Before his death in 2003, Bernard Williams
planned to publish a collection of historical essays,
focusing primarily on the ancient world. This posthumous
volume brings together a much wider selection, written
over some forty years. His legacy lives on in this
masterful work, the first collection ever published of
Williams's essays on the history of philosophy. The
subjects range from the sixth century B.C. to the
twentieth A.D., from Homer to Wittgenstein by way of
Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Hume, Sidgwick,
Collingwood, and Nietzsche. Often one would be hard put
to say which part is history, which philosophy. Both are
involved throughout, because this is the history of
philosophy written philosophically. Historical
exposition goes hand in hand with philosophical
scrutiny. Insights into the past counteract blind
acceptance of present assumptions. In his touching
and illuminating introduction, Myles Burnyeat writes of
these essays: "They show a depth of commitment to the
history of philosophy seldom to be found nowadays in a
thinker so prominent on the contemporary philosophical
scene." The result celebrates the interest and
importance to philosophy today of its near and distant
past. The Sense of the Past is one of three
collections of essays by Bernard Williams published by
Princeton University Press since his death. In the
Beginning Was the Deed: Realism and Moralism in
Political Argument, selected, edited, and with an
introduction by Geoffrey Hawthorn, and Philosophy as
a Humanistic Discipline, selected, edited, and with
an introduction by A. W. Moore, make up the
trio.
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