Covering the topics of God, immortality, conscience and immortality, this volume presents a selection of essays of the first decade of Russell as an independent thinker. It includes his graduate essays, adolescent writings and ideas on ethics, Bacon, Hobbes and DesCartes, psychology and politics.

Table of Contents:
Introduction PART I. ADOLESCENT WRITINGS 1 Greek Exercises [1888-89] 2 How Far Does a Country's Prosperity Depend on Natural Resources [1889] 3 Evolution as Affecting Modern Political Science [1889] 4 State-Socialism [1889] 5 The Advantages and Disadvantages of Party Government, and the Conditions Necessary for Its Success [1889] 6 ''The Language of a Nation Is a Monument to Which Every Forcible Individual in the Course of Ages Has Contributed a Stone." [1889] 7 Contentment; Its Good and Bad Points [1889] 8 Destruction Must Precede Construction [1889] PART II. LATER PERSONAL WRITINGS 9 "A Locked Diary" [1890-94] 10 Die Ehe [1893] 11 Self-Appreciation [1897] PART III. APOSTOLIC ESSAYS 12 Can We Be Statesmen? [1893] 13 Lovborg or Hedda [1894] 14 Cleopatra or Maggie Tulliver [1894] 15 Is Ethics a Branch of Empirical Psychology? [I 897] 16 Seems, Madam? Nay, It Is [I897] 17 Was the World Good before the Sixth Day? [I899] PART IV. GRADUATE ESSAYS IN EPISTEMOLOGY AND THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 18 Paper on Epistemology I [I893] 19 Paper on Epistemology II [I893] 20 Paper on Bacon [I893] 21 Paper on History of Philosophy [I 894] 22 Paper on Epistemology III [I894] 23 Paper on Descartes [I894] 24 A Critical Comparison of the Methods of Bacon, Hobbes and DesCartes [I 894] 25 Paper on Bacon [I894] 26 Paper on DesCartes I [I894] 27 Paper on Descartes II [I894] 28 Paper on Hobbes [I894] 29 On the Distinction between the Psychological and Metaphysical Points of View [c. I894] PART V. GRADUATE ESSAYS IN ETHICS 30 On Pleasure [I893] 31 On the Foundations of Ethics [I893] 32 The Relation of What Ought to Be to What Is, Has Been or Will Be [I893] 33 The Relation of Rule and End [I893] 34 On the Definition of Virtue [1893] 35 The Ethical Bearings of Psychogony [I 894]36 Ethical Axioms [1894] 37 The Free-Will Problem from an Idealist Standpoint [1895] 38 Note on Ethical Theory [c. I896] 39 Are All Desires Equally Moral? [c. 1896] PART VI. FELLOWSHIP AND FIRST PROFESSIONAL PAPERS 40 Review of Heymans, Die Gesetze und Elemente des Wissen-schaftlichen Denkens [I895] 41 Observations on Space and Geometry [1895] a Introduction b Alternative or Supplementary Introduction c Note. On the Meaning of Apriority as Applied to Space d Erhardt, Metaphysik, Kap. v, Pp. 226-258 42 The Logic of Geometry [I 896] 43 Review of Lechalas, Etude sur l'espace et le temps [1896] 44 The A Priori in Geometry [1896] PART VII. POLITICAL ECONOMY General Headnote 45 Note on Economic Theory [c. 1895] 46 German Social Democracy, as a Lesson in Political Tactics [1896] 47 The Uses of Luxury [1896] 48 Mechanical Morals and the Moral of Machinery [1896] 49 Review of Schmale, Die Sozialdemokratischen Gewerkschaften in Deutschland seit dem Erlasse des Sozialisten-Gesetzes [I897]