Read the 100 most influential books ever written on Seymour-Smith’s compendium

COMMON SENSE

Thomas Paine

“These are the times that try men’s souls,” begins Thomas Paine’s first Crisis paper, the impassioned pamphlet that helped ignite the American Revolution. Published in Philadelphia in January of 1776, Common Sense sold 150,000 copies almost immediately. A powerful piece of propaganda, it attacked the idea of a hereditary monarchy, dismissed the chance for reconciliation with England, and outlined the economic benefits of independence while espousing equality of rights among citizens. Paine fanned a flame that was already burning, but many historians argue that his work unified dissenting voices and persuaded patriots that the American Revolution was not only necessary, but an epochal step in world history.

Thomas Paine alienated his British countrymen by championing the American and French Revolutions. In fact, he ended up alienating the Americans and French, too – but not before publishing passionate and influential writings that still stir hearts and minds. His pamphlet COMMON SENSE (1776) provided a concise, plain-language rationale for America’s break with the mother country.

Paine favours a representative democracy wherein there is frequent turn-over, and where the common interests of the people are consulted and catered to. Finally, he argues for the rule and sovereignty of law against the arbitrary and absurd rule of kings and men. He contrasts this with the British model, in which government seems only to serve the interests of the King and the aristocracy. Taxation, as a primary example, allows hereditary rulers, who are inherently removed from the interests of the industrious people they govern, to live off their subjects without contributing anything of substance to the society or the polis. Paine insists that the province of government is not to regulate the lives of the citizens; instead, it must create and protect an arena where free competition in the marketplace will allow people to pursue their own best interests. With a minimum of government, civil society, Paine believes, can administer itself. In one of his most clever lines, Paine says that if an American government can only see to the protection of its own economy and exports, it will flourish “and will always have a market while eating is the custom of Europe”.

The impetus for “Common Sense” is the current of thought that suggested reconciliation with Britain is preferable to independence. In an American public sphere anxious about its relationship to Britain, Paine provides encouragement to debate and discussion with all the subtlety of a street-corner millenarian. Citing the inevitability of a split between the colonies and Britain, and emphasizing that the legacy of America is at stake in the choices of the present moment, Paine calls the drive to independence “the cause of all mankind”. In persuasive and urgent, nearly prophetic language, Paine makes a case for the political, economic, and historical implications of American independence.

THE UPANISHADS

Authors Unknown

The poetic backbone of Hinduism, the millennia-old Upanishads are some of the oldest religious documents ever written. The selections offered in ‘The Upanishads’ illuminate a path that is as “narrow as the edge of a razor” but pregnant with freedom and bliss. Through vivid metaphors and timeless prose, the book exemplifies how the path of yoga leads beyond the treacherous web of karma to the final, blissful union of the personal soul, atman, with the universal soul, Brahman.

As written in one of the reviews, ‘An “Upanishad” is a teaching session with a guru, and the thirteen texts of the “Principal Upanishads”—which comprise this volume—form a series of philosophical discourses between teacher and student that question the inner meaning of the world. Composed beginning around the eighth century BC, the Upanishads have been central to the development of Hinduism, exploring its central doctrines: rebirth, karma, overcoming death, and achieving detachment, equilibrium, and spiritual bliss. Speaking to the reader in direct, unadorned prose or lucid verse, the Upanishads collected here embody humanity’s perennial search for truth and knowledge.’

The interblend of philosophical and spiritualistic teachings are infused with both age-old wisdom and idealistic selfishness of thought and living – the balance could only be drawn somewhere between these two paradigms. Much of the text draws distinct parallels between biblical teachings and Hindu/Buddhist mythology; however it varies in the essence that its discourse is one of pursuing self-centered security and well-being as opposed to the biblical aspirations of servanthood and generosity of heart.

DON QUIXOTE

Miguel de Cervantes

The extraordinary tale of Don Quixote is no less humorous than it is delicately inspiring to any avid reader who seeks to indulge in the fantasy world of their noble imaginations. The misguided adventures of this chivalric knight present a very nuanced look at identity and escapism. The titular hero, a man who reads one too many books about chivalry and knighthood, becomes so engrossed in the tantalizing tales of heroic knights that he seeks to persuade all that he himself is a knight-errant under the guise of some enchanted and deceiving commonality.

After recruiting a noble and worthy squire Sancho Panza, and choosing a lady to woo per narrative convention, he sets out to conquer the forces of evil, which include, among other things, giant windmills and rogue “knights”. Cervantes’ insight and ability to parody were both ahead of his time, and in a time where escapism and voyeurism are well and thriving, it is not difficult to imagine someone watching too many TV shows and believing they’re a wild west outlaw or what-have-you.

The tale of this formidable Knight Errant and his noble squire is one that transcends all culture, generations, and society. It is timeless and tells the story of the human condition and one’s desire to succeed and be recognised as famous or at the very least appreciated. Cervantes’ book is now considered one of the greatest pieces of classic literature ever written and I myself found it well deserving of such high recommendations.

PILGRIM’S PROGRESS

John Bunyan

John Bunyan’s immortal classic Pilgrim’s Progress is one of the best-selling books of all time and holds a unique place in the history of English literature. An allegory of the man named Christian, the book depicts the life of a born-again believer and his struggles and victories through his pilgrimage to heaven. It follows the journey of Christian from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, a story that has brought comfort and inspiration to millions of believers.

C.S Lewis once wrote that it is only in fiction that truth is shown in its most authentic light. Masked behind the journey of Bunyan’s fictional characters is revelation of the journey we all face in life. For some this is a journey of discovery, for others enlightenment and others still for healing and renewal. Yet reinforced through Bunyan’s book is the simple revelation that truth is not found in the journey but rather in its end.

