The Oracle of the Past, the Present and the Future

Bento SerranoProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.4

Word count: 67K words
Chapters: 7

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.O Oraculo do Passado, do presente e do Futuro (1/7) by Bento SerranoAuthor: Serrano, Bento,Language: Portuguese, Class: BF: Philosophy, Psychology, Religion: Psychology, Philosophy, Psychoanalysis, Release Date: Nov 12, 2008

Editor's review

O Oraculo do Passado, do presente e do Futuro is a Portuguese-language work by Bento Serrano. Judging by its classification, it belongs to the field of philosophy, psychology, and religion, and its title points to an inquiry into the past, the present, and the future. As a free Project Gutenberg ebook, its value lies more in accessibility: readers can encounter a Portuguese-language text that has rarely entered the public eye at little cost, and observe how the Portuguese-speaking world around the nineteenth century articulated fortune-telling, fate, and questions of life. It is best read as historical and cultural material rather than an operational guide, with attention to its questions, argumentative style, and historical context, rather than to verifying whether its predictions hold up one by one. For readers studying popular philosophy, folk belief, or Portuguese-language sources, this is a primary document worth consulting; general readers should approach it with a critical eye and avoid taking its judgments as practical advice.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Scholars studying Portuguese popular philosophy and folk belief
Readers interested in Portuguese-language culture around the nineteenth century
Advanced learners who need free Portuguese-language texts for textual analysis
Readers who enjoy intellectual-history material and can read with a critical eye

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking practical fortune-telling or fate prediction guidance
Readers with no Portuguese, as the original poses a high barrier to comprehension
Readers expecting systematic philosophical argument or rigorous scientific conclusions

Reading tips

Read the table of contents and preface first to grasp the book's framing before going chapter by chapter
Place the book's judgments in their historical context and note the grounds of argument rather than the conclusions themselves
Compare it with contemporary Portuguese popular writings to observe shared topics and rhetoric
Take excerpt notes while reading, distinguishing descriptive content from the author's personal claims

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.

FAQ

Is this book a fortune-telling manual?

Judging by its title and classification, it discusses the past, present, and future and touches on philosophy, psychology, and religion, but it should not be treated as an operational fortune-telling guide. It is better positioned as source material for understanding how the Portuguese-speaking world of the time talked about fate and foreknowledge.

What language proficiency is needed to read it?

The book is entirely in Portuguese and requires some Portuguese reading ability. Readers with no Portuguese can first use a translation or辅助 tools to get the gist and then decide whether to tackle the original; advanced learners can use it as lengthy reading practice.

Is this book suitable for academic citation?

It can be used as primary material for studying popular thought and Portuguese-language sources, but before citing, verify the edition information and specific page numbers, and be careful to distinguish the author's claims from verifiable facts, avoiding treating the book's judgments directly as academic conclusions.

Comments

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About the author

Bento Serrano Author · Portuguese

Bento Serrano was a nineteenth-century Portuguese astrologer who lived for a long time as a recluse in a cave in the Serra da Estrela; little is publicly documented about his birth, death, or early life. In 1883, in Porto, he published the seven-volume O Oraculo do Passado, do presente e do Futuro (The Oracle of the Past, Present and Future), covering dream interpretation, divination games, and popular astronomy, and combining practical reference with introductory reading. Substantial in size and popular in subject matter, it was a widely circulated astrological work in Portugal at the time and earned him a local reputation. Beyond this, records of his life and intellectual development are scarce, and readers today know his astrological practice and writing mainly through this work.