The Principles of Moral and Christian Philosophy presents the first masterpiece of Scottish Common Sense philosophy. This two-volume treatise is important for its wide range of insights about the nature of the human mind, the foundations of morals, and the relationship between morality and religion.The first volume presents a detailed study of the faculties of the human mind and their interrelations. The second volume presents arguments for the existence of God and for God’s infinite perfection. The underlying notion is God’s moral government of the world, in which there is recompense for good and evil deeds.George Turnbull (1698–1748) taught at Marischal College, Aberdeen.Alexander Broadie is Professor of Logic and Rhetoric at the University of Glasgow. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.
The Origin of the Distinction of Ranks is one of the major products of the Scottish Enlightenment and a masterpiece of jurisprudence and social theory. Drawing on Adam Smith’s four-stages theory of history and the natural law’s traditional division of domestic duties into those toward servants, children, and women, Millar provides a rich historical analysis of the ways in which progressive economic change transforms the nature of authority.John Millar (1735–1801) attended Adam Smith’s lectures at the University of Glasgow and later became a distinguished professor of law there.Aaron Garrett is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Boston University. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.
Samuel Pufendorf’s The Whole Duty of Man, According to the Law of Nature suggested a purely conventional basis for natural law. Rejecting scholasticism’s metaphysical theories, Pufendorf found the source of natural law in humanity’s need to cultivate sociability.Samuel Pufendorf (1632–1694) taught natural law and was court historian in both Germany and Sweden.Ian Hunter is Australian Professorial Fellow in the Centre for the History of European Discourses, University of Queensland.David Saunders is Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Arts at Griffith University. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.
In An Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections, with Illustrations on the Moral Sense, Francis Hutcheson answers the criticism that had been leveled against his first book, Inquiry into the Original of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue (1725). Together the two works constitute the great innovation in philosophy for which Hutcheson is most well known.Professor Garrett has constructed a critical variorum edition of this great work. Because there are no manuscripts of the work, this could be done only by comparing all extant lifetime editions. Three such editions exist: those of 1728, 1730 (chiefly a reprint of the 1728 edition), and 1742. The Liberty Fund edition collates the first edition with Hutcheson’s revision of 1742.Francis Hutcheson (1694–1746) was educated at the University of Glasgow, where he assumed the chair of moral philosophy in 1729.Aaron Garrett is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Boston University. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.
This Liberty Fund edition of Commentary on the Law of Prize and Booty is based on the one prepared by Gwladys L. Williams and Walter H. Zeydel for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. It combines the original text and new material.Hugo Grotius (1583–1645) was a lawyer and legal theorist, diplomat and political philosopher, ecumenical activist and theologian.Martine Julia van Ittersum is a Lecturer in History at the University of Dundee. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.
Liberty Fund’s edition of The Free Sea is the only translation of Grotius’s masterpiece undertaken in his own lifetime, left in manuscript by the English historian, Richard Hakluyt (1552–1616). It also contains William Welwod’s critique of Grotius (reprinted for the first time since the seventeenth century) and Grotius’s reply to Welwod. These documents provide an indispensable introduction to modern ideas of sovereignty and property as they emerged from the early-modern tradition of natural law.Hugo Grotius (1583–1645) was a lawyer and legal theorist, diplomat and political philosopher, ecumenical activist and theologian.David Armitage is the Lloyd C. Blankfein Professor of History at Harvard University. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.
Elements of Criticism is Kames’s most influential work. When it first appeared, in 1762, it was the most comprehensive philosophical work on “criticism” in English, and it was published in five editions during Kames’s lifetime and another forty editions over the next century. In America, Elements of Criticism served as a standard text for college students of English.Liberty Fund’s edition of Elements of Criticism is the first modern edition of one of Kames’s most influential works. In Elements, Kames sets out his argument that the “science of criticism” is a “rational science;” it is “a subject of reasoning as well as of taste.” Volume one explores the nature and causes of the emotions and passions. Volume two delineates principles of rhetoric and literary appreciation, ending with a discussion of the formation of a standard of taste. Kames illustrated both volumes with a vast range of examples from classical literature and the arts of his own day.Henry Home, Lord Kames (1696–1782) was one of the leaders of the Scottish Enlightenment.Peter Jones is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.
A Treatise of the Laws of Nature, originally titled De Legibus Naturae, first appeared in 1672 as a theoretical response to a range of issues that came together during the late 1660s. It conveyed a conviction that science might offer a more effective means of demonstrating both the contents and the obligatory force of the law of nature.Jon Parkin is a Lecturer in Politics at the University of York, United Kingdom. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.
Philosophical Commentary deals with church and state, religious toleration, legal enforcement of religious practices, and religiously motivated violence.Pierre Bayle (1647–1706) was a Protestant philosopher and critic.John Kilcullen is Senior Research Fellow, Humanities, at Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.Chandran Kukathas is Chair in Political Theory at The London School of Economics and Political Science, University of London. Please note: This title is available as an ebook for purchase on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and iTunes.