In writing this book I have been stimulated and sustained by my friends in the Workshop in the History of the Human Sciences at the University of Chicago—Keith Baker, Arnold Davidson, Jan Goldstein, Bob Richards, and George Stocking: an exemplary intellectual community. Others who have read portions of the manuscript and contributed useful criticisms or suggestions include David Abraham, Susan Frank, Jim Grossman, Harry Harootunian, Don Levine, Don McCloskey, Bill McNeill, Joan Novick, Dorothy Ross, and Laurence Veysey, as well as anonymous referees. I could not begin to list the friends and colleagues, at the University of Chicago and elsewhere, who have supplied information, on whom I have tried out various ideas, or who have helped me in various ways, large and small; I thank them all.

Another sort of intellectual obligation is often acknowledged by bibliographical footnotes: “On this subject see.… ” My indebtednesses of this kind are so numerous that had I listed them the notes would have crowded the text off the page, so except for a few instances where my treatment closely followed that of another writer, I have not done so. I trust this omission will not be considered ungenerous. The staffs of libraries and archives which I visited in the course of my research have been extremely helpful in furthering my work. My thanks to them, and to the staff of Cambridge University Press, in particular that paragon of an editor, Frank S. Smith, but also my production editor, Janis Bolster, and copy editor, Nancy Landau.