Books Received

680 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 26:4 OCTOBER 1988 empiricist, so favored by the unhistorical. The reality to be described defies these neat templates, however convenient their use may seem, while it is precisely the use of such crude analytical tools that (among other things) prevents us from "learning something significant" from the past. The history of eighteenth-century philosophy is represented by two papers on Hume, one by M. A. Stewart, the other by Nicholas Capaldi. The former takes up Hume's references to the "metaphysical argument a priori," while the latter offers an account of the significance of Hume's theory of the self. Eckart F6rster contributes a discussion of Kant's refutation of idealism, and Paul Wood brings the volume to a close with "The Hagiography of Common Sense: Dugald Stewart's Account of the Life and Writings of Thomas Reid." Of these pieces I found the first and last especially helpful. Stewart's combines a close analysis of Hume's perfunctory comments on the metaphysical argument a priori and attention to the argument as found in, and discussed by, some of Hume's less studied contemporaries. By attending to the texts in which this argument is propounded (Samuel Clark, John Jackson) or criticized (Edmund Law, Daniel Waterland), Stewart shows that post-Kantian commentators on the argument have been mistaken to suppose it a confused version of the ontological argument, and also that when "Hume attacks the a priori argument it is always a form of the a priori argument that deploys causal concepts; and it is primarily because of the way it deploys causal concepts a priori that he attacks it" (245). Paul Wood's piece helpfully unravels the threads of Dugald Stewart's seemingly uninformative account of Thomas Reid, and shows that the treatment of even so benign a subject may be significantly affected by powerful social factors--a concern, in this case, with The Event of the late eighteenth-century, the French Revolution. In the end, the volume exhibits more unity of theme than one would have expected, for nearly all the distinctly historical contributions reveal the determination of their authors to avoid reading themselves or the twentieth century off the philosophical past to which they attend; there are here, as I have indicated, genuine efforts to learn from the past rather than imposing on it. It is also gratifying to note that the concerns which gave rise to the conference and this volume led more or less directly to the founding of the British Society for the History of Philosophy, a group whose subsequent activities and Newsletter are well worth following (information from Richard Francks, Department of Philosophy, University of York, Heslington, York YO 1 5DD, U.K.), and indirectly to the founding of Oxford Studies in the History of Philosophy, an annual publication that is expected to focus on modern philosophy. A successful conference, indeed. DAVID FATE NORTON McGiU University BOOKS RECEIVED Afansayev, V. G. Dialectical Materiali.~m. New York: International Publishers, 1987. Pp. ~52. Paper , $4.25 . BOOK REVIEWS 681 AIbertoni, Ettore A. Masca and the Theory of Elitism. Translated by Paul Goodrich. Oxfordi Basil Blackwell, 1987. Pp. xvii + 194. NP. Bales, Eugene F. A Ready Reference to Philosophy East and West. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1987. Pp. xxiv + 289. $24.5o. Bar-On, A. Zvie. The Categories and the Principle of Coherence. Whitehead's Theory of Categories in Historical Perspective. Nijhoff International Philosophy Series, Vol. 26. Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1987. Pp. viii + 249. $59.5o. Baxandall, Michael. Giotto and the Orators. Humanist Observers of Painting in Italy and the Discovery of Pictorial Composition. 235o-i45o. New York: Oxford University Press, Clarendon Press, 1986. Pp. xii + 185. Paper, $17.95. Bencivenga, Ermanno. Kant's Copermcan Revolution. New York: Oxford University Press, t987. Pp. x + 262. $32.50. Bernstein,John Andrew. Nietz~che'sMoralPhilosophy. Rutherford, NJ: FairleighDickinson University Press, 1987. Pp. 214. $27.5 o. Bloch, Ernst. The Utopian Function of Art and Literature. SelectedEssays. Translated byJack Zipes and Frank Mecklenburg. Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought. Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1988. Pp. xliii + 3to- $25.oo. Blumenberg, Hans. The Genesis of the Copernican WorM. Translated by...