The student who wishes to acquire an elementary knowledge of philosophy will find it both easier and more profitable to read some of the works of the great philosophers than to attempt to derive an all-round view from handbooks. The following are specially recommended:

Plato: Republic, especially Books VI and VII.
Descartes: Meditations.
Spinoza: Ethics.
Leibniz: The Monadology.
Berkeley: Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous.
Hume: Enquiry concerning Human Understanding.
Kant: Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysic.