Author: SHAFTESBURY, (ANTHONY ASHLEY COOPER, EARL OF
Title: Characteristicks of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times, &c.
Description: London, No Publisher Stated. 1733, 5-Th. Edition. Full Calf, Small 8-Vo. Book, 3 Vols.Vol.I- VIII-364 PP. Vol.II-443 PP. Vol. III-408 PP + extensive index. Orig. full calf with gilt, double filet lines at covers. spines with raised bands and contrasting title pieces. Contains [e.g] A letter concerning enthusiasm, An inquiry concerning Virtue and Merit. etc. etc. The 'Characteristics' give unmistakable indications of religious scepticism, especially in allusions to the Old Testament. He was accordingly attacked as a deist by Leland, Warburton, Berkeley, and many other christian apologists. He had been influenced by Bayle, and shares or exaggerates the ordinary dislike of the whig nobles to church principles. His heterodoxy excited the prejudice of many reasoners who might have welcomed him as an ally upon fundamental questions. As a philosopher he had no distinct system, and repudiates metaphysics. He revolted against the teaching of Locke, to which there are some contemptuous references in the 'Advice to an Author (the first and eighth of the 'Letters to a Student' give an explicit statement). He was probably much influenced by the 'Cambridge Platonists,' especially Whichcote and Cudworth, and shows many points of affinity to Cumberland. His cosmopolitan and classical training, and the traditional code of honour of his class, are discernible in all his writings. His special idol was Plato, whom he endeavoured to imitate in the 'Moralists.' Hurd and Monboddo are enraptured with his performance as unsurpassed in the language. Opponents, especially the shrewd cynic Mandeville, regarded him as a pretentious and high-flown declaimer; but his real elevation of feeling gives a serious value to his ethical speculations, the most systematic account of which is in the 'Inquiry concerning Virtue.' The phrase 'moral sense' which occurs in that treatise became famous in the Scotch school of philosophy of which Hutcheson, a disciple of Shaftesbury's, was the founder.See; DNB Gaskell 49. Good copie, in the original bindings of a scarce book. Fine/No Jacket.

Keywords: Shaftesbury. Literature. Characteristicks.


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