Ocean State Libraries

Eighteenth-century French philosopher Charles-Louis de Secondat explores the essential components of good government.

Written by one of the founders of modern political philosophy, Thomas Hobbes, during the English civil war, Leviathan is an influential work of nonfiction. Regarded as one of the earliest examples of the social contract theory, Leviathan has both historical and philosophical importance. Social contract theory prioritizes the state over the individual, claiming that individuals have consented to the surrender of some of their freedoms by participating...

Similar to Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle explores another facet of good living by outlining the best governing practices that benefit the majority, and not the minority. In The Politics, he defines various institutions and how they should operate within an established system. The Politics provides an analysis of contemporary government as it relates to all people. Aristotle discusses the positive and negative qualities of authority and how they affect...

Considered the inventor of the essay itself, Michel de Montaigne published Essays (Essais, literally "Attempts") in 1850. Known for his skill at merging serious intellectual debate with personal anecdotes, his vast work collects together some of the most influential essays the world has ever seen, shaping the thoughts Blaise Pascal, René Descartes, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Stefan Zweig, Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Isaac

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"Bertrand Russell was one of the greatest logicians since Aristotle, and one of the most important philosophers of the past two hundred years. The Problems of Philosophy, one of the most popular works in Russell's prolific collection of writings, has become core reading in philosophy. Clear and accessible, this little book is an intelligible and stimulating guide to those problems of philosophy which often mistakenly make the subject seem too lofty...

The eighteenth-century philosopher’s landmark treatise against monarchy that inspired the French and American Revolutions.
 “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”
 
With these stirring words, Jean-Jacques Rousseau begins The Social Contract—the first shot in a battle of ideas that would set the stage for the American War of Independence and the French Revolution....

How do we decide what is "good" and what is "bad"? According to the ethical theory of Utilitarianism, to do good is to "always perform that act, of those available, that will bring the most happiness or the least unhappiness." By far the most widely read introduction to this theory, John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism is one of the most important and controversial works of moral philosophy ever written. In this major contribution to ethical history,...

John Stuart Mill's 1869 essay The Subjection of Women argues for equality between the sexes, putting forward ideas that were an affront to many at the time. His wife, Harriet Taylor Mill, is credited with co-authoring the essay. The Subjection of Women puts forward a detailed and passionate opposition to the social and legal inequalities imposed on women by society. Mill saw that he was going against the grain of the time, but argued

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Disappointed by the public reception to 'A Treatise of Human Nature', published anonymously between 1739 and 1740, David Hume decided to produce a shorter more polemic version of that work nearly ten years later. That revision, which was published in 1748, would be entitled 'An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding'. Dispensing with much of the extraneous material from the 'Treatise', Hume focuses on his more vital propositions in the 'Enquiry'....

First published posthumously in 1779, "Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion" is Scottish philosopher David Hume's classic work of religious philosophy. This detailed and exhaustive examination of the nature and existence of God was begun by Hume in 1750, but not completed until shortly before his death in 1776. Hume was an important and influential English Empiricist, along with other English philosophers such as Francis Bacon, John Locke, and Thomas...