{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_38091/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_38091","id":"gutenberg_38091","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/38091","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Biographies","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Psychiatry/Psychology","Intellectuals -- United States","James, William, 1842-1910","Philosophers -- United States","Psychologists -- United States"],"text":"THE LETTERS OF WILLIAM JAMES\n\n[Illustration: WILLIAM JAMES\n\nFROM A PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN ABOUT 1895]\n\n\n\n\nTHE LETTERS OF\nWILLIAM JAMES\n\nEDITED BY HIS SON\nHENRY JAMES\n\nIN TWO VOLUMES\n\nVOLUME II\n\n[Illustration]\n\nTHE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS\nBOSTON\n\nCOPYRIGHT, 1920, BY\nHENRY JAMES\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nXI. 1893-1899 1-52\n\n_Turning to Philosophy--A Student's Impressions--Popular\nLecturing--Chautauqua._\n\nLETTERS:--\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 17\n\nTo Henry Holt 19\n\nTo Henry James 20\n\nTo Henry James 20\n\nTo Mrs. Henry Whitman 20\n\nTo G. H. Howison 22\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 23\n\nTo his Daughter 25\n\nTo E. L. Godkin 28\n\nTo F. W. H. Myers 30\n\nTo F. W. H. Myers 32\n\nTo Henry Holt 33\n\nTo his Class at Radcliffe College 33\n\nTo Henry James 34\n\nTo Henry James 36\n\nTo Benjamin P. Blood 38\n\nTo Mrs. James 40\n\nTo Miss Rosina H. Emmet 44\n\nTo Charles Renouvier 44\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 46\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 48\n\nTo Henry James 51\n\nXII. 1893-1899 (Continued) 53-91\n\n_The Will to Believe--Talks to Teachers--Defense of Mental\nHealers--Excessive Climbing in the Adirondacks._\n\nLETTERS:--\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 53\n\nTo Henry W. Rankin 56\n\nTo Benjamin P. Blood 58\n\nTo Henry James 60\n\nTo Miss Ellen Emmet 62\n\nTo E. L. Godkin 64\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 65\n\nTo James J. Putnam 66\n\nTo James J. Putnam 72\n\nTo Fran\u00e7ois Pillon 73\n\nTo Mrs. James 75\n\nTo G. H. Howison 79\n\nTo Henry James 80\n\nTo his Son Alexander 81\n\nTo Miss Rosina H. Emmet 82\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 84\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 86\n\nTo Henry Rutgers Marshall 86\n\nTo Henry Rutgers Marshall 88\n\nTo Mrs. Henry Whitman 88\n\n\nXIII. 1899-1902 92-170\n\n_Two Years of Illness in Europe--Retirement from Active Duty at\nHarvard--The First and Second Series of the Gifford Lectures._\n\nLETTERS:--\n\nTo Miss Pauline Goldmark 95\n\nTo Mrs. E. P. Gibbens 96\n\nTo William M. Salter 99\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 102\n\nTo Mrs. Henry Whitman 103\n\nTo Thomas Davidson 106\n\nTo John C. Gray 108\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 109\n\nTo Mrs. Glendower Evans 112\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 115\n\nTo Francis Boott 117\n\nTo Hugo M\u00fcnsterberg 119\n\nTo G. H. Palmer 120\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 124\n\nTo his Son Alexander 129\n\nTo his Daughter 130\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 133\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 133\n\nTo Josiah Royce 135\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 138\n\nTo James Sully 140\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 142\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 142\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 143\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 146\n\nTo Henry W. Rankin 148\n\nTo Charles Eliot Norton 150\n\nTo N. S. Shaler 153\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 155\n\nTo Henry James 159\n\nTo E. L. Godkin 159\n\nTo E. L. Godkin 161\n\nTo Miss Pauline Goldmark 162\n\nTo H. N. Gardiner 164\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 164\n\nTo Charles Eliot Norton 166\n\nTo Mrs. Henry Whitman 167\n\nXIV. 1902-1905 171-218\n\n_The Last Period (I)--Statements of Religious Belief--Philosophical\nWriting._\n\nLETTERS:--\n\nTo Henry L. Higginson 173\n\nTo Miss Grace Norton 173\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 175\n\nTo Henry L. Higginson 176\n\nTo Henri Bergson 178\n\nTo Mrs. Louis Agassiz 180\n\nTo Henry L. Higginson 182\n\nTo Henri Bergson 183\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 185\n\nTo Henry James 188\n\nTo his Daughter 192\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 193\n\nTo Henry James 195\n\nTo Henry W. Rankin 196\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 197\n\nTo Mrs. Henry Whitman 198\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 200\n\nTo Mrs. Henry Whitman 201\n\nTo Henry James 202\n\nTo Fran\u00e7ois Pillon 203\n\nTo Henry James 204\n\nTo Charles Eliot Norton 206\n\nTo L. T. Hobhouse 207\n\nTo Edwin D. Starbuck 209\n\nTo James Henry Leuba 211\n\nAnswers to the Pratt Questionnaire on Religious Belief 212\n\nTo Miss Pauline Goldmark 215\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 216\n\nTo F. J. E. Woodbridge 217\n\nTo Edwin D. Starbuck 217\n\nTo F. J. E. Woodbridge 218\n\n\nXV. 1905-1907 219-282\n\n_The Last Period (II)--Italy and Greece--Philosophical Congress in\nRome--Stanford University--The Earthquake--Resignation of\nProfessorship._\n\nLETTERS:--\n\nTo Mrs. James 221\n\nTo his Daughter 223\n\nTo Mrs. James 225\n\nTo George Santayana 228\n\nTo Mrs. James 229\n\nTo Mrs. James 230\n\nTo H. G. Wells 230\n\nTo Henry L. Higginson 231\n\nTo T. S. Perry 232\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 233\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 235\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 237\n\nTo Daniel Merriman 238\n\nTo Miss Pauline Goldmark 238\n\nTo Henry James 239\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 241\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 245\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 247\n\nTo Henry James and W. James, Jr. 250\n\nTo W. Lutoslawski 252\n\nTo John Jay Chapman 255\n\nTo Henry James 258\n\nTo H. G. Wells 259\n\nTo Miss Theodora Sedgwick 260\n\nTo his Daughter 262\n\nTo Henry James and W. James, Jr. 263\n\nTo Moorfield Storey 265\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 266\n\nTo Charles A. Strong 268\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 270\n\nTo Clifford W. Beers 273\n\nTo William James, Jr. 275\n\nTo Henry James 277\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 280\n\n\nXVI. 1907-1909 283-332\n\n_The Last Period (III)--Hibbert Lectures in Oxford--The Hodgson Report._\n\nLETTERS:--\n\nTo Charles Lewis Slattery 287\n\nTo Henry L. Higginson 288\n\nTo W. Cameron Forbes 288\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 290\n\nTo Henri Bergson 290\n\nTo T. S. Perry 294\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 295\n\nTo Miss Pauline Goldmark 296\n\nTo W. Jerusalem 297\n\nTo Henry James 298\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 300\n\nTo Norman Kemp Smith 301\n\nTo his Daughter 301\n\nTo Henry James 302\n\nTo Henry James 303\n\nTo Miss Pauline Goldmark 303\n\nTo Charles Eliot Norton 306\n\nTo Henri Bergson 308\n\nTo John Dewey 310\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 310\n\nTo Shadworth H. Hodgson 312\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 313\n\nTo Henri Bergson 315\n\nTo H. G. Wells 316\n\nTo Henry James 317\n\nTo T. S. Perry 318\n\nTo Hugo M\u00fcnsterberg 320\n\nTo John Jay Chapman 321\n\nTo G. H. Palmer 322\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 322\n\nTo Miss Theodora Sedgwick 324\n\nTo F. C. S. Schiller 325\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 326\n\nTo Shadworth H. Hodgson 328\n\nTo John Jay Chapman 329\n\nTo John Jay Chapman 330\n\nTo John Jay Chapman 330\n\nTo Dickinson S. Miller 331\n\n\nXVII. 1910 333-350\n\n_Final Months--The End._\n\nLETTERS:--\n\nTo Henry L. Higginson 334\n\nTo Miss Frances R. Morse 335\n\nTo T. S. Perry 335\n\nTo Fran\u00e7ois Pillon 336\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 338\n\nTo his Daughter 338\n\nTo Henry P. Bowditch 341\n\nTo Fran\u00e7ois Pillon 342\n\nTo Henry Adams 344\n\nTo Henry Adams 346\n\nTo Henry Adams 347\n\nTo Benjamin P. Blood 347\n\nTo Theodore Flournoy 349\n\n\nAPPENDIX I. 353\n\nThree Criticisms for Students.\n\nAPPENDIX II. 357\n\nBooks by William James.\n\nINDEX 363\n\n\n\n\nLIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS\n\n\nWilliam James in middle life _Frontispiece_\n\n\"Damn the Absolute\": two snapshots of William\nJames and Josiah Royce 135\n\nWilliam James and Henry James posing for a\nkodak in 1900 161\n\nWilliam James and Henry Clement at the \"Putnam\nShanty\" in the Adirondacks (1907?) 315\n\nFacsimile of Post-card addressed to Henry Adams 347\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE LETTERS OF WILLIAM JAMES\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\n1893-1899\n\n _Turning to Philosophy--A Student's Impressions--Popular\n Lecturing--Chautauqua_\n\n\nWhen James returned from Europe, he was fifty-two years old. If he had\nbeen another man, he might have settled down to the intensive\ncultivation of the field in which he had already achieved renown and\ninfluence. He would then have spent the rest of his life in working out\nspecial problems in psychology, in deducing a few theories, in making\nparticular applications of his conclusions, in administering a growing\nlaboratory, in surrounding himself with assistants and disciples--in\nweeding and gathering where he had tilled. But the fact was that the\npublication of his two books on psychology operated for him as a welcome\nrelease from the subject.\n\nHe had no illusion of finality about what he had written.[1] But he\nwould have said that whatever original contribution he was capable of\nmaking to psychology had already been made; that he must pass on and\nleave addition and revision to others. He gradually disencumbered\nhimself of responsibility for teaching the subject in the College. The\nlaboratory had already been placed under Professor M\u00fcnsterberg's charge.\nFor one year, during which M\u00fcnsterberg returned to Germany, James was\ncompelled to direct its conduct; but he let it be known that he would\nresign his professorship rather than concern himself with it\nindefinitely.\n\nReaders of this book will have seen that the centre of his interest had\nalways been religious and philosophical. To be sure, the currents by\nwhich science was being carried forward during the sixties and seventies\nhad supported him in his distrust of conclusions based largely on\nintrospection and _a priori_ reasoning. As early as 1865 he had said,\napropos of Agassiz, \"No one sees farther into a generalization than his\nown knowledge of details extends.\" In the spirit of that remark he had\nspent years on brain-physiology, on the theory of the emotions, on the\nfeeling of effort in mental processes, in studying the measurements and\nexact experiments by means of which the science of the mind was being\nbrought into quickening relation with the physical and biological\nsciences. But all the while he had been driven on by a curiosity that\nembraced ulterior problems. In half of the field of his consciousness\nquestions had been stirring which now held his attention completely.\nDoes consciousness really exist? Could a radically empirical conception\nof the universe be formulated? What is knowledge? What truth? Where is\nfreedom? and where is there room for faith? Metaphysical problems\nhaunted his mind; discussions that ran in strictly psychological\nchannels bored him. He called psychology \"a nasty little subject,\"\naccording to Professor Palmer, and added, \"all one cares to know lies\noutside.\" He would not consider spending time on a revised edition of\nhis textbook (the \"Briefer Course\") except for a bribe that was too\ngreat ever to be urged upon him. As time went on, he became more and\nmore irritated at being addressed or referred to as a \"psychologist.\" In\nJune, 1903, when he became aware that Harvard was intending to confer an\nhonorary degree on him, he went about for days before Commencement in a\nhalf-serious state of dread lest, at the fatal moment, he should hear\nPresident Eliot's voice naming him \"Psychologist, psychical researcher,\nwiller-to-believe, religious experiencer.\" He could not say whether the\nimpossible last epithets would be less to his taste than \"psychologist.\"\n\nOnly along the borderland between normal and pathological mental states,\nand particularly in the region of \"religious experience,\" did he\ncontinue to collect psychological data and to explore them.\n\nThe new subjects which he offered at Harvard during the nineties are\nindicative of the directions in which his mind was moving. In the first\nwinter after his return he gave a course on Cosmology, which he had\nnever taught before and which he described in the department\nannouncement as \"a study of the fundamental conceptions of natural\nscience with especial reference to the theories of evolution and\nmaterialism,\" and for the first time announced that his graduate\n\"seminar\" would be wholly devoted to questions in mental pathology\n\"embracing a review of the principal forms of abnormal or exceptional\nmental life.\" In 1895 the second half of his psychological seminar was\nannounced as \"a discussion of certain theoretic problems, as\nConsciousness, Knowledge, Self, the relations of Mind and Body.\" In 1896\nhe offered a course on the philosophy of Kant for the first time. In\n1898 the announcement of his \"elective\" on Metaphysics explained that\nthe class would consider \"the unity or pluralism of the world ground,\nand its knowability or unknowability; realism and idealism, freedom,\nteleology and theism.\"[2]\n\nBut there is another aspect of the nineties which must be touched upon.\nAfter getting back \"to harness\" in 1893 James took up, not only his full\ncollege duties, but an amount of outside lecturing such as he had never\ndone before. In so doing he overburdened himself and postponed the\nattainment of his true purpose; but the temptation to accept the\nrequests which now poured in on him was made irresistible by practical\nconsiderations. He not only repeated some of his Harvard courses at\nRadcliffe College, and gave instruction in the Harvard Summer School in\naddition to the regular work of the term; but delivered lectures at\nteachers' meetings and before other special audiences in places as far\nfrom Cambridge as Colorado and California. A number of the papers that\nare included in \"The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular\nPhilosophy\" (1897) and \"Talks to Teachers and Students on Some of Life's\nIdeals\" (1897) were thus prepared as lectures. Some of them were read\nmany times before they were published. When he stopped for a rest in\n1899, he was exhausted to the verge of a formidable break-down.\n\nEven a glance at this period tempts one to wonder whether this record\nwould not have been richer if it had been different. Might-have-beens\ncan never be measured or verified; and yet sometimes it cannot be\ndoubted that possibilities never realized were actual possibilities\nonce. By 1893 James was inwardly eager, as has already been said, to\ndevote all his thought and working time to metaphysical and religious\nquestions. More than that--he had already conceived the important terms\nof his own _Welt-anschauung_. \"The Will to Believe\" was written by 1896.\nIn the preface to the \"Talks to Teachers\" he said of the essay called \"A\nCertain Blindness in Human Beings,\" \"it connects itself with a definite\nview of the World and our Moral relations to the same.... I mean the\npluralistic or individualistic philosophy.\" This was no more than a\nstatement of a general philosophic attitude which had for some years\nbeen familiar to his students and to readers of his occasional papers.\nThe lecture on \"Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results,\"\ndelivered at the University of California in 1898, forecast \"Pragmatism\"\nand the \"Meaning of Truth.\" If his time and energy had not been\notherwise consumed, the nineties might well have witnessed the\nappearance of papers which were not written until the next decade. If he\nhad been able to apply an undistracted attention to what his spirit was\nall the while straining toward, the disastrous breakdown of 1899-1902\nmight not have happened. But instead, these best years of his maturity\nwere largely sacrificed to the practical business of supporting his\nfamily. His salary as a Harvard professor was insufficient to his needs.\nOn his salary alone he could not educate his four children as he wanted\nto, and make provision for his old age and their future and his wife's,\nexcept by denying himself movement and social and professional contacts\nand by withdrawing into isolation that would have been utterly\nparalyzing and depressing to his genius. He possessed private means, to\nbe sure; but, considering his family, these amounted to no more than a\npartial insurance against accident and a moderate supplement to his\nsalary. His books had not yet begun to yield him a substantial increase\nof income. It is true that he made certain lecture engagements serve as\nthe occasion for casting philosophical conceptions in more or less\npopular form, and that he frequently paid the expenses of refreshing\ntravels by means of these lectures. But after he had economized in every\ndirection,--as for instance, by giving up horse and hired man at\nChocorua,--the bald fact remained that for six years he spent most of\nthe time that he could spare from regular college duties, and about all\nhis vacations, in carrying the fruits of the previous fifteen years of\npsychological work into the popular market. His public reputation was\nincreased thereby. Teachers, audiences, and the \"general reader\" had\nreason to be thankful. But science and philosophy paid for the gain. His\ncase was no worse than that of plenty of other men of productive genius\nwho were enmeshed in an inadequately supported academic system. It would\nhave been much more distressing under the conditions that prevail today.\nSo James took the limitations of the situation as a matter of course and\nmade no complaint. But when he died, the systematic statement of his\nphilosophy had not been \"rounded out\" and he knew that he was leaving it\n\"too much like an arch built only on one side.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nJames's appearance at this period is well shown by the frontispiece of\nthis volume. Almost anyone who was at Harvard in the nineties can recall\nhim as he went back and forth in Kirkland Street between the College and\nhis Irving Street house, and can in memory see again that erect figure\nwalking with a step that was somehow firm and light without being\nparticularly rapid, two or three thick volumes and a note-book under\none arm, and on his face a look of abstraction that used suddenly to\ngive way to an expression of delighted and friendly curiosity. Sometimes\nit was an acquaintance who caught his eye and received a cordial word;\nsometimes it was an occurrence in the street that arrested him;\nsometimes the terrier dog, who had been roving along unwatched and\nforgotten, embroiled himself in an adventure or a fight and brought\nJames out of his thoughts. One day he would have worn the Norfolk jacket\nthat he usually worked in at home to his lecture-room; the next, he\nwould have forgotten to change the black coat that he had put on for a\nformal occasion. At twenty minutes before nine in the morning he could\nusually be seen going to the College Chapel for the fifteen-minute\nservice with which the College day began. If he was returning home for\nlunch, he was likely to be hurrying; for he had probably let himself be\ndetained after a lecture to discuss some question with a few of his\nclass. He was apt then to have some student with him whom he was\nbringing home to lunch and to finish the discussion at the family table,\nor merely for the purpose of establishing more personal relations than\nwere possible in the class-room. At the end of the afternoon, or in the\nearly evening, he would frequently be bicycling or walking again. He\nwould then have been working until his head was tired, and would have\nlaid his spectacles down on his desk and have started out again to get a\nbreath of air and perhaps to drop in on a Cambridge neighbor.