Peter Leggett also known by his nom de plume D. M. A. Leggett, studied applied mathematics at Trinity College, Cambridge, and subsequently dedicated his career to higher education. His positions included Principal of Battersea College of Technology and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Surrey. He also had a lifelong interest in the paranormal. In this book the author draws on a variety of sources to explain our spiritual evolution reasoning that science is not doing the job at this time. He writes, "There has simply been little interest on the part of science in the great spiritual questions of human life. Religious concerns have often been callously dismissed as illusory panaceas, power politics and pathology. But if science is supposed to serve the whole man, it is indeed a scandal that a huge proportion of our civilization's human and material resources has been absorbed by a sub-culture which has systematically screened out the study of the transcendent and what it is to be human." "The Sacred Quest will I hope, help to widen the self-imposed boundary of contemporary thought which impedes the development of a wider awareness. For this expansion of awareness, is I believe the next step in evolution - a step we now have freedom to hasten or delay." "Indeed, if our freedom is wrongly used and we continue our reckless ravaging of the earth's stored riches for purely material ends, we may render further development of life on this planet impossible."