The following is a list of works read in whole or in part in the curriculum of Thomas Aquinas College. They are not all of equal weight. Some are regarded as masterworks, while others serve as source of opinions that either lead students to the truth or make the truth more evident by opposition to it. (In 2010, College Dean Brian T. Kelly began a series of presentations to the Board of Governors about why the curriculum includes particular authors and subjects. You can read those talks by clicking here.)

Freshman Year | Sophomore Year | Junior Year | Senior Year

Compositions | Senior Thesis

Freshman Year Theology The Holy Bible Philosophy Plato Meno, Protagoras, Gorgias, Apology, Crito, Phaedo Porphyry On the Predicaments (Isagoge) Aristotle Categories, On Interpretation, Prior Analytics, Posterior Analytics, Topics St. Thomas Aquinas Proemium to the Commentary on the Posterior Analytics Natural Science Aristotle Parts of Animals DeKoninck The Lifeless World of Biology Fabre Souvenirs Entomologiques Galen On the Natural Faculties Harvey On the Motion of the Heart and Blood in Animals Linnaeus Systema Naturae Pascal On the Equilibrium of Liquids Archimedes On Floating Bodies Mendel Plant Hybridization Various Authors Scientific papers of Driesch, Gould and Marler, Tinbergen, Goethe, Virchow, von Frisch, et alia Measurements Manual Mathematics Euclid Elements Language A Primer in Latin Morphology According to the “Stem Method” Latin Readings According to the “Stem Method” Nesfield Aids to the Study and Composition of English Seminar Homer Iliad, Odyssey Plato Ion, Symposium, Republic Aeschylus Agamemnon, Libation Bearers, Eumenides Sophocles Oedipus Tyrannus, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone Herodotus Histories Plutarch Lives (Lycurgus, Pericles, Aristides, Alcibiades, Alexander) Aristotle Poetics, Rhetoric Euripides Hippolytus Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War Aristophanes The Birds, The Clouds

Sophomore Year Theology St. Augustine On Christian Doctrine, On the Spirit and the Letter, On Nature and Grace, On the Predestination of the Saints, On the Gift of Perseverance, City of God Council of Orange Canons St. Athanasius On the Incarnation Gaunilo On Behalf of the Fool St. Anselm Proslogion, Reply to Gaunilo St. John Damascene An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith Philosophy Pre-Socratic Philosophers Fragments Aristotle Physics, De Anima Natural Science Aristotle On Generation and Corruption St. Thomas Aquinas On the Principles of Nature, On the Combination of the Elements Lavoisier Elements of Chemistry Avogadro Masses and Proportions of Elementary Molecules Dalton Proportion of Gases in the Atmosphere Gay-Lussac Combination of Gaseous Substances Pascal Treatise on the Weight of the Mass of Air Various Authors Scientific papers of Berthollet, Couper, Lavoisier, Mendeleev, Richter, Wollaston, Cannizzaro,et alia Atomic Theory Manual Mathematics Plato Timaeus Ptolemy Almagest Copernicus Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres Apollonius On Conic Sections Kepler Epitome of Copernican Astronomy, Astronomia Nova Archimedes On Conoids and Spheroids Language Latin Readings According to the Stem Method—Sophomore Year Martin of Denmark Tractas De Modis Significandi Horace, Cicero Selections St.Thomas Aquinas Selections Canon of the Mass Seminar Virgil Aeneid Lucretius On the Nature of Things Livy The Rise of Rome Plutarch Lives (Marcellus, Caius Marius, Sylla, Tiberius Gracchus, Caius Gracchus, Caesar, Cato the Younger, Marcus Brutus, Comparison of Dion and Brutus) Cicero On Duties Tacitus Annals Epictetus Manual St. Augustine Confessions, On the Teacher Boethius Consolation of Philosophy Dante Divine Comedy; Inferno, Purgatory, Paradise Chaucer Canterbury Tales The Pearl Poet Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Spenser Faerie Queen St. Thomas Aquinas On the Teacher

