Stebbing Summary - Preface

Chapter Summary Of The Philosophy Of Freedom
Rita Stebbing

Preface
The philosophy of Freedom may be regarded as a modern temple in which self-knowledge may be found. At the portal to the temple in ancient times the pupil met the challenge : “Man Know Thyself.” The reader meets the same challenge in the preface---the portal---to The Philosophy of Freedom.

The preface opens with two questions: Is it possible to attain a kind of insight into human nature that can support the rest of knowledge and: Is man's will free? It goes on to say that our attitude to the second question will depend upon the answer we give to the first. If we look more closely at these words we recognize the same call to self-knowledge as in the “Man, Know Thyself.” In The Philosophy of Freedom it is expected in a way more suitable to our age, so different from that of the Greek, when as yet man did not feel him self so completely estranged from the world.

Just as the words, “Man, Know Thyself” indicate the solution to the world-riddle, so in the preface we find the answers indicated to the two questions, namely, that on the basis of a knowledge of man which is capable of being the foundation on which can be built all knowledge and all science, it will also be possible to recognize in what sense one can speak of human freedom.

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