****"Devastating in its use of cold logic," (The Independent), the
classic essay collection that expresses the freethinker's views to
religion and challenges set notions in today's society from one of the
most influential intellectual figures of the twentieth century.
Dedicated as few men have been to the life of reason, Bertrand Russell
has always been concerned with the basic questions to which religion
also addresses itself--questions about man's place in the universe and
the nature of the good life, questions that involve life after death,
morality, freedom, education, and sexual ethics. He brings to his
treatment of these questions the same courage, scrupulous logic, and
lofty wisdom for which his other work as philosopher, writer, and
teacher has been famous. These qualities make the essays included in
this book perhaps the most graceful and moving presentation of the
freethinker's position since the days of Hume and Voltaire.
"I am as firmly convinced that religions do harm as I am that they are
untrue," Russell declares in his Preface, and his reasoned opposition to
any system or dogma which he feels may shackle man's mind runs through
all the essays in this book, whether they were written as early as 1899
or as late as 1954.
The book has been edited, with Lord Russell's full approval and
cooperation, by Professor Paul Edwards of the Philosophy Department of
New York University. In an Appendix, Professor Edwards contributes a
full account of the highly controversial "Bertrand Russell Case" of
1940, in which Russell was judicially declared "unfit" to teach
philosophy at the College of the City of New York.
Whether the reader shares or rejects Bertrand Russell's views, he will
find this book an invigorating challenge to set notions, a masterly
statement of a philosophical position, and a pure joy to read.
