[AUTHOR'S PREFACE]
[I]
THE MAN OF FLESH AND BONE
Philosophy and the concrete man—The man Kant, the man Butler, and the man Spinoza—Unity and continuity of the person—Man an end not a means—Intellectual necessities and necessities of the heart and the will—Tragic sense of life in men and in peoples
[II]
THE STARTING-POINT
Tragedy of Paradise—Disease an element of progress—Necessity of knowing in order to live—Instinct of preservation and instinct of perpetuation—The sensible world and the ideal world—Practical starting-point of all philosophy—Knowledge an end in itself?—The man Descartes—The longing not to die
[III]
THE HUNGER OF IMMORTALITY
Thirst of being—Cult of immortality—Plato's "glorious risk"— Materialism—Paul's discourse to the Athenians—Intolerance of the intellectuals—Craving for fame—Struggle for survival