Originally published as Course of Popular Lectures, the works collected in this volume display the gift for oratory and range of progressive ideas that made Frances Wright (1795-1852) both a sought-after lecturer and a controversial figure in early nineteenth-century America. Born in Scotland, this pioneering freethinker and abolitionist emigrated to America in her twenties and became friends with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. In 1828, she joined Robert Dale Owen's socialist community at New Harmony, Indiana, and helped him edit his New Harmony Gazette. The next year she and Owen moved to New York City, where they published Free Enquirer, which advocated liberalized divorce laws; birth control; free, state-run, secular education; and organization of the disadvantaged working class. It was at this time that she began delivering the popular lectures here collected. Some persistent themes that run throughout these well-argued pieces are: the importance of free, impartial inquiry conducted in a scientific spirit and not influenced by religious superstition or popular prejudice; the need for better, universal education that trains young minds in scientific inquiry rather than religious dogma; the advantage of focusing on the facts of the here-and-now rather than theological speculations; and the failure of American society to live up to its noble ideals of equality and justice for all. With an insightful introduction by Wright scholar Susan S. Adams (Emeritus Professor of English, Northern Kentucky University), these stimulating lectures by an early feminist and freethinker will be of interest to students and scholars of women's studies, humanism, and freethought.

By Frances Wright - Foreword by Susan S. Adams

Preface, by Susan S. Adams

Introduction

Lecture I: On the Nature of Knowledge

Lecture II: Of Free Inquiry

Lecture III: Of the More Important Divisions and Essential Parts of Knowledge

Lecture IV: Religion

Lecture V: Morals

Lecture VI: Opinions

Lecture VII: On Exisiting Evils and Their Remedy

Address I: Delivered in the New Harmony Hall, on the Fourth July, 1828

Address II: Delivered in the Walnut-Street Theatre, Philadelphia, on the Furth of July, 1829

Address III: Delivered at the Opening of the Hall of Science, New York, Sunday, April 26, 1829

Reply to the Traducers of the French Reformers of the year 1789

Analytical Table of Contents

Address on the State of the Public Mind and the Measures which it calls for

Review of the Times

Address to Young Mechanics

Parting Address