\n\nIn his own house it seemed as if he was always at work; all the more,\nperhaps, because it was obvious that he possessed no instinct for\narranging his day and protecting himself from interruptions. He managed\nreasonably well to keep his mornings clear; or rather he allowed his\nwife to stand guard over them with fair success. But soon after he had\ntaken an essential after-lunch nap, he was pretty sure to be \"caught\" by\ncallers and visitors. From six o'clock on, he usually had one or two of\nthe children sitting, more or less subdued, in the library, while he\nhimself read or dashed off letters, or (if his eyes were tired) dictated\nthem to Mrs. James. He always had letters and post-cards to write. At\nany odd time--with his overcoat on and during a last moment before\nhurrying off to an appointment or a train--he would sit down at his desk\nand do one more note or card--always in the beautiful and flowing hand\nthat hardly changed between his eighteenth and his sixty-eighth years.\nHe seemed to feel no need of solitude except when he was reading\ntechnical literature or writing philosophy. If other members of the\nhousehold were talking and laughing in the room that adjoined his study,\nhe used to keep the door open and occasionally pop in for a word, or to\ntalk for a quarter of an hour. It was with the greatest difficulty that\nMrs. James finally persuaded him to let the door be closed up. He never\nstruck an equilibrium between wishing to see his students and neighbors\nfreely and often, and wishing not to be interrupted by even the most\nagreeable reminder of the existence of anyone or anything outside the\nmatter in which he was absorbed.\n\nIt was customary for each member of the Harvard Faculty to announce in\nthe college catalogue at what hour of the day he could be consulted by\nstudents. Year after year James assigned the hour of his evening meal\nfor such calls. Sometimes he left the table to deal with the caller in\nprivate; sometimes a student, who had pretty certainly eaten already and\nwas visibly abashed at finding himself walking in on a second dinner,\nwould be brought into the dining-room and made to talk about other\nthings than his business.\n\nHe allowed his conscience to be constantly burdened with a sense of\nobligation to all sorts of people. The list of neighbors, students,\nstrangers visiting Cambridge, to whom he and Mrs. James felt responsible\nfor civilities, was never closed, and the cordiality which animated his\nintentions kept him reminded of every one on it.\n\nAnd yet, whenever his wife wisely prepared for a suitable time and made\nengagements for some sort of hospitality otherwise than by hap-hazard,\nit was perversely likely to be the case, when the appointed hour\narrived, that James was \"going on his nerves\" and in no mood for \"being\nentertaining.\" The most comradely of men, nothing galled him like\n_having to be_ sociable. The \"hollow mockery of our social conventions\"\nwould then be described in furious and lurid speech. Luckily the guests\nwere not yet there to hear him. But they did not always get away without\ncatching a glimpse of his state of mind. On one such occasion,--an\nevening reception for his graduate class had been arranged,--Mrs. James\nencountered a young man in the hall whose expression was so perturbed\nthat she asked him what had happened to him. \"I've come in again,\" he\nreplied, \"to get my hat. I was trying to find my way to the dining-room\nwhen Mr. James swooped at me and said, 'Here, Smith, you want to get out\nof this _Hell_, don't you? I'll show you how. There!' And before I could\nanswer, he'd popped me out through a back-door. But, really, I do not\nwant to go!\"\n\nThe dinners of a club to which allusions will occur in this volume, (in\nletters to Henry L. Higginson, T. S. Perry, and John C. Gray) were\noccasions apart from all others; for James could go to them at the last\nmoment, without any sense of responsibility and knowing that he would\nfind congenial company and old friends. So he continued to go to these\ndinners, even after he had stopped accepting all invitations to dine.\nThe Club (for it never had any name) had been started in 1870. James had\nbeen one of the original group who agreed to dine together once a month\nduring the winter. Among the other early members had been his brother\nHenry, W. D. Howells, O. W. Holmes, Jr., John Fiske, John C. Gray, Henry\nAdams, T. S. Perry, John C. Ropes, A. G. Sedgwick, and F. Parkman. The\nmore faithful diners, who constituted the nucleus of the Club during the\nlater years, included Henry L. Higginson, Sturgis Bigelow, John C.\nRopes, John T. Morse, Charles Grinnell, James Ford Rhodes, Moorfield\nStorey, James W. Crafts, and H. P. Walcott.\n\n * * * * *\n\nEvery little while James's sleep would \"go to pieces,\" and he would go\noff to Newport, the Adirondacks, or elsewhere, for a few days. This\nhappened both summer and winter. It was not the effect of the place or\nclimate in which he was living, but simply that his dangerously high\naverage of nervous tension had been momentarily raised to the snapping\npoint. Writing was almost certain to bring on this result. When he had\nan essay or a lecture to prepare, he could not do it by bits. In order\nto begin such a task, he tried to seize upon a free day--more often a\nSunday than any other. Then he would shut himself into his library, or\ndisappear into a room at the top of the house, and remain hidden all\nday. If things went well, twenty or thirty sheets of much-corrected\nmanuscript (about twenty-five hundred words in his free hand) might\nresult from such a day. As many more would have gone into the\nwaste-basket. Two or three successive days of such writing \"took it out\nof him\" visibly.\n\nShort holidays, or intervals in college lecturing, were often employed\nfor writing in this way, the longer vacations of the latter nineties\nbeing filled, as has been said, with traveling and lecture engagements.\nIn the intervals there would be a few days, or sometimes two or three\nwhole weeks, at Chocorua. Or, one evening, all the windows of the\ndeserted Irving Street house would suddenly be wide open to the night\nair, and passers on the sidewalk could see James sitting in his\nshirt-sleeves within the circle of the bright light that stood on his\nlibrary table. He was writing letters, making notes, and skirmishing\nthrough the piles of journals and pamphlets that had accumulated during\nan absence.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe impression which he made on a student who sat under him in several\nclasses shortly before the date at which this volume begins have been\nset down in a form in which they can be given here.\n\n\"I have a vivid recollection\" (writes Dr. Dickinson S. Miller) \"of\nJames's lectures, classes, conferences, seminars, laboratory interests,\nand the side that students saw of him generally. Fellow-manliness seemed\nto me a good name for his quality. The one thing apparently impossible\nto him was to speak _ex cathedra_ from heights of scientific erudition\nand attainment. There were not a few 'if's' and 'maybe's' in his\nremarks. Moreover he seldom followed for long an orderly system of\nargument or unfolding of a theory, but was always apt to puncture such\nsystematic pretensions when in the midst of them with some entirely\nunaffected doubt or question that put the matter upon a basis of common\nsense at once. He had drawn from his laboratory experience in chemistry\nand his study of medicine a keen sense that the imposing formulas of\nscience that impress laymen are not so 'exact' as they sound. He was\nnot, in my time at least, much of a believer in lecturing in the sense\nof continuous exposition.\n\n\"I can well remember the first meeting of the course in psychology in\n1890, in a ground-floor room of the old Lawrence Scientific School. He\ntook a considerable part of the hour by reading extracts from Henry\nSidgwick's Lecture against Lecturing, proceeding to explain that we\nshould use as a textbook his own 'Principles of Psychology,' appearing\nfor the first time that very week from the press, and should spend the\nhours in conference, in which we should discuss and ask questions, on\nboth sides. So during the year's course we read the two volumes through,\nwith some amount of running commentary and controversy. There were four\nor five men of previous psychological training in a class of (I think)\nbetween twenty and thirty, two of whom were disposed to take up cudgels\nfor the British associational psychology and were particularly troubled\nby the repeated doctrine of the 'Principles' that a state of\nconsciousness had no parts or elements, but was one indivisible fact. He\nbore questions that really were criticisms with inexhaustible patience\nand what I may call (the subject invites the word often) _human_\nattention; invited written questions as well, and would often return\nthem with a reply penciled on the back when he thought the discussion\ntoo special in interest to be pursued before the class. Moreover, he\nbore with us with never a sign of impatience if we lingered after class,\nand even walked up Kirkland Street with him on his way home. Yet he was\nreally not argumentative, not inclined to dialectic or pertinacious\ndebate of any sort. It must always have required an effort of\nself-control to put up with it. He almost never, even in private\nconversation, contended for his own opinion. He had a way of often\nfalling back on the language of perception, insight, sensibility, vision\nof possibilities. I recall how on one occasion after class, as I parted\nwith him at the gate of the Memorial Hall triangle, his last words were\nsomething like these: 'Well, Miller, that theory's not a warm reality to\nme yet--still a cold conception'; and the charm of the comradely smile\nwith which he said it! The disinclination to formal logical system and\nthe more prolonged purely intellectual analyses was felt by some men as\na lack in his classroom work, though they recognized that these analyses\nwere present in the 'Psychology.' On the other hand, the very tendency\nto _feel_ ideas lent a kind of emotional or \u00e6sthetic color which\ndeepened the interest.\n\n\"In the course of the year he asked the men each to write some word of\nsuggestion, if he were so inclined, for improvement in the method with\nwhich the course was conducted; and, if I remember rightly, there were\nnot a few respectful suggestions that too much time was allowed to the\nfew wrangling disputants. In a pretty full and varied experience of\nlecture-rooms at home and abroad I cannot recall another where the class\nwas asked to criticize the methods of the lecturer.\n\n\"Another class of twelve or fourteen, in the same year, on Descartes,\nSpinoza, and Leibnitz, met in one of the 'tower rooms' of Sever Hall,\nsitting around a table. Here we had to do mostly with pure metaphysics.\nAnd more striking still was the prominence of humanity and sensibility\nin his way of taking philosophic problems. I can see him now, sitting at\nthe head of that heavy table of light-colored oak near the bow-window\nthat formed the end of the room. My brother, a visitor at Cambridge,\ndropping in for an hour and seeing him with his vigorous air, bronzed\nand sanguine complexion, and brown tweeds, said, 'He looks more like a\nsportsman than a professor.' I think that the sporting men in college\nalways felt a certain affinity to themselves on one side in the\nfreshness and manhood that distinguished him in mind, appearance, and\ndiction. It was, by the way, in this latter course that I first heard\nsome of the philosophic phrases now identified with him. There was a\ngreat deal about the monist and pluralist views of the universe. The\nworld of the monist was described as a 'block-universe' and the monist\nhimself as 'wallowing in a sense of unbridled unity,' or something of\nthe sort. He always wanted the men to write one or two 'theses' in the\ncourse of the year and to get to work early on them. He made a great\ndeal of bibliography. He would say, 'I am no man for editions and\nreferences, no exact bibliographer.' But none the less he would put upon\nthe blackboard full lists of books, English, French, German, and\nItalian, on our subject. His own reading was immense and systematic. No\none has ever done justice to it, partly because he spoke with unaffected\nmodesty of that side of his equipment.\n\n\"Of course this knowledge came to the foreground in his 'seminar.' In my\nsecond year I was with him in one of these for both terms, the first\nhalf-year studying the psychology of pleasure and pain, and the second,\nmental pathology. Here each of us undertook a special topic, the reading\nfor which was suggested by him. The students were an interesting group,\nincluding Professor Santayana, then an instructor, Dr. Herbert Nichols,\nMessrs. Mezes (now President of the City College, New York), Pierce\n(late Professor at Smith College), Angell (Professor of Psychology at\nChicago, and now President of the Carnegie Corporation), Bakewell\n(Professor at Yale), and Alfred Hodder (who became instructor at Bryn\nMawr College, then abandoned academic life for literature and politics).\nIn this seminar I was deeply impressed by his judicious and often\njudicial quality. His range of intellectual experience, his profound\ncultivation in literature, in science and in art (has there been in our\ngeneration a more cultivated man?), his absolutely unfettered and\nuntrammeled mind, ready to do sympathetic justice to the most\nunaccredited, audacious, or despised hypotheses, yet always keeping his\nown sense of proportion and the balance of evidence--merely to know\nthese qualities, as we sat about that council-board, was to receive, so\nfar as we were capable of absorbing it, in a heightened sense of the\ngood old adjective, 'liberal' education. Of all the services he did us\nin this seminar perhaps the greatest was his running commentary on the\nstudents' reports on such authors as Lombroso and Nordau, and all\ntheories of degeneracy and morbid human types. His thought was that\nthere is no sharp line to be drawn between 'healthy' and 'unhealthy'\nminds, that all have something of both. Once when we were returning from\ntwo insane asylums which he had arranged for the class to visit, and at\none of which we had seen a dangerous, almost naked maniac, I remember\nhis saying, 'President Eliot might not like to admit that there is no\nsharp line between himself and the men we have just seen, but it is\ntrue.' He would emphasize that people who had great nervous burdens to\ncarry, hereditary perhaps, could order their lives fruitfully and\nperhaps derive some gain from their 'degenerate' sensitiveness, whatever\nit might be. The doctrine is set forth with regard to religion in an\nearly chapter of his 'Varieties of Religious Experience,' but for us it\nwas applied to life at large.\n\n\"In private conversation he had a mastery of words, a voice, a vigor, a\nfreedom, a dignity, and therefore what one might call an authority, in\nwhich he stood quite alone. Yet brilliant man as he was, he never quite\noutgrew a perceptible shyness or diffidence in the lecture-room, which\nshowed sometimes in a heightened color. Going to lecture in one of the\nlast courses he ever gave at Harvard, he said to a colleague whom he met\non the way, 'I have lectured so and so many years, and yet here am I on\nthe way to my class in trepidation!'\n\n\"Professor Royce's style of exposition was continuous, even, unfailing,\ncomposed. Professor James was more conversational, varied, broken, at\ntimes struggling for expression--in spite of what has been mentioned as\nhis mastery of words. This was natural, for the one was deeply and\ncomfortably installed in a theory (to be sure a great theory), and the\nother was peering out in quest of something greater which he did not\ndistinctly see. James's method gave us in the classroom more of his own\nexploration and _aper\u00e7u_. We felt his mind at work.\n\n\"Royce in lecturing sat immovable. James would rise with a peculiar\nsuddenness and make bold and rapid strokes for a diagram on the\nblack-board--I can remember his abstracted air as he wrestled with some\nidea, standing by his chair with one foot upon it, elbow on knee, hand\nto chin. A friend has described a scene at a little class that, in a\nstill earlier year, met in James's own study. In the effort to\nillustrate he brought out a black-board. He stood it on a chair and in\nvarious other positions, but could not at once write upon it, hold it\nsteady, and keep it in the class's vision. Entirely bent on what he was\ndoing, his efforts resulted at last in his standing it on the floor\nwhile he lay down at full length, holding it with one hand, drawing with\nthe other, and continuing the flow of his commentary. I can myself\nremember how, after one of his lectures on Pragmatism in the Horace Mann\nAuditorium in New York, being assailed with questions by people who came\nup to the edge of the platform, he ended by sitting on that edge\nhimself, all in his frock-coat as he was, his feet hanging down, with\nhis usual complete absorption in the subject, and the look of human and\nmellow consideration which distinguished him at such moments, meeting\nthe thoughts of the inquirers, whose attention also was entirely\nriveted. If this suggests a lack of dignity, it misleads, for dignity\nnever forsook him, such was the inherent strength of tone and bearing.\nIn one respect these particular lectures (afterwards published as his\nbook on Pragmatism) stand alone in my recollection. An audience may\neasily be large the first time, but if there is a change it usually\nfalls away more or less on the subsequent occasions. These lectures were\nannounced for one of the larger lecture-halls. This was so crowded\nbefore the lecture began, some not being able to gain admittance, that\nthe audience had to be asked to move to the large 'auditorium' I have\nmentioned. But in it also the numbers grew, till on the last day it\npresented much the same appearance as the other hall on the first.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Nov._ 19, 1893.\n\nMY DEAR MILLER,--I have found the work of recommencing teaching\nunexpectedly formidable after our year of gentlemanly irresponsibility.\nI seem to have forgotten everything, especially psychology, and the\nsubjects themselves have become so paltry and insignificant-seeming that\neach lecture has appeared a ghastly farce. Of late things are getting\nmore real; but the experience brings startlingly near to one the wild\ndesert of old-age which lies ahead, and makes me feel like impressing on\nall chicken-professors like you the paramount urgency of providing for\nthe time when you'll be old fogies, by laying by from your very first\nyear of service a fund on which you may be enabled to \"retire\" before\nyou're sixty and incapable of any cognitive operation that wasn't ground\ninto you twenty years before, or of any emotion save bewilderment and\njealousy of the thinkers of the rising generation.