The best introduction to the study of the history of English political ideas since the Revolution. Mr. Laski's survey beings with Locke and ends with Burke. His studies of these two great figures are very well done. He has related them to their envir ... Read more

The best introduction to the study of the history of English political ideas since the Revolution. Mr. Laski's survey beings with Locke and ends with Burke. His studies of these two great figures are very well done. He has related them to their environments; brought out in clear effect the interplay of political facts and political ideas; and illuminatingly analyzed the significance of their contributions for their own and succeeding generations. But it was not to be expected that in such well-tilled fields much new information was to be supplied. It is in the arid and hitherto almost uncultivated region which lies betwixt that Mr. Laski has done his most valuable work. He has here enabled us to better understand the importance in the field of political ideas of such writers as Bolingbroke, Hume, Blackstone, Adam Smith, Price, and Priestly, with whom we might have claimed at least a passing acquaintance. But even more important, he has drawn attention to the real significance of a number of other writers hitherto quite obscure, if not unknown, controversialists such as Hickes, Leslie, Shower, Wake, Hoadly, Law, and Warburton. It is a period in which political ideas develop through the fermentation of controversies waged by a multitude of minor pamphleteers rather than by the magna opera of philosophical writers of the first importance. But political thought germinates and fructifies none the less than in the heroic epochs of Hobbes or Locke...In truth, this is just such an illuminating, not to say brilliant, little book, studded with forceful epigrams and reflecting a very wide and fruitful reading, as one might expect Mr. Laski to write." -The American Political Science Review "Rarely has the task of summarizing the main characteristics of an intellectual movement been performed with more notable success than that which Professor Laski has attained in this concise account of the development of English political thought from Locke to Bentham. Any writer who essays to narrate the history of ideas is beset by two dangers. One is the danger of framing a series of essentially detached studies whose subjects are the more striking personalities of the period with which he deals. The other is that of forcing an appearance of development or logical connection where in fact little or none exists. Mr. Laski has avoided both of these pitfalls." -The Nation "Professor Laski has admirably succeeded in this discussion of political thought in England...Those who wish to understand intelligently current thought will find considerable assistance in studying this small book." -The Churchman "Presents with the compression and clarity...a survey of the way England political thought developed from the revolution of 1688 to the reform act of 1867. Within this period England incubated the main idea which motivated the American revolution and brought about the origin of the American republic." -The Interior Less