Early Entries Research Articles

John Muir, A Reading Bibliography by William F. Kimes and Maymie B. Kimes

236 Western American Literature John Muir, A Reading Bibliography. By William F. Kimes and Maymie B. Kimes. (Fresno: Panorama West Books, 1986. 179 pages, $40.00.) Duty, not pleasure, sends me to a bibliography. Most such scholarly tomes simply aren’t very interesting to read line by line. Only a few, like John Muir, A Reading Bibliography, invite close attention to every detail. The authors list Muir’s work chronologically, beginning with a letter in the December, 1866, Boston Recorder and concluding with recent paperback reprints, some newly-discovered unpublished materials, and the 1986 micro­ film edition of the Muir papers. Each entry contains not only publication data and physical description—“Green cloth with black lettering. Illus.: front. Price, 44$,” for example—but includes thorough annotation as well. The descriptive annotations are important because Muir reworked so much of his prose. Articles and book chapters retell adventures and repeat thematic variations so frequently—the hazardous climb of Mt. Ritter re­ appears fifteen different times; Stickeen, seventeen—that it is difficult for an ordinary reader to follow a publication’shistory. The Kimeses have done it for every entry. The annotations are equally important because they cogently trace Muir’s intellectual evolution. The exuberant youth grows to a zestful maturity; the loner becomes a leader; the passionate hiker develops into a political activist. Liberally quoting Muir, the authors reveal several meaningful patterns. Equally revealing are their own comments about his writing. They point to the significance of the early entries, they tell anecdotes, they note discrep­ ancies, they detail publication trivia. Some purists may complain that the entries are too conversational, but I quite like the fact that real people, not a computer, compiled the book. John Muir, A Reading Bibliography was first published in a 1975 limited edition. This “Revised and Enlarged Second Edition” adds 192 further entries, chronologically integrated with the original text. Updated, too, is a very com­ plete and useful index. Several years ago I meant to check a single item in that first edition and found myself spending an entire afternoon with the book. A thorough reading of the second edition is no less compelling. ANN RONALD University of Nevada, Reno Utah Canyon Country. By F. A. Barnes. (Billings: Falcon Press, 1986. 117 pages, $14.95.) This first book in the Utah Geographic Series celebrates the color, diver­ sity and sheer magnificance of Utah’s canyon country. Moab writer Fran Barnes takes a broad view of this convoluted land, lying between the Rocky ...

The Implication of Berkeley's Earliest Philosophy Concerning Things

The Implication of Berkeley'sEarliest Philosophy ConcerningThings* GEORGE H. THOMAS PROBABLY THE MOST CONTROVERSIAL ISSUE in Berkeley's philosophy is his view of things (physical objects). 1 In this study we shall investigate the very first stage of his thought in this area. 2 It is possible to discover Berkeley's earliest thought through a careful examination of his Philosophical Commentaries. 3 By deliberately excluding his later correc- * This paper was first presented to a staff seminar in the department of philosophy at Trinity College, Dublin. Consequently I wish to thank Prof. E. J. Furlong and Mr. David Berman, both of Trinity College, and Mr. Bertil Belfrage, of the University of Lund (Sweden) but a frequent visitor to Trinity College, for their expert and very helpful comments on the paper. Also I must express my gratitude to Prof. A. A. Luce who, although he did not advise me on this paper, has taught me much about the Philosophical Commentaries through his assistance on a new edition of them that I have prepared (to which he has consented to append the encyclopedic notes from his own diplomatic edition). 1 There is an ambiguity in Berkeley's use of "thing." When he is referring to objects or bodies he uses "thing" and "idea" synonymously. But he sometimes uses the term in a much broader sense that includes both ideas (things in the narrow sense) and minds or spirits (which he differentiates from ideas [369, 644, 872--the reference numbers are those assigned by Prof. A. A. Luce to each of the entries in the Philosophical Commentaries]). It is the narrow sense of "thing" (object or bodies) that 1 am discussing. 2 "First stage" is deliberately used rather than "the beginning" of Berkeley's thought. This is because his serious thought on the nature and existence of things began prior to the Philosophical Commentaries, as is reflected in the early entries. However, since we have no extant writings on this topic predating the Philosophical Commentaries, we may view this document as representing the first stage of Berkeley's thought. As for those who insist that there were earlier writings, the contents of which can be deduced from the Philosophical Commentaries, I offer the following dilemma: If Berkeley's earlier writings differ from the Philosophical Commentaries, we can never know them since they are not extant and cannot be inferred from the Philosophical Commentaries; and, if they are like the Philosophical Commentaries (inferred from that work) then they are a needless and redundant supposition, and we can use the Philosophical Commentaries as Berkeley's earliest thought. In either case we are justified in saying that the Philosophical Commentaries represent Berkeley's earliest thought concerning the nature and existence of things. a The edition of the Philosophical Commentaries used in this paper is: A. A. Luce (ed.), The Works of George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons Limited, 1967), Vol. I. This source will be referred to hereafter as Commentaries. This edition has been carefully checked with the diplomatic edition: A. A. Luce (ed.), Philo- [425] 426 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY tions we can reduce the Commentaries to their original form. 4 We then have a version of them just as Berkeley left them prior to reworking them. With this source we can begin our scrutiny where he began his. sophical Commentaries, generally called the Commonplace Book: George Berkeley, Bishop o/ Cloyne (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons Limited, 1944). This latter source will be referred to hereafter as Dipl. Ed. Also a photographed copy of Berkeley's manuscript of the Philosophical Commentaries (photographed from Add. MS. 39305 in the British Museum) has been consulted in all cases. 4 The methodological discussion in this footnote is as important to the study of Berkeley's writings as is the entire body of the paper, and should be given comparable attention. The following analysis (which can be followed only with the Dipl. Ed.) is intended as a justification of the claim that the entries used in this paper represent the original, unrevised edition of the Commentaries, and as an example of the kind of stratification of the Commentaries that needs to be performed on a far...

A Bibliography of the Membership Lists of the Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft

A Bibliography of the Membership Lists of the Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft

Early entries in the Edinburgh register of testaments

Journal Article Early entries in the Edinburgh register of testaments Get access Notes and Queries, Volume s3-VIII, Issue 199, 21 October 1865, Page 329, https://doi.org/10.1093/nq/s3-VIII.199.329a Published: 21 October 1865