Soren Kierkegaard is often cast as the forefather of existentialism and an anti-Hegelian proponent of the single individual. Yet this book calls these traditional characterizations into question by arguing that Kierkegaard offers not only a systematic critique of idealist philosophy, but more surprisingly, a political ontology that is paradoxically at home in the context of twenty-first-century philosophical and political thought. Through a close consideration of his authorship in the context of nineteenth-century German idealism, Michael O'Neill Burns argues that Kierkegaard develops an ontology, anthropology and theory of the political that are outcomes of his critical appropriation of the philosophical projects of Hegel, Schelling, and Fichte. While starting out in the philosophical concerns of the nineteenth century, the book offers an interpretation of Kierkegaard that shows his relevance to philosophers and political theorists in the twenty-first century.

Michael Inwood, an eminent scholar of German philosophy, presents a full and detailed new commentary on a classic work of the nineteenth century. Philosophy of Mind is the third part of Hegel's Encyclopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences, in which he summarizes his philosophical system. It is one of the main pillars of his thought. Inwood gives the clear and careful guidance needed for an understanding of this challenging work. In his editorial introduction he offers a philosophically sophisticated evaluation of Hegel's ideas which includes a survey of the whole of his thought and detailed analysis of the terminology he used.

Recovers a sense of John Locke's central role in the making of the modern world. It demonstrates that his vision of modern life was constructed on a philosophy of human freedom that is the intellectual nerve connecting the various strands of his thought. By revealing the depth and originality of Locke's critique of the metaphysical assumptions and authoritative institutions of pre-modern life, this book rejects the notion of Locke as an intellectual anachronism. Indeed, the radical core of Locke's modern project was the 'democratization of mind', according to which he challenged practically every previous mode of philosophical analysis by making the autonomous individual the sole determinant of truth. It was on the basis of this new philosophical dispensation that Locke crafted a modern vision not only of government but also of the churches, the family, education, and the conduct of international relations.

Although it is widely recognized that David Hume's A Treatise of Human Nature (1729-40) belongs among the greatest works of philosophy, there is little aggreement about the correct way to interpret his fundamental intentions. The solution to this riddle depends on challenging another, closely related, point of orthodoxy: namely, that before Hume published the Treatise he removed almost all material concerned with problems of religion. Russell argues, contrary to this view, that irreligious aims and objectives are fundamental to the Treatise and account for its underlying unity and coherence. It is Hume's basic anti-Christian aims and objectives that serve to shape and direct both his skeptical and naturalistic commitments. When Hume's arguments are viewed from this perspective we can solve, not only puzzles arising from his discussion of various specific issues, we can also explain the intimate and intricate connections that hold his entire project together. This "irreligious" interpretation provides a comprehensive fresh account of the nature of Hume's fundamental aims and ambitions in the Treatise. It also presents a radically different picture of the way in which Hume's project was rooted in the debates and controversies of his own time, placing the Treatise in an irreligious or anti-Christian philosophical tradition that includes Hobbes, Spinoza and freethinking followers. Considered in these terms, Hume's Treatise constitutes the crowning achievement of the Radical Enlightenment.

Debates over the 'end of art' have tended to obscure Hegel's work on the arts themselves. Benjamin Rutter opens this study with a defence of art's indispensability to Hegel's conception of modernity; he then seeks to reorient discussion toward the distinctive values of painting, poetry, and the novel. Working carefully through Hegel's four lecture series on aesthetics, he identifies the expressive possibilities particular to each medium. Thus, Dutch genre scenes animate the everyday with an appearance of vitality; metaphor frees language from prose; and Goethe's lyrics revive the banal routines of love with imagination and wit. Rutter's important study reconstructs Hegel's view not only of modern art but of modern life and will appeal to philosophers, literary theorists, and art historians alike.

A concise and very readable summary of Nietzsche's "Beyond Good and Evil," geared toward students embarking on their studies and general readers. It is an ideal companion for those new to the study of this challenging and often misunderstood classic.
Offers clear explanations of the central themes and ideas, terminology, and argumentsIncludes a glossary of difficult terms as well as helpful biographical and historical informationIllustrates arguments and ideas with useful tables, diagrams, and images; and includes references to further readingsForms part of a series of Guides designed specifically for A-level philosophy students by an experienced teacher and founder of the popular website Philosophy Online

Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834) is sometimes referred to as the ''father of liberal Protestant theology, '' largely on the strength of his massive work of systematic theology, The Christian Faith. It is generally recognized that Schleiermacher grounded his theological work in an innovative and historically important understanding of religion in general, and that the influence of his thought about religion has extended beyond the boundaries of theology.
In Schleiermacher on Religion and the Natural Order, Andrew Dole presents a new account of Schleiermacher's theory of religion. His purpose is to challenge a deeply entrenched tradition that characterizes Schleiermacher's account of religion as ''subjective'' or ''individualistic.'' While many scholars view Schleiermacher primarily as a theorist of "religious experience," Dole argues that Schleiermacher integrates the individualistic side of religion with a set of claims about its social dynamics, and that this takes place within a broader understanding of all events in the world as the product of a universal, law-governed ''causal nexus.'' Schleiermacher argued that religion emerges out of the interactions of cause and effect that constitute the 'natural order'-or Naturzusammenhang-and is thus to be understood as naturally caused.
Properly understood, says Dole, Schleiermacher's account of religion is an early and important example of a combination of theology and the ''scientific'' study of religion. Dole focuses particularly on Schleiermacher's lectures in ethics at Halle and Berlin, wherein he developed an understanding of religion as a process of the social formation of feeling, and also investigates the relationship between this account of religion and Schleiermacher's theological account of Christianity in The Christian Faith. By calling attention to this under-discussed aspect of Schleiermacher's work, Dole hopes to correct the historical record and stimulate interest in Schleiermacher outside the field of theological studies.

The Attempt at a Critique of All Revelation (1792) was the first published work of Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762-1814), the founder of the German idealist movement in philosophy. It predated the system of philosophy which Fichte developed during his years in Jena, and for that reason - and possibly also because of its religious orientation - later commentators have tended to overlook the work in their treatments of Fichte's philosophy. It is, however, already representative of the most interesting aspects of Fichte's thought. It displays an affinity with his later moral psychology, introduces (in theological form) Fichte's distinctively 'second-person' conception of moral requirements, and employs the 'synthetic method' which is crucial to the transcendental systems Fichte developed during his Jena period. This volume offers a clear and accessible translation of the work by Garrett Green, while an introduction by Allen Wood sets the work in its historical and philosophical contexts.

David Hume (1711-1776) is one of the greatest of philosophers. Today he probably ranks highest of all British philosophers in terms of influence and philosophical standing. His philosophical work ranges across morals, the mind, metaphysics, epistemology, religion, and aesthetics; he had broad interests not only in philosophy as it is now conceived but in history, politics, economics, religion, and the arts. He was a master of English prose.
The Clarendon Hume Edition will include all of his works except his History of England and minor historical writings. It is the only thorough critical edition, and will provide a far more extensive scholarly treatment than any previous editions. This edition (which has been in preparation since the 1970s) offers authoritative annotation, bibliographical information, and indexes, and draws upon the major advances in textual scholarship that have been made since the publication of earlier editions--advances both in the understanding of editorial principle and practice and in knowledge of the history of Hume's own texts.
In this volume, Tom Beauchamp presents two essays from Four Dissertations (1757), the last philosophical work written by Hume, which was subsequently revised by the philosopher in the remaining years of his life. While the bulk of A Dissertation on the Passions was extracted from passages in ATreatise of Human Nature, The Natural History of Religion was an original work when published in 1757, as well as the only major work devoted exclusively to the subject of religion that Hume published in his lifetime. Together with Hume's earlier work on religious topics, this essay drew considerable philosophical commentary from his contemporaries.
The last edition of the two works in this volume seen through the press by Hume himself appeared in 1772. It provides the copy-text for this critical edition. The editor's primarily historical Introduction discusses the genesis, revision, and reception of these two dissertations, which went into ten editions at the author's hand. It will appeal to scholars across many disciplines.

First published in 1955, this volume contains three works by Friedrich von Hardenberg (1772-1801), the German Romantic philosopher and poet whose pseudonym Novalis was an ancient family name. The works, each given in the original German, include the only existing sections of Novalis's unfinished novel, Die Lehrlinge zu Sais; a selection of ideas published as a literary fragment in 1798 under the title Blutenstaub; and Die Christenheit oder Europa, an essay in cultural history. Of these, only Blutenstaub was published before Novalis's death in 1801 at the age of 28. This volume also contains a preface in English by Brian A. Rowley, which contextualizes the three works and offers a cursory description of Novalis's life.

