This new book of essays (then 1956) demonstrates afresh the unorthodox, wide-ranging quality of Huxley's mind.He is concerned, throughout, with modern man, in his relation to the past, the technological present, the ominous future.Himself both humanist and mystic, Huxley points the way to a new synthesis.He discusses the 'sins of the intellect', the confusion of knowledge with understanding,the 'difficult art of being charitable' in a world where 'solitude is receding at the rate of four and a half kilometres per annum'.He visits a place, and it starts a lively train of thought: at Paphos, he recalls the beauty of Mallarme's poetry:in Salt Lake city,he ponders on the relation betweenmusic and popular taste.These essays deal, then, with a diversity of subjects.But there runs through them a unity of purpose, and the vision of a man who can view the past without illusions and the future without despair. Aldous Leonard Huxley was an English writer and one of the most prominent members of the famous Huxley family. He spent the latter part of his life in the United States, living in Los Angeles from 1937 until his death in 1963. Best known for his novels and wide-ranging output of essays, he also published short stories, poetry, travel writing, and film stories and scripts. Through his novels and essays Huxley functioned as an examiner and sometimes critic of social mores, norms and ideals. Huxley was a humanist but was also interested towards the end of his life in spiritual subjects such as parapsychology and philosophical mysticism. By the end of his life, Huxley was widely acknowledged as one of the pre-eminent intellectuals of his time.