Junior Year Theology St. Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologiae: On Sacred Doctrine, On God, On Law Philosophy Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, Politics Natural Science Descartes Principles of Philosophy Galileo Two New Sciences Newton Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy Mathematics Viete Standard Enumeration of Geometric Results, Introduction to the Analytic Art Descartes Geometry Archimedes Quadrature of the Parabola Various Authors Mathematical works of Hippocrates, Archimedes, Cavalieri, Pascal, Leibniz, Bernoulli, Newton, Berkeley, Balzano,et alia Music Zuckerkandl The Sense of Music Boethius On Music Mozart Sonatas Gustin Tonality Kalkavage On the Measurement of Tones Seminar Cervantes Don Quixote St. Thomas Aquinas On Kingship, Summa Theologiae I-II, Q. 105, Art. 1 Machiavelli The Prince, Discourses Shakespeare Julius Caesar, King Richard the Second, King Henry the Fourth: Part One, Hamlet, King Lear, Othello, Macbeth, Twelfth Night, The Tempest, Sonnets Luther The Freedom of a Christian Cajetan On Faith and Works — Against the Lutherans The Council of Trent “Decree Concerning Justification” Descartes Discourse on Method, Rules for the Direction of the Mind, Meditations Pascal Pensées Hobbes Leviathan Spinoza Theologico-Political Treatise Milton Paradise Lost Corneille Le Cid Racine Phaedre Locke Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Second Treatise of Government Berkeley Treatise Concerning Human Knowledge Hume An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding Swift Gulliver’s Travels Gibbon Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Leibniz Discourse on Metaphysics Rousseau Social Contract, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality Kant Critique of Pure Reason Hamilton, Madison, Jay Federalist Papers Articles of Confederation, Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution, Lincoln-Douglas Debates

Senior Year Theology St. Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologiae: On the Trinity, On the Sacraments, On the Passion of Christ Philosophy Aristotle Physics, Metaphysics St. Thomas Aquinas On Being and Essence Natural Science Newton Optics and Principia Huygens Treatise on Light Young “On Light and Color” Gilbert De Magnete Faraday Experimental Researches in Electricity Maxwell various papers and essays Darwin Origin of the Species Jenkins Review of the Origin of the Species Mivart On the Genesis of Species Mendel Experiments in Plant Hybridization Schrödinger What is Life Mayr One Long Argument Watson & Crick “Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids”, Monod, Chance and Necessity Jonas “Philosophical Aspects of Darwinism” Eldredge & Gould “Punctuated Equilibria” Harold The Way of the Cell Polanyi “Life’s Irreducible Structure” Kass “The Permanent Limitation of Biology” St. Thomas Aquinas Summa Contra Gentiles, In metaphysicam Aristotelis commentaria, Questiones disputationae de potentia Aristotle Metaphysics St. Augustine Literal Interpretation of Genesis Manual of readings from other scientists (Oersted, Ampere, et al.) Mathematics Dedekind Essay on the Theory of Numbers Lobachevski Geometrical Researches on the Theory of Parallels Einstein Relativity: The Special and the General Theory Readings from various mathematicians Seminar Tolstoy War and Peace Smith Wealth of Nations Kant Critique of Pure Reason, Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals Goethe Faust Hegel Philosophy of History, Phenomenology of the Spirit Feuerbach Essence of Christianity Austen Emma Tocqueville Democracy in America, The Old Regime and the Revolution Twain Huckleberry Finn Marx Capital, Communist Manifesto, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, German Ideology Engels Quantity and Quality, Negation of the Negation Ibsen A Doll's House Dostoyevski Brothers Karamazov Nietzsche On the Advantage and Disadvantage of History, Beyond Good & Evil Kierkegaard Fear and Trembling, Philosophical Fragments Cather My Antonia Flaubert Three Tales St. John Henry Newman An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine Conrad Heart of Darkness Keats, Hopkins, and Stevens Selected poems Eliot The Waste Land, Journey of the Magi Joyce Dubliners (four selections:), Eveline, A Little Cloud, A Painful Case, The Dead Freud Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis Jung Analytical Psychology Heidegger Introduction to Metaphysics, Lecture 1 Faulkner The Bear St. Thomas Aquinas The Division and Methods of the Sciences St. Pius X Pascendi Dominici Gregis Leo XIII Aeterni Patris, Rerum Novarum Pius XII Humani Generis Pius XI Quadragesimo Anno O’Connor A Good Man is Hard to Find, The Enduring Chill Plato Phaedrus Pope St. John

Paul II Veritatis Splendor

Compositions

Writing requires both greater completeness and greater precision than does speech. On the one hand, the writer cannot make assumptions about the unknown reader; on the other hand, his prose must be efficient. The College helps students develop their writing skills through the essays they write periodically each year. Five essays are written in freshman year, four sophomore year, and two lengthier essays are written in junior year. These essays are reviewed carefully by tutors for content as well as for grammar, style, and arrangement and development of ideas. Seniors write a more substantial “Senior Thesis”.

Senior Thesis

The Senior Thesis is an integral part of the curriculum. As compared with the other parts, it requires a greater independence on the part of the student. He frames a question of the sort the authors in the program themselves frame and, under the direction of a tutor, refines, explores, and answers that question. The student’s answer need not be ultimate, but it must not be superficial or simply the repetition of authority. The thesis is of greater length than the other compositions in the program and is defended before a committee of faculty examiners in a session open to all.

The ability to carry out such an investigation and reasonably to account for and defend its conclusions is an important aim of the program, and a successful Senior Thesis may be seen as a formal and public display that the student has begun to have such an ability in his own right.

The following titles are representative of Senior Theses: