Poor Man’s Earl

an introduction to Lord Shaftesbury, the great reformer

By John Pollock
Foreword by Os Guinness
(1999)

This Reading is currently out of print.

Our situation at the dawn of the twenty-first century is often compared with that of the nineteenth-century industrial revolution. Rapid change, progress, and prosperity comes at the cost of intense social dislocation and human suffering. Back then it was one man, Lord Shaftesbury, who decisively led the necessary reforms. His enduring legacy is his demonstration of the essential link between privilege and responsibility in a prosperous society.

This Reading—an original, fresh, and accessible introduction to the life and work of the seventh Earl of Shaftesbury—is a Trinity Forum exclusive. The foreword highlights the connections between Shaftesbury’s times and our own. This is an ideal companion piece to our bestselling Reading on William Wilberforce, also by John Pollock.

Category: Readings (No. 23)

Mark this well, you proud men of action! you are, after all, nothing but unconscious instruments of the men of thought.

Heinrich Heine

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