Philosophy

In many ways C. S. Lewis predicted the future. "He foresaw the rise of trends we're currently experiencing: ethical emotivism, the sometimes unquestioned authority of science, and the increasing use of technology by states to control their populations." -The Gospel Coalition, Joseph A. Kohm Jr.

The Abolition of Man discusses why we shouldn't always listen to only reason and cut out our emotions. Lewis argues that reason without emotion there is not a reality. He debunks arguments that the purist form of reason is instinct, that benevolent actions will be found through pursuing science, and that science will be the best moral compass for mankind to follow. Lewis proves that moral absolutes do exist and they are universal throughout all of time.

This is a book for C. S. Lewis fans and anyone who wants to better understand traditional moral virtues and how they impact your life. Lewis said, "If nothing is self-evident then nothing can be proved." There must be self-evident truths that can be applied everywhere. The book brings together a series of lectures on education that Lewis delivered over three nights at the University of Durham.

A book of everyday ethics by a man whom Pope St. John Paul II called "one of the great ethicists of the twentieth century," The Art of Living is Dietrich von Hildebrand's essential guide to the moral life.

In just over one hundred pages, Dietrich von Hildebrand, with his wife Alice, presents a distinctive view of the virtuous life that begins with reverence, "the mother of all virtues," and includes chapters on "Faithfulness," "Goodness," "Hope," "The Human Heart," and many others.

The essays that make up this book began as a popular series of radio lectures in 1930s Germany, and their conversational tone comes through in this new edition, which maintains Alice von Hildebrand's original translation, and updates this beloved work for a new generation of readers.

The Art of Living promises to provide clarity, hope, and fresh insights for those seeking to live life more fully, faithfully, and beautifully.

Editorial Reviews

"The author is true to his title. Hildebrand writes about virtue with an artist's flair. He shows us the moral life as it is -- and so we can see the overwhelming appeal of every virtue, every value. It is the art of living virtuously that makes love possible and leads us to friendship and communion - with God and neighbor. A better life, the life we want, begins in these luminous pages."

-- Scott Hahn, bestselling author of over forty titles, including The Lamb's Supper and Reasons to Believe.

"The essays in Dietrich von Hildebrand's The Art of Living are a sublime treasury, filled with light and truth. Whoever longs to live fully and truly will do well to discover and cherish this golden book."

-- Eric Metaxas, New York Times Bestselling author of Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy

"The primacy of moral virtue has never had a more passionate, insightful--and bracing-- champion in the modern era than Dietrich von Hildebrand. Men and women of all faiths should celebrate the reissue of this inspired volume."

-- Rabbi Mark Gottlieb, Senior Director, The Tikvah Fund

What are the best things in life?

Questions like that may boggle your mind. But they don't boggle Socrates. The indomitable old Greek brings his unending questions to Desperate State University. With him come the same mind-opening and spirit-stretching challenge that disrupted ancient Athens.

In twelve short, Socratic dialogues Peter Kreeft explodes contemporary values like success, power and pleasure. And he bursts the modern bubbles of agnosticism and subjectivism. He leaves you richer, wiser and more able to discern what the best things in life actually are.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Can time be our friend? At first glance the question seems ridiculous, because the apparent scarcity of time is a constant source of stress in our busy lives. There are not enough hours in the day, we say as we collapse late at night. Deep down we know that we cannot go on like this.

Father Stinnisen's book dares us to see time with new eyes. The insight that eternity is written in the depths of our hearts helps us to live in time in a way that leads us deeper into God's joy. We are like children in a land of fairy tales where everything is exciting and exploration never ends.We therefore should rejoice that everything around us is great and mysterious and that we can live in eternal wonder.

His intention is not to explain what time is and thus take away its mystery. Instead, his aim is to show us how to see time from different perspectives and to discover how rich and multifaceted it is. Above all, he demonstrates how we can make use of the tremendous possibilities that time offers to us.

Why, since happiness is so universally sought after, are so many people so miserable? The answer can be found by unpacking the wisdom of two of history's intellectual giants who set out to answer the question that has confounded man from time immemorial: What makes us happy?

Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas existed sixteen centuries apart, yet each reached similar understandings about what makes a person happy and what makes him miserable. In these enlightening pages, Dr. Charles Nemeth synthesizes the judgments of history's two greatest thinkers to present for you a life plan that inevitably leads to a happy human existence, whatever your ethnicity, religion, or citizenship.

You will explore what it means to be happy and will come to understand the limitations of happiness. You'll learn how to live in accordance with your basic nature so that your inclinations will not conflict with that which makes you flourish. And you'll calibrate your compass so that you will be able to navigate your way into a state of life that makes you truly happy.

Moreover, you'll discover why happiness is obtained through action and not mere desire and why wealth and fame do not - and cannot - buy happiness. You'll also learn why the body, despite providing avenues for sensory and intellectual pleasure, is incapable of providing true happiness.

