Curtis Wilson was a revered tutor and two-time dean at St. John's College in Annapolis for over fifty years. He was also an eminent historian of science, who published many significant studies in the history of astronomy and physics. This collection of his writings and lectures omits his purely scholarly work, focusing instead on spoken or written discourses produced for the St. John's College community.

The volume includes the eight lectures Mr. Wilson delivered as Dean of the College in 1958-1961 and 1973-1976, as well as other lectures, an article on Charles Peirce co-authored with one of the editors, and two book reviews. All of this work, in one way or another, speaks about the place of the natural sciences within the context of the liberal arts, and invites the layman to join in and follow along with Mr. Wilson as he meditates over many years on science and its place in human thought.