William Ellis

Ideal for peer-learning environments, the Student Activity Workbook offers group workshop activities for all the core concepts in the text, with an emphasis on developing problem-solving skills.

Ideal for peer-learning environments, the Student Activity Workbook offers group workshop activities for all the core concepts in the text, with an emphasis on developing problem-solving skills.

It is with real pleasure Prospect Books announce the publication of a facsimile (enlarged by 15% to promote legibility) of this wonderful book. William Ellis lived and farmed at Little Gaddesden in Hertfordshire, although he was originally a London brewer. (His only other book on domestic economy was indeed about brewing.) He wrote several books of husbandry - and was famous enough to be visited by the Swedish traveller Per Kalm, who was shocked to find that Hertfordshire menfolk looked after the cattle and the women did very little indeed except prepare food, 'which they commonly do very well, though roast beef and puddings form nearly all an Englishman's eatables'. Ellis wrote about the farm and how to make money from its produce or how to cook it. There is much about farming itself and plenty of medicine; there are long sections on brewing and distilling; there is more about bread and grain cookery than in any other English book of the period I know; there is an almost complete disregard of fancy cookery of French kickshaws to impress the neighbours. This book tells more of the actual product of English country kitchen, and more about regionality and local custom, than its contemporaries. He 'invariably knew what he was talking about' (Maclean).

Building upon the foundations of his seminal discussion of the good life, virtue, happiness, and the golden mean in the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle now turns his attention to man as a political being and to the nature of the state. How do human relationships mirror specific political associations? What is the nature of political man? What is the proper purpose of the state with respect to those it governs? Who should rule, and what are the characteristics of those who govern well? Can anyone make the laws for the society, or is this function best suited to certain members of the community? How should a regime rule in order to achieve the purpose of government? These questions are addressed by Aristotle within the context of his description and analysis of the political societies of his time. The result is a penetrating discussion of rational ideals combined with practical political reality.