliberately, I believe) leaves many aspects of Jeeves' character unknown, but his love of Spinoza might provide a window into the personal philosophy of this paragon among manservants. A reading of Spinoza's Ethics offers tantalizing insight into Jeeves' behavior, and, taken in tandem with Jeeves as he is presented through Bertie's eyes, we might be able to unravel some of the mysteries behind his stratagems and schemes, throwing into sharper relief the man behind the stuffed frog mask.



Of course, before addressing the relationship between Jeeves as a character and Spinoza's philosophy in any detail, it is worth asking why Wodehouse made Spinoza Jeeves' philosopher of choice. There remains the possibility, of course, that Wodehouse merely chose Spinoza for practical reasons. Some[3] have suggested that Spinoza just happened to be a name which, alphabetically, is close to Spindrift, a detail that allows Bertie to be presented with Florence Craye's work just in time for her to find him in the bookstore looking for "Spinoza's latest."[4] This, however, seems unlikely. While Spinoza has the same first three letters as Spindrift, it is unclear why if Spindrift were filed alphabetically by title it would be anywhere near Spinoza's Ethics, On the Improvement of the Understanding or his Theologico-Political Treatise. By all accounts, Wodehouse planned his plots with great care,[5] and it seems unlikely that this discrepancy would escape his notice.



Determining with any degree of certainty whether or not Wodehouse had ever read Spinoza is difficult, however. While Wodehouse was unquestionably well-educated, information concerning the reception of Spinoza in England, America and France during the inter-war period is difficult to come by. It is, of course, possible that Wodehouse chose Spinoza as Jeeves' philosopher of choice merely because he is notoriously difficult to understand. Perhaps Spinoza is invoked only to throw Jeeves' intelligence into sharper relief. Yet Nietzsche is also a difficult philosopher, and Jeeves dismisses his work as "fundamentally unsound."[6] This suggests that Wodehouse's understanding of philosophy was at least sufficient to enable him to recognize that Nietzsche's philosophy would be inimical to Jeeves' disposition and would be suited to, say, Honoria Glossop instead.[7] Wodehouse does not explicitly provide any reason for Jeeves to prefer Spinoza over Nietzsche, but given the fact that it is Bertie Wooster telling the story, it is doubtful that Wodehouse would ever have occasion to do so. Besides, detailed exegeses on philosophical theories do not well-paced comic novels make.



If one looks at the philosophy of Spinoza in conjunction with Jeeves' character, Wodehouse's choice in this matter seems less than arbitrary. Even if the parallels between Spinoza's philosophy and Jeeves' personality are not intentional, they are striking and provide interesting and fruitful grounds for speculation concerning the inner life of Reginald Jeeves.



Before I delve into the connections between Spinoza's philosophy and Jeeves, I will provide a brief biography and background for understanding the Ethics. Spinoza was a Jew who lived in the Netherlands from the time of his birth in 1632 until his death at the age of 45 in 1677.[8] He remained unmarried and fathered no children, and was cast out of the Jewish community in 1656 at the age of 23. He was employed as a lens grinder and worked as a private scholar, unaffiliated with any university or institution. His writings were banned by the Catholic Church, and, while he was an extremely influential philosopher, he remained a controversial figure throughout the Modern period in Europe.



His most well-known work, and the only one mentioned explicitly in canon, is his Ethics. The Ethics is divided into five sections: "Of God," "Of the Nature and Origin of the Mind," "On the Origin and Nature of the Emotions," "Of Human Bondage; or of the Strength of the Emotions," and "Of the Power of the Intellect; or, of Human Freedom." The argument of the Ethics is that there exists only one substance (or "stuff") that comprises all that is, and this substance is God.[9] In other words, all that can be said to exist, is God. There has been some debate over whether this makes Spinoza a pantheist (all is God) or an atheist (if all can be said to be God, then nothing is God). I, personally, am inclined to believe the latter. At any rate, whether pantheist or atheist, for Spinoza God has nothing in common with anything the Western Judeo-Christian tradition would consider to be "God." Spinoza's God is not a personal God; this God has no anthropomorphic psychology.[10] God takes no interest in any aspect of the world, since God is the world. God does not desire worship, and God does not reward or favor any particular kind of being within the world because every individual thing is part of God. God is the same thing as Nature.



