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Bertrand Russell always thought of himself as a sceptic. At the
same time he never doubted that human life could be trans-
formed by the use of reason. The two points of view do not
easily coexist. Amongst the ancient Greeks, scepticism was a path
to inner tranquillity, not a programme of social change. In early
modern times, Montaigne revived scepticism in order to justify
his withdrawal from public affairs. For Russell such withdrawal
was unthinkable. A scion of a noble Whig family—his grand-
father Lord John Russell had brought in the Great Reform Act
that started England on the path to democracy in 1832—he was
also godson to John Stuart Mill. Reform was in his blood. It was
natural, then, that he should try to show—to himself and
others—that scepticism and a belief in the possibility of progress
need not be at odds. The result is the present volume, a collec-
tion of some of the most beautifully written and engaging essays
in the English language, in which he tries to show that sceptical
doubt can change the world.
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