Martin Seymour-Smith has collected what he considers the most profoundly influential books of the centuries. A chronological history of thought, from ancient China to twentieth century United States. This compendium bears common threads of science treatises; political works, religious theorems and debates, reason and knowledge.

We live in a society where literature and diversities of opinion are more readily available today than they have ever been before. Some of these texts were regarded in their time as blasphemous, hypocritical and born of some wickedness that was intolerable to the enlightened population. Many of these authors defied convention and walked paths of lonely isolation in their quest for knowledge and understanding. In this collection of books we are confronted with interpretations of life that are still debated, theorems of science that have long been proven in the advancements of the modern age and stakes of religious acclaim that still give cause to war and disparity between nations.

If I am to uphold any views, I would wish them to be founded on something other than mere thought or revelation. It is all well to adopt the views of our forefathers, to carry on the flame of knowledge and understanding from generations past, but what significance do these views uphold if we do not have our own personal revelation of them? A view is only honourable if it is founded on something more than just personal preference? and the only way to form a well founded view is through the wisdom, experiences and knowledge of the ages.

Glossary:

Books Read – Bold
Books Owned – Red

1. The I Ching
2. The Old Testament
3. The Iliad and The Odyssey, Homer
4. The Upanishads
5. The Way and Its Power, Lao-tzu
6. The Avesta
7. Analects, Confucius
8. History of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides
9. Works, Hippocrates
10. Works, Aristotle
11. History, Herodotus
12. The Republic, Plato
13. Elements, Euclid
14. The Dhammapada
15. Aeneid, Virgil
16. On the Nature of Reality, Lucretius
17. Allegorical Expositions of the Holy Laws, Philo of Alexandria
18. The New Testament
19. Lives, Plutarch
20. Annals, from the Death of the Divine Augustus, Cornelius Tacitus
21. The Gospel of Truth
22. Meditations, Marcus Aurelius
23. Outlines of Pyrrhonism, Sextus Empiricus
24. Enneads, Plotinus
25. Confessions, Augustine of Hippo
26. The Koran
27. Guide for the Perplexed, Moses Maimonides
28. The Kabbalah
29. Summa Theologicae, Thomas Aquinas
30. The Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri
31. In Praise of Folly, Desiderius Erasmus
32. The Prince, Niccol򠍡chiavelli
33. On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church, Martin Luther
34. Gargantua and Pantagruel, Fran篩s Rabelais
35. Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin
36. On the Revolution of the Celestial Orbs, Nicolaus Copernicus
37. Essays, Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
38. Don Quixote, Parts I and II, Miguel de Cervantes
39. The Harmony of the World, Johannes Kepler
40. Novum Organum, Francis Bacon
41. The First Folio [Works], William Shakespeare
42. Dialogue Concerning Two New Chief World Systems, Galileo Galilei
43. Discourse on Method, René „escartes
44. Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes
45. Works, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
46. Pens饳, Blaise Pascal
47. Ethics, Baruch de Spinoza
48. Pilgrim?s Progress, John Bunyan
49. Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, Isaac Newton
50. Essay Concerning Human Understanding, John Locke
51. The Principles of Human Knowledge, George Berkeley
52. The New Science, Giambattista Vico
53. A Treatise of Human Nature, David Hume
54. The Encyclopedia, Denis Diderot, ed.
55. A Dictionary of the English Language, Samuel Johnson
56. Candide, Fran篩s-Marie de Voltaire
57. Common Sense, Thomas Paine
58. An Enquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith
59. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon
60. Critique of Pure Reason, Immanuel Kant
61. Confessions, Jean-Jacques Rousseau
62. Reflections on the Revolution in France, Edmund Burke
63. Vindication of the Rights of Women, Mary Wollstonecraft
64. An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, William Godwin
65. An Essay on the Principle of Population, Thomas Robert Malthus
66. Phenomenology of Spirit, George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
67. The World as Will and Idea, Arthur Schopenhauer
68. Course in the Positivist Philosophy, Auguste Comte
69. On War, Carl Marie von Clausewitz
70. Either/Or, S?Kierkegaard
71. The Manifesto of the Communist Party, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
72. {color:red} ?Civil Disobedience,? Henry David Thoreau
73. The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Charles Darwin
74. On Liberty, John Stuart Mill
75. First Principles, Herbert Spencer
76. ?Experiments with Plant Hybrids,? Gregor Mendel
77. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
78. Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism, James Clerk Maxwell
79. Thus Spake Zarathustra, Friedrich Nietzsche
80. The Interpretation of Dreams, Sigmund Freud
81. Pragmatism, William James
82. Relativity, Albert Einstein
83. The Mind and Society, Vilfredo Pareto
84. Psychological Types, Carl Gustav Jung
85. I and Thou, Martin Buber
86. The Trial, Franz Kafka
87. The Logic of Scientific Discovery, Karl Popper
88. The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money, John Maynard Keynes
89. Being and Nothingness, Jean-Paul Sartre
90. The Road to Serfdom, Friedrich von Hayek
91. The Second Sex, Simone de Beauvoir
92. Cybernetics, Norbert Wiener
93. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
94. Beelzebub?s Tales to His Grandson, George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff
95. Philosophical Investigations, Ludwig Wittgenstein
96. Syntactic Structures, Noam Chomsky
97. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, T. S. Kuhn
98. The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan
99. Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung [The Little Red Book], Mao Zedong
100. Beyond Freedom and Dignity, B. F. Skinner