The purpose of this paper is to introduce, discuss, and analyze the book "Suggestions for Thought" by Florence Nightingale. Specifically, it will discuss insight into the personal philosophy and spirituality of the author. Florence Nightingale is most known as a nurse and the founder of modern nursing principles. However, she was also a spiritual woman, as this volume indicates. She initially wrote it for friends and acquaintances that were not religious as an alternative to atheism, or no religious belief at all.
             . While this book has a strong religious and spiritual theme, the author also discusses several other portions of her life very candidly, including her unhappy family life, and the rigid differences between men and women in Victorian society. For example, she writes, "The connexion between parents and children, in its present state of transition, is a miserable one" (Nightingale 105). Her spirituality is great, but her outlook is still realistic, if somewhat skewed from her own unhappy family life. Many people would think that a nurse and woman determined to help heal others would be a soft and kindly woman, which certainly Nightingale was, but she also had a very stubborn and strong streak that came out in this book, and points to her deeply held beliefs about many things, not just religion and spirituality.
             Her feelings on spirituality would have been considered quite radical in her day, and yet, they seem to make sense even today. She writes, "[B]ut feelings called forth by the consciousness of a presence of higher nature than human, unconnected with the material, these we call spiritual influences" (Nightingale 120). She believes true spirituality involves recognizing and acknowledging this presence, especially when engaging in pleasurable or moral activities. This is her idea of true spirituality, and it is certainly different from the idea of spirituality that sustains many people. Yet, her ideas indicat...