The Eternal Ocean of Mind: Mary Shepherd's Metaphysics

The Eternal Ocean of Mind argues that mind is central to Mary Shepherd's metaphysics and that it functions as a causal power responsible for consciousness in all its forms. The book treats Shepherd's writings on mind and causation as parts of a unified philosophical project, rather than as separate topics, and uses that unity to reconstruct her wider metaphysical system. The text defends a reading of Shepherd as developing a unified account of consciousness, causation, and reality. At the same time her views are placed in conversation with a wider philosophical tradition. This is achieved through sustained engagement with earlier thinkers, including Cavendish, Descartes, Locke, Hume, and Newton, and various medieval metaphysical systems.As Manuel Fasko argues, Shepherd's position is deeply connected to earlier debates about the nature of powers, causation, and God. Her metaphysics is best understood as a hierarchy of powers that rules out genuinely free-floating powers, except for the always-manifest divine mind. This in turn helps explain how mind, matter, space, time, motion--in short, the whole universe--belong within a single interconnected system that is ultimately grounded in God; forming an "eternal ocean of mind," to draw from Shepherd's own evocative metaphor.