Life and Conduct

Lees, J. Cameron (James Cameron), 1834-1913Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.0
Word count
203K words
Chapters
21

Tags

English Originals Ethics Self-CultivationLife PhilosophyInspirationCharacter BuildingSocial ConductSpiritual PracticeSelf ImprovementCode of ConductMoral CultivationYouth Reading

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Life and Conduct by J. Cameron LeesAuthor: Lees, J. Cameron (James Cameron), 1834-1913,Language: English, Class: BJ: Philosophy, Psychology, Religion: Ethics, Social usages, Etiquette, Religion, Release Date: Jul 11, 2007

Editor's review

This book is a collection of ethical essays on life and conduct by the 19th-century Scottish minister J. Cameron Lees, belonging to the popular writing tradition of classical moral philosophy and practical ethics. In a plain, reasoned style, the author discusses daily behavior, responsibility, habit formation, and moral judgment in interpersonal relationships; the language carries the composure and weight of Victorian didactic prose. Its value lies not in system-building but in grounding abstract ethics in concrete situations, making it suitable material for introspective reading. As a public-domain e-book, the text is easy to search and excerpt, and can be read repeatedly alongside notes. When reading, pay attention to the historical context: some examples and assumptions about gender and class bear 19th-century marks, and readers should take what is useful with a discerning eye rather than accepting everything wholesale. It is better suited as a slow-reading bedside book or a shared text for an ethics discussion group than as a knowledge book to race through.

Who it's for

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Reading tips

  1. Read slowly chapter by chapter, and after each section write two or three notes related to your own life.
  2. Start with the table of contents and choose pieces close to your current situation; there is no need to read in order.
  3. When reading with others, pick one behavioral case from each chapter for comparison and discussion in real-life situations.
  4. When you encounter passages with obvious period prejudice, mark them and review them together later to train discerning reading.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a collection of ethical essays? According to the classification given in the material, it belongs to ethics and social customs; it is reasoned writing about life and conduct, not a work of fiction. You can read it essay by essay rather than looking for a plot line.
How difficult is the English original? The text is 19th-century English, with rather long sentences and an obvious didactic tone; the vocabulary is not especially obscure, but the syntax takes some getting used to. It is advisable to read a page or two first to judge the feel, and reading with an electronic dictionary and note-taking tools will be smoother.
Are the views in the book still applicable today? Its discussions of habit, responsibility, and interpersonal integrity still have reference value, but some examples and assumptions about gender and class bear clear marks of their time. The safer approach is to treat it as introspective material, distinguishing what is useful from what is outdated as you read.

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About the author

Lees, J. Cameron (James Cameron), 1834-1913 Author

J. Cameron Lees (James Cameron Lees, 1834–1913) was a writer active in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Public information about his life and nationality is limited, and what can be confirmed about him comes mainly from his surviving works. The library holds one work by him, Life and Conduct, which, judging from its title and its usual classification, is a guide to moral cultivation and conduct addressed to general readers, concerned with character formation, rules of behavior, and the conduct of daily life. Books of this kind were popular in the Victorian era, often discussing duty, temperance, and self-cultivation in a plain, instructive tone, with accessible language and a practical emphasis. Because biographical material is lacking, his education, career, and social activities cannot be described in detail; readers can approach this author mainly through the writing orientation and moral concern shown in Life and Conduct.