The Idea of Progress: An Inquiry into Its Origin and Growth

xv, [1], 377, 2 pp. Blue cloth, gilt titles and rules. An aggregation of philosophical and political theories regarding the origins of civilization and society, and its growth and progress, by the history professor who famously edited and annotated Edward Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Includes discussion of Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes, Bernard de Fontenelle, Abbe de Saint-Pierre, Montesquieu, Voltaire, Turgot, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Chastellux, Condorcet, Comte, etc.