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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea Paperback - 1976

by Arthur O. Lovejoy


From the publisher

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 samifications 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.

From the rear cover

'Men are galvanized by ideas and act as vehicles for them ...Such a ruling idea is that of the great chain of being. Prof. Lovejoy's study records the birth, the growth, the vicissitudes, transformations, and finally the senility, and perhaps the death of this idea. The study is as fascinating as that of the rise and decay of an empire, and, in fact, it is the study of the empire of an idea over human minds throughout many centuries...Prof. Lovejoy's approach is fresh and different.' Modern Language Notes

Details

  • Title The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea
  • Author Arthur O. Lovejoy
  • Binding Paperback
  • Edition 13th Printing
  • Pages 400
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA
  • Date January 31, 1976
  • ISBN 9780674361539 / 0674361539
  • Weight 0.98 lbs (0.44 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.12 x 5.46 x 1.04 in (20.62 x 13.87 x 2.64 cm)
  • Library of Congress subjects Continuity, Idea (Philosophy) - History
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 36014264
  • Dewey Decimal Code 109
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea

The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea

by Lovejoy, Arthur O.

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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea [William James Lectures Delivered at...
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea [William James Lectures Delivered at Harvard University, 1933]

by Lovejoy, Arthur O.

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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea

by Lovejoy, Arthur O

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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of An Idea
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of An Idea

by Lovejoy, A.O.

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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea: 1 (The William James Lectures)

The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea: 1 (The William James Lectures)

by Arthur O. Lovejoy

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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea

by Lovejoy, A.O.

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Harvard University Press, 1978. This is an ex-library book and may have the usual library/used-book markings inside.This book has soft covers. Book contains pen markings. In poor condition, suitable as a reading copy. Please note the Image in this listing is a stock photo and may not match the covers of the actual item,550grams, ISBN:0674361539
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The Great Chain of Being  A Study of the History of an Idea

The Great Chain of Being A Study of the History of an Idea

by Lovejoy, Arthur O.

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Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1964 9, 382 pp. Some blue highlighting in the first 30 pages; the remainder of the text is clean, tight, bright and unmarked. The Subtitle of this book is "The William James Lectures Delivered at Harvard University, 1933." Originally published in 1936, this edition is a later reprint.. 17 th Printing. Trade Paperback. Very Good. 5 3/8 X 8".
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea

by Lovejoy, Arthur O.

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Harvard University Press, 1973. 11th printing. Soft cover. Near Fine. 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" tall. pg.382 with index clean tight copy with light tanning to edges and spine covers are white
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea
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The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea

by ARTHUR O. LOVEJOY

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Harvard University Press, January 1976. Paper Back. New. The Idea: that the universe is ''composed of an immense, or...infinite number of links ranging in hierarchical order from the meagerest kind of existents...through every possible grade up to the...highest possible kind of creature, between which and the Absolute Being the disparity was assumed to be infinite.'' Of this chain, Alexander Pope wrote thus: ''Vast chain of being! which from God began / Natures aethereal, human, angel, man / beast, bird, fish, insect, what no eye can see / No glass can reach; from Infinite to thee / From thee to nothing...Where, one step broken, the great scale's destroy'd / From Nature's chain whatever link you strike / Tenth, or ten thousandth, breaks the chain alike.'' This paradigm of the chain of being pervaded poetry, philosophy, science, theology, and morality alike for centuries, and in these William James Lectures delivered in 1933, it is examined and explicated… Read More
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The Great Chain of Being: the Study of the History of an Idea
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The Great Chain of Being: the Study of the History of an Idea

by LOVEJOY, Arthur O

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Pbk 382pp covers just a tad shelfworn otherwise internally an excellent clean tight unmarked as new
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