Reviews for An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent

The average rating for An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2013-10-20 00:00:00 Keith Knowles If there was any one person I could point to as the biggest influence on my decision to become Catholic, that person would probably be John Henry Newman...which wouldn't be terribly unusual--lots of other people point to him. ;P But everything he writes is spiritually and intellectually vigorous, historically grounded, and just downright profound. This book was no exception. A Grammar of Assent is an extended epistemological analysis of what it means to give assent to a proposition, especially religious assent in the life of a Christian, and deals with issues of certitude and infallibility. Interestingly, Newman does not seem to draw much on the Scholastics, and some of his ideas of epistemology and his critique of causation are more reminiscent of Locke and Hume (though he also disagrees with both of those in the course of the book). Though it is heavier reading than Apologia Pro Vita Sua, Newman's more personal biography, this book is not really complicated to read. It does require careful attention to the course of a prolonged argument, with many long discussions of the terms Newman employs, but it is definitely worth it.

Review # 2 was written on 2013-05-29 00:00:00 Peter Klapka I won't deny that Newman's writing, though ever clear, is anything other than slow-going, packed as it is with serious, thoroughly-covered thought. Even as a philosopher, it is true, at times he simply blocks off avenues of investigation as being assumed for the sake of his argument and the philospher-reader simply has to take his word for it in continuing on to the points Newman wishes to make. But the points he makes are worth it; or I at least found them so. It was the first, cover-to-cover philosophical read I managed since finishing my B.A. and it kept me to the course eagerly.