I wouldn't. There's already a threat of Webkit's monoculture on the web, we don't need to make it worse. If you'd like to see Spartan based on some already existing free software engine, then go for Gecko; however, another big player on the engine market won't hurt, especially after Opera went Webkit (well, Blink technically, but it's not a big difference yet).
Good point. As a front end developer I just am still wary of what Microsoft produces as a browser just because IE left such a bad taste in my mouth and I really love what Opera did with it.