Strikingly, none of the suggestions in this book have ever been shown to be flawed. These timeless recommendations for a happy life never go out of favor and never change. Instead, they remain a constant, permanent, universal set of criteria on how to achieve a happy existence.

You'll also learn:

With this Rosetta stone of a book, you will find solutions to fortify your soul and bring you peace. You will be equipped with a new sense of direction, hope, and healing that will guide you closer to lasting happiness.

"Fr. Sertillanges's teachings are as timeless as any truths which describe the genuine nature of things. . . . This book is highly recommended not only for intellectuals, but also for students and those discerning their vocation in life."--New Oxford Review

"[This] is above all a practical book. It discusses with a wealth of illustration and insight such subjects as the organization of the intellectual worker's time, materials, and his life; the integration of knowledge and the relation of one's specialty to general knowledge; the choice and use of reading; the discipline of memory; the taking of notes, their classification and use; and the preparation and organization of the final production."--The Sign

The Politics of Heaven and Hell makes an invaluable contribution to the understanding of classical, medieval, and modern political philosophy, while explaining the profound problem with modernity.

Christianity freed men from the overwhelming burden of ever thinking that their salvation will ultimately come from the political order, writes Fr. James Schall, S.J. Modernity, on the other hand, is a perversion of Christianity, which tries to achieve man's salvation in this world. It does this by politicizing everything, which results in the absolute state: The distance from the City of God to the Leviathan is not at all far once the City of God is relocated on earth.

The best defense against this tyranny is the adequate description of the highest things, of what is beyond politics. Both reason and revelation are needed for this work, and they are eloquently and ably set forth in this book.

A great philosopher once observed, "Philosophers let theories get in the way of what they and everybody else know." A lot of ink has been spilt in order to obscure what we really can't not know about reality, humanity and morality.

In the midst of a culture permeated by philosophies that seek to redefine the universally available meaning of what it is to be human, Fr. Robert McTeigue says it is more important than ever to be equipped with reliable philosophical tools that help us to see clearly the implications of our stated moral claims; that enable us to detect moral and logical error; and that keep us grounded in the love of truth.

You will find such tools in these pages that explore what it means to be human with metaphysical, anthropological, and ethical dimensions.

But this book does more than offer tools for seeing and understanding. It is a refutation of philosophies which prize love of theory over love of truth; a rebuke of any metaphysics that cannot account for itself; a refutation of anthropologies which are unworthy of the human person; and a refutation of ethical systems which reduce the great dignity and destiny of the human person.

Most importantly, this book is a prescription for an alternative: it is a real philosophy for real people, wherein the best of classical philosophy finds its fulfillment, expressed in a contemporary idiom that is accessible to the layman and plausible to the scholar. It offers a catalog of errors with their refutations, and a map for living a truly human life. It is a portable error-detector, while providing a basis for knowing and presenting the truth.

Since the early twentieth century, scientific materialism has so undermined our belief in the human capacity for transcendence that many people find it difficult to believe in God and the human soul. The materialist perspective has not only cast its spell on the natural sciences, psychology, philosophy, and literature, it has also enthralled popular culture, which offers very little to encourage the "soul's upward yearning".

There are many signs of the widespread loss of confidence in our ability to soar upward, and these have been noted by thinkers as diverse as Carl Jung (psychiatrist), Mircea Eliade (historian of religion), Gabriel Marcel (philosopher), and authors C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. Their observations were validated by a 2004 study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry that linked the absence of religion with a marked increase in suicide, meaninglessness, substance abuse, separation from family members, and other psychological problems.

Thus, the loss of transcendence is negatively affecting an entire society. It is stealing from countless individuals their sense of happiness, dignity, ideals, virtues, and destiny.Ironically, the evidence for transcendence is greater today than in any other period in history. The problem is, this evidence has not been compiled and made widely available--a challenge Father Spitzer aspires to meet with this book.

Father Spitzer's work provides a bright light in the midst of the darkness by presenting traditional and contemporary evidence for God and a transphysical soul from several major sources. It shows that we are transcendent beings with souls capable of surviving bodily death; that we are self-reflective beings aware of and able to strive toward perfect truth, love, goodness, and beauty; that we have the dignity of being created in the very image of God. If we underestimate these truths, we undervalue one another, underlive our lives, and underachieve our destiny.

"A magnificent treatise by a distinguished philosopher on the pursuit of spiritual perfection."
ùPublishers Weekly

"A masterpiece of modern spirituality: eminently practical and highly recommended."
ùFr. John Hardon, S.J.

"A solid and penetrating analysis of the Christian virtues, and their application in the struggle toward Christian perfection."
ùLibrary Journal

Kreeft has imagined Socrates University: a log, with Socrates at one end and a typical intelligent modern student beginner at the other, conversing about the problems at the heart of each major division of philosophy.

Nothing teaches more effectively than concrete examples and apprenticeship. Like the real Socrates, this fictionalized version by Kreeft is grounded in common sense and commonsense logic, fair and open-minded on all issues but demanding good reasons for every opinion.