Divination and Human Nature casts a new perspective on the rich tradition of ancient divination—the reading of divine signs in oracles, omens, and dreams. Popular attitudes during classical antiquity saw these readings as signs from the gods while modern scholars have treated such beliefs as primitive superstitions. In this book, Peter Struck reveals instead that such phenomena provoked an entirely different accounting from the ancient philosophers. These philosophers produced sub...

Allegory is a vast subject, and its knotty history is daunting to students and even advanced scholars venturing outside their own historical specializations. This Companion will present, lucidly, systematically, and expertly, the various threads that comprise the allegorical tradition over its entire chronological range. Beginning with Greek antiquity, the volume shows how the earliest systems of allegory developed in poetry dealing with philosophy, mystical religion, and hermeneutics. Onc...

"A rich and fascinating account of how . . . symbolism and allegorical reading developed over the course of classical antiquity." — Literary ImaginationNearly all of us have studied poetry and been taught to look for the symbolic as well as literal meaning of the text. Is this the way the ancients saw poetry? In Birth of the Symbol, Peter Struck explores the ancient Greek literary critics and theorists who invented the idea of the poetic "symbol."

This book is no less than a guide to the whole of Western philosophy -- the ideas that have undergirded our civilization for two-and-a-half thousand years. Anthony Kenny tells the story of philosophy from ancient Greece through the Middle Ages and the Enlightenment into the modern world. He introduces us to the great thinkers and their ideas, starting with Plato, Aristotle, and the other founders of Western thought. In the second part of the book he takes us through a thousand years of med...

Benedict de Spinoza (1632-77) was at once the father of the Enlightenment and the last sad guardian of the medieval world. In his brilliant synthesis of geometrical method, religious sentiment, and secular science, he attempted to reconcile the conflicting moral and intellectual demands of his epoch, and to present a vision of humanity as simultaneously bound by necessity and eternally free. In this book Roger Scruton presents a clear and systematic analysis of Spinoza's thought,and shows ...

"A passionate, humane intelligence addressing itself to the fundamental problem of how the mind operates." — NewsweekConsidered by many to be Hannah Arendt's greatest work, published as she neared the end of her life, The Life of the Mind investigates thought itself, as it exists in contemplative life. In a shift from her previous writings, most of which focus on the world outside the mind, this work was planned as three volumes that would explore ...

Richard Popkin has assembled 63 leading scholars to forge a highly approachable chronological account of the development of Western philosophical traditions. From Plato to Wittgenstein and from Aquinas to Heidegger, this volume provides lively, in-depth, and up-to-date historical analysis of all the key figures, schools, and movements of Western philosophy.The Columbia History significantly broadens the scope of Western philosophy to reveal the influence of Middle Eastern and Asian...

Jacques Maritain's An Introduction to Philosophy was first published in 1931. Since then, this book has stood the test of time as a clear guide to what philosophy is and how to philosophize. Inspired by the Thomistic Revival called for by Leo XIII, Maritain relies heavily on Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas to shape a philosophy that, far from sectarian theology in disguise, is driven by reason and engages the modern world. Re-released as part of the Sheed & Ward Classic series, An Introdu...

Over 100,000 Copies Sold!Truth used to be based on reason. No more. What we feel is now the truest source of reality. Despite our obsession with the emotive and the experiential, we still face anxiety, despair, and purposelessness.How did we get here? And where do we find a remedy?In this modern classic, Francis A. Schaeffer traces trends in twentieth-century thought and unpacks how key ideas have shaped our society. Wide-ranging in his analysis, S...

Sir Anthony Kenny's engaging new history of Western philosophy now advances into the modern era. The Rise of Modern Philosophy is the fascinating story of the emergence, from the early sixteenth to the early nineteenth century, of great ideas and intellectual systems that shaped modern thought. Kenny introduces us to some of the world's most original and influential thinkers, and shows us the way to an understanding of their famous works. The thinkers we meet include René Descarte...

This unique volume offers an odyssey through the ideas of the Stoics in three particular ways: first, through the historical trajectory of the school itself and its influence; second, through the recovery of the history of Stoic thought; third, through the ongoing confrontation with Stoicism, showing how it refines philosophical traditions, challenges the imagination, and ultimately defines the kind of life one chooses to lead. A distinguished roster of specialists have written an authorit...

Through three editions over more than four decades, The Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics has built an unrivaled reputation as the most comprehensive and authoritative reference for students, scholars, and poets on all aspects of its subject: history, movements, genres, prosody, rhetorical devices, critical terms, and more. Now this landmark work has been thoroughly revised and updated for the twenty-first century. Compiled by an entirely new team of editors, the fourth...