\n\nI am glad to hear that you have more writings on the stocks. I read your\npaper on \"Truth and Error\" with bewilderment and jealousy. Either it is\nDr. Johnson _redivivus_ striking the earth with his stick and saying,\n\"Matter exists and there's an end on 't,\" or it is a new David Hume,\nreincarnated in your form, and so subtle in his simplicity that a\ndecaying mind like mine fails to seize any of the deeper import of his\nwords. The trouble is, I can't tell which it is. But with the help of\nGod I will go at it again this winter, when I settle down to my final\nbout with Royce's theory, which must result in my either _actively_\nbecoming a propagator thereof, or actively its enemy and destroyer. It\nis high time that this more decisive attitude were generated in me, and\nit ought to take place this winter.\n\nI hardly see more of my colleagues this winter than I did last year.\nEach of us lies in his burrow, and we meet on the street. M\u00fcnsterberg is\ngoing really _splendidly_ and the Laboratory is a bower of delight. But\nI do not work there. Royce is in powerful condition.... Yours ever,\n\nW. J.\n\nAlthough, in the next letter, James poked fun at reformed spelling, he\nwas really in sympathy with the movement to which his correspondent was\ngiving an outspoken support--as Mr. Holt of course understood. \"Isn't it\nabominable\"--Professor Palmer has quoted James as exclaiming--\"that\neverybody is expected to spell the same way!\" He lent his name to Mr.\nCarnegie's simplified spelling program, and used to wax honestly\nindignant when people opposed spelling reform with purely conservative\narguments. He cared little about etymology, and saw clearly enough that\nmere accident and fashion have helped to determine orthography. But in\nhis own writing he never put himself to great pains to re\u00ebducate his\nreflexes. He let his hand write _through_ as often as _thro'_ or _thru_,\nand only occasionally bethought him to write 'filosofy' and 'telefone.'\nWhen he published, the text of his books showed very few reforms.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry Holt._\n\n\nCambridge, _March_ 27[1894].\n\n_Autographically written, and spelt spontaneously._\n\nDEAR HOLT,--The Introduction to filosofy is what I ment--I dont no the\nother book.\n\nI will try Nordau's Entartung this summer--as a rule however it duzn't\nprofit me to read Jeremiads against evil--the example of a little good\nhas more effect.\n\nA propo of kitchen ranges, I wish you wood remoov your recommendation\nfrom that Boynton Furnace Company's affair. We have struggld with it for\nfive years--lost 2 cooks in consequens--burnt countless tons of extra\ncoal, never had anything decently baikt, and now, having got rid of it\nfor 15 dollars, are having a happy kitchen for the 1st time in our\nexperience--all through your unprinsipld recommendation! You ought to\nhear my wife sware when she hears your name!\n\nI will try about a translator for Nordau--though the only man I can\nthink of needs munny more than fame, and coodn't do the job for pure\nlove of the publisher or author, or on an unsertainty.\n\nYours affectionately,\nWILLIAM JAMES.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James_.\n\n\nPRINCETON, _Dec. 29, 1894_.\n\nDEAR H.,--I have been here for three days at my co-psychologist\nBaldwin's house, presiding over a meeting of the American Association of\nPsychologists, which has proved a very solid and successful affair.[3]\nStrange to say, we are getting to be veterans, and the brunt of the\ndiscussions was borne by former students of mine. It is a very healthy\nmovement. Alice is with me, the weather is frosty clear and cold,\ntouching zero this A.M. and the country robed in snow. Princeton is a\nbeautiful place....\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 26, 1895_.\n\n...I have been reading Balfour's \"Foundations of Belief\" with immense\ngusto. It almost makes me a Liberal-Unionist! If I mistake not, it will\nhave a profound effect eventually, and it is a pleasure to see old\nEngland coming to the fore every time with some big stroke. There is\nmore real philosophy in such a book than in fifty German ones of which\nthe eminence consists in heaping up subtleties and technicalities about\nthe subject. The English genius makes the vitals plain by scuffing the\ntechnicalities away. B. is a great man....\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Henry Whitman._\n\n\nSPRINGFIELD CENTRE, N.Y., _June 16, 1895_.\n\nMY DEAR FRIEND,--About the 22nd! I will come if you command it; but\nreflect on my situation ere you do so. Just reviving from the addled and\ncorrupted condition in which the Cambridge year has left me; just at the\nportals of that Adirondack wilderness for the breath of which I have\nsighed for years, unable to escape the cares of domesticity and get\nthere; just about to get a little health into me, a little\nsimplification and solidification and purification and sanification--things\nwhich will never come again if this one chance be lost; just filled to\nsatiety with all the simpering conventions and vacuous excitements of\nso-called civilization; hungering for their opposite, the smell of the\nspruce, the feel of the moss, the sound of the cataract, the bath in its\nwaters, the divine outlook from the cliff or hill-top over the unbroken\nforest--oh, Madam, Madam! do you know what medicinal things you ask me\nto give up? Alas!\n\nI aspire downwards, and really _am_ nothing, _not becoming_ a savage as\nI would be, and failing to be the civilizee that I really ought to be\ncontent with being! But I wish that _you_ also aspired to the\nwilderness. There are some nooks and summits in that Adirondack region\nwhere one can really \"recline on one's divine composure,\" and, as long\nas one stays up there, seem for a while to enjoy one's birth-right of\nfreedom and relief from every fever and falsity. Stretched out on such a\nshelf,--with thee beside me singing in the wilderness,--what babblings\nmight go on, what judgment-day discourse!\n\nCommand me to give it up and return, if you will, by telegram addressed\n\"Adirondack Lodge, North Elba, N.Y.\" In any case I shall return before\nthe end of the month, and later shall be hanging about Cambridge some\ntime in July, giving lectures (for my sins) in the Summer School. I am\nstaying now with a cousin on Otsego Lake, a dear old country-place that\nhas been in their family for a century, and is rich and ample and\nreposeful. The Kipling visit went off splendidly--he's a regular little\nbrick of a man; but it's strange that with so much sympathy with the\ninsides of every living thing, brute or human, drunk or sober, he\nshould have so little sympathy with those of a Yankee--who also is, in\nthe last analysis, one of God's creatures. I have stopped at\nWilliamstown, at Albany, at Amsterdam, at Utica, at Syracuse, and\nfinally here, each time to visit human beings with whom I had business\nof some sort or other. The best was Benj. Paul Blood at Amsterdam, a son\nof the soil, but a man with extraordinary power over the English tongue,\nof whom I will tell you more some day. I will by the way enclose some\nclippings from his latest \"effort.\" \"Yes, Paul is quite a\n_correspondent_!\" as a citizen remarked to me from whom I inquired the\nway to his dwelling. Don't you think \"correspondent\" rather a good\ngeneric term for \"man of letters,\" from the point of view of the\ncountry-town newspaper reader?...\n\nNow, dear, noble, incredibly perfect Madam, you won't take ill my\nreluctance about going to Beverly, even to your abode, so soon. I am a\nbadly mixed critter, and I experience a certain organic need for\nsimplification and solitude that is quite imperious, and so vital as\nactually to be respectable even by others. So be indulgent to your ever\nfaithful and worshipful,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To G. H. Howison._\n\nCambridge, _July 17, 1895_.\n\nMY DEAR HOWISON,--How you _have_ misunderstood the application of my\nword \"trivial\" as being discriminatively applied to your pluralistic\nidealism! Quite the reverse--if there be a philosophy that I believe in,\nit's that. The word came out of one who is unfit to be a philosopher\nbecause at bottom he hates philosophy, especially at the beginning of a\nvacation, with the fragrance of the spruces and sweet ferns all soaking\nhim through with the conviction that it is better to _be_ than to define\nyour being. I am a victim of neurasthenia and of the sense of hollowness\nand unreality that goes with it. And philosophic literature _will_ often\nseem to me the hollowest thing. My word trivial was a general reflection\nexhaling from this mood, vile indeed in a supposed professor. Where it\nwill end with me, I do not know. I wish I could give it all up. But\nperhaps it is a grand climacteric and will pass away. At present I am\nphilosophizing as little as possible, in order to do it the better next\nyear, if I can do it at all. And I envy you your stalwart and steadfast\nenthusiasm and faith. Always devotedly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nGLENWOOD SPRINGS,\nCOLORADO, _Aug. 13, 1895_.\n\nMY DEAR FLOURNOY,--Ever since last January an envelope addressed to you\nhas been lying before my eyes on my library table. I mention this to\nassure you that you have not been absent from my thoughts; but I will\nwaste no time or paper in making excuses. As the sage Emerson says, when\nyou visit a man do not degrade the occasion with apologies for not\nhaving visited him before. Visit him now! Make him feel that the highest\ntruth has come to see him in you its lowliest organ. I don't know about\nthe highest truth transpiring through this letter, but I feel as if\nthere were plenty of affection and personal gossip to express\nthemselves. To begin with, your photograph and Mrs. Flournoy's were\nsplendid. What we need now is the photographs of those fair\n_demoiselles_! I may say that one reason of my long silence has been the\nhope that when I wrote I should have my wife's photograph to send you.\nBut alas! it has not been taken yet. She is well, very well, and is now\nin our little New Hampshire country-place with the children, living very\nquietly and happily. We have had a rather large _train de maison_\nhitherto, and this summer we are shrunken to our bare essentials--a very\npleasant change.\n\nI, you see, am farther away from home than I have ever been before on\nthis side of the Atlantic, namely, in the state of Colorado, and just\nnow in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. I have been giving a course of\nsix lectures on psychology \"for teachers\" at a so-called \"summer-school\"\nin Colorado Springs. I had to remain for three nights and three days in\nthe train to get there, and it has made me understand the vastness of my\ndear native land better than I ever did before.... The trouble with all\nthis new civilization is that it is based, not on saving, but on\nborrowing; and when hard times come, as they did come three years ago,\neveryone goes bankrupt. But the vision of the future, the dreams of the\npossible, keep everyone enthusiastic, and so the work goes on. Such\nconditions have never existed before on so enormous a scale. But I must\nnot write you a treatise on national economy!--I got through the year\nvery well in regard to health, and gave in the course of it, what I had\nnever done before, a number of lectures to teachers in Boston and New\nYork. I also repeated my course in Cosmology in the new woman's College\nwhich has lately been established in connection with our University. The\nconsequence is that I laid by more than a thousand dollars, an\nabsolutely new and proportionately pleasant experience for me. To make\nup for it, I haven't had an idea or written anything to speak of except\nthe \"presidential address\" which I sent you, and which really contained\nnothing new....\n\nAnd now is not that enough gossip about ourselves? I wish I could, by\ntelephone, at this moment, hear just where and how you all are, and what\nyou are all doing. In the mountains somewhere, of course, and I trust\nall well; but it is perhaps fifteen or twenty years too soon for\ntransatlantic telephone. My surroundings here, so much like those of\nSwitzerland, bring you before me in a lively manner. I enclose a picture\nof one of the streets at Colorado Springs for Madame Flournoy, and\nanother one of a \"cowboy\" for that one of the _demoiselles_ who is most\n_romanesque_. Alice, Blanche--but I have actually gone and been and\nforgotten the name of the magnificent third one, whose resplendent face\nI so well remember notwithstanding. _Dulcissima mundi nomina_, all of\nthem; and I do hope that they are being educated in a thoroughly\nemancipated way, just like true American girls, with no laws except\nthose imposed by their own sense of fitness. I am sure it produces the\nbest results! How did the teaching go last year? I mean your own\nteaching. Have you started any new lines? And how is Chantre? and how\nRitter? And how Monsieur Gowd? Please give my best regards to all round,\nespecially to Ritter. Have you a copy left of your \"M\u00e9taphysique et\nPsychologie\"? In some inscrutable way my copy has disappeared, and the\nbook is reported _\u00e9puis\u00e9_.\n\nWith warmest possible regards to both of you, and to all five of the\ndescendants, believe me ever faithfully yours,\n\nW. JAMES.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Daughter._\n\n\nEL PASO, COLO., _Aug. 8, 1895_.\n\nSWEETEST OF LIVING Pegs,--Your letter made glad my heart the day before\nyesterday, and I marveled to see what an improvement had come over your\nhandwriting in the short space of six weeks. \"Orphly\" and \"ofly\" are\ngood ways to spell \"awfully,\" too. I went up a high mountain yesterday\nand saw all the kingdoms of the world spread out before me, on the\nillimitable prairie which looked like a map. The sky glowed and made the\nearth look like a stained-glass window. The mountains are bright red.\nAll the flowers and plants are different from those at home. There is an\nimmense mastiff in my house here. I think that even you would like him,\nhe is so tender and gentle and mild, although fully as big as a calf.\nHis ears and face are black, his eyes are yellow, his paws are\nmagnificent, his tail keeps wagging _all_ the time, and he makes on me\nthe impression of an angel hid in a cloud. He longs to do good.\n\nI must now go and hear two other men lecture. Many kisses, also to\nTweedy, from your ever loving,\n\nDAD.\n\n * * * * *\n\nOn December 17, 1895, President Cleveland's Venezuela message startled\nthe world and created a situation with which the next three letters are\nconcerned. The boundary dispute between Venezuela and British Guiana had\nbeen dragging along for years. The public had no reason to suppose that\nit was becoming acute, or that the United States was particularly\ninterested in it, and had, in fact, not been giving the matter so much\nas a thought. All at once the President sent a message to Congress in\nwhich he announced that it was incumbent upon the United States to \"take\nmeasures to determine ... the true\" boundary line, and then to \"resist\nby every means in its power as a willful aggression upon its rights and\ninterests\" any appropriation by Great Britain of territory not thus\ndetermined to be hers. In addition he sent to Congress, and thus\npublished, the diplomatic despatches which had already passed between\nMr. Olney and Lord Salisbury. In these Mr. Olney had informed the\nrepresentative of the Empire which was sovereign in British Guiana \"that\ndistance and three thousand miles of intervening ocean make any\npermanent political union between a European and an American state\nunnatural and inexpedient,\" and that \"today the United States is\npractically sovereign on this continent, and its fiat is law upon the\nsubjects to which it confines its interposition.\" Lord Salisbury had\nsquarely declined to concede that the United States could, of its own\ninitiative, assume to settle the boundary dispute. It was difficult to\nsee how either Great Britain or the United States could with dignity\nalter the position which its minister had assumed.\n\nJames was a warm admirer of the President, but this seemingly wanton\nprovocation of a friendly nation horrified him. He considered that no\nblunder in statesmanship could be more dangerous than a premature appeal\nto a people's fighting pride, and that no perils inherent in the\nVenezuela boundary dispute were as grave as was the danger that popular\nexplosions on one or both sides of the Atlantic would make it impossible\nfor the two governments to proceed moderately. He was appalled at the\noutburst of Anglophobia and war-talk which followed the message. The\nwar-cloud hung in the heavens for several weeks. Then, suddenly, a\nbreeze from a strange quarter relieved the atmosphere. The Jameson raid\noccurred in Africa, and the Kaiser sent his famous message to President\nKruger.[4] The English press turned its fire upon the Kaiser. The\nworld's attention was diverted from Venezuela, and the boundary dispute\nwas quietly and amicably disposed of.\n\n\n\n\n_To E. L. Godkin._\n\n\nCambridge, _Christmas Eve [1895]_.\n\nDARLING OLD GODKIN,--The only Christmas present I can send you is a word\nof thanks and a _bravo bravissimo_ for your glorious fight against the\npowers of darkness. I swear it brings back the days of '61 again, when\nthe worst enemies of our country were in our own borders. But now that\ndefervescence has set in, and the long, long campaign of discussion and\neducation is about to begin, you will have to bear the leading part in\nit, and I beseech you to be as non-expletive and patiently explanatory\nas you can, for thus will you be the more effective. Father, forgive\nthem for they know not what they do! The insincere propaganda of\njingoism as a mere weapon of attack on the President was diabolic. But\nin the rally of the country to the President's message lay that instinct\nof obedience to leaders which is the prime condition of all effective\ngreatness in a nation. And after all, when one thinks that the only\nEngland most Americans are taught to conceive of is the bugaboo\ncoward-England, ready to invade the Globe wherever there is no danger,\nthe rally does not necessarily show savagery, but only ignorance. We are\nall ready to be savage in _some_ cause. The difference between a good\nman and a bad one is the choice of the cause.\n\nTwo things are, however, _d\u00e9sormais_ certain: Three days of fighting\nmob-hysteria at Washington can at any time undo peace habits of a\nhundred years; and the only permanent safeguard against irrational\nexplosions of the fighting instinct is absence of armament and\nopportunity. Since this country has absolutely nothing to fear, or any\nother country anything to gain from its invasion, it seems to me that\nthe party of civilization ought immediately, at any cost of discredit,\nto begin to agitate against any increase of either army, navy, or coast\ndefense. That is the one form of protection against the internal enemy\non which we can most rely. We live and learn: the labor of civilizing\nourselves is for the next thirty years going to be complicated with this\nother abominable new issue of which the seed was sown last week. _You_\nsaw the new kind of danger, as you always do, before anyone else; but it\ngrew gigantic much more suddenly than even you conceived to be possible.