Nietzsche wrote in a scientific culture transformed by Darwin. He read extensively in German and British Darwinists, and his own works dealt often with such obvious Darwinian themes as struggle and evolution. Yet most of what Nietzsche said about Darwin was hostile: he sharply attacked many of his ideas, and often slurred Darwin himself as "mediocre." So most readers of Nietzsche have inferred that he must have cast Darwin quite aside.
But in fact, John Richardson argues, Nietzsche was deeply and pervasively influenced by Darwin. He stressed his disagreements, but was silent about several core points he took over from Darwin. Moreover, Richardson claims, these Darwinian borrowings were to Nietzsche's credit: when we bring them to the surface we discover his positions to be much stronger than we had thought. Even Nietzsche's radical innovations are more plausible when we expose their Darwinian ground; we see that they amount to a "new Darwinism."
The book's four chapters show how four of Nietzsche's most problematic ideas benefit from this Darwinian setting. These are: his claim that life is "will to power," his insistence that his values are "higher" yet also "just his," his disturbing ethics of selfishness and politics of inequality, and his elevation of aesthetic over moral values. Richardson argues that each of these Nietzschean ideas has a clearer and stronger sense when set on the scientific ground he takes from Darwin.

This volume brings to English readers the finest postwar German-language scholarship on Kant's moral and legal philosophy. Examining Kant's relation to predecessors such as Hutcheson, Wolff, and Baumgarten, it clarifies the central issues in each of Kant's major works in practical philosophy, including The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, The Critique of Practical Reason, and The Metaphysics of Morals. It also examines the relation of Kant's philosophy to politics. Collectively, the essays in this volume provide English readers with a direct view of how leading German philosophers are now regarding Kant's revolutionary practical philosophy, one of the outstanding achievements of German thought.

We live in an era defined by a sense of separation, even in the midst of networked connectivity. As cultural climates sour and divisive political structures spread, we are left wondering about our ties to each other. Consequently, there is no better time than now to reconsider ideas of unity. In The Ethics of Oneness, Jeremy David Engels reads the Bhagavad Gita alongside the works of American thinkers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt Whitman. Drawing on this rich combination of traditions, Engels presents the notion that individuals are fundamentally interconnected in their shared divinity. In other words, everything is one. If the lessons of oneness are taken to heart, particularly as they were expressed and celebrated by Whitman, and the ethical challenges of oneness considered seriously, Engels thinks it is possible to counter the pervasive and problematic American ideals of hierarchy, exclusion, violence, and domination.

This is the second and concluding volume of a biography of Edmund Burke (1730-97), a key figure in eighteenth-century British and Irish politics and intellectual life. Covering the most interesting years of his life (1784-97), its leading themes are India and the French Revolution. Burke was largely responsible for the impeachment of Warren Hastings, former Governor-General of Bengal. The lengthy (145-day) trial of Hastings (which lasted from 1788 to 1795) is recognized as a landmark episode in the history of Britain's relationship with India. Lock provides the first day-by-day account of the entire trial, highlighting some of the many disputes about evidence as well as the great set speeches by Burke and others.
In 1790, Burke published Reflections on the Revolution in France, the earliest sustained attack on the principles of the Revolution. Continuously in print ever since, the Reflections remains the most widely read and quoted book about the Revolution. The Reflections was followed by a series of anti-revolutionary writings, as Burke maintained his crusade against the Revolution to the end of his life.
In addition to these leading themes, the biography examines many other topics in its coverage of Burke's busy and varied life: his parliamentary career; his family, friendships, and philanthropy; and his often difficult and obsessive personality. There are more than thirty illustrations, including many contemporary caricatures that convey how Burke was perceived by an often hostile and uncomprehending public. Controversial in his time, Burke is now regarded as one of the greatest of orators in the English language, as well as one of the most influential politicalphilosophers in the Western tradition.

This book is an introduction to the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer, written in a lively, personal style. Hannan emphasizes the peculiar inconsistencies and tensions in Schopenhauer's thought - he was torn between idealism and realism, and between denial and affirmation of the individual will. In addition to providing a useful summary of Schopenhauer's main ideas, Hannan connects Schopenhauer's thought with ongoing debates in philosophy. According to Hannan, Schopenhauer was struggling half-consciously to break altogether with Kant and transcendental idealism; the anti-Kantian features of Schopenhauer's thought possess the most lasting value. Hannan defends panpsychist metaphysics of will, comparing it with contemporary views according to which causal power is metaphysically basic. Hannan also defends Schopenhauer's ethics of compassion against Kant's ethics of pure reason, and offers friendly amendments to Schopenhauer's theories of art, music, and "salvation." She also illuminates the deep connection between Schopenhauer and the early Wittgenstein, as well as Schopenhauer's influence on existentialism and psychoanalytic thought.

