The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Life of Reason, by George Santayana

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: The Life of Reason

Author: George Santayana

Release Date: February 14, 2005 [eBook #15000]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIFE OF REASON***

E-text prepared by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Garrett Alley, and the
Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team

THE LIFE OF REASON

The Phases of Human Progress

In Five Volumes

by

GEORGE SANTAYANA

he gar noy enhergeia zohe

Dover Publication, Inc.
New York

CONTENTS

Volume I. REASON IN COMMON SENSE

Volume II. REASON IN SOCIETY

Volume III. REASON IN RELIGION

Volume IV. REASON IN ART

Volume V. REASON IN SCIENCE

REASON IN COMMON SENSE

Volume One of "The Life of Reason"

GEORGE SANTAYANA

he gar noy enhergeia zohe

This Dover edition, first published in 1980, is an
unabridged republication of volume one of _The
Life of Reason; or the Phases of Human Progress_,
originally published by Charles Scribner's Sons in
1905. This volume contains the general introduction
to the entire five-volume series.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

THE SUBJECT OF THIS WORK, ITS METHOD AND ANTECEDENTS Pages 1-32
Progress is relative to an ideal which reflection
creates.--Efficacious reflection is reason.--The Life of Reason a
name for all practical thought and all action justified by its
fruits in consciousness.--- It is the sum of Art.--It has a natural
basis which makes it definable.--Modern philosophy not
helpful.--Positivism no positive ideal.--Christian philosophy
mythical: it misrepresents facts and conditions.--Liberal theology
a superstitious attitude toward a natural world.--The Greeks
thought straight in both physics and morals.--Heraclitus and the
immediate.--Democritus and the naturally intelligible.--Socrates
and the autonomy of mind.--Plato gave the ideal its full
expression.--Aristotle supplied its natural basis.--Philosophy thus
complete, yet in need of restatement.--Plato's myths in lieu of