\nOlney's Jefferson Brick style makes of our Foreign Office a\nlaughing-stock, of course. But why, oh why, couldn't he and Cleveland\nand Congress between them have left out the infernal war-threat and\nsimply asked for $100,000 for a judicial commission to enable us to see\nexactly to what effect we ought, in justice, to exert our influence.\nThat commission, if its decision were adverse, would have put England\n\"in a hole,\" awakened allies for us in all countries, been a solemn step\nforward in the line of national righteousness, covered us with dignity,\nand all the rest. But no--_omnia ademit una dies infesta tibi tot pr\u00e6mia\nvit\u00e6!_--Still, the campaign of education may raise us out of it all yet.\nDistrust of each other must not be suffered to go too far, for that way\nlies destruction.\n\nDear old Godkin--I don't know whether you will have read more than the\nfirst page--I didn't expect to write more than one and a half, but the\nsteam will work off. I haven't slept right for a week.\n\nI have just given my Harry, now a freshman, your \"Comments and\nReflections,\" and have been renewing my youth in some of its admirable\npages. But why the dickens did you leave out some of the most delectable\nof the old sentences in the cottager and boarder essay?[5]\n\nDon't curse God and die, dear old fellow. Live and be patient and fight\nfor us a long time yet in this new war. Best regards to Mrs. Godkin and\nto Lawrence, and a merry Christmas. Yours ever affectionately,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. W. H. Myers._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan. 1, 1896_.\n\nMY DEAR MYERS,--Here is a happy New Year to you with my presidential\naddress for a gift.[6] _Valeat quantum._ The end could have been\nexpanded, but probably this is enough to set the S. P. R. against a\nlofty _Kultur-historisch_ background; and where we have to do so much\nchamping of the jaws on minute details of cases, that seems to me a good\npoint in a president's address.\n\nIn the first half, it has just come over me that what I say of one line\nof fact being \"strengthened in the flank\" by another is an \"uprush\" from\nmy subliminal memory of words of Gurney's--but that does no harm....\n\nWell, our countries will soon be soaked in each other's gore. You will\nbe disemboweling me, and Hodgson cleaving Lodge's skull. It will be a\nwar of extermination when it comes, for neither side can tell when it is\nbeaten, and the last man will bury the penultimate one, and then die\nhimself. The French will then occupy England and the Spaniards America.\nBoth will unite against the Germans, and no one can foretell the end.\n\nBut seriously, all true patriots here have had a hell of a time. It has\nbeen a most instructive thing for the dispassionate student of history\nto see how near the surface in all of us the old fighting instinct lies,\nand how slight an appeal will wake it up. Once _really_ waked, there is\nno retreat. So the whole wisdom of governors should be to avoid the\ndirect appeals. This your European governments know; but we in our\nbottomless innocence and ignorance over here know nothing, and Cleveland\nin my opinion, by his explicit allusion to war, has committed the\nbiggest political crime I have ever seen here. The secession of the\nsouthern states had more excuse. There was absolutely no need of it. A\ncommission solemnly appointed to pronounce justice in the Venezuela case\nwould, if its decision were adverse to your country, have doubtless\naroused the Liberal party in England to espouse the policy of\narbitrating, and would have covered us with dignity, if no threat of war\nhad been uttered. But as it is, who can see the way out?\n\nEvery one goes about now saying war is not to be. But with these\nvolcanic forces who can tell? I suppose that the offices of Germany or\nItaly might in any case, however, save us from what would be the worst\ndisaster to civilization that our time could bring forth.\n\nThe astounding thing is the latent Anglophobia now revealed. It is most\nof it directly traceable to the diabolic machinations of the party of\nprotection for the past twenty years. They have lived by every sort of\ninfamous sophistication, and hatred of England has been one of their\nmost conspicuous notes....\n\nI hope _you'll_ read my address--unless indeed Gladstone will consent!!\n\nEver thine--I hate to think of \"embruing\" my hands in (or with?) your\nblood.\n\nW. J.\n\n[S. P. R.] _Proceedings XXIX_ just in--hurrah for your 200-odd pages!\n\nI have been ultra non-committal as to our evidence,--thinking it to be\ngood presidential policy,--but I may have overdone the impartiality\nbusiness.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. W. H. Myers._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb. 5, 1896_.\n\nDEAR MYERS,--_Voici_ the proof! Pray _send me a revise_--Cattell wants\nto print it simultaneously _in extenso_ in \"Science,\" which I judge to\nbe a very good piece of luck for it. When will the next \"Proceedings\" be\nlikely to appear?\n\nI hope your rich tones were those that rolled off its periods, and that\nyou didn't flinch, but rather raised your voice, when your own genius\nwas mentioned. I read it both in New York and Boston to full houses, but\nheard no comments on the spot....\n\nAs for Venezuela, Ach! of that be silent! as Carlyle would have said. It\nis a sickening business, but some good may come out of it yet. Don't\nfeel too badly about the Anglophobia here. It doesn't mean so much.\nRemember by what words the country was roused: \"Supine submission to\nwrong and injustice and the consequent loss of national self-respect and\nhonor.\"[7] If any other country's ruler had expressed himself with equal\nmoral ponderosity wouldn't the population have gone twice as\nfighting-mad as ours? Of course it would; the wolf would have been\naroused; and when the wolf once gets going, we know that there is no\ncrime of which it doesn't sincerely begin to believe its oppressor, the\nlamb down-stream, to be guilty. The great proof that civilization _does_\nmove, however, is the magnificent conduct of the British press. Yours\neverlastingly,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry Holt, Esq._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan. 19, 1896_.\n\nMY DEAR HOLT,--At the risk of displeasing you, I think I won't have my\nphotograph taken, even at no cost to myself. I abhor this hawking about\nof everybody's phiz which is growing on every hand, and don't see why\nhaving written a book should expose one to it. I am sorry that you\nshould have succumbed to the supposed trade necessity. In any case, I\nwill stand on my rights as a free man. You may kill me, but you shan't\npublish my photograph. Put a blank \"thumbnail\" in its place. Very very\nsorry to displease a man whom I love so much. Always lovingly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Class at Radcliffe College which had sent a potted azalea to\nhim at Easter._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 6, 1896_.\n\nDEAR YOUNG LADIES,--I am deeply touched by your remembrance. It is the\nfirst time anyone ever treated me so kindly, so you may well believe\nthat the impression on the heart of the lonely sufferer will be even\nmore durable than the impression on your minds of all the teachings of\nPhilosophy 2A. I now perceive one immense omission in my\nPsychology,--the deepest principle of Human Nature is the _craving to be\nappreciated_, and I left it out altogether from the book, because I had\nnever had it gratified till now. I fear you have let loose a demon in\nme, and that all my actions will now be for the sake of such rewards.\nHowever, I will try to be faithful to this one unique and beautiful\nazalea tree, the pride of my life and delight of my existence. Winter\nand summer will I tend and water it--even with my tears. Mrs. James\nshall never go near it or touch it. If it dies, I will die too; and if I\ndie, it shall be planted on my grave.\n\nDon't take all this too jocosely, but believe in the extreme pleasure\nyou have caused me, and in the affectionate feelings with which I am and\nshall always be faithfully your friend,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\n[Cambridge] _Apr. 17, 1896_.\n\nDEAR H.,--Too busy to live almost, lectures and laboratory, dentists and\ndinner-parties, so that I am much played out, but get off today for\neight days' vacation _via_ New Haven, where I deliver an \"address\"\ntonight, to the Yale Philosophy Club. I shall make it the title of a\nsmall volume of collected things called \"The Will to Believe, and Other\nEssays in Popular Philosophy,\" and then I think write no more addresses,\nof which the form takes it out of one unduly. If I do anything more, it\nwill be a book on general Philosophy. I have been having a bad\nconscience about not writing to you, when your letter of the 7th came\nyesterday expressing a bad conscience of your own. You certainly do your\nduty best. I am glad to think of you in the country and hope it will\nsucceed with you and make you thrive. I look forward with much\nexcitement to the fruit of all this work.... Just a word of good-will\nand good wish. I think I shall go to the Hot Springs of Virginia for\nnext week. The spring has burst upon us, hot and droughtily, after a\nglorious burly winter-playing March. Yours ever,\n\nW. J.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe next letter begins by acknowledging one which had alluded to the\ndeath of a Cambridge gentleman who had been run over in the street,\nalmost under William James's eyes. Henry James had closed his allusion\nby exclaiming, \"What melancholy, what terrible duties _vous incombent_\nwhen your neighbours are destroyed. And telling that poor man's\nwife!--Life _is_ heroic--however we 'fix' it! Even as I write these\nwords the St. Louis horror bursts in upon me in the evening paper.\nInconceivable--I can't try; and I _won't_. Strange how practically all\none's sense of news from the U. S. here is huge Horrors and\nCatastrophes. It's a terrible country _not_ to live in.\" He would have\nexclaimed even more if he had witnessed the mescal experiment, that is\nbriefly mentioned in the letter that follows. He might then have gone on\nto remark that the \"fixing\" of life seemed, in William's neighborhood,\nto be quite gratuitously heroic. William James and his wife and the\nyoungest child were alone in the Chocorua cottage for a few days,\npicnicking by themselves without any servant. They had no horse; at that\nseason of the year hours often went by without any one passing the\nhouse; there was no telephone, no neighbor within a mile, no good doctor\nwithin eighteen miles. It was quite characteristic of James that he\nshould think such conditions ideal for testing an unknown drug on\nhimself. There would be no interruptions. He had no fear. He was\nimpatient to satisfy his curiosity about the promised hallucinations of\ncolor. But the effects of one dose were, for a while, much more alarming\nthan his letter would give one to understand.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _June 11, 1896_.\n\nYour long letter of Whitsuntide week in London came yesterday evening,\nand was read by me aloud to Alice and Harry as we sat at tea in the\nwindow to get the last rays of the Sunday's [sun]. You have too much\nfeeling of duty about corresponding with us, and, I imagine, with\neveryone. I think you have behaved most handsomely of late--and always,\nand though your letters are the great _f\u00eate_ of our lives, I won't be\n\"on your mind\" for worlds. Your general feeling of unfulfilled\nobligations is one that runs in the family--I at least am often\nafflicted by it--but it is \"morbid.\" The horrors of _not_ living in\nAmerica, as you so well put it, are not shared by those who do live\nhere. All that the telegraph imparts are the shocks; the \"happy homes,\"\ngood husbands and fathers, fine weather, honest business men, neat new\nhouses, punctual meetings of engagements, etc., of which the country\nmainly consists, are never cabled over. Of course, the Saint Louis\ndisaster is dreadful, but it will very likely end by \"improving\" the\ncity. The really bad thing here is the silly wave that has gone over the\npublic mind--protection humbug, silver, jingoism, etc. It is a case of\n\"mob-psychology.\" Any country is liable to it if circumstances conspire,\nand our circumstances have conspired. It is very hard to get them out of\nthe rut. It _may_ take another financial crash to get them out--which,\nof course, will be an expensive method. It is no more foolish and\nconsiderably less damnable than the Russophobia of England, which would\nseem to have been responsible for the Armenian massacres. That to me is\nthe biggest indictment \"of our boasted civilization\"!! It _requires_\nEngland, I say nothing of the other powers, to maintain the Turks at\nthat business. We have let our little place, our tenant arrives the day\nafter tomorrow, and Alice and I and Tweedie have been here a week\nenjoying it and cleaning house and place. She has worked like a beaver.\nI had two days spoiled by a psychological experiment with _mescal_, an\nintoxicant used by some of our Southwestern Indians in their religious\nceremonies, a sort of cactus bud, of which the U. S. Government had\ndistributed a supply to certain medical men, including Weir Mitchell,\nwho sent me some to try. He had himself been \"in fairyland.\" It gives\nthe most glorious visions of color--every object thought of appears in a\njeweled splendor unknown to the natural world. It disturbs the stomach\nsomewhat, but that, according to W. M., was a cheap price, etc. I took\none bud three days ago, was violently sick for 24 hours, and had no\nother symptom whatever except that and the _Katzenjammer_ the following\nday. I will take the visions on trust!\n\nWe have had three days of delicious rain--it all soaks into the sandy\nsoil here and leaves no mud whatever. The little place is the most\ncurious mixture of sadness with delight. The sadness of _things_--things\nevery one of which was done either by our hands or by our planning, old\nfurniture renovated, there isn't an object in the house that isn't\nassociated with past life, old summers, dead people, people who will\nnever come again, etc., and the way it catches you round the heart when\nyou first come and open the house from its long winter sleep is most\nextraordinary.\n\nI have been reading Bourget's \"Idylle Tragique,\" which he very kindly\nsent me, and since then have been reading in Tolstoy's \"War and Peace,\"\nwhich I never read before, strange to say. I must say that T. rather\nkills B., for my mind. B.'s moral atmosphere is anyhow so foreign to me,\na lewdness so obligatory that it hardly seems as if it were part of a\nmoral _donn\u00e9e_ at all; and then his overlabored descriptions, and\nexcessive explanations. But with it all an earnestness and enthusiasm\nfor getting it said as well as possible, a richness of epithet, and a\nwarmth of heart that makes you like him, in spite of the unmanliness of\nall the things he writes about. I suppose there is a stratum in France\nto whom it is all manly and ideal, but he and I are, as Rosina says, a\nbad combination....\n\nTolstoy is immense!\n\nI am glad _you_ are in a writing vein again, to go still higher up the\nscale! I have abstained on principle from the \"Atlantic\" serial, wishing\nto get it all at once. I am not going abroad; I can't afford it. I have\na chance to give $1500 worth of summer lectures here, which won't recur.\nI have a heavy year of work next year, and shall very likely _need_ to\ngo the following summer, which will anyhow be after a more becoming\ninterval than this, so, _somme toute_, it is postponed. If I went I\nshould certainly enjoy seeing you at Rye more than in London, which I\nconfess tempts me little now. I love to _see_ it, but staying there\ndoesn't seem to agree with me, and only suggests constraint and\nmoney-spending, apart from seeing you. I wish you could see how\ncomfortable our Cambridge house has got at last to be. Alice who is\nupstairs sewing whilst I write below by the lamp--a great wood fire\nhissing in the fireplace--sings out her thanks and love to you....\n\n\n\n\n_To Benjamin Paul Blood._\n\n\nCHATHAM, MASS., _June 28, 1896_.\n\nMY DEAR BLOOD,--Your letter was an \"event,\" as anything always is from\nyour pen--though of course I never expected any acknowledgment of my\nbooklet. Fear of life in one form or other is the great thing to\nexorcise; but it isn't reason that will ever do it. Impulse without\nreason is enough, and reason without impulse is a poor makeshift. I take\nit that no man is educated who has never dallied with the thought of\nsuicide. Barely more than a year ago I was sitting at your table and\ndallying with the thought of publishing an anthology of your works. But,\nlike many other projects, it has been postponed in indefinition. The\nhour never came last year, and pretty surely will not come next.\nNevertheless I shall work for your fame some time! Count on W. J.[8] I\nwound up my \"seminary\" in speculative psychology a month ago by reading\nsome passages from the \"Flaw in Supremacy\"--\"game flavored as a hawk's\nwing.\" \"Ever not quite\" covers a deal of truth--yet it seems a very\nsimple thing to have said. \"There is no _Absolute_\" were my last words.\nWhereupon a number of students asked where they could get \"that\npamphlet\" and I distributed nearly all the copies I had from you. I wish\nyou would keep on writing, but I see you are a man of discontinuity and\ninsights, and not a philosophic pack-horse, or pack-mule....\n\nI rejoice that ten hours a day of toil makes you feel so hearty. Verily\nMr. Rindge says truly. He is a Cambridge boy, who made a fortune in\nCalifornia, and then gave a lot of public buildings to his native town.\nUnfortunately he insisted on bedecking them with \"mottoes\" of his own\ncomposition, and over the Manual Training School near my house one\nreads: \"_Work is one of our greatest blessings. Every man should have an\nhonest occupation_\"--which, if not lapidary in style, is at least what\nmy father once said. Swedenborg's writings were, viz., \"insipid with\nveracity,\" as your case now again demonstrates. Have you read Tolstoy's\n\"War and Peace\"? I am just about finishing it. It is undoubtedly the\ngreatest novel ever written--also insipid with veracity. The man is\ninfallible--and the anesthetic revelation[9] plays a part as in no\nwriter. You have very likely read it. If you haven't, sell all you have\nand buy the book, for I know it will speak to your very gizzard. Pray\nthank Mrs. Blood for her appreciation of my \"booklet\" (such things\nencourage a writer!), and believe me ever sincerely yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\nIn July, 1896, James delivered, in Buffalo and at the Chautauqua\nAssembly, the substance of the lectures that were later published as\n\"Talks to Teachers.\" His impressions of Chautauqua were so\ncharacteristic and so lively that they must be included here, even\nthough they duplicate in some measure a well-known passage in the essay\ncalled \"A Certain Blindness in Human Beings.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. James._\n\n\nCHAUTAUQUA, _July 23, 1896_.\n\n...The audience is some 500, in an open-air auditorium where (strange to\nsay) everyone seems to hear well; and it is very good-looking--mostly\nteachers and women, but they make the best impression of any audience of\nthat sort that I have seen except the Brooklyn one. So here I go\nagain!...\n\n\n_July 24_, 9.30 P.M.