Dynamics of World History
Christopher Dawson, John J. (Ed.) Mulloy, John J. Mulloy (Editor), Dermot QuinnBooks.org participates in affiliate programs including Bookshop.org and the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made through links on this page, at no additional cost to you.
Overview
In scope and in vision Christopher Dawson's historiography ranks with the work of men like Spengler, Northrop, and Toynbee. Immensely learned and erudite, the scholarship of the British Catholic Dawson eventually earned him a professorship at Harvard University and widespread acknowledgment as one of the world's great historians. This book, assembled by John Mulloy with Dawson's cooperation, comprises Dawson's essential essays, providing the reader with an illuminating introduction to the sweep of his thought.Several major themes run through Dawson's work, including the interdependence of history and sociology; the need to go beyond nationalist history toward a history of the entire process of cultural development; the need to study not abstract Man but particular men in their local relations, including their relations with the land; a trenchant critique of urban industrialism, rootless cosmopolitanism, and bourgeois culture; and a firm conviction of the radically destructive character of cultural imperialism. But perhaps the most unique aspect of Dawson's historiography was its unequivocal insistence on the determinative importance of religion in shaping and sustaining civilizations. Religion, Dawson firmly believed, is the great creative force in any culture, and the loss of a society's historic religion therefore portends a process of social dissolution. For this reason Dawson concluded that Western society must find a way to revitalize its spiritual life if it is to avoid irreversible decay. Progress, the real religion of modernity, is insufficient to sustain cultural health. And an ahistorical, secularized Christianity is an oxymoron, a pseudo-religion only nominally related to the historical religion of the West. Dawson held that the hope of the present age lay in the reconciliation of the religious tradition of Christianity with the intellectual tradition of humanism and the new knowledge about man and nature provided by modern science. Dynamics of World History shows that though such a task may be difficult, it is not impossible.About the Author
Christopher Dawson (1889-1970) is widely regarded as one of the most important historians of the twentieth century. Dermot Quinn is Associate Professor of History at Seton Hall University.
Synopsis
In scope and in vision Dawson's conception of history ranks with the work of men like Spengler, Northrop, and Toynbee. The New York Times said that "for breadth of knowledge and lucidity of style [Dawson] had few rivals." This classic Dawson work is a conspectus of his thought on universal history in all its depth and range. Containing thirty-one essays selected from his writings it gives a clear and fascinating picture of his achievement in helping to widen our perspective of world history and in identifying the central determinative importance of religion for the formation of culture.
Touchstone
[T]his book, arguably the finest and most definitive summary of his thought, is recommended without the slightest reservation to historians, philosophers, artists, theologians, and lovers of letters.