Document Type

Book Chapter

Publication Date

1958

Abstract

The work of the classical economists was primarily one of deduction. In a sense it is a tribute to their capacity to draw corollaries and conclusions from basic principles accepted as established truths. The finely spun theoretical model which they constructed was not long immune from attack by several quarters. As we shall see in Chapter XVI, the Marxian Socialists took the labor theory of value and used it to advocate the overthrow of capitalistic society. [excerpt]

Comments

This is a part of Section XIV: The Industrial Revolution, Classical Economics, and Economic Liberalism. The Contemporary Civilization page lists all additional sections of Ideas and Institutions of Western Man, as well as the Table of Contents for both volumes.

More About Contemporary Civilization:

From 1947 through 1969, all first-year Gettysburg College students took a two-semester course called Contemporary Civilization. The course was developed at President Henry W.A. Hanson’s request with the goal of “introducing the student to the backgrounds of contemporary social problems through the major concepts, ideals, hopes and motivations of western culture since the Middle Ages.”

Gettysburg College professors from the history, philosophy, and religion departments developed a textbook for the course. The first edition, published in 1955, was called An Introduction to Contemporary Civilization and Its Problems. A second edition, retitled Ideas and Institutions of Western Man, was published in 1958 and 1960. It is this second edition that we include here. The copy we digitized is from the Gary T. Hawbaker ’66 Collection and the marginalia are his.

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