\n\n...X---- departed after breakfast--a good inarticulate man, farmer's\nboy, four years soldier from private to major, business man in various\nStates, great reader, editor of a \"Handbook of Facts,\" full of swelling\nand bursting _Weltschmerz_ and religious melancholy, yet no more\nflexibility or self-power in his mind than in a boot-jack. Altogether,\nwhat with the teachers, him and others whom I've met, I'm put in conceit\nof college training. It certainly gives glibness and flexibility, if it\ndoesn't give earnestness and depth. I've been meeting minds so earnest\nand helpless that it takes them half an hour to get from one idea to its\nimmediately adjacent next neighbor, and that with infinite creaking and\ngroaning. And when they've got to the next idea, they lie down on it\nwith their whole weight and can get no farther, like a cow on a\ndoor-mat, so that you can get neither in nor out with them. Still,\nglibness is not all. Weight is something, even cow-weight. Tolstoy feels\nthese things so--I am still in \"Anna Karenina,\" volume I, a book almost\nincredible and supernatural for veracity. I wish we were reading it\naloud together. It has rained at intervals all day. Young Vincent, a\npowerful fellow, took me over and into the whole vast college side of\nthe institution this A.M. I have heard 4-1/2 lectures, including the one\nI gave myself at 4 o'clock, to about 1200 or more in the vast open\namphitheatre, which seats 6000 and which has very good acoustic\nproperties. I think my voice sufficed. I can't judge of the effect. Of\ncourse I left out all that gossip about my medical degree, etc. But I\ndon't want any more sporadic lecturing--I must stick to more inward\nthings.\n\n\n_July 26_, 12:30 P.M.\n\n...'T is the sabbath and I am just in from the amphitheatre, where the\nRev.---- has been chanting, calling and bellowing his\nhour-and-a-quarter-long sermon to 6000 people at least--a sad audition.\nThe music was bully, a chorus of some 700, splendidly drilled, with the\naudience to help. I have myself been asked to lead, or, if not to lead,\nat least to do something prominent--I declined so quick that I didn't\nfully gather what it was--in the exercise which I have marked on the\nprogram I enclose. Young Vincent, whom I take to be a splendid young\nfellow, told me it was the characteristically \"Chautauquan\" event of the\nday. I would give anything to have you here. I didn't write yesterday\nbecause there is no mail till tomorrow. I went to four lectures, in\nwhole or in part. All to hundreds of human beings, a large proportion\nunable to get seats, who transport themselves from one lecture-room to\nanother _en masse_. One was on bread-making, with practical\ndemonstrations. One was on _walking_, by a graceful young Delsartian,\nwho showed us a lot. One was on telling stories to children, the\npsychology and pedagogy of it. The audiences interrupt and ask questions\noccasionally in spite of their size. There is hardly a pretty woman's\nface in the lot, and they seem to have little or no humor in their\ncomposition. No _epicureanism_ of any sort!\n\nYesterday was a beautiful day, and I sailed an hour and a half down the\nLake again to \"Celoron,\" \"America's greatest pleasure resort,\"--in other\nwords popcorn and peep-show place. A sort of Midway-Pleasance in the\nwilderness--supported Heaven knows how, so far from any human habitation\nexcept the odd little Jamestown from which a tramway leads to it. Good\nmonkeys, bears, foxes, etc. Endless peanuts, popcorn, bananas, and soft\ndrinks; crowds of people, a ferris wheel, a balloon ascension, with a\nman dropping by a parachute, a theatre, a vast concert hall, and all\nsorts of peep-shows. I feel as if I were in a foreign land; even as far\neast as this the accent of everyone is terrific. The \"Nation\" is no more\nknown than the London \"Times.\" I see no need of going to Europe when\nsuch wonders are close by. I breakfasted with a Methodist parson with 32\nfalse teeth, at the X's table, and discoursed of demoniacal possession.\nThe wife said she had my portrait in her bedroom with the words written\nunder it, \"I want to bring a balm to human lives\"!!!!! Supposed to be a\nquotation from me!!! After breakfast an extremely interesting lady who\nhas suffered from half-possessional insanity gave me a long account of\nher case. Life _is_ heroic indeed, as Harry wrote. I shall stay through\ntomorrow, and get to Syracuse on Tuesday....\n\n\n_July 27._\n\n...It rained hard last night, and today a part of the time. I took a\nlesson in roasting, in Delsarte, and I made with my own fair hands a\nbeautiful loaf of graham bread with some rolls, long, flute-like, and\ndelicious. I should have sent them to you by express, only it seemed\nunnecessary, since I can keep the family in bread easily after my return\nhome. Please tell this, with amplifications, to Peggy and Tweedy....\n\n\nBUFFALO, N.Y., _July 29_.\n\n...The Chautauqua week, or rather six and a half days, has been a real\nsuccess. I have learned a lot, but I'm glad to get into something less\nblameless but more admiration-worthy. The flash of a pistol, a dagger,\nor a devilish eye, anything to break the unlovely level of 10,000 good\npeople--a crime, murder, rape, elopement, anything would do. I don't see\nhow the younger Vincents stand it, because they are people of such\nspirit....\n\n\nSYRACUSE, N.Y., _July 31_.\n\n...Now for Utica and Lake Placid by rail, with East Hill in prospect for\ntomorrow. You bet I rejoice at the outlook--I long to escape from\ntepidity. Even an Armenian massacre, whether to be killer or killed,\nwould seem an agreeable change from the blamelessness of Chautauqua as\nshe lies soaking year after year in her lakeside sun and showers. Man\nwants to be _stretched_ to his utmost, if not in one way then in\nanother!...\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Rosina H. Emmet._\n\n\nBURLINGTON, VT., _Aug. 2, 1896_.\n\n...I have seen more women and less beauty, heard more voices and less\nsweetness, perceived more earnestness and less triumph than I ever\nsupposed possible. Most of the American nation (and probably all\nnations) is white-trash,--but Tolstoy has borne me up--and I say unto\n_you_: \"_Smooth out your voices_ if you want to be saved\"!!...\n\n\n\n\n_To Charles Renouvier._\n\n\nBURLINGTON, VT., _Aug. 4, 1896_.\n\nDEAR MR. RENOUVIER,--My wife announces to me from Cambridge the\nreception of two immense volumes from you on the Philosophy of History.\nI thank you most heartily for the gift, and am more and more amazed at\nyour intellectual and moral power--physical power, too, for the nervous\nenergy required for your work has to be extremely great.\n\nMy own nervous energy is a small teacup-full, and is more than consumed\nby my duties of teaching, so that almost none is left over for writing.\nI sent you a \"New World\" the other day, however, with an article in it\ncalled \"The Will to Believe,\" in which (if you took the trouble to\nglance at it) you probably recognized how completely I am still your\ndisciple. In this point perhaps more fully than in any other; and this\npoint is central!\n\nI have to lecture on general \"psychology\" and \"morbid psychology,\" \"the\nphilosophy of nature\" and the \"philosophy of Kant,\" thirteen lectures a\nweek for half the year and eight for the rest. Our University moreover\ninflicts a monstrous amount of routine business on one, faculty meetings\nand committees of every sort,[10] so that during term-time one can do no\ncontinuous reading at all--reading of books, I mean. When vacation\ncomes, my brain is so tired that I can read nothing serious for a month.\nDuring the past month I have only read Tolstoy's two great novels,\nwhich, strange to say, I had never attacked before. I don't like his\nfatalism and semi-pessimism, but for infallible veracity concerning\nhuman nature, and absolute simplicity of method, he makes all the other\nwriters of novels and plays seem like children.\n\nAll this proves that I shall be slow in attaining to the reading of your\nbook. I have not yet read Pillon's last _Ann\u00e9e_ except some of the book\nnotices and Danriac's article. How admirably clear P. is in style, and\nwhat a power of reading he possesses.\n\nI hope, dear Mr. Renouvier, that the years are not weighing heavily upon\nyou, and that this letter will find you well in body and in mind. Yours\ngratefully and faithfully,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nLAKE GENEVA, WISCONSIN, _Aug. 30, 1896_.\n\nMY DEAR FLOURNOY,--You see the electric current of sympathy that binds\nthe world together--I turn towards you, and the place I write from\nrepeats the name of your Lake Leman. I was informed yesterday, however,\nthat the lake here was named after Lake Geneva _in the State of New\nYork_! and _that_ Lake only has Leman for its Godmother. Still you see\nhow dependent, whether immediately or remotely, America is on Europe. I\nwas at Niagara some three weeks ago, and bought a photograph as souvenir\nand addressed it to you after getting back to Cambridge. Possibly Madame\nFlournoy will deign to accept it. I have thought of you a great deal\nwithout writing, for truly, my dear Flournoy, there is hardly a human\nbeing with whom I feel as much sympathy of aims and character, or feel\nas much \"at home,\" as I do with you. It is as if we were of the same\nstock, and I often mentally turn and make a remark to you, which the\npressure of life's occupations prevents from ever finding its way to\npaper.\n\nI am hoping that you may have figured, or at any rate _been_, at the\nMunich \"Congress\"--that apparently stupendous affair. If they keep\ngrowing at this rate, the next Paris one will be altogether too heavy. I\nhave heard no details of the meeting as yet. But whether you have been\nat Munich or not, I trust that you have been having a salubrious and\nhappy vacation so far, and that Mrs. Flournoy and the young people are\nall well. I will venture to suppose that your illness of last year has\nleft no bad effects whatever behind. I myself have had a rather busy and\ninstructive, though possibly not very hygienic summer, making money (in\nmoderate amounts) by lecturing on psychology to teachers at different\n\"summer schools\" in this land. There is a great fermentation in\n\"p\u00e6dagogy\" at present in the U.S., and my wares come in for their share\nof patronage. But although I learn a good deal and become a better\nAmerican for having all the travel and social experience, it has ended\nby being too tiresome; and when I give the lectures at Chicago, which I\nbegin tomorrow, I shall have them stenographed and very likely published\nin a very small volume, and so remove from myself the temptation ever to\ngive them again.\n\nLast year was a year of hard work, and before the end of the term came,\nI was in a state of bad neurasthenic fatigue, but I got through\noutwardly all right. I have definitely given up the laboratory, for\nwhich I am more and more unfit, and shall probably devote what little\nability I may hereafter have to purely \"speculative\" work. My inability\nto read troubles me a good deal: I am in arrears of several years with\npsychological literature, which, to tell the truth, does grow now at a\npace too rapid for anyone to follow. I was engaged to review Stout's new\nbook (which I fancy is very good) for \"Mind,\" and after keeping it two\nmonths had to back out, from sheer inability to read it, and to ask\npermission to hand it over to my colleague Royce. Have you seen the\ncolossal Renouvier's two vast volumes on the philosophy of\nhistory?--that will be another thing worth reading no doubt, yet very\ndifficult to read. I give a course in Kant for the first time in my life\n(!) next year, and at present and for many months to come shall have to\nput most of my reading to the service of that overgrown subject....\n\nOf course you have read Tolstoy's \"War and Peace\" and \"Anna Karenina.\" I\nnever had that exquisite felicity before this summer, and now I feel as\nif I knew _perfection_ in the representation of human life. Life indeed\nseems less real than his tale of it. Such infallible veracity! The\nimpression haunts me as nothing literary ever haunted me before.\n\nI imagine you lounging on some steep mountainside, with those\ndemoiselles all grown too tall and beautiful and proud to think\notherwise than with disdain of their elderly _commensal_ who spoke such\ndifficult French when he took walks with them at Vers-chez-les-Blanc.\nBut I hope that they are happy as they were then. Cannot we all pass\nsome summer near each other again, and can't it next time be in Tyrol\nrather than in Switzerland, for the purpose of increasing in all of us\nthat \"knowledge of the world\" which is so desirable? I think it would be\na splendid plan. At any rate, wherever you are, take my most\naffectionate regards for yourself and Madame Flournoy and all of yours,\nand believe me ever sincerely your friend,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nLAKE GENEVA, WISCONSIN, _Aug. 30, 1896_.\n\nDEAR MILLER,--Your letter from Halle of June 22nd came duly, but\ntreating of things eternal as it did, I thought it called for no reply\ntill I should have caught up with more temporal matters, of which there\nhas been no lack to press on my attention. To tell the truth, regarding\nyou as my most penetrating critic and intimate enemy, I was greatly\nrelieved to find that you had nothing worse to say about \"The Will to\nBelieve.\" You say you are no \"rationalist,\" and yet you speak of the\n\"sharp\" distinction between beliefs based on \"inner evidence\" and\nbeliefs based on \"craving.\" I can find _nothing_ sharp (or susceptible\nof schoolmaster's codification) in the different degrees of \"liveliness\"\nin hypotheses concerning the universe, or distinguish _a priori_ between\nlegitimate and illegitimate cravings. And when an hypothesis _is_ once a\nlive one, one _risks_ something in one's practical relations towards\ntruth and error, _whichever_ of the three positions (affirmation, doubt,\nor negation) one may take up towards it. _The individual himself is the\nonly rightful chooser of his risk._ Hence respectful toleration, as the\nonly law that logic can lay down.\n\nYou don't say a word against my _logic_, which seems to me to cover your\ncases entirely in its compartments. I class you as one to whom the\nreligious hypothesis is _von vornherein_ so dead, that the risk of error\nin espousing it now far outweighs for you the chance of truth, so you\nsimply stake your money on the field as against it. If you _say_ this,\nof course I can, as logician, have no quarrel with you, even though my\nown choice of risk (determined by the irrational impressions,\nsuspicions, cravings, senses of direction in nature, or what not, that\nmake religion for me a more live hypothesis than for you) leads me to an\nopposite methodical decision.\n\nOf course if any one comes along and says that men at large don't need\nto have facility of faith in their inner convictions preached to them,\n[that] they have only too much readiness in that way already, and the\none thing needful to preach is that they should hesitate with their\nconvictions, and take their faiths out for an airing into the howling\nwilderness of nature, I should also agree. But my paper wasn't addressed\nto mankind at large but to a limited set of studious persons, badly\nunder the ban just now of certain authorities whose simple-minded faith\nin \"naturalism\" also is sorely in need of an airing--and an airing, as\nit seems to me, of the sort I tried to give.\n\nBut all this is unimportant; and I still await criticism of my\n_Auseinandersetzung_ of the _logical situation_ of man's mind\n_gegen\u00fcber_ the Universe, in respect to the risks it runs.\n\nI wish I could have been with you at Munich and heard the deep-lunged\nGermans roar at each other. I care not for the matters uttered, if I\nonly could hear the voice. I hope you met [Henry] Sidgwick there. I sent\nhim the American Hallucination-Census results, after considerable toil\nover them, but S. never acknowledges or answers anything, so I'll have\nto wait to hear from someone else whether he \"got them off.\" I have had\na somewhat unwholesome summer. Much lecturing to teachers and sitting up\nto talk with strangers. But it is instructive and makes one patriotic,\nand in six days I shall have finished the Chicago lectures, which begin\ntomorrow, and get straight to Keene Valley for the rest of September. My\nconditions just now are materially splendid, as I am the guest of a\ncharming elderly lady, Mrs. Wilmarth, here at her country house, and in\ntown at the finest hotel of the place. The political campaign is a bully\none. Everyone outdoing himself in sweet reasonableness and persuasive\nargument--hardly an undignified note anywhere. It shows the deepening\nand elevating influence of a big topic of debate. It is difficult to\ndoubt of a people part of whose life such an experience is. But imagine\nthe country being saved by a McKinley! If only Reed had been the\ncandidate! There have been some really splendid speeches and\ndocuments....\n\nEver thine,\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nBURLINGTON, VT., _Sept. 28, 1896_.\n\nDEAR HENRY,--The summer is over! alas! alas! I left Keene Valley this\nA.M. where I have had three life-and-health-giving weeks in the forest\nand the mountain air, crossed Lake Champlain in the steamer, not a cloud\nin the sky, and sleep here tonight, meaning to take the train for Boston\nin the A.M. and read Kant's Life all day, so as to be able to lecture on\nit when I first meet my class. School begins on Thursday--this being\nMonday night. It has been a rather cultivating summer for me, and an\nactive one, of which the best impression (after that of the Adirondack\nwoods, or even before it) was that of the greatness of Chicago. It needs\na Victor Hugo to celebrate it. But as you won't appreciate it without\ndemonstration, and I can't give the demonstration (at least not now and\non paper), I will say no more on that score! Alice came up for a week,\nbut went down and through last night. She brought me up your letter of I\ndon't remember now what date (after your return to London, about Wendell\nHolmes, Baldwin and Royalty, etc.) which was very delightful and for\nwhich I thank. But don't take your epistolary duties hard!\nLetter-writing becomes to me more and more of an affliction, I get so\nmany business letters now. At Chicago, I tried a stenographer and\ntype-writer with an alleviation that seemed almost miraculous. I think\nthat I shall have to go in for one some hours a week in Cambridge. It\njust goes \"whiff\" and six or eight long letters are _done_, so far as\nyou're concerned. I hear great reports of your \"old things,\" and await\nthe book. My great literary impression this summer has been Tolstoy. On\nthe whole his atmosphere absorbs me into it as no one's else has ever\ndone, and even his religious and melancholy stuff, his insanity, is\nprobably more significant than the sanity of men who haven't been\nthrough that phase at all.\n\nBut I am forgetting to tell you (strange to say, since it has hung over\nme like a cloud ever since it happened) of dear old Professor Child's\ndeath. We shall never see his curly head and thickset figure more. He\nhad aged greatly in the past three years, since being thrown out of a\ncarriage, and went to the hospital in July to be treated surgically. He\nnever recovered and died in three weeks, after much suffering, his\nfamily not being called down from the country till the last days. He had\na moral delicacy and a richness of heart that I never saw and never\nexpect to see equaled.[1] The children bear it well, but I fear it will\nbe a bad blow for dear Mrs. Child. She and Alice, I am glad to say, are\ngreat friends.... Good-night. _Leb' wohl!