This authoritative edition was originally published in the acclaimed Oxford Authors series under the general editorship of Frank Kermode. It brings together an extensive collection of Bacon's writing - the major prose in full, together with sixteen other pieces not otherwise available - to give the essence of his work and thinking. Although he had a distinguished career as a lawyer and statesman, Francis Bacon's lifelong goal was to improve and extend human knowledge. In The Advancement of Learning (1605) he made a brilliant critique of the deficiencies of previous systems of thought and proposed improvements to knowledge in every area of human life. He conceived the Essays (1597, much enlarged in 1625) as a study of the formative influences on human behaviour, psychological and social. In The New Atlantis (1626) he outlined his plan for a scientific research institute in the form of a Utopian fable. In addition to these major English works this edition includes 'Of Tribute', an important early work here printed complete for the first time, and a revealing selection of his legal and political writings, together with his poetry. A special feature of the edition is its extensive annotation which identifies Bacon's sources and allusions, and glosses his vocabulary. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

German Philosophers contains studies of four of the most important German theorists: Kant, arguably the most influential modern philosopher; Hegel, whose philosophy inspired an enduring vision of a communist society; Schopenhauer, renowned for his pessimistic preference for non-existence; and Nietzsche, who has been appropriated as an icon by an astonishingly diverse spectrum of people.

The first comprehensive one-volume collection of St.Thomas More's writing "[A] tremendous scholarly undertaking. . . . Accessible and transparent to both scholars and the general audience."-Renaissance and Reformation In this book, Wegemer and Smith assemble More's most important English and Latin works for the first time in a single volume. This volume reveals the breadth of More's writing and includes a rich selection of illustrations and artwork. The book provides the most complete picture of More's work available, serving as a major resource for early modern scholars, teachers, students, and the general reader.

The nature and content of the thought of Duns Scotus (c.1266-1308) remains largely unknown except by the expert. This book provides an accessible account of Scotus's theology, focusing both on what is distinctive in his thought, and on issues where his insights might prove to be of perennial value.

The Middle Ages span a period of well over a millennium: from the emperor Constantine's Christian conversion in 312 to the early sixteenth century. David Luscombe's history of Medieval Thought steers a clear path through this long period, beginning with the three greatest influences on medieval philosophy: Augustine, Boethius, and Pseudo-Denis, and focusing on Abelard, Anselm, Aquinas, Ockham, Duns Scotus, and Eckhart amongst others in the twelfth to fifteenth centuries.

From the days of antiquity to the time of the Middle Ages, intellectuals have widely assumed that stars were alive, a belief that gave the cosmos an important position not only in Greek religion, but also in discussions of human psychology and eschatology. In the third century AD, the Christian theologian Origen included such Hellenistic theories on the life and nature of the stars in his cosmology, a theory that would have important implications for early Christian theology. Moving through a wide range of Greek, Latin, and Oriental sources from antiquity to medieval times, this is the first thorough treatment of Origen's biblical theology. The second book in the new Oxford Early Christian Studies series, Origen and the Life of the Stars provides a new look at the roots of early Christian thought.

Lorenzo Valla (1407-1457) was the most important theorist of the humanist movement. He wrote a major work on Latin style, "On Elegance in the Latin Language," which became a battle-standard in the struggle for the reform of Latin across Europe, and "Dialectical Disputations," a wide-ranging attack on scholastic logic. His most famous work is "On the Donation of Constantine," an oration in which Valla uses new philological methods to attack the authenticity of the most important document justifying the papacy's claims to temporal rule. It appears here in a new translation with introduction and notes by G. W. Bowersock, based on the critical text of Wolfram Setz (1976). This volume also includes a text and translation of the "Constitutum Constantini," commonly known as the "Donation of Constantine."

The Renaissance has long been recognized as a brilliant moment in the development of Western civilization. This book demonstrates the uses of ancient and medieval philosophy by Renaissance thinkers, and throws light on the early modern origins of modern philosophy. The authors introduce the reader to the philosophy written, read, taught, and debated during the period traditionally credited with the `revival of learning'.

A synthesis of literary critical and historical methods, Porterfield's book combines insightful analysis of Puritan theological writings with detailed examinations of historical records showing the changing patterns of church membership and domestic life. She finds that by conflating marriage as a trope of grace with marriage as a social construct, Puritan ministers invested relationships between husbands and wives with religious meaning. Images of female piety represented the humility that Puritans believed led all Christians to self-control and, ultimately, to love. But while images of female piety were important for men primarily as aids to controlling aggression and ambition, they were primarily attractive to women as aids to exercising indirect influence over men and obtaining public recognition and status.

Diese Abhandlung ist im Marz 1988 geschrieben, im August 1989 und im Sommer 1990 Uberarbeitet worden. Es ergab sich unbeabsichtigt, daB sie im hun- dertsten Todesjahr Gontscharovs herauskommt. Die in ihr gegebene Erklarung von Gontscharovs drittem und letztem Roman, nach eigener Dberzeugung seinem wichtigsten, will keine vollstandige Interpreta- tion geben. Vieles bleibt offen: das Bild der Statue und das Pygmalionmotiv, das eine wohl aus der Goethe-Kritik des Jungen Deutschlands, das andere aus Schiller genommen; das Instinktmotiv, das Fenstermotiv, das Motiv der Dammerung, das aus Gogol entwickelt ist, des Schusses, das es auch in Turgenevs Vater und Sohne gibt. Bestimmte Stilfiguren wie die Reflexion in Dreierformeln, die gewiB eine Analyse wert sind, werden gesehen, aber nicht behandelt. Literarische Beziehun- gen wie die zu Karamzin, Gogol, Lermontov, Byron sind kaum beriihrt; die zu Ossian und Bellini wurden friiher an anderer Stelle behandelt. Die Tiervergleiche verdienen genauere Betrachtung; hier ist nur einer, der Hundevergleich unter- sucht; ein anderer, der Vogelvergleich, gestreift. Manche wichtige Person, wie die Babuschka und Tuschin, mUBte in ihrer allegorischen Form ausfiihrlicher unter- sucht werden, als es hier geschieht. Vieles ist freilich erwahnt, Einiges in Anmer- kungen angedeutet; Manches haben Andere erschopfend untersucht und es wurde deshalb nicht wiederholt. Das Ziel dieser Abhandlung ist ein anderes. Das Feuer der Kritik hat yom ersten Augenblick an Die Schlucht in eine Beleuchtung getaucht, aus der sie sich bisher nicht hat befreien konnen.

The Logic of Love in The Canterbury Tales argues that Geoffrey Chaucer's magnum opus draws inventively on the resources of late medieval logic to conceive of love as an "insoluble." Philosophers of the fourteenth century expended great effort to solve insolubilia, like the notorious Liar paradox, in order to decide upon their truth or falsity. For Chaucer, however, and in keeping with Christ's admonition from the Sermon on the Mount, the lover does not judge - does not decide on - the beloved. Through a series of detailed and rigorously "non-judgmental" readings, Manish Sharma provides new insight into each of the prologues and tales and intervenes into scholarly debates about their collective import. In so doing, The Logic of Love in The Canterbury Tales deploys Chaucer's understanding of charity to consider the limitations of modern critical approaches to The Canterbury Tales, including deconstruction, psychoanalysis, and gender theory. In the course of the analysis, Sharma shows not only how love and medieval philosophy together inform Chaucerian composition, but also how Chaucer could serve as a resource for contemporary theoretical reflections on love and ethics.