Spinoza is also a determinist, which means he thinks that everything that happens does so necessarily. There is no such thing as free will for Spinoza, because all that transpires is caused.[11] While this may seem quite abstract, from his definition of God and his understanding of causal necessity, he develops a quite sophisticated understanding of human psychology (a psychology of the individual, if you will). Spinoza writes that "[man] has a desire, of which he is conscious, to seek that which is profitable to him.”[12] Like everything else that exists, humans are determined by the necessary law of their nature. This fundamental human characteristic, this law of human nature, is that we always act in accordance with what they think is most profitable to us.



Spinoza is a psychological egoist, although it is important to understand that his Ethics merely describe human nature as it is; his model of human psychology contains no moral evaluation. Because human beings are constituted in this way, we experience the world in light of our desire for those things we think will be profitable to us. We call that which helps us to these ends, "good," and that which does not, "evil." Good and evil do not exist independently of us; there is no good or evil, beauty or ugliness in Nature--these are qualities which we mistakenly ascribe to Nature. This mistake arises from our failure to understand the nature of causes and from our arrogant and narrow assumption that the world (or God) takes a special interest in human beings.



As I have explained it so far, Spinoza's philosophy might seem far afield from Wodehouse's bright, quotidian world of chequered suits and unwanted engagements. The Ethics, however, true to its name, discusses human life at length in quite practical terms. In Books II & III of the Ethics Spinoza explains in considerable detail the origin and the nature of the human mind and human emotions. For Spinoza, we as human beings can experience affect in one of two ways: passively or actively. A passive affect, or a passion, is "a confused idea."[13] In other words, we experience passions when something happens to us and we do not understand what caused it. This is what Spinoza means by "inadequate ideas.” When human beings are enslaved by their passions, or are passively affected because their ideas about Nature and necessary causes are confused, they are in bondage. Spinoza writes that "a man who is under [the control of the emotions] is not his own master, but is mastered by fortune, in whose power he is."[14] When we have inadequate ideas, we are completely vulnerable to external circumstances that we do not understand.



The other way we can experience affect is through the activity of our minds. When we have an adequate idea, we are no longer enslaved to the passions or mastered by fortune; we are, in this way, free. Spinoza's Ethics is a book intended to be a practical guide to how we can learn to use the power of reason. To become rational and free, we must realize "how much reason itself can control the emotions, and then, what is freedom of mind or blessedness."[15] Spinoza demonstrates that human beings belong to the larger order of Nature, and through this recognition he generates an account of what freedom and blessedness--in a word, happiness--is for us. Thus he introduces the idea of the "free man," and it is here that our favorite paragon comes into the equation.



It is important to note, at this juncture, that the "free man" for Spinoza is an ideal, not something that is ever completely attainable. My argument is not that Jeeves is Spinoza's free man; however I maintain that Jeeves lives his life and comports himself in such a way that suggests he actively practices and adheres to the tenets of Spinozistic philosophy. That is to say, insofar as it is possible for a mere mortal to style himself or herself as Spinoza's free man, that person would be Reginald Jeeves.



