This farsighted, humanizing volume celebrates "the supreme art of living" and the creative potential of exuberance and delight to spur developments in every realm, from biology to technology to politics. 
Claiming that "we are given no escape from last questions," the esteemed Spanish thinker and teacher JosŽ Ortega y Gasset identifies two kinds of activity serving human advancement: on the one hand, a vital, creative profligacy that generates multiple possibilities; on the other, a utilitarian mechanization that trims this excess back to everyday use and habit. In this dialectic, Ortega locates the origin of the state as well as of evolution, which he describes as "a consequence of innumerable useless actions which a living being performs out of sheer exuberance." 
Observing that "living means dealing with the world, turning to it, acting in it," Ortega warns against the dangers of intellectual isolation. "Alertness is what we require," he says. "We are not allowed to confine ourselves within our own professions, but must live in full view of the entire scene of life." Writing in the 1940s, he foresees the unification of the states of Europe, noting that "the unity of Europe as society is not an ideal but an ancient daily fact." He also discusses the advantages, the limitations, and the threat of technology, insisting that its illusory security imperils Western civilization. 
Measuring true progress by humankind's capacity to retain its humanity, Toward a Philosophy of History bears the mark of Ortega's fine intelligence and his abiding faith in the redemptive power of engaged living and original thinking.

Toward a Philosophy of History

History

Ortega y. Gasset, Jose

Europe

University of Illinois Press

Social upheaval in early 20th-century Europe is the historical setting for this seminal study by the Spanish philosopher, José Ortega y Gasset. Continuously in print since 1932, Ortega's vision of Western culture as sinking to its lowest common denominator and drifting toward chaos brought its author international fame and has remained one of the influential books of the 20th century.

The Revolt of the Masses

KERRIGAN, Anthony

World

Univ of Notre Dame Pr

Four essays by Jose Ortega y Gasset, the distinguished Spanish philosopher.

History As A System: and Other Essays Toward a Philosophy of History

Praeger

“A worthy companion of the author’s The Revolt of the Masses. Both books are marked by the brilliance, originality, and depth of the author’s interpretation of the crisis of our age and of the basic historical processes.” ―Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science A brilliant examination of the twentieth century predicament in the light of the shift in Rome from paganism to Christianity and the transition from the static world of the Middle Ages to the expanding one of the Renaissance.

Man and Crisis (Norton Library)

W.W.Norton&Company

“Senor Ortega y Gasset has contributed a thoughtful and a careful analysis of our present situation. If he is correct, then nationalism and liberalism as we have known them in the past are doomed. A new and perhaps a better order and conditioning of life are on the way. This book attempts to justify historically the coming of great change―the same great change that was prophesied by William Morris in England, more than half a century ago.” ―The New York Times Four stimulating essays: “The Sportive Origin of the State,” “Unity and Diversity of Europe,” “Man the Technician,” and “History as a System.” The essays by Ortega in this volume were originally published under the title Toward a Philosophy of History.

History as a System and Other Essays Toward a Philosophy of History

Historical Study & Educational Resources

The distinguished philosopher explores the foundations of sociology and makes a fresh examination of the meaning of society. "This last book, from the man whose The Revolt of the Masses is now in a 25th anniversary edition, newly designed and reset, is sure of attention from those who know that he will provide active mental gymnastics in his dissection to the roots of today's social, political and governmental structures in dissertations that, requiring close attention, are rewarding and revealing." -Kirkus Review

Man and People (Norton Library (Paperback))

Politics & Social Sciences

Philosophy

A work powerful and pervading in its implications not only for metaphysics but also for art, political science, and the philosophy of history.

What Is Philosophy?

Ortega deals here with the roots and historical justification of philosophy, and the question of philosophy's essential unity.

The Origin of Philosophy

Some lessons in metaphysics

José Ortega y Gasset was a writer and a thinker in the finest sense of both words. He was also an extraordinary educator who attracted eager students and enthusiasts of all ages. His inexhaustible subject was man and man's problems.
Ortega's entry into the writing world came by way of newspaper essays that are still read by generations seeking revelations and interpretations of the world. He wrote on varied subjects: love, bullfighting, hunting, education, and Don Quixote. His incessant search for knowledge led him into political theory and practice and metaphysics as well.
This present book represents Ortega's incursions into a field of thought along which anyone curious enough to travel will find leads him into a succession of ideas that extend his vision and his understanding of himself. If generations of men have puzzled over man's role in the universe and have tried to put it into words, Ortega's phrase "I am myself and my circumstances" is so simply and appealingly true that it may come as a great surprise to find it hailed as an important philosophic contribution. In this day of alienation, when the young have difficulty finding out who they are, Ortega's venture into metaphysics is a lit lamp in the first chapter, of the student's role will shed light on the reason for present student disorders.

Some Lessons in Metaphysics

Ortega traces the course of Western civilization backward, searching out what makes a civilization rise or fall and offering a way of looking at our own time. Based on a series of lectures on A. J. Toynbee's A Study of History. The prospectus that announced the creation of The Institute of the Humanities promised an inaugural course of twelve lectures, to be given by its founder and entitled, “Concerning a New Interpretation of International History. (Exposition and Examination of A. J. Toynbee’s work, A Study of History.)” But the course as given (in 1948-49) went much farther than that announcement, for the “examination” consisted principally of a critique of Toynbee’s work from the point of view of Ortega’s own doctrines, together with the unfolding of his personal ideas about the science of history and the progress of peoples―in particular the Romans―with frequent side excursions, meant to be systematic, into the crisis of the present time. The central theme of these pages becomes “the analysis of life established in illegitimacy . . . of which the two gigantic examples are the declining days of the Roman Empire and the period in which we ourselves are living.” To the modern crisis, Ortega brings a basic analysis and a program of reform for intelligence by which contemporary life might emerge from the confusion it now suffers.

An Interpretation of Universal History

Americas

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