Heritage Classics: A Collection of Essential Wisdom

Heritage Classics was designed to make history interesting and relevant to readers both young and old. It is a one-stop resource for learning, or relearning, 3500 years of Western history. Originally titled, “Things Every Smart Person Should Know,” Heritage Classics contains a collection of 134 primary sources on government, literature and philosophy that are the cornerstone of the Western intellectual tradition. But unlike other anthologies, Heritage Classics also includes thorough but easily understood introductions to sixteen eras in history, from ancient Greece through World War II. The documents are separated by historical period and each source is accompanied by reading questions and a short introduction to help make the content meaningful. Heritage Classics includes excerpts from literary classics from antiquity to the modern era such as: The Iliad, The Aeneid, Beowulf, The Divine Comedy, Utopia, Heart of Darkness and All Quiet on the Western Front. The book includes historical legal documents that have become the foundation of today’s representative forms of government including the Roman Constitution, the Magna Carta, the English Bill of Rights, the U.S. Constitution and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man. Heritage Classics also provides a great introduction to the philosophical ideas of men like Socrates, Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Thomas Aquinas, John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Karl Marx and many more.