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From later antiquity down to the close of the eighteenth century, most philosophers and men of science and, indeed, most educated men, accepted without question a traditional view of the plan and structure of the world.In this volume, which embodies the William James lectures for 1933, Arthur O. Lovejoy points out the three principles - plenitude, continuity, and graduation - which were combined in this conception; analyzes their origins in the philosophies of Plato, Aristotle, and the Neoplatonists; traces the most important of their diverse ramifications in subsequent religious thought, in metaphysics, in ethics and aesthetics, and in astronomical and biological theories; and copiously illustrates the influence of the conception as a whole, and of the ideas out of which it was compounded, upon the imagination and feelings as expressed in literature.
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The Great Chain of Being, Arthur O. Lovejoy
- Language
- Released
- 1990
- Binding
- (Paperback)
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- Title
- The Great Chain of Being
- Language
- English
- Authors
- Arthur O. Lovejoy
- Publisher
- Harvard University Press
- Released
- 1990
- Format
- Paperback
- Pages
- 382
- ISBN10
- 0674361539
- ISBN13
- 9780674361539
- Series
- Tags
- Non-Fiction, Social Sciences, Historical Themes, History, Religion & Spirituality, Political Science & Politics, Religious Topics, Philosophical Topics, Religion, Philosophy, Politics, Science, History of Science
- Original title
- The great chain of being
- Rating
- 4.05 out of 5
- Description
- From later antiquity down to the close of the eighteenth century, most philosophers and men of science and, indeed, most educated men, accepted without question a traditional view of the plan and structure of the world.In this volume, which embodies the William James lectures for 1933, Arthur O. Lovejoy points out the three principles - plenitude, continuity, and graduation - which were combined in this conception; analyzes their origins in the philosophies of Plato, Aristotle, and the Neoplatonists; traces the most important of their diverse ramifications in subsequent religious thought, in metaphysics, in ethics and aesthetics, and in astronomical and biological theories; and copiously illustrates the influence of the conception as a whole, and of the ideas out of which it was compounded, upon the imagination and feelings as expressed in literature.