131 audiobooks, 1,134 hours of narration. Give $50 and every one is yours.

Collection · 18 books · 399 BC to 1910 AD

Philosophy

Classic philosophical texts that have shaped Western thought.

400s BC

Apology

Plato · 399 BC — Socrates' defense before an Athenian jury against charges of impiety and corrupting the young.

Gorgias

Plato · 380 BC — Socrates asks what rhetoric is and argues that doing injustice is worse than suffering it.

Meno

Plato · 380 BC — Socrates and Meno debate whether virtue can be taught.

Categories

Aristotle · 350 BC — the opening treatise of the Organon, sorting every expression into ten basic kinds.

Nicomachean Ethics

Aristotle · 350 BC — what happiness, virtue, and friendship require of a well-lived life.

Rhetoric

Aristotle · 350 BC — three books on persuasion, analyzing proof, emotion, character, style, and arrangement.

On the Soul

Aristotle · 335 BC — the soul as the principle of life, tracing nutrition, sense, imagination, and intellect.

Poetics

Aristotle · 335 BC — how plot, character, reversal, and recognition make tragedy work.

100s BC

On Duties

Cicero · 44 BC — a father's letter to his son on justice, generosity, and why nothing wrong can ever truly be advantageous.

First century

B

On Benefits

Seneca · 62 AD — the ethics of giving and receiving favors, and how gratitude binds society together.

100s

The Enchiridion

Epictetus · 125 AD — maxims for inner freedom by focusing only on what lies within your control.

Meditations

Marcus Aurelius · 175 AD — the private journal of a Roman emperor on duty, mortality, and virtue.

500s

The Consolation of Philosophy

Boethius · 524 AD — a condemned Roman statesman's prison dialogue with Philosophy on fortune, happiness, evil, and God's foreknowledge.

1600s

Essays

Francis Bacon · 1625 AD — fifty-eight meditations on truth, death, ambition, friendship, and the art of living.

Some Thoughts Concerning Education

John Locke · 1693 AD — letters on raising a child, arguing character forms in the earliest years.

1800s

Signs of the Times

Thomas Carlyle · 1829 AD — an essay naming the era the Mechanical Age, run by machinery instead of conviction.

Household Education

Harriet Martineau · 1849 AD — Martineau's guide to educating children through reason and moral training.

1900s

W

What's Wrong with the World

G.K. Chesterton · 1910 AD — Chesterton's diagnosis of modern reformers who have lost sight of human purpose.

Every book in this collection is free to read online

All 18 books, full text, with a free account that saves your place on every device. The PDF and EPUB come with each book, and paperbacks are printed to order.

Start reading free