Principal Writings on Religion Including Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion and the Natural History of Religion

by Hume, David; Gaskin, J. C. A.

• ISBN13: 9780192838766
• ISBN10: 0192838768
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-01-28
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

David Hume is the greatest and also one of the most provocativephilosophers to have written in the English language. No philosopher is moreimportant for his careful, critical, and deeply perceptive examination of thegrounds for belief in divine powers and for his sceptical accounts of the causesand consequences of religious belief, expressed most powerfully in the DialoguesConcerning Natural Religion and The Natural History of Religion.The Dialogues ask if belief in God can be inferred from the nature of theuniverse or whether it is even consistent with what we know about the universe.The Natural History of Religion investigates the origins of belief, and followsits development from harmless polytheism to dogmatic monotheism. Together theyconstitute the most formidable attack upon the rationality of religious beliefever mounted by a philosopher.This edition also includes Section XI of The Enquiry Concerning HumanUnderstanding and a letter concerning the Dialogues, as well as particularlyhelpful critical apparatus and abstracts of the main texts, enabling the readerto locate or relocate key topics.

Table of Contents

Oxford World's Classics Dialogues And The Natural History	p. i
Preface	p. v
Introduction	p. ix
Select Bibliography	p. xxix
My Own Life	p. 3
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding Section XI	p. 11
A Letter Concerning the Dialogues, 10 March 1751	p. 25
Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion	p. 29
An Abstract of the Dialogues	p. 131
The Natural History of Religion	p. 134
Hume's Notes to the Natural History	p. 186
An Abstract of the Natural History	p. 194
EXPLANATORY NOTES	p. 197
Descriptive Index of Classical Names in Hume's Texts	p. 216
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