_\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\n\n1893-1899 (CONTINUED)\n\n\n _The Will to Believe--Talks to Teachers--Defense of Mental\n Healers--Excessive Climbing in the Adirondacks_\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n[Dictated]\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 7, 1896_.\n\nMY DEAR FLOURNOY,--Your altogether precious and delightful letter\nreached me duly, and you see I am making a not altogether too dilatory\nreply. In the first place, we congratulate you upon the new-comer, and\nthink if she only proves as satisfactory a damsel as her charming elder\nsisters, you will never have any occasion to regret that she is not a\nboy. I hope that Madame Flournoy is by this time thoroughly strong and\nwell, and that everything is perfect with the baby. I should like to\nhave been at Munich with you; I have heard a good many accounts of the\njollity of the proceedings there, but on the whole I did a more\nwholesome thing to stay in my own country, of which the dangers and dark\nsides are singularly exaggerated in Europe.\n\nYour lamentations on your cerebral state make me smile, knowing, as I\ndo, under all your subjective feelings, how great your vigor is. Of\ncourse I sympathize with you about the laboratory, and advise you, since\nit seems to me you are in a position to make conditions rather than have\nthem imposed on you, simply to drop it and teach what you prefer.\nWhatever the latter may be, it will be as good for the students as if\nthey had something else from you in its place, and I see no need in this\nworld, when there is someone provided somewhere to do everything, for\nanyone of us to do what he does least willingly and well.\n\n_I_ have got rid of the laboratory forever, and should resign my place\nimmediately if they reimposed its duties upon me. The results that come\nfrom all this laboratory work seem to me to grow more and more\ndisappointing and trivial. What is most needed is new ideas. For every\nman who has one of them one may find a hundred who are willing to drudge\npatiently at some unimportant experiment. The atmosphere of your mind is\nin an extraordinary degree sane and balanced on philosophical matters.\nThat is where your forte lies, and where your University ought to see\nthat its best interests lie in having you employed. Don't consider this\nadvice impertinent. Your temperament is such that I think you need to be\nstrengthened from without in asserting your right to carry out your true\nvocation.\n\nEverything goes well with us here. The boys are developing finely; both\nof them taller than I am, and Peggy healthy and well. I have just been\ngiving a course of public lectures of which I enclose you a ticket to\namuse you.[11] The audience, a thousand in number, kept its numbers to\nthe last. I was careful not to tread upon the domains of psychical\nresearch, although many of my hearers were eager that I should do so. _I\nam teaching Kant for the first time in my life_, and it gives me much\nsatisfaction. I am also sending a collection of old essays through the\npress, of which I will send you a copy as soon as they appear; I am sure\nof your sympathy in advance for much of their contents. But I am afraid\nthat what you never will appreciate is their wonderful English style!\nShakespeare is a little street-boy in comparison!\n\nOur political crisis is over, but the hard times still endure. Lack of\nconfidence is a disease from which convalescence is not quick. I doubt,\nnotwithstanding certain appearances, whether the country was ever\nmorally in as sound a state as it now is, after all this discussion. And\nthe very silver men, who have been treated as a party of dishonesty, are\nanything but that. They very likely are victims of the economic\ndelusion, but their intentions are just as good as those of the other\nside....\n\nIf you meet my friend Ritter, please give him my love. I shall write to\nyou again ere long _eigenh\u00e4ndig_. Meanwhile believe me, with lots of\nlove to you all, especially to _ces demoiselles_, and felicitations to\ntheir mother, Always yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\nMy wife wishes to convey to Madame Flournoy her most loving regards and\nhopes for the little one.\n\n * * * * *\n\nJames had already been invited to deliver a course of \"Gifford Lectures\non Natural Religion\" at the University of Edinburgh. He had not yet\naccepted for a definite date; but he had begun to collect illustrative\nmaterial for the proposed lectures. A large number of references to such\nmaterial were supplied to him by Mr. Henry W. Rankin of East\nNorthfield.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry W. Rankin._\n\n\nNEWPORT, R.I., _Feb. 1, 1897_.\n\nDEAR MR. RANKIN,--A pause in lecturing, consequent upon our midyear\nexaminations having begun, has given me a little respite, and I am\npaying a three-days' visit upon an old friend here, meaning to leave for\nNew York tomorrow where I have a couple of lectures to give. It is an\nagreeable moment of quiet and enables me to write a letter or two which\nI have long postponed, and chiefly one to you, who have given me so much\nwithout asking anything in return.\n\nOne of my lectures in New York is at the Academy of Medicine before the\nNeurological Society, the subject being \"Demoniacal Possession.\" I shall\nof course duly advertise the Nevius book.[12] I am not as positive as\nyou are in the belief that the obsessing agency is really demonic\nindividuals. I am perfectly willing to adopt that theory if the facts\nlend themselves best to it; for who can trace limits to the hierarchies\nof personal existence in the world? But the lower stages of mere\nautomatism shade off so continuously into the highest supernormal\nmanifestations, through the intermediary ones of imitative hysteria and\n\"suggestibility,\" that I feel as if no _general theory_ as yet would\ncover all the facts. So that the most I shall plead for before the\nneurologists is the recognition of demon possession as a regular\n\"morbid-entity\" whose commonest homologue today is the \"spirit-control\"\nobserved in test-mediumship, and which tends to become the more\nbenignant and less alarming, the less pessimistically it is regarded.\nThis last remark seems certainly to be true. Of course I shall not\nignore the sporadic cases of old-fashioned malignant possession which\nstill occur today. I am convinced that we stand with all these things\nat the threshold of a long inquiry, of which the end appears as yet to\nno one, least of all to myself. And I believe that the best theoretic\nwork yet done in the subject is the beginning made by F. W. H. Myers in\nhis papers in the S. P. R. Proceedings. The first thing is to start the\nmedical profession out of its idiotically _conceited ignorance_ of all\nsuch matters--matters which have everywhere and at all times played a\nvital part in human history.\n\nYou have written me at different times about conversion, and about\nmiracles, getting as usual no reply, but not because I failed to heed\nyour words, which come from a deep life-experience of your own\nevidently, and from a deep acquaintance with the experiences of others.\nIn the matter of conversion I am quite willing to believe that a new\ntruth may be supernaturally revealed to a subject when he really _asks_.\nBut I am sure that in many cases of conversion it is less a new truth\nthan a new power gained over life by a truth always known. It is a case\nof the conflict of two _self-systems_ in a personality up to that time\nheterogeneously divided, but in which, after the conversion-crisis, the\nhigher loves and powers come definitively to gain the upper-hand and\nexpel the forces which up to that time had kept them down in the\nposition of mere grumblers and protesters and agents of remorse and\ndiscontent. This broader view will cover an enormous number of cases\n_psychologically_, and leaves all the _religious importance_ to the\nresult which it has on any other theory.\n\nAs to true and false miracles, I don't know that I can follow you so\nwell, for in any case the notion of a miracle as a mere attestation of\nsuperior power is one that I cannot espouse. A miracle must in any case\nbe an expression of personal purpose, but the demon-purpose of\nantagonizing God and winning away his adherents has never yet taken\nhold of my imagination. I prefer an open mind of inquiry, first _about\nthe facts_, in all these matters; and I believe that the S. P. R.\nmethods, if pertinaciously stuck to, will eventually do much to clear\nthings up.--You see that, although religion is the great interest of my\nlife, I am rather hopelessly non-evangelical, and take the whole thing\ntoo impersonally.\n\nBut my College work is lightening in a way. Psychology is being handed\nover to others more and more, and I see a chance ahead for reading and\nstudy in other directions from those to which my very feeble powers in\nthat line have hitherto been confined. I am going to give all the\nfragments of time I can get, after this year is over, to religious\nbiography and philosophy. Shield's book, Steenstra's, Gratry's, and\nHarris's, I don't yet know, but can easily get at them.\n\nI hope your health is better in this beautiful winter which we are\nhaving. I am very well, and so is all my family. Believe me, with\naffectionate regards, truly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Benjamin Paul Blood._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 28, 1897_.\n\nDEAR BLOOD,--Your letter is delectable. From your not having yet\nacknowledged the book,[13] I began to wonder whether you had got it, but\nthis acknowledgment is almost too good. Your thought is\nobscure--lightning flashes darting gleams--but that's the way truth is.\nAnd altho' I \"put pluralism in the place of philosophy,\" I do it only so\nfar as philosophy means the articulate and the scientific. Life and\nmysticism exceed the articulable, and if there is a _One_ (and surely\nmen will never be weaned from the idea of it), it must remain only\nmystically expressed.\n\nI have been roaring over and quoting some of the passages of your\nletter, in which my wife takes as much delight as I do. As for your\nstrictures on my English, I accept them humbly. I have a tendency\ntowards too great colloquiality, I know, and I trust your sense of\nEnglish better than any man's in the country. I have a fearful job on\nhand just now: an address on the unveiling of a military statue. Three\nthousand people, governor and troops, etc. Why they fell upon me, God\nknows; but being challenged, I could not funk. The task is a mechanical\none, and the result somewhat of a school-boy composition. If I thought\nit wouldn't bore you, I should send you a copy for you to go carefully\nover and correct or rewrite as to the English. I should probably adopt\nevery one of your corrections. What do you say to this? Yours ever,\n\nWm. James.\n\n_P.S._ Please don't betitle _me_!\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe \"copy\" which was offered for correction with so much humility was\nthe \"Oration\" on the unveiling of St. Gaudens's monument to Colonel\nRobert Gould Shaw of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry (the first colored\nregiment). James was quite accustomed to lecturing from brief notes and\nto reading from a complete manuscript; but on this occasion he thought\nit necessary to commit his address to memory. He had never done this\nbefore and he never tried to do it again. He memorized with great\ndifficulty, found himself placed in an entirely unfamiliar relation to\nhis audience, and felt as much nervous trepidation as any inexperienced\nspeaker.[14]\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCambridge, _June 5, 1897_.\n\nDEAR H.,--Alice wrote you (I think) a brief word after the crisis of\nlast Monday. It took it out of me nervously a good deal, for it came at\nthe end of the month of May, when I am always fagged to death; and for a\nweek previous I had almost lost my voice with hoarseness. At nine\no'clock the night before I ran in to a laryngologist in Boston, who\nsprayed and cauterized and otherwise tuned up my throat, giving me\npellets to suck all the morning. By a sort of miracle I spoke for\nthree-quarters of an hour without becoming perceptibly hoarse. But it is\na curious kind of physical effort to fill a hall as large as Boston\nMusic Hall, unless you are trained to the work. You have to shout and\nbellow, and you seem to yourself wholly unnatural. The day was an\nextraordinary occasion for sentiment. The streets were thronged with\npeople, and I was toted around for two hours in a barouche at the tail\nend of the procession. There were seven such carriages in all, and I had\nthe great pleasure of being with St. Gaudens, who is a most charming and\nmodest man. The weather was cool and the skies were weeping, but not\nenough to cause any serious discomfort. They simply formed a harmonious\nbackground to the pathetic sentiment that reigned over the day. It was\nvery peculiar, and people have been speaking about it ever since--the\nlast wave of the war breaking over Boston, everything softened and made\npoetic and unreal by distance, poor little Robert Shaw erected into a\ngreat symbol of deeper things than he ever realized himself,--\"the\ntender grace of a day that is dead,\"--etc. We shall never have anything\nlike it again. The monument is really superb, certainly one of the\nfinest things of this century. Read the darkey [Booker T.] Washington's\nspeech, a model of elevation and brevity. The thing that struck me most\nin the day was the faces of the old 54th soldiers, of whom there were\nperhaps about thirty or forty present, with such respectable old darkey\nfaces, the heavy animal look entirely absent, and in its place the\nwrinkled, patient, good old darkey citizen.\n\nAs for myself, I will never accept such a job again. It is entirely\noutside of my legitimate line of business, although my speech seems to\nhave been a great success, if I can judge by the encomiums which are\npouring in upon me on every hand. I brought in some mugwumpery at the\nend, but it was very difficult to manage it.... Always affectionately\nyours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n * * * * *\n\nLetters to Ellen and Rosina Emmet, which now enter the series, will be\nthe better understood for a word of reminder. \"Elly\" Temple, one of the\nNewport cousins referred to in the very first letters, had married, and\ngone with her husband, Temple Emmet, to California. But in 1887, after\nhis death, she had returned to the East to place her daughters in a\nCambridge school. In 1895 and 1896 Ellen and Rosina had made several\nvisits to the house in Irving Street; and thus the comradely cousinship\nof the sixties had been maintained and re\u00ebstablished with the younger\ngeneration. At the date now reached, Ellen, or \"Bay\" as she was usually\ncalled, was studying painting. She and Rosina had been in Paris during\nthe preceding winter. Now they and their mother were spending the summer\non the south coast of England, at Iden, quite close to Rye, where Henry\nJames was already becoming established.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Ellen Emmet (Mrs. Blanchard Rand)._\n\n\nBAR HARBOR, ME., _Aug. 11, 1897_.\n\nDEAR OLD BAY (and DEAR ROSINA),--For I have letters from both of you and\nmy heart inclines to both so that I can't write to either without the\nother--I hope you are enjoying the English coast. A rumor reached me not\nlong since that my brother Henry had given up his trip to the Continent\nin order to be near to you, and I hope for the sakes of all concerned\nthat it is true. He will find in you both that eager and vivid artistic\nsense, and that direct swoop at the vital facts of human character from\nwhich I am sure he has been weaned for fifteen years at least. And I am\nsure it will rejuvenate him again. It is more Celtic than English, and\nwhen joined with those faculties of soul, conscience, or whatever they\nbe that make England rule the waves, as they are joined in you, Bay,\nthey leave no room for any anxiety about the creature's destiny. But\nRosina, who is all senses and intelligence, alarms me by her recital of\nmidnight walks on the Boulevard des Italiens with bohemian artists....\nYou can't live by gaslight and excitement, nor can naked intelligence\nrun a _jeune fille's_ life. Affections, pieties, and prejudices must\nplay their part, and only let the intelligence get an occasional peep at\nthings from the midst of their smothering embrace. That again is what\nmakes the British nation so great. Intelligence doesn't flaunt itself\nthere quite naked as in France.\n\nAs for the MacMonnies Bacchante,[15] I only saw her faintly looming\nthrough the moon-light one night when she was _sub judice_, so can frame\nno opinion. The place certainly calls for a lightsome capricious figure,\nbut the solemn Boston mind declared that anything but a solemn figure\nwould be desecration. As to her immodesty, opinions got very hot. My\nknowledge of MacMonnies is confined to one statue, that of Sir Henry\nVane, also in our Public Library, an impressionist sketch in bronze (I\nthink), sculpture treated like painting--and I must say I don't admire\nthe result _at all_. But you _know_; and I wish I could see other things\nof his also. How I wish I could _talk_ with Rosina, or rather hear her\ntalk, about Paris, _talk in her French_ which I doubt not is by this\ntime admirable. The only book she has vouchsafed news of having read, to\nme, is the d'Annunzio one, which I have ordered in most choice Italian;\nbut of Lema\u00eetre, France, etc., she writes never a word. Nor of V. Hugo.\nShe ought to read \"La L\u00e9gende des Si\u00e8cles.\" For the picturesque pure and\nsimple, go there! laid on with a trowel so generous that you really get\nyour glut. But the things in French literature that I have gained most\nfrom--the next most to Tolstoy, in the last few years--are the whole\ncycle of Geo. Sand's life: her \"Histoire,\" her letters, and now lately\nthese revelations of the de Musset episode. The whole thing is beautiful\nand uplifting--an absolute \"liver\" harmoniously leading her own life and\n_neither_ obedient nor defiant to what others expected or thought.\n\nWe are passing the summer very quietly at Chocorua, with our bare feet\non the ground. Children growing up bullily, a pride to the parental\nheart.... Alice and I have just spent a rich week at North Conway, at a\nbeautiful \"place,\" the Merrimans'. I am now here at a really grand\nplace, the Dorrs'--tell Rosina that I went to a domino party last night\nbut was so afraid that some one of the weird and sinister sisters would\nspeak to me that I came home at 12 o'clock, when it had hardly begun. I\nam so sensitive! Tell her that a lady from Michigan was recently shown\nthe sights of Cambridge by one of my Radcliffe girls. She took her to\nthe Longfellow house, and as the visitor went into the gate, said, \"I\nwill just wait here.\" To her surprise, the visitor went up to the house,\nlooked in to one window after the other, then rang the bell, and the\ndoor closed upon her. She soon emerged, and said that the servant had\nshown her the house. \"I'm so sensitive that at first I thought I would\nonly peep in at the windows. But then I said to myself, 'What's the use\nof being so sensitive?' So I rang the bell.\"\n\nPray be happy this summer. I see nothing more of Rosina's in the papers.\nHow is that sort of thing going on?... As for your mother, give her my\nold-fashioned love. For some unexplained reason, I find it very hard to\nwrite to her--probably it is the same reason that makes it hard for her\nto write to me--so we can sympathize over so strange a mystery. Anyhow,\ngive her my best love, and with plenty for yourself, old Bay, and for\nRosina, believe me, yours ever,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To E. L. Godkin._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _Aug. 17, 1897_.