The title and the table of contents of this thesis, in one respect, fully convey its contents, substance, and plan. Here is expounded, surveyed, and critically appraised certain branches of Macmurray's thought. Very little, if any, of either Macmurray or his work has been written about in this way, if at all. So this thesis is, as it should be, a unique and original contribution to knowledge and scholarship. The programme and procedure has been to expound his ideas under suitable headings according to subject matter, and to follow this --- from time to time --- with a relevant appraisement, rather than intersperse criticism with exposition. But Macmurray's thought is so broad, so encompassing, so diverse and intricate that it must never be imagined that adequate justice has been, or could be, done to the subjects contained in the title in such a short compass. Thus whilst not exhaustively covering the subject in exposition, which would require at least ten thesis of this length, it has also not been possible to raise, discuss, and positively answer numerous questions which frequently come to mind as we read both the original texts and this exposition of them. Many, of course, have been raised, researched, met, and answered. But many more must wait for further researches, and for more space to consider and probe them. The above has had to be made clear for I would not want it to be thought that this is, and was meant to be, a definitive work in the selected field of Macmurray's ideas.

This thesis examines the theological import of Owen Barfield's poetic philosophy. Barfield's claim that subjects and objects exist in tension rescinds nominalism. In this scheme being resists closure, as instead the subject appears to inhabit a middle or medial realm. This presents a formidable challenge to philosophies of immanence and the sciences which presuppose them. For this reason the thesis draws upon relevant interlocutors to underscore the originality of Barfield's poetic philosophy, particularly as it relates to language, philosophy and the social and physical sciences. Overall, the thesis argues that the nominalist legacy results in a failure to ground the subject that emerges in the dialectic between modernity's active subject and postmodemity's passive subject. As such, nominalism represents merely a caesura to being's harmonious poetic kenosis. This dialectic not only reveals the inconsistencies of philosophy's immanent construal of being, but further exposes the very openness or mediation it denies. In the first two parts, Barfield's poetic philosophy is presented as an alternative to such feigned philosophies, in that it affirms the openness of being and concomitantly its theological trajectory. In this vein, the final part of the thesis builds upon Barfield's poetic philosophy to construct a theology as poetic metaphysics that baptizes philosophy's openness. Language and being are inconceivable outside of a theology of transcendence. For without transcendence, conceived of as in-and beyond immanence, being dissolves into either univocal repetition or equivocal non-identity. Thus, the only possibility of being is a non-identical repetition wherein the subject paradoxically grasps the truth that infinitely exceeds her. In this scheme, and not unlike Barfield's, the subject is not purely passive nor purely active, but middle. She is not an immanent ground in herself; her utterance is mediated, a participation in being's primordial.

In 1712 the radical intellectual John Toland wrote a treatise entitled Cicero Illustratus, which proposed a new edition of Cicero's complete works. In this text Toland justified and described his plans; as a result such varied issues as the Ciceronian tradition in eighteenth century culture, the nature of scholarship in this period, and the value of Ciceroni an scholarship to Toland's intellectual efforts were encompassed. In spite of the evident potential of Cicero Illustratus to provide a new perspective on these issues, it has been largely neglected by modern scholarship. This thesis rectifies that omission by establishing precisely what Toland hoped to achieve with Cicero lllustratus, and the significance of his engagement with Ciceronian scholarship. The first section of the thesis addresses Cicero IlIustratus itself, discovering Toland's aims by evaluating his proposals against both the existing Ciceronian editorial tradition and his immediate scholarly context. This reveals that Toland used his engagement with scholarship to simultaneously construct authority for his professed rehabilitation of the real Cicero, and for himself as an interpreter of this 'real' Cicero. The second section of this thesis demonstrates the broader purpose of this exploitation of erudition; it allowed Toland to construct Cicero as a vital weapon in his radical discourse on politics and religion. The active role of the Ciceronian tradition in the formation ofToland's radical thought thereby demonstrated, this thesis contributes to the intellectual history of this period. It will both support narratives in modem scholarship which emphasise the on-going influence of humanist scholarship on modem thought, and challenge readings of the early Enlightenment which emphasise its rejection of tradition by demonstrating the importance of the classical tradition to the work of one of its foremost thinkers.

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This thesis seeks to explain how Francis Bacon promoted a materialist ontology whilst at the same time designating the goal of his inquiry into nature "true natural magic. " It attempts to establish the precise relationships among Bacon's concepts of matter, inquiry and magic in terms of his novel conception of nature. Baconian matter forms the basis of Bacon's substantive natural philosophy; it is highly potent and the unique source of operative power. In its unhampered or "free" state, nature takes the easiest and most economic route leaving a reservoir of unused possibility. To access the benefits of this unexploited potential, the Baconian mage experimentally and methodically deflects nature from its habitual course. Thus Baconian operational power is derived from constraining or binding nature so as to activate matter's dormant powers. For Bacon, magic is the artful constraint of nature. Through harnessing the primitive and archetypal powers of matter, Baconian magic would achieve what the magical and alchemical traditions had attempted haphazardly. Magic constitutes the capstone of Bacon's reform of natural philosophy and it relies fundamentally on a plenipotentiary matter. The inquiry prepares and guides the mind in its efforts to achieve that goal. Although these themes are often fragmented by commentators, they form a coherent natural philosophical foundation for Bacon's Instauratio magna. Their reintegration requires a return to Bacon's texts. A close reading of Bacon's works demonstrates a complex but internally coherent substantive philosophy. By placing Bacon's materialism centre-stage, in conjunction with thorough and detailed exegesis, longstanding disputes over central Baconian concepts can be resolved.

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The aim of this thesis is to explore the philosophical and stylistic difficulties of Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus by looking at them in the contexts of modernity and modernism. Rather than placing the book in the lineage of analytic philosophy, I examine it instead in relation to some of the cultural and aesthetic discourses of its times.

In this thesis, I examine how a reading of the later philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein can be of use to the reflective practitioner of literary translation. Wittgenstein, whilst a key figure in twentieth-century philosophy, remains peripheral to the field of translation studies and I argue that his later work, because it deals with the nature of language and meaning, is potentially of great significance: the story that Wittgenstein tells can change the field. It can rid translators of pictures of translation that are detrimental to literary translation and can also offer tools that will facilitate the task of literary translation, such as: the language-game; the form of life; the surveyable representation. In Chapter 1, I discuss the relation between philosophy and translation studies, presenting the later work of Wittgenstein, in particular the 1953 Philosophical Investigations. In Chapters 2, 3 and 4, I relate Wittgenstein’s work to translation by examining respectively: the reading for translation of the source text; the writing of the target text; the theorising of the target text. In Chapter 5, I draw conclusions. In the central three chapters, I offer case studies of the translation of the poetry of Eduard Mörike and of the New Testament to illustrate my arguments. My aim is that the thesis will form the basis for a greater concern for Wittgenstein in translation studies than has previously been the case.