"It is not enough to have a good mind; it is more important to use it well"
Rene Descartes was a central figure in the scientific revolution of the seventeenth century. In his Discourse on Method he outlined the contrast between mathematics and experimental sciences, and the extent to which each one can achieve certainty. Drawing on his own work in geometry, optics, astronomy and physiology, Descartes developed the hypothetical method that characterizes modern science, and this soon came to replace the traditional techniques derived from Aristotle. Many of Descartes most...

This volume brings together major works by German thinkers who were extremely influential in the crucial period of aesthetics prior to and after Kant. It includes the first translation into English of Schiller's Kallias Letters and Moritz's on the Artistic Imitation of the Beautiful, and new translations of some of Holderlin's most important theoretical writings and works by Hamann, Lessing, Novalis and Schlegel. The volume features an introduction in which J.M. Bernstein places the works in their historical and philosophical context.

Julien Offray de La Mettrie (1709-51), author of Man a Machine (1747), was the most uncompromising of the materialists of the eighteenth century, and the provocative title of his work ensured it a succes de scandale in his own time. This fully annotated edition presents a new English translation of the text together with the most important of La Mettrie's other philosophical works, translated into English for the first time. Ann Thomson's introduction examines his aims and the scandalous moral consequences which he drew from his materialism.

Although strongly influenced by Greek thought, Islamic philosophers also developed an original philosophical culture of their own which flourished from the ninth through the fourteenth century. This volume offers new translations of philosophical writings by Farabi, Ibn Sina (Avicenna), Ghazali, Ibn Tufayl, and Ibn Rushd (Averroes). A historical and philosophical introduction sets the writings in context and traces their preoccupations and their achievements.

Mendelssohn's Philosophical Writings, published in 1761, bring the metaphysical tradition to bear on the topic of "sentiments" (defined as knowledge or awareness by way of the senses). They include a nuanced defense of Leibniz's theodicy and conception of freedom, and examination of the ethics of suicide, an account of the "mixed sentiments" so central to the tragic genre, an hypothesis about weakness of will, an elaboration of the main principles and types of art, and a brief tract on probability theory, aimed at rebutting Hume's skepticism.

Mendelssohn's Philosophical Writings, published in 1761, bring the metaphysical tradition to bear on the topic of "sentiments" (defined as knowledge or awareness by way of the senses). They include a nuanced defense of Leibniz's theodicy and conception of freedom, and examination of the ethics of suicide, an account of the "mixed sentiments" so central to the tragic genre, an hypothesis about weakness of will, an elaboration of the main principles and types of art, and a brief tract on probability theory, aimed at rebutting Hume's skepticism.

Fichte's thought marks a crucial transitional stage between Kant and post-Kantian philosophy. Foundations of Natural Right, thought by many to be Fichte's most important work of political philosophy, applies his ideas to fundamental issues in political and legal philosophy, covering such topics as civic freedom, right, private property, contracts, family relations, and the foundations of modern political organization. This volume offers the first complete translation of the work into English, by Michael Baur, together with an introduction by Frederick Neuhouser that sets it in its...

Condillac's Essay on the Origin of Human Knowledge, first published in French in 1746 and offered here in a new translation, represented in its time a radical departure from the dominant conception of the mind as a reservoir of innately given ideas. Descartes had held that knowledge must rest on ideas; Condillac turned this upside down by arguing that speech and words are the origin of mental life and knowledge. His work influenced many later philosophers, and also anticipated Wittgenstein's view of language and its relation to mind and thought.

Schleiermacher's Hermeneutics and Criticism is the founding text of modern hermeneutics. Written as a method for the interpretation and textual criticism of the New Testament, it is remarkably relevant to contemporary theories of interpretation in literary theory and analytical philosophy. This volume offers the text in a new translation by Andrew Bowie, together with related writings on secular hermeneutics and language. An introduction places the texts in the context of Schleiermacher's philosophy as a whole.

A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God was published in 1705 and is one of the most famous attempts at proving the existence of God. It is a very clear exposition of the Cosmological Argument, which seeks to show that the existence of the world necessarily entails that of its maker. This volume presents it together with some important supplementary texts, and with a historical introduction that examines Clarke's views and relates them to the Newtonian circle of which he was the most gifted and influential representative.