If you had said to Shaftesbury that you could read only one of his books, The Moralists is what he would have given you. He thought of it as his magnum opus, the work that best captured both the essence and scope of his thought. So we can fully understand Shaftesbury only by exploring The Moralists, even if that work has had considerably less influence on contemporary philosophy than the Inquiry.

Form and Purpose in The Moralists

One of the most obvious reasons The Moralists has fared less well with contemporary philosophers than the Inquiry is the difference between the forms of the two works. The Inquiry has the form of a typical philosophical treatise. Systematic and discursive, it states its theses at the start and then presents arguments to establish their truth. Distinctions are drawn, objections are answered. The connection between each idea and the next is explicitly articulated.

To read The Moralists, in contrast, is to enter a narrative world. It is a story told in the first person by Philocles to his friend Palemon. The story is of Philocles' two-day visit to the country estate of a man named Theocles, a visit that converted Philocles from skepticism to a rare type of reasonable enthusiasm. In telling his story, Philocles recounts several long conversations he had with Theocles and other men visiting the estate.