Peter Rudge

From Plato to the Present Peter Rudge

Anybody picking up this book can readily perceive from the major line in the title that it encompasses the centuries of our civilisation. The second line indicates that it is brief, brief indeed, less than 100 pages; and that it is the record of accumulated wisdom and understanding in the West and the West only - nothing about other spheres such as the Incas or India or even the 40,000 years of aboriginal culture in the author's home continent of Australia. The third line shows that the history is not simply a linear sequence through the centuries. There were three phases of about 800 years each, with the first culminating in the achievements of St Augustine known as "Transfiguration" and those of St Thomas Aquinas concluding with his "Summa". The third shows the way in which knowledge increased until there is a torrent of expansion into so many fields at the present time. Readers may know want to know more about the many individual subjects touched on. Details can be found elsewhere in encyclopaedias and the internet; but in doing so they may continually refer back to the way in which the several phases developed and provided themes to be followed.