Introduction: The Metaphysical Society in Context

The introduction covers a history of the Metaphysical Society, including its aims and membership, role and legacy. After reviewing the previous scholarship on the Society, it lays out the structure of the volume, and introduces some of the figures who formed the membership of the Society, and their widely divergent views on such matters as, miracles, determinism, evolutionary ethics, liberalism. empiricism, intuitionism, and even metaphysics itself. It also discusses how the collection moves beyond past scholarship and draws directly on the papers presented at the Society, detailing the major concepts examined by the contributors, and offering a more detailed analysis of the Society’s inner dynamics and its wider impact on British society and culture. The contributors to this collection include scholars from different fields and different countries.