His lifelong motto was caute—carefully. Spinoza knew that others would find his naturalism and rationalism dangerous, and although he published some work during his lifetime, he withheld from the public the most radical statement of his naturalistic and rationalistic vision. Spinoza's life, thus, was in many ways marked by a balance between, on the one hand, extreme caution and the dread of public controversy and, on the other, an audacious hope and need that others would come to share in his striking naturalistic conception.

Spinoza (2008) - One: Spinoza's Understanding and Understanding Spinoza