An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding and Selections from a Treatise of Human Nature.

La Salle, IL Open Court Publishing Co, 1966. Paperback Second Edition [1966], Revised & Enlarged. Shows UNDERLINING IN INK to page 78 and then in the last few pages of the book. Else, Very Good in Wraps: shows slight spine lean; very light wear to the extremities; moderate rubbing and very faint soiling to wrapper covers; the sewn binding is secure. Clearly a flawed copy, but remains a sturdy, presentable working copy. NOT a Remainder, Book-Club, or Ex-Library. 8vo. xl, 280pp. Includes Appendix, Bibliography and Index. Second Edition [1966], Revised & Enlarged. One of the Philosophical Classics, Religion of Science Library No. 45. Trade Paperback. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding is a book by the Scottish empiricist philosopher David Hume, published in 1748. It was a revision of an earlier effort, Hume's A Treatise of Human Nature, published anonymously in London in 1739–40. Hume was disappointed with the reception of the Treatise, which "fell dead-born from the press," as he put it, and so tried again to disseminate his more developed ideas to the public by writing a shorter and more polemical work. The end product of his labours was the Enquiry. The Enquiry dispensed with much of the material from the Treatise, in favor of clarifying and emphasizing its most important aspects. For example, Hume's views on personal identity do not appear. However, more vital propositions, such as Hume's argument for the role of habit in a theory of knowledge, are retained. This book has proven highly influential, both in the years that would immediately follow and today. Immanuel Kant points to it as the book which woke him from his self-described "dogmatic slumber". The Enquiry is widely regarded as a classic in modern philosophical literature.