While, as I noted earlier, direct insight into Jeeves' motivations and thoughts is tantalizingly absent from the stories, we can infer from his actions that Jeeves seems to have a healthy degree of self-interest. This is not to say that he is selfish or uncaring; however, in Bertie's madcap adventures, Jeeves invariably benefits in some way, whether it be a tip from Bertie or his friends, assurance of his continued employment, or an around-the-word cruise with his employer. His motives are always a bit mysterious, but the reader is left with the conviction that whatever else Jeeves' reasons for acting may be, he has a healthy concern for his own advantage. This suggests that Jeeves may be unapologetically aware of Spinoza's adage that "man does everything for an end, namely, for that which is profitable to him."[16]



Jeeves also is a man of extraordinary self-control, both with respect to his emotions and his conduct. Bertie often praises Jeeves' "feudal spirit," and Jeeves is well-known for his placid demeanor, or "stuffed frog mask." Jeeves never betrays any overt agitation, and Bertie can only read his feelings through a minute elevation of the eyebrow or a significant but momentary twitch in the corner of his lip. One could read Jeeves' stoicism as a consequence of his conservative outlook concerning the role and proper conduct of a servant, but given that Jeeves has no problem overstepping boundaries in other respects (policing Bertie's wardrobe is one notable example among others), his motivations may be more complex than this explanation would allow. I would contend that Jeeves' mastery over his emotions is symptomatic of his Spinozism.



For Spinoza, freedom is found through acting in accordance with one's own nature and not being subject to the passions. The final aim is to be "guided by reason, that is to say, the chief desire by which [the free man] strives to govern all his other desires."[17] The free person acts in such a way that all of his or her actions are guided by reason and not by emotion. It does not take much imaginative extrapolation to envision Jeeves' self-mastery as arising from a self-disciplined and rational approach to life's difficulties. Spinoza writes that "to bear with each, therefore, according to his disposition and to refrain from imitating his emotions requires a singular power of mind."[18] I can think of few persons, in life or fiction, who demonstrate this equanimity and intellectual strength to a greater degree than Reginald Jeeves.



By replacing confused or inadequate ideas (remember, all passions stem from a lack of understanding of the true nature of things) with adequate ideas, one can free one's self from slavery to emotion. To learn more is to acquire more freedom. Spinoza writes that, through reason, "[the free man] is lead adequately to conceive himself and all things which can be conceived by his intelligence."[19] To be a Spinozist is to undergo a rigorous regimen of constant intellectual--and bodily--self-improvement. The more one understands nature, the more one "passes to the highest human perfection, and consequently is affected with the highest joy which is accompanied with the idea of himself and his own virtue . . . the highest possible peace of mind."[20] Happiness is the recognition of the power of one's own mind. If there is one thing we know beyond a shadow of a doubt about Jeeves, it is that he is extraordinarily intelligent, well-informed and constantly learning more things. Bertie extols Jeeves' intelligence continuously throughout the stories, and in every misadventure Jeeves shines through as a paragon of sagacity and cunning.



Jeeves possesses an apparent love of learning and extensive expertise on all subjects, a quality that has made his name synonymous with encyclopedic knowledge. But Jeeves is not merely a source of factoids and quotes; he also has a genius for strategy and deep insight into human nature. For Spinoza, to master the emotions one must "understand all things to be necessary, and determined by an infinite change of causes to existence and action."[21] Part of this understanding of causes entails a detailed knowledge of human psychology, a psychology for which Spinoza lays the groundwork in his Ethics. As Bertie reminds us over and over again, Jeeves has a profound knowledge of what he calls "the psychology of the individual." This enables Jeeves to predict the desires and behaviors of those around him and, when it suits his purposes, to manipulate them to his own ends. It is important to note, however, that he always acts in the interest of bolstering certain social relationships. In severing unsuitable fiancées from his hapless employer, reuniting quarreling couples or preserving the security of his own position with Bertie, Jeeves always acts as a stabilizing force among the persons he serves. As Spinoza suggests, he "[applies] his [mind] to those things which subserve concord and the establishment of friendship."[22]



Jeeves' love of Spinoza can also help explain why he works as a valet. Bertie is fond of saying that Jeeves could biff off to be an Oxford don or prime minister, and often wonders why such an exemplar would remain as a personal caretaker for such a hopeless chump as Wooster, B. Of course, on one level this remark reflects Bertie's naïveté: the prospects for a man in Jeeves' station, however brilliant he may be, would probably not be so extravagant. On the other hand, one could imagine that Jeeves might easily procure a position in which he might be able to earn more money (while I am not entirely sure, I think a butler working for a wealthy family or a valet employed by someone with even more of the ready than Bertie would earn a larger income) or, perhaps, a greater appreciation for his intellectual gifts. While Bertie is effusive in singing Jeeves' praises, there is only so much notoriety a manservant in Jeeves' position could enjoy. Though Jeeves is rewarded with tips--quite generous ones--his motivations for working for Bertie could not be primarily pecuniary.