Including three of his most famous and important essays, "Utilitarianism," "On Liberty," and "Essay on Bentham," along with formative selections from Jeremy Bentham and John Austin, this volume provides a uniquely perspicuous view of Mill's ethical and political thought.
Contains Mill's most famous and influential works, "Utilitarianism" and "On Liberty" as well as his important "Essay on Bentham."
Uses the 1871 edition of "Utilitarianism," the last to be published in Mill's lifetime.
Includes selections from Bentham and John Austin, the two thinkers who most influenced Mill.
Introduction written by Mary Warnock, a highly respected figure in 20th-century ethics in her own right.
Provides an extensive, up-to-date bibliography with the best scholarship on Mill, Bentham and Utilitarianism.

Neostoicism was one of the most important intellectual movements of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It started in the Protestant Netherlands during the revolt against Catholic Spain. Very quickly it began to influence both the theory and practice of politics in many parts of Europe. It proved to be particularly useful and appropriate to the early modern militaristic states; for, on the basis of the still generally accepted humanistic values of classical antiquity, it promoted a strong central power in the state, raised above the conflicting doctrines of the theologians. Characteristically, a great part of Neostoic writing was concerned with the nationally organized military institutions of the state. Its aim was the general improvement of social discipline and the education of the citizen to both the exercise and acceptance of bureaucracy, controlled economic life and a large army.

Copleston, an Oxford Jesuit and specialist in the history of philosophy, first created his history as an introduction for Catholic ecclesiastical seminaries. However, since its first publication (the last volume appearing in the mid-1970s) the series has become the classic account for all philosophy scholars and students. The 11-volume series gives an accessible account of each philosopher's work, but also explains their relationship to the work of other philosophers.

Edmund Burke (1730-1797) was one of the most profound, versatile, and accomplished thinkers of the eighteenth century. Born and educated in Dublin, he moved to London to study law, but remained to make a career in English politics, completing A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (1757) before entering the political arena. A Member of Parliament for nearly thirty years, his speeches are still read and studied as classics of political thought, and through his best-known work, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790) he has continued to exercise a posthumous influence as "the father of conservatism."
In this, the first of two volumes, F.P. Lock covers the years between 1730-1784, and describes Burke's Irish upbringing and education, early writing, and his parliamentary career throughout the momentous years of the American War of Independence. Lavishly illustrated, the book provides an authoritative account of the complexity and breadth of Burke's philosophical and political writing and examines its origins in his personal experiences and the political world of his day.

This collection of essays looks at the distinctively English intellectual, social and political phenomenon of Latitudinarianism, which emerged during the Civil War and Interregnum and came into its own after the Restoration, becoming a virtual orthodoxy after 1688. Dividing into two parts, it first examines the importance of the Cambridge Platonists, who sought to embrace the newest philosophical and scientific movements within Church of England orthodoxy, and then moves into the later seventeenth century, from the Restoration onwards, culminating in essays on the philosopher John Locke. These contributions establish a firmly interdisciplinary basis for the subject, while collectively gravitating towards the importance of discourse and language as the medium for cultural exchange. The variety of approaches serves to illuminate the cultural indeterminacy of the period, in which inherited models and vocabularies were forced to undergo revisions, coinciding with the formation of many cultural institutions still governing English society.

Thomas Hobbes is an iconic figure who serves as an easy reference for pundits commenting on the brutality of war as well as for critics of a distinctly modern individualism in which calculating and rapacious self-interest is the cause of the violence, destruction, and exploitation endemic to the contemporary world. Frost's reading of Hobbes's philosophy shows us that underlying such visions of self and politics is another iconic figure: that of the Cartesian subject. What gives the iconic Hobbes his hardcore individualism and its corollary accounts of instrumentalism, conflict, and absolutism is a Cartesian rendering of the self as split into mind and body. Carefully elaborating Hobbes's materialist ontology, "Lessons from a Materialist Thinker" challenges both our implicit Cartesian assumptions about the self and the commonplace Hobbes that so readily figures violence in our political imagination. Through his materialism, Hobbes presents an alternative modern account of self-consciousness, reason, agency, power, freedom, and responsibility. In doing so, he shows that our fundamental intersubjectivity and interdependence require that we pursue peace above all else.

