Human Events asked conservative scholars to compile a list of the most harmful books of the past 200 years. Here are the results:
1. The Communist Manifesto
2. Mein Kampf
3. Quotations from Chairman Mao
4. The Kinsey Report
5. Democracy and Education
6. Das Kapital
7. The Feminine Mystique
8. The Course of Positive Philosophy
9. Beyond Good and Evil
10. General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
For a discussion of each, go here.
Here are the honorable mentions:
The Population Bomb
What Is To Be Done
Authoritarian Personality
On Liberty
Beyond Freedom and Dignity
Reflections on Violence
The Promise of American Life
Origin of the Species
Madness and Civilization
Soviet Communism: A New Civilization
Coming of Age in Samoa
Unsafe at Any Speed
Second Sex
Prison Notebooks
Silent Spring
Wretched of the Earth
Introduction to Psychoanalysis
The Greening of America
The Limits to Growth
Descent of Man
The mention of Silent Spring reminds us of an anecdote about Thomas Merton. After he had gone of the left end, he convinced his superiors at the monastery to have Silent Spring read during the monks' meals. The reading during meals is normally reserved for scriptures of venerable holy works. It's a good indication of how highly Merton had come to value his politics.