In the Ethics, Spinoza derides those who are motivated by trivial things like improving their reputation or acquiring greater wealth. He writes, "Those, however, who know the true use of money, and regulate the measure of wealth according to their needs, live contented with few things."[23] With the notable exception of the Banjolele incident in Thank You, Jeeves, Jeeves seems nothing if not content, even determined, to retain his position with Bertie. Presumably he lives well within his means and is happy to have a job in which he is able to have his needs met and to develop his particular talents and capacities as a supremely competent servant. For Spinoza, "joy consists in this, that the power of man, in so far as he is made up of mind and body, is helped or increased." [24] Happiness is not acquired through knowledge alone, but also requires the development of the power of the body. Any occupation in which one is able to maximize one's efficacy, both mental and physical, would be one in which any Spinozist would find peace and blessedness. As a valet serving one of nature's bachelors, Jeeves is afforded the opportunity to meet his own basic needs, the means to exercise the power of his mind in extricating Bertie and his friends from innumerable scrapes, and an occupation in which he can perfect his bodily and intellectual powers through improving books and honing his skills as the consummate valet.



The final question, one which can be answered only speculatively, is why does he remain with Bertram Wooster in particular? Surely there are many employers eager to engage Jeeves' services, some of whom may not be averse to taking around the world cruises and could offer a stipend to rival--or even surpass--what Bertie provides for Jeeves. Bertie, while charming, certainly does not provide the kind of meeting of the minds Spinoza describes among "individuals of the same kind" in Book IV of the Ethics.[25] It is my belief, however, that the tie that binds Bertie to Jeeves is best described by what Spinoza says when he writes, "Minds are not conquered by arms, but by love and generosity."[26]



Many thanks to erynn999 for looking over this essay on such short notice.









Endnotes





[1] P.G. Wodehouse. Thank You, Jeeves. (New York: Overlook Press, 1971), 56

[2] Ibid., Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit. (New York: Overlook Press, 1988), 11

[3] Cf. http://www.freelists.org/post/lit-ideas/Wodehouse-on-Spinoza

[4] P.G. Wodehouse. “Jeeves Takes Charge.” Carry on Jeeves. (New York: Penguin, 1975), 9-34

[5] Gerald Clarke. “P.G. Wodehouse Interview: The Art of Fiction.” Paris Review, #60 (http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3773/the-art-of-fiction-no-60-p-g-wodehouse)

[6] P.G. Wodehouse. “Jeeves Takes Charge.”

[7] Ibid.

[8] It has been suggested on account of Spinoza's Judaism that Wodehouse made Spinoza Jeeves' favorite philosopher as an implicit criticism of the Nazi regime, but this remains an extremely speculative contention.

[9] Spinoza. Ethics. Trans. James Gutmann. (New York: Hafner Publishing, 1955), Book I, definition I-VI

[10] Ibid., I, Appendix

[11] Ibid., II, Proposition 48

[12] Ibid., I, Appendix

[13] Ibid., III, Definition 48, Explanation

[14] Ibid., IV, Preface

[15] Ibid., V, Preface

[16] Ibid., I, Appendix

[17] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 4

[18] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 13

[19] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 4

[20] Ibid., V, Proposition 27, Definition

[21] Ibid., V, Proposition 6, Definition

[22] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 14

[23] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 24

[24] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 30

[25] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 9

[26] Ibid., IV, Appendix, Proposition 9