Richard Cumberland and Natural Law: Secularisation of Thought in Seventeenth-century England - Hardcover

Kirk, Linda

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0227678591 ISBN 13: 9780227678596

Publisher: James Clarke Lutterworth, 1987

Synopsis

No study in the history of seventeenth century thought is completed without some mention of Richard Cumberland, one of the many writers who aimed to refute Hobbes. Cumberland remains on of the few important writers of his century on whom, until now, nothing of substance has been written In the past Cumberland has been somewhat unfairly overshadowed by his fellow anti-Hobbists. His one important work, De Legibus Naturae, first appeared in Latin in 1672 and has never been satisfactorily translated into English. That he published so little in such a prolific age was unusual, but his influence through his work continued to be felt well into the nineteenth century. It is now clear that he went further than both Grotius and Pufendorf in devising a system which prefigured classical utilitarianism, propounding a cosmology based upon the reconciliation of charity and self-interest. In this study, Cumberland is placed for the first time, in his intellectual and historical setting. The author des

About this title

About the Author:

After lecturing for a period at what was then the University College of Rhodesia, Linda Kirk took up a lectureship in history at the University of Sheffield. She has published articles on political thought in Protestant Christianity in seventeenth-century England and eighteenth-century Geneva; she is at present working on a book which examines the impact of the Enlightenment of Geneva politics and political debate.

About this edition

• Publisher: James Clarke Lutterworth
• Publication date: 1987
• ISBN 10: 0227678591
• ISBN 13: 9780227678596
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 144