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This book takes the doctrine of analogy and the equally important doctrine of existence as guiding principles for a survey of the foundations of natural theology. Both doctrines are treated in depth here, and readers of the same author's He Who Is: A Study in Traditional Theism - where frequent reference is made to the doctrine of analogy - will find the present work not only a significant elaboration of the outline sketched there, but also an original and suggestive presentation of such a doctrine.
Mascall bases his work on the great conceptions of St. Thomas, including what he calls the "existentialism" of Thomas, and he also makes full use of relevant material in post-Thomist thought. His re-examination of traditional approaches to the existence of God is made with the lucidity and scholarship which have made his work of great value both to the specialist and to the non-specialist interested in problems of philosophy and theology. Now back in print along with a new foreword by Rowan Williams, Existence and Analogy, along with its companion volume He Who Is, remains one of the most outstanding general treatments of traditional Christian metaphysics available in English.
About the author
Eric Lionel Mascall was Professor of Historical Theology at King's College London, and the Church of England's leading Thomist theologian. A member of the Oratory of the Good Shepherd, he also taught at Lincoln Theological College and Oxford, before retiring to the parish of St Mary's, Bourne Street, London.
