These three volumes make available rare primary source material that should greatly facilitate research on the St Louis Hegelians. The thought and activities of this loosely organized group of philosophers was instrumental in the crucial shift from 19th-century laissez-faire individualism to the institutional liberalism of the Progressive Era, and they influenced intellectuals as diverse as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Bronson Alcott, John Dewey, and Jane Addams. The first volume of this collection focuses on the origins of the movement, the St Louis Hegelian's critique of "brittle individualism", and the "agnostic materialism" of Herbert Spencer. The volume features articles by principal St Louis Hegelians - W.T. Harris and Denton Snider - and includes debates with American and European intellectuals - G.S. Morris, Augusto Vera, Karl Rosenkranz and Franz Hoffman - about the ability of Hegel's dialectic to account adequately for the reality of the individual within the greater whole.
The second volume includes essays by Snider, Harris, Rosenkranz, Thomas Davidson and Adolph Kroeger, and focuses on the St Louis Hegelians' philosophical interpretation of American history, especially the Civil unification. Volume three is a collection of the St Louis Hegelians' writings on aesthetics and art history, a crucial element of their philosophy of cultural unification, and includes articles by Henry Conrad Brokmeyer, Morris, Snider, Davidson and William Bryant. As a whole, these volumes demonstrate the St Louis Hegelians' engagement with a wide variety of intellectuals and philosophical issues, and reveal their centrist social and political philosophy. Making an extensive selection of scarce and out of print materials available, this set allows a full assessment of the movement.

Introduction by: Michael DeArmey, James A. Good