In thirty-seven concise and beautifully written chapters, Thomas Merton explores the meaning of interior solitude and its necessary role in bringing every life to joyous fruition. "What is said here about solitude is not just a recipe for hermits," he writes in the preface, "it has a bearing in the whole future of man and his world." Thomas Merton was a Trappist monk whose more than fifty published works range from his phenomenally popular spiritual autobiography, The Seven Story Mountain, to his writings on the contemplative experience and on political and social issues. He was also one of the first and most important figures to make the philosophies of Asia accessible to large numbers of Westerners.