The Hegel Lectures Series
Series Editor: Peter C. Hodgson
Hegel's lectures have had as great a historical impact as the works he himself published. Important elements of his system are elaborated only in the lectures, especially those given in Berlin during the last decade of his life. The original editors conflated materials from different sources and dates, obscuring the development and logic of Hegel's thought. The Hegel Lectures series is based on a selection of extant and recently discovered transcripts and manuscripts. Lectures from specific years are reconstructed so that the structure of Hegel's argument can be followed. Each volume presents an accurate new translation accompanied by an editorial introduction and annotations on the text, which make possible the identification of Hegel's many allusions and sources.
Hegel's Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion represent the final and in some ways the decisive element of his entire philosophical system. His conception and execution of the lectures differed significantly on each of the occasions he delivered them, in 1821, 1824, 1827, and 1831. The older editions introduced insoluble problems by conflating these materials into an editorially constructed text. The present volumes establish a critical edition by separating the series of lectures and presenting them as independent units on the basis of a complete re-editing of the sources by Walter Jaeschke. The English translation has been prepared by a team consisting of Robert F. Brown, Peter C. Hodgson, and J. Michael Stewart, with the assistance of H. S. Harris. Now widely recognized as the definitive English edition, it is being reissued by Oxford in the HegelLectures Series. The three volumes include editorial introductions, critical annotations on the text, textual variants, and tables, bibliography, and glossary.
"The Consummate Religion" is Hegel's name for Christianity, which he also designates "the Revelatory Religion." Here he offers a speculative interpretation of major Christian doctrines: the Trinity, creation, humanity, estrangement and evil, Christ, the Spirit, the spiritual community, church and world. These interpretations have had a powerful and controversial impact on modern theology.

Friedrich Nietzsche has emerged as one of the most important and influential modern philosophers. For several decades, the book series Monographien und Texte zur Nietzsche-Forschung (MTNF) has set the agenda in a rapidly growing and changing field of Nietzsche scholarship. The scope of the series is interdisciplinary and international in orientation reflects the entire spectrum of research on Nietzsche, from philosophy to literary studies and political theory. The series publishes monographs and edited volumes that undergo a strict peer-review process. The book series is led by an international team of editors, whose work represents the full range of current Nietzsche scholarship.

In Of Liberty and Necessity James A. Harris presents the first comprehensive account of the free will problem in eighteenth-century British philosophy. Harris proposes new interpretations of the positions of familiar figures such as Locke, Hume, Edwards, and Reid. He also gives careful attention to writers such as William King, Samuel Clarke, Anthony Collins, Lord Kames, James Beattie, David Hartley, Joseph Priestley, and Dugald Stewart, who, while well-known in the eighteenth century, have since been largely ignored by historians of philosophy. Through detailed textual analysis, and by making precise use of a variety of different contexts, Harris elucidates the contribution that each of these writers makes to the eighteenth-century discussion of the will and its freedom.
In this period, the question of the nature of human freedom is posed principally in terms of the influence of motives upon the will. On one side of the debate are those who believe that we are free in our choices. A motive, these philosophers believe, constitutes a reason to act in a particular way, but it is up to us which motive we act upon. On the other side of the debate are those who believe that, on the contrary, there is no such thing as freedom of choice. According to these philosophers, one motive is always intrinsically stronger than the rest and so is the one that must determine choice. Several important issues are raised as this disagreement is explored and developed, including the nature of motives, the value of "indifference" to the will's freedom, the distinction between "moral" and "physical" necessity, the relation between the will and the understanding, and the internal coherence of the concept offreedom of will.
One of Harris's primary objectives is to place this debate in the context of the eighteenth-century concern with replicating in the mental sphere what Newton had achieved in the philosophy of nature. All of the philosophers discussed in Of Liberty and Necessity conceive of themselves as "experimental" reasoners, and, when examining the will, focus primarily upon what experience reveals about the influence of motives upon choice. The nature and significance of introspection is therefore at the very center of the free will problem in this period, as is the question of what can legitimately be inferred from observable regularities in human behavior.

Renowned for his metaphysics, Spinoza made significant contributions to understanding the human mind, the emotions, moral philosophy, and political philosophy.
Beginning with an overview of Spinoza's life, Michael Della Rocca carefully unpacks and explains Spinoza's philosophy: his metaphysics of substance and argument at the center of his whole system that God is the sole independent substance; his account of the human mind and its relation to the body; his theory that human beings tend towards self-preservation and his most famous work, the Ethics, including the problem of free will; and his writings on the state, religion and scripture.

Della Rocca concludes with a chapter on Spinoza's legacy and how modern philosophers, Hume, Hegel, and Nietzsche, responded to Spinoza's challenge. Ideal for those coming to Spinoza for the first time as well as those already acquainted with his thought, Spinoza is essential reading for anyone studying philosophy.