The Muirhead Library of Philosophy was an influential series which published some of the best writings of twentieth century philosophy. The original programme was drawn up by John Muirhead

John Muirhead

John Muirhead was a politician in Manitoba, Canada. He served in the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba from 1922 to 1936.Muirhead was born in Clinton, Ontario, and educated at public schools...

 and published in Erdmann's History of Philosophy in 1890. This statement was published in slightly altered form in subsequent volumes.

"The Muirhead Library of Philosophy was designed as a contribution to the History of Modern Philosophy under the heads: first of Different Schools of Thought — Sensationalist, Realist

Philosophical realism

Contemporary philosophical realism is the belief that our reality, or some aspect of it, is ontologically independent of our conceptual schemes, linguistic practices, beliefs, etc....

, idealist, Intuitivist; secondly of different Subjects — Psychology

Psychology

Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...

, Ethics

Ethics

Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...

, Political Philosophy

Political philosophy

Political philosophy is the study of such topics as liberty, justice, property, rights, law, and the enforcement of a legal code by authority: what they are, why they are needed, what, if anything, makes a government legitimate, what rights and freedoms it should protect and why, what form it...

, Theology

Theology

Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

. While much had been done in England in tracing the course of evolution in nature, history, economics, morals and religion, little had been done in tracing the development of thought on these subjects. Yet 'the evolution of opinion is part of the whole evolution'."

It has since been forgotten with the waning of the influence of some of the published philosophers. Among the authors published are: Bernard Bosanquet

Bernard Bosanquet (philosopher)

Bernard Bosanquet was an English philosopher and political theorist, and an influential figure on matters of political and social policy in late 19th and early 20th century Britain...

, Axel Hägerström

Axel Hägerström

Axel Anders Theodor Hägerström was a Swedish philosopher and jurist.Born in Vireda, Jönköping County Sweden, he was the son of a Church of Sweden pastor. As student at Uppsala University, he gave up theology for a career in philosophy...

, G. W. F. Hegel, Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, OM, FRS was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic. At various points in his life he considered himself a liberal, a socialist, and a pacifist, but he also admitted that he had never been any of these things...

, Nicolai Hartmann

Nicolai Hartmann

-Biography:Hartmann was born of German descent in Riga, which was then the capital of the Russian province of Livonia, and which is now in Latvia. He studied Medicine at the University of Tartu , then Philosophy in St. Petersburg and at the University of Marburg in Germany, where he took his Ph.D....

, J. N. Findlay, Brand Blanshard

Brand Blanshard

Percy Brand Blanshard was an American philosopher known primarily for his defense of reason. A powerful polemicist, by all accounts he comported himself with courtesy and grace in philosophical controversies and exemplified the "rational temper" he advocated.-Life:Brand Blanshard was born August...

, Henri Bergson

Henri Bergson

Henri-Louis Bergson was a major French philosopher, influential especially in the first half of the 20th century. Bergson convinced many thinkers that immediate experience and intuition are more significant than rationalism and science for understanding reality.He was awarded the 1927 Nobel Prize...

, Herbert Haberley Price, Francis Bradley

Francis Bradley

Francis Bradley is the name of:* Francis Herbert Bradley, philosopher* Francis Wright Bradley, educator, academic...

, G. S. Brett, A. H. Johnson, Roderick Chisholm

Roderick Chisholm

Roderick M. Chisholm was an American philosopher known for his work on epistemology, metaphysics, free will, and the philosophy of perception. He received his Ph.D. at Harvard University under Clarence Irving Lewis and Donald C. Williams, and taught at Brown University...

, Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan

Sir Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan , OM, FBA was an Indian philosopher and statesman. He was the first Vice President of India and subsequently the second President of India ....

, John Henry Muirhead

John Henry Muirhead

John Henry Muirhead was a British philosopher best known for having initiated the Muirhead Library of Philosophy in 1890...

, Joel Kupperman, G. F. Stout, George Edward Moore

George Edward Moore

George Edward Moore OM, was an English philosopher. He was, with Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Gottlob Frege, one of the founders of the analytic tradition in philosophy...

, Edmund Husserl

Edmund Husserl

Edmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl was a philosopher and mathematician and the founder of the 20th century philosophical school of phenomenology. He broke with the positivist orientation of the science and philosophy of his day, yet he elaborated critiques of historicism and of psychologism in logic...

, R. J. Hirst, H. J. Paton, William Marshall Urban, Max Black

Max Black

Max Black was a British-American philosopher, who was a leading influential figure in analytic philosophy in the first half of the twentieth century. He made contributions to the philosophy of language, the philosophy of mathematics and science, and the philosophy of art, also publishing studies...

, Morris Lazerowitz and others. Some of the books in the series are:

• Nicholas Malebranche, Dialogues on Metaphysics
• A. H. Johnson, Experiential Realism
• Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, The Principal Upanisads
• Roderick Chisholm, Person and Object
• Bertrand Russell, Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy
• Joel Kupperman, Ethical Knowledge
• G. W. F. Hegel, The Phenomenology of The Mind
• G. W. F. Hegel, The Science of Logic
• G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of Nature
• G. S. Brett, A History of Psychology 3 vols.
• Henri Bergson, Time and Free Will
• G. F. Stout, Analytic Psychology
• G. E. Moore, Some Main Problems in Philosophy
• G. E. Moore, Philosophical Papers
• Edmund Husserl, Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology
• Brand Blanshard, The Nature of Thought
• Brand Blanshard, Reason and Analysis
• R. J. Hirst, Problems of Perception
• Axel Hagerstrom, Philosophy and Religion, (1964, translated by Robert T. Sandin)
• H. J. Paton, The Good Will
• H. J. Paton, Kant's Metaphysic of Experience
• Bernard Bosanquet, History of Aesthetic
• William Marshall Urban, Language and Reality
• William Marshall Urban, Valuation
• Nicolai Hartmann, Ethics

The importance of this series can be judged by the list of masterpieces in Frank Magill's World Masterpieces of Philosophy in Digest Form, which includes many of the works from this series in its overview of twentieth century philosophy.