Introduction Summary and Analysis

Heilbroner begins the book by saying it is limited to a small number of men who did more for history than famous men did. They did this with theories that shaped the thinking of men. "And because he who enlists a man's mind wields a power even greater than the sword or the scepter, these men shaped and swayed the world. Few of them ever lifted a finger in action; they worked, in the main, as scholars—quietly, inconspicuously, and without much regard for what the world had to say about them. But they left in their train shattered empires and exploded continents; they buttressed and undermined political regimes; they set class against class and even nation against nation—not because they plotted mischief, but because of the extraordinary power of their ideas" (Chapter 1, pg. 13). These are the men...