\n\nDEAR GODKIN,--Thanks for your kind note _in re_ \"Will to Believe.\" I\nsuppose you expect as little a reply to it as I expected one from you to\nthe book; but since you ask what I _du_ mean by Religion, and add that\nuntil I define that word my essay cannot be effective, I can't forbear\nsending you a word to clear up that point. I mean by religion for a man\n_anything_ that for _him_ is a live hypothesis in that line, altho' it\nmay be a dead one for anyone else. And what I try to show is that\nwhether the man believes, disbelieves, or doubts his hypothesis, the\nmoment he does either, on principle and methodically, he runs a risk of\none sort or the other from his own point of view. There is no escaping\nthe risk; why not then admit that one's human function is to run it? By\nsettling down on that basis, and respecting each other's choice of risk\nto run, it seems to me that we should be in a clearer-headed condition\nthan we now are in, postulating as most all of us do a rational\ncertitude which doesn't exist and disowning the semi-voluntary mental\naction by which we continue in our own severally characteristic\nattitudes of belief. Since our willing natures are active here, why not\nface squarely the fact without humbug and get the benefits of the\nadmission?\n\nI passed a day lately with the [James] Bryces at Bar Harbor, and we\nspoke--not altogether unkindly--of you. I hope you are enjoying, both of\nyou, the summer. All goes well with us. Yours always truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller_ [Corpus Christi, Oxford].\n\n\nCambridge, _Oct. 23, 1897_.\n\nDEAR SCHILLER,--Did you ever hear of the famous international prize\nfight between Tom Sayers and Heenan the Benicia Boy, or were you too\nsmall a baby in 1857 [1860?] The \"Times\" devoted a couple of pages of\nreport and one or more eulogistic editorials to the English champion,\nand the latter, brimming over with emotion, wrote a letter to the\n\"Times\" in which he touchingly said that he would live in future as one\nwho had been once deemed worthy of commemoration in its leaders. After\nreading your review of me in the October \"Mind\" (which only reached me\ntwo days ago) I feel as the noble Sayers felt, and think I ought to\nwrite to Stout to say I will try to live up to such a character. My\npast has not deserved such words, but my future shall. Seriously, your\nreview has given me the keenest possible pleasure. This philosophy must\nbe thickened up most decidedly--your review represents it as something\nto rally to, so we must fly a banner and start a school. Some of your\nphrases are bully: \"reckless rationalism,\" \"pure science is pure bosh,\"\n\"infallible _a priori_ test of truth to screen us from the consequences\nof our choice,\" etc., etc. Thank you from the bottom of my heart!\n\nThe enclosed document [a returned letter addressed to Christ Church]\nexplains itself. The Church and the Body of Christ are easily confused\nand I haven't a scholarly memory. I wrote you a post-card recently to\nthe same address, patting you on the back for your article on\nImmortality in the \"New World.\" A staving good thing. I am myself to\ngive the \"Ingersoll Lecture on Human Immortality\" here in November--the\nsecond lecturer on the foundation. I treat the matter very inferiorly to\nyou, but use your conception of the brain as a sifting agency, which\nexplains my question in the letter. Young [R. B.] Merriman is at Balliol\nand a really good fellow in all possible respects. Pray be good to him\nif he calls on you. I hope things have a peacock hue for you now that\nterm has begun. They are all going well here. Yours always gratefully,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To James J. Putnam._\n\n\nCambridge, _Mar. 2, 1898_.\n\nDEAR JIM,--On page 7 of the \"Transcript\" tonight you will find a\nmanifestation of me at the State House, protesting against the proposed\nmedical license bill.\n\nIf you think I _enjoy_ that sort of thing you are mistaken. I never did\nanything that required as much moral effort in my life. My vocation is\nto treat of things in an all-round manner and not make _ex-parte_ pleas\nto influence (or seek to) a peculiar jury. _Aussi_, why do the medical\nbrethren force an unoffending citizen like me into such a position?\nLegislative license is sheer humbug--mere abstract paper thunder under\nwhich every ignorance and abuse can still go on. Why this mania for more\nlaws? Why seek to stop the really extremely important experiences which\nthese peculiar creatures are rolling up?\n\nBah! I'm sick of the whole business, and I well know how all my\ncolleagues at the Medical School, who go only by the label, will view me\nand my efforts. But if Zola and Col. Picquart can face the whole French\narmy, can't I face their disapproval?--Much more easily than that of my\nown conscience!\n\nYou, I fancy, are not one of the fully disciplined demanders of more\nlegislation. So I write to you, as on the whole my dearest friend\nhereabouts, to explain just what my state of mind is. Ever yours,\n\nW. J.\n\nJames was not indulging in empty rhetoric when he said that his\nconscience drove him to face the disapproval of his medical colleagues.\nSome of them never forgave him, and to this day references to his\n\"appearance\" at the State House in Boston are marked by partisanship\nrather than understanding.\n\nWhat happened cannot be understood without recalling that thirty-odd\nyears ago the licensing of medical practitioners was just being\ninaugurated in the United States. Today it is evident that everyone must\nbe qualified and licensed before he can be permitted to write\nprescriptions, to sign statements upon which public records, inquests,\nand health statistics are to be based, and to go about the community\ncalling himself a doctor. On the other hand, experience has proved that\nthose people who do not pretend to be physicians, who do not use drugs\nor the knife, and who attempt to heal only by mental or spiritual\ninfluence, cannot be regulated by the clumsy machinery of the criminal\nlaw. But either because the whole question of medical registration was\nnew, or because professional men are seldom masters of the science of\nlawmaking, the sponsors of the bills proposed to the Massachusetts\nLegislature in 1894 and 1898 ignored these distinctions. James did not\nname them, although his argument implied them and rested upon them. The\nbills included clauses which attempted to abolish the faith-curers by\nrequiring them to become Doctors of Medicine. The \"Spiritualists\" and\nChristian Scientists were a numerous element in the population and\nclaimed a religious sanction for their beliefs. The gentlemen who mixed\nan anti-spiritualist program in their effort to have doctors examined\nand licensed by a State Board were either innocent of political\ndiscretion or blind to the facts. For it was idle to argue that\nfaith-curers would be able to continue in their own ways as soon as they\nhad passed the medical examinations of the State Board, and that\naccordingly the proposed law could not be said to involve their\nsuppression. Obviously, medical examinations were barriers which the\nfaith-curers could not climb over. This was the feature of the proposed\nlaw which roused James to opposition, and led him to take sides for the\nmoment with all the spokesmen of all the-isms and-opathies.\n\n\"I will confine myself to a class of diseases\" (he wrote to the Boston\n\"Transcript\" in 1894) \"with which my occupation has made me somewhat\nconversant. I mean the diseases of the nervous system and the mind....\nOf all the new agencies that our day has seen, there is but one that\ntends steadily to assume a more and more commanding importance, and that\nis the agency of the patient's mind itself. Whoever can produce effects\nthere holds the key of the situation in a number of morbid conditions of\nwhich we do not yet know the extent; for systematic experiments in this\ndirection are in their merest infancy. They began in Europe fifteen\nyears ago, when the medical world so tardily admitted the facts of\nhypnotism to be true; and in this country they have been carried on in a\nmuch bolder and more radical fashion by all those 'mind-curers' and\n'Christian Scientists' with whose results the public, and even the\nprofession, are growing gradually familiar.\n\n\"I assuredly hold no brief for any of these healers, and must confess\nthat my intellect has been unable to assimilate their theories, so far\nas I have heard them given. But their _facts_ are patent and startling;\nand anything that interferes with the multiplication of such facts, and\nwith our freest opportunity of observing and studying them, will, I\nbelieve, be a public calamity. The law now proposed will so interfere,\nsimply because the mind-curers will not take the examinations....\nNothing would please some of them better than such a taste of\nimprisonment as might, by the public outcry it would occasion, bring the\nlaw rattling down about the ears of the mandarins who should have\nenacted it.\n\n\"And whatever one may think of the narrowness of the mind-curers, their\nlogical position is impregnable. They are proving by the most brilliant\nnew results that the therapeutic relation may be what we can at present\ndescribe only as a relation of one person to another person; and they\nare consistent in resisting to the uttermost any legislation that would\nmake 'examinable' information the root of medical virtue, and hamper\nthe free play of personal force and affinity by mechanically imposed\nconditions.\"\n\nJames knew as well as anyone that in the ranks of the healers there were\nmany who could fairly be described as preying on superstition and\nignorance. \"X---- personally is a rapacious humbug\" was his privately\nexpressed opinion of one of them who had a very large following. He had\nno reverence for the preposterous theories with which their minds were\nbefogged; but \"every good thing like _science_ in medicine,\" as he once\nsaid, \"has to be imitated and grimaced by a rabble of people who would\nbe at the required height; and the folly, humbug and mendacity is\npitiful.\" Furthermore he saw a quackery quite as odious and much more\ndangerous than that of the \"healers\" in the patent-medicine business,\nwhich was allowed to advertise its lies and secret nostrums in the\nnewspapers and on the bill-boards, and which flourished behind the\ncounter of every apothecary and village store-keeper at that time. (The\nFederal Pure Food and Drug Act was still many years off.)\n\nThe spokesmen of the medical profession were ignoring what he believed\nto be instructive phenomena. \"What the real interests of medicine\nrequire is that mental therapeutics should _not_ be stamped out, but\nstudied, and its laws ascertained. For that the mind-curers must at\nleast be suffered to make their experiments. If they cannot interpret\ntheir results aright, why then let the orthodox M.D.'s follow up their\nfacts, and study and interpret them? But to force the mind-curers to a\nState examination is to kill the experiments outright.\" But instead of\nthe open-minded attitude which he thus advocated, he saw doctors who\n\"had no more exact science in them than a fox terrier\"[16] invoking the\nholy name of Science and blundering ahead with an air of moral\nsuperiority.\n\n\"One would suppose,\" he exclaimed again in the 1898 hearing, \"that any\nset of sane persons interested in the growth of medical truth would\nrejoice if other persons were found willing to push out their\nexperiences in the mental-healing direction, and provide a mass of\nmaterial out of which the conditions and limits of such therapeutic\nmethods may at last become clear. One would suppose that our orthodox\nmedical brethren might so rejoice; but instead of rejoicing they adopt\nthe fiercely partisan attitude of a powerful trades-union, demanding\nlegislation against the competition of the 'scabs.' ... The mind-curers\nand their public return the scorn of the regular profession with an\nequal scorn, and will never come up for the examination. Their movement\nis a religious or quasi-religious movement; personality is one condition\nof success there, and impressions and intuitions seem to accomplish more\nthan chemical, anatomical or physiological information.... Pray do not\nfail, Mr. Chairman, to catch my point. You are not to ask yourselves\nwhether these mind-curers do really achieve the successes that are\nclaimed. It is enough for you as legislators to ascertain that a large\nnumber of our citizens, persons as intelligent and well-educated as\nyourself, or I, persons whose number seems daily to increase, are\nconvinced that they do achieve them, are persuaded that a valuable new\ndepartment of medical experience is by them opening up. Here is a purely\nmedical question, regarding which our General Court, not being a\nwell-spring and source of medical virtue, not having any private test of\ntherapeutic truth, must remain strictly neutral under penalty of making\nthe confusion worse.... Above all things, Mr. Chairman, let us not be\ninfected with the Gallic spirit of regulation and reglementation for\ntheir own abstract sakes. Let us not grow hysterical about law-making.\nLet us not fall in love with enactments and penalties because they are\nso logical and sound so pretty, and look so nice on paper.\"[17]\n\n\n\n\n_To James J. Putnam._\n\n\nCambridge, _Mar. [3?] 1898_.\n\nDEAR JIM,--Thanks for your noble-hearted letter, which makes me feel\nwarm again. I am glad to learn that you feel positively _agin_ the\nproposed law, and hope that you will express yourself freely towards the\nprofessional brethren to that effect.\n\nDr. Russell Sturgis has written me a similar letter.\n\nOnce more, thanks!\n\nW. J.\n\nP.S. _March 3._ The \"Transcript\" report, I am sorry to say, was a good\ndeal cut. I send you another copy, to keep and use where it will do most\ngood. The rhetorical problem with me was to say things to the Committee\nthat might neutralize the influence of their medical advisers, who, I\nsupposed, had the inside track, and all the _prestige_. I being banded\nwith the spiritists, faith-curers, magnetic healers, etc., etc. Strange\naffinities![18]\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Fran\u00e7ois Pillon._\n\n\nCambridge, _June 15, 1898_.\n\nMY DEAR PILLON,--I have just received your pleasant letter and the\n_Ann\u00e9e_, volume 8, and shall immediately proceed to read the latter,\nhaving finished reading my examinations yesterday, and being now free to\nenjoy the vacation, but excessively tired. I grieve to learn of poor\nMrs. Pillon's continued ill health. How much patience both of you\nrequire. I think of you also as spending most of the summer in Paris,\nwhen the country contains so many more elements that are good for body\nand soul.\n\nHow much has happened since I last heard from you! To say nothing of the\nZola trial, we now have the Cuban War! A curious episode of history,\nshowing how a nation's ideals can be changed in the twinkling of an eye,\nby a succession of outward events partly accidental. It is quite\npossible that, without the explosion of the Maine, we should still be at\npeace, though, since the _basis_ of the whole American attitude is the\npersuasion on the part of the people that the cruelty and misrule of\nSpain in Cuba call for her expulsion (so that in that sense our war is\njust what a war of \"the powers\" against Turkey for the Armenian\natrocities would have been), it is hardly possible that peace could have\nbeen maintained indefinitely longer, unless Spain had gone out--a\nconsummation hardly to be expected by peaceful means. The actual\ndeclaration of war by Congress, however, was a case of _psychologie des\nfoules_, a genuine hysteric stampede at the last moment, which shows\nhow unfortunate that provision of our written constitution is which\ntakes the power of declaring war from the Executive and places it in\nCongress. Our Executive has behaved very well. The European nations of\nthe Continent cannot believe that our pretense of humanity, and our\ndisclaiming of all ideas of conquest, is sincere. It has been\n_absolutely_ sincere! The self-conscious feeling of our people has been\nentirely based in a sense of philanthropic duty, without which not a\nstep would have been taken. And when, in its ultimatum to Spain,\nCongress denied any project of conquest in Cuba, it genuinely meant\nevery word it said. But here comes in the psychologic factor: once the\nexcitement of action gets loose, the taxes levied, the victories\nachieved, etc., the old human instincts will get into play with all\ntheir old strength, and the ambition and sense of mastery which our\nnation has will set up new demands. We shall never take Cuba; I imagine\nthat to be very certain--unless indeed after years of unsuccessful\npolice duty there, for that is what we have made ourselves responsible\nfor. But Porto Rico, and even the Philippines, are not so sure. We had\nsupposed ourselves (with all our crudity and barbarity in certain ways)\na better nation morally than the rest, safe at home, and without the old\nsavage ambition, destined to exert great international influence by\nthrowing in our \"moral weight,\" etc. Dreams! Human Nature is everywhere\nthe same; and at the least temptation all the old military passions\nrise, and sweep everything before them. It will be interesting to see\nhow it will end.\n\nBut enough of this!--It all shows by what short steps progress is made,\nand it confirms the \"criticist\" views of the philosophy of history. I am\ngoing to a great popular meeting in Boston today where a lot of my\nfriends are to protest against the new \"Imperialism.\"\n\nIn August I go for two months to California to do some lecturing. As I\nhave never crossed the continent or seen the Pacific Ocean or those\nbeautiful _parages_, I am very glad of the opportunity. The year after\nnext (_i.e._ one year from now) begins a new year of absence from my\ncollege duties. I _may_ spend it in Europe again. In any case I shall\nhope to see you, for I am appointed to give the \"Gifford Lectures\" at\nEdinburgh during 1899-1901--two courses of 10 each on the philosophy of\nreligion. A great honor.--I have also received the honor of an election\nas \"Correspondent\" of the Acad\u00e9mie des Sciences Morales et Politiques.\nHave I _your_ influence to thank for this? Believe me, with most\nsympathetic regards to Mrs. Pillon and affectionate greetings to\nyourself, yours most truly\n\nWm. James.\n\nBefore starting for California, James went to the Adirondack Lodge to\nsnatch a brief holiday. One episode in this holiday can best be\ndescribed by an extract from a letter to Mrs. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. James._\n\n\nST. HUBERT'S INN,\nKEENE VALLEY, _July 9, 1898_.\n\n...I have had an eventful 24 hours, and my hands are so stiff after it\nthat my fingers can hardly hold the pen. I left, as I informed you by\npost-card, the Lodge at seven, and five hours of walking brought us to\nthe top of Marcy--I carrying 18 lbs. of weight in my pack. As usual, I\nmet two Cambridge acquaintances on the mountain top--\"Appalachians\" from\nBeede's. At four, hearing an axe below, I went down (an hour's walk) to\nPanther Lodge Camp, and there found Charles and Pauline Goldmark, Waldo\nAdler and another schoolboy, and two Bryn Mawr girls--the girls all\ndressed in boys' breeches, and cutaneously desecrated in the extreme\nfrom seven of them having been camping without a male on Loon Lake to\nthe north of this. My guide had to serve for the party, and quite\nunexpectedly to me the night turned out one of the most memorable of all\nmy memorable experiences. I was in a wakeful mood before starting,\nhaving been awake since three, and I may have slept a little during this\nnight; but I was not aware of sleeping at all. My companions, except\nWaldo Adler, were all motionless. The guide had got a magnificent\nprovision of firewood, the sky swept itself clear of every trace of\ncloud or vapor, the wind entirely ceased, so that the fire-smoke rose\nstraight up to heaven. The temperature was perfect either inside or\noutside the cabin, the moon rose and hung above the scene before\nmidnight, leaving only a few of the larger stars visible, and I got into\na state of spiritual alertness of the most vital description. The\ninfluences of Nature, the wholesomeness of the people round me,\nespecially the good Pauline, the thought of you and the children, dear\nHarry on the wave, the problem of the Edinburgh lectures, all fermented\nwithin me till it became a regular Walpurgis Nacht. I spent a good deal\nof it in the woods, where the streaming moonlight lit up things in a\nmagical checkered play, and it seemed as if the Gods of all the\nnature-mythologies were holding an indescribable meeting in my breast\nwith the moral Gods of the inner life. The two kinds of Gods have\nnothing in common--the Edinburgh lectures made quite a hitch ahead. The\nintense significance of some sort, of the whole scene, if one could only\n_tell_ the significance; the intense inhuman remoteness of its inner\nlife, and yet the intense _appeal_ of it; its everlasting freshness and\nits immemorial antiquity and decay; its utter Americanism, and every\nsort of patriotic suggestiveness, and you, and my relation to you part\nand parcel of it all, and beaten up with it, so that memory and\nsensation all whirled inexplicably together; it was indeed worth coming\nfor, and worth repeating year by year, if repetition could only procure\nwhat in its nature I suppose must be all unplanned for and unexpected.\nIt was one of the happiest lonesome nights of my existence, and I\nunderstand now what a poet is. He is a person who can feel the immense\ncomplexity of influences that I felt, and make some partial tracks in\nthem for verbal statement. In point of fact, I can't find a single word\nfor all that significance, and don't know what it was significant of, so\nthere it remains, a mere boulder of _impression_. Doubtless in more ways\nthan one, though, things in the Edinburgh lectures will be traceable to\nit.\n\nIn the morning at six, I shouldered my undiminished pack and went up\nMarcy, ahead of the party, who arrived half an hour later, and we got in\nhere at eight [P.M.] after 10-1/2 hours of the solidest walking I ever\nmade, and I, I think, more fatigued than I have been after any walk. We\nplunged down Marcy, and up Bason Mountain, led by C. Goldmark, who had,\nwith Mr. White, blazed a trail the year before;[19] then down again,\naway down, and up the Gothics, not counting a third down-and-up over an\nintermediate spur. It was the steepest sort of work, and, as one looked\nfrom the summits, seemed sheer impossible, but the girls kept up\nsplendidly, and were all fresher than I. It was true that they had slept\nlike logs all night, whereas I was \"on my nerves.\" I lost my Norfolk\njacket at the last third of the course--high time to say good-bye to\nthat possession--and staggered up to the Putnams to find Hatty Shaw[20]\ntaking me for a tramp. Not a soul was there, but everything spotless and\nready for the arrival today. I got a bath at Bowditch's bath-house,\nslept in my old room, and slept soundly and well, and save for the\nunwashable staining of my hands and a certain stiffness in my thighs, am\nentirely rested and well. But I don't believe in keeping it up too long,\nand at the Willey House will lead a comparatively sedentary life, and\ncultivate sleep, if I can....\n\nW. J.\n\nThe intense experience which James thus described had consequences that\nwere not foreseen at the time. He had gone to the Adirondacks at the\nclose of the college term in a much fatigued condition. He had been\nsleeping badly for some weeks, and when he started up Mount Marcy he had\nneuralgia in one foot; but he had characteristically determined to\nignore and \"bully\" this ailment. Under such conditions the prolonged\nphysical exertion of the two days' climb, aggravated by the fact that he\ncarried a pack all the second day, was too much for a man of his years\nand sedentary occupations. As the summer wore on, pain or discomfort in\nthe region of his heart became constant. He tried to persuade himself\nthat it signified nothing and would pass away, and concealed it from his\nwife until mid-winter. To Howison--who was himself a confessed heart\ncase--he wrote, \"My heart has been kicking about terribly of late,\nstopping, and hurrying and aching and so forth, but I do not propose to\ngive up to it too much.\" The fact was that the strain of the two days'\nclimb had caused a valvular lesion that was irreparable, although not\ngreat enough seriously to curtail his activities if he had given heed\nto his general condition and avoided straining himself again.\n\nIn August James went to California to give the lectures which have\nalready been mentioned in a letter to Pillon. Again, these lectures were\nin substance the \"Talks to Teachers.\" The next letter, written just\nbefore he left Cambridge, answers a request to him to address the\nPhilosophical Club at the University of California.\n\n\n\n\n_To G. H. Howison._\n\n\nCambridge, _July 24, 1898_.\n\nDEAR HOWISON,--Your kind letter greeted me on my arrival here three days\nago--but I have waited to answer it in order to determine just what my\nlecture's title should be. I wanted to make something entirely popular,\nand as it were emotional, for technicality seems to me to spell\n\"failure\" in philosophy. But the subject in the margin of my\nconsciousness failed to make connexion with the centre, and I have\nfallen back on something less vital, but still, I think, sufficiently\npopular and practical, which you can advertise under the rather\nill-chosen title of \"Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results,\"\nif you wish.\n\nI am just back from a month of practical idleness in the Adirondacks,\nbut such is the infirmity of my complexion that I am not yet in proper\nworking trim. You ask me, like an angel, in what form I like to take my\nsociability. The spirit is willing to take it in any form, but the flesh\nis weak, and it runs to destruction of nerve-tissue and madness in me to\ngo to big stand-up receptions where the people scream and breathe in\neach other's faces. But I know my duties; and one such reception I will\ngladly face. For the rest, I should infinitely prefer a chosen few at\ndinner. But this enterprise is going, my friend, to give you and Mrs.\nHowison a heap of trouble. My purpose is to arrive on the eve of the\n26th. I will telegraph you the hour and train. When the lectures to the\nteachers are over, I will make for the Yosemite Valley, where I want to\nspend a fortnight if I can, and come home.... Yours ever truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nOCCIDENTAL HOTEL,\nSAN FRANCISCO, _Aug. 11, 1898_.\n\nDEAR OLD HENRY,--You see I have worked my way across the Continent, and,\nfull of the impressions of this queer place, I must overflow for a page\nor two to you. I saw some really grand and ferocious scenery on the\nCanadian Pacific, and wish I could go right back to see it again. But it\ndoesn't mean much, on the whole, for human habitation, and the British\nEmpire's investment in Canada is in so far forth but _scenic_. It is\ngrand, though, in its vastness and simplicity. In Washington and Oregon\nthe whole foreground consisted of desolation by fire. The magnificent\nconiferous forests burnt and burning, as they have been for years and\nyears back. Northern California one pulverous earth-colored mass of\nhills and heat, with green spots produced by irrigation hardly showing\non the background. I drove through a wheatfield at Harry's Uncle\nChristopher's on a machine, drawn by 26 mules, which cut a swathe 18\nfeet wide through the wheat and threw it out in bags to be taken home,\nas fast as the leisurely mules could walk. It is like Egypt. Down here,\nsplendid air, and a city so indescribably odd and unique in its\nsuggestions that I have been saying to myself all day that _you_ ought\nto have taken it in when you were under 30 and added it to your\nportraits of places. So remote and terminal, so full of the sea-port\nnakedness, yet so new and American, with its queer suggestions of a\nhistory based on the fifties and the sixties. But at my age those\nimpressions are curiously weak to what they once were, and the time to\ntravel is between one's 20th and 30th year. This hotel--an old house\ncleaned into newness--is redolent of '59 or '60, when it must have been\nbuilt. Hideous vast stuccoed thing, with long undulating balustrades and\nwells and lace curtains. The fare is very good, but the servants all\nIrish, who seem cowed in the dining-room, and go about as if they had\ncorns on their feet and for that reason had given up the pick and\nshovel.... Tomorrow, in spite of drouth and dust, I leave for the\nYosemite Valley, with a young Californian philosopher, named [Charles\nM.] Bakewell, as companion. On the whole I prefer the works of God to\nthose of man, and the alternative, a trip down the coast, beauties as it\nwould doubtless show, would include too much humanity....\n\n\n\n\n_To his Son Alexander._\n\n\nBERKELEY, CAL., _Aug. 28, 1898_.\n\nDARLING OLD CHERUBINI,--See how brave this girl and boy are in the\nYosemite Valley![21] I saw a moving sight the other morning before\nbreakfast in a little hotel where I slept in the dusty fields. The young\nman of the house had shot a little wolf called a coyote in the early\nmorning. The heroic little animal lay on the ground, with his big furry\nears, and his clean white teeth, and his jolly cheerful little body, but\nhis brave little life was gone. It made me think how brave all these\nliving things are. Here little coyote was, without any clothes or house\nor books or anything, with nothing but his own naked self to pay his\nway with, and risking his life so cheerfully--and losing it--just to\nsee if he could pick up a meal near the hotel. He was doing his\ncoyote-business like a hero, and you must do your boy-business, and I my\nman-business bravely too, or else we won't be worth as much as that\nlittle coyote. Your mother can find a picture of him in those green\nbooks of animals, and I want you to copy it. Your loving\n\nDAD.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Rosina H. Emmet._\n\n\nMONTEREY, _Sept. 9, 1898_.\n\nDEAR OLD ROSINA,--I have seen your native state and even been driven by\ndear, good, sweet Hal Dibblee (who is turning into a perfectly ideal\nfellow) through the charming and utterly lovable place in which you all\npassed your childhood. (How your mother must sometimes long for it\nagain!) Of California and its greatness, the half can never be told. I\nhave been on a ranch in the white, bare dryness of Siskiyou County, and\nreaped wheat with a swathe of 18 feet wide on a machine drawn by a\nprocession of 26 mules. I've been to Yosemite, and camped for five days\nin the high Sierras; I've lectured at the two universities of the state,\nand seen the youths and maidens lounge together at Stanford in cloisters\nwhose architecture is purer and more lovely than aught that Italy can\nshow. I've heard Mrs. Dibblee read letter after letter from Anita\nconcerning your life together; and even one letter to Anita from Bay,\nwhich the former enclosed. (Dear Bay!) All this, dear old Rosina, is a\n\"summation of stimuli\" which at last carries me over the dam that has so\nlong obstructed all my epistolary efforts in your direction.\n\nOver and over again I have been on the point of writing to you, more\nthan once I have actually written a page or two, but something has\nalways checked the flow, and arrested the current of the soul. What is\nit? I think it is this: I naturally tend, when \"familiar\" with what the\nauthors of the beginning of the century used to call \"a refined female,\"\nto indulge in chaffing personalities in writing to her. There is\nsomething in you that doubtfully enjoys the chaffing; and subtly feeling\nthat, I stop. But some day, when experience shall have winnowed you with\nher wing; when the illusions and the hopes of youth alike are faded;\nwhen eternal principles of order are more to you than sensations that\npass in a day, however exciting; when friends that know you and your\nroots and derivations are more satisfactory, however humdrum and hoary\nthey be, than the handsome recent acquaintances that know nothing of you\nbut the hour; when, in short, your being is mellowed, dulled and\nharmonized by time so as to be a grave, wise, deep, and discerning moral\nand intellectual unity (as mine is already from the height of my 40\ncenturies!), then, Rosina, we two shall be the most perfect of\ncombinations, and I shall write to you every week of my life and you\nwill be utterly unable to resist replying. That will not be, however,\nbefore you are forty years old. You are sure to come to it! For you see\nthe truth, irrespective of persons, as few people see it; and after all,\nyou care for that more than for anything else--and that means a rare and\nunusual destiny, and ultimate salvation.--But here I am, chaffing, quite\nagainst my intentions and altogether in spite of myself. The ruling\npassion is irresistible. Let me stop!\n\nBut still I must be personal, and not write merely of the climate and\nproductions of California, as I have been doing to others for the past\nfour weeks. How I do wish I could be dropped amongst you for but 24\nhours! What talk I should hear! What perceptions of truth from you and\nBay (and probably young Leslie) would pour into my receptive soul. How\nI _should_ like to hear you hold forth about the French, their art,\ntheir literature, their nature, and all else about them! How I should\nlike to hear you _talk_ French! How I should like to note the changes\nwrought in you by all this experience, and take all sorts of excursions\nin your company! Don't come home for one more year if you can help it.\nStay and let the impressions set and tie themselves in with a hard knot,\nso that they will be worth something and definitive.\n\nI am so glad to hear that Bay is doing so well, and doubly glad (as Mrs.\nDibblee tells me from Anita) that H. J. is going to sit to her for his\nportrait. I am a bit sorry that the youthful Harry didn't accept your\ninvitation, but his time was after all so short that it has been perhaps\ngood for him to get the massive English impression. What times we live\nin! Dreyfus, Cuba, and Khartoum!--I keep well, though fragile as a\nworker. You will have heard of my Edinburgh appointment and my election\nto the Institut de France as _Correspondant_. The latter is silly, but\nthe former a serious scrape out of which I am praying all the gods to\nhelp me, as the time for preparation is so short. All Cambridge friends\nare well. You heard of dear Child's death, last summer, I suppose.\nGood-bye! Write to me, dear old Rosina. Kiss Bay and Leslie--even\n_effleurez_ your own cheek, for me. Give my best love to your mother,\nand believe me always your affectionate\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 3, 1898_.\n\nILLUSTRIOUS FRIEND AND JOY OF MY LIVER,--I am much pleased to hear from\nyou, for I have wished to know of your destinies, and Bakewell couldn't\ngive me a very precise account. I congratulate you on getting your\nreview of me off your hands--you must experience a relief similar to\nthat of Christian when he lost his bag of sin. I imagine your account of\nits unsatisfactoriness is a little hyper\u00e6sthetic, and that what you have\nbrooded over so long will, in spite of anything in the accidents of its\nproduction, prove solid and deep, and reveal _ex pede_ the Hercules. Of\ncourse, if you do not unconditionally subscribe to my \"Will to Believe\"\nessay, it shows that you still are groping in the darkness of\nmisunderstanding either of my meaning or of the truth; for in spite of\n\"the bludgeonings of fate,\" my head is \"bloody but unbowed\" as to the\nrightness of my contention there, in both its parts. But we shall see;\nand I hope you are now free for more distant flights.\n\nI am extremely sorry to hear you have been not well again, even though\nyou say you are so much better now. You ought to be _entirely_ well and\nevery inch a king. Remember that, _whenever_ you need a change, your bed\nis made in this house for as many weeks as you care to stay. I know\nthere will come feelings of disconsolateness over you occasionally, from\nbeing so out of the academic swim. But that is nothing! And while this\ntime is on, you should think exclusively of its unique characteristics\nof blessedness, which will be irrecoverable when you are in the harness\nagain.\n\nI spent the first six weeks after term began in trying to clear my table\nof encumbering tasks, in order to get at my own reading for the Gifford\nlectures. In vain. Each day brought its cargo, and I never got at my own\nwork, until a fortnight ago the brilliant resolve was communicated to\nme, by divine inspiration, of not doing anything for anybody else, not\nwriting a letter or looking at a MS., on any day until I should have\ndone at least one hour of work for _myself_. If you spend your time\npreparing to be ready, you _never_ will be ready. Since that wonderful\ninsight into the truth, despair has given way to happiness. I do my hour\nor hour and a half of free reading; and don't care what extraneous\ninterest suffers.... Good-night, dear old Miller. Your ever loving,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan. 31, 1899_.\n\n...Your account of Josiah Royce is adorable--we have both gloated over\nit all day. The best intellectual character-painting ever limned by an\nEnglish pen! Since teaching the \"Conception of God,\" I have come to\nperceive what I didn't trust myself to believe before, that looseness of\nthought is R.'s _essential_ element. He _wants_ it. There isn't a tight\njoint in his system; not one. And yet I thought that a mind that could\ntalk me blind and black and numb on mathematics and logic, and whose\nfavorite recreation is works on those subjects, must necessarily conceal\ncloseness and exactitudes of ratiocination that I hadn't the wit to find\nout. But no! he is the Rubens of philosophy. Richness, abundance,\nboldness, color, but a sharp contour never, and never any _perfection_.\nBut isn't fertility better than perfection? Deary me! Ever thine,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry Rutgers Marshall._\n\n\nCambridge [_Feb. 7, 1899_?].\n\nDEAR MARSHALL,--I will hand your paper to Eliot, though I am sure that\nnothing will come of it in _this_ University.\n\nMoreover, it strikes me that no good will ever come to Art as such from\nthe analytic study of \u00c6sthetics--harm rather, if the abstractions could\nin any way be made the basis of practice. We should get stark things\ndone on system with all the intangible personal _je ne s\u00e7ais quaw_ left\nout. The difference between the first-and second-best things in art\nabsolutely seems to escape verbal definition--it is a matter of a hair,\na shade, an inward quiver of some kind--yet what miles away in point of\npreciousness! Absolutely the same verbal formula applies to the supreme\nsuccess and to the thing that just misses it, and yet verbal formulas\nare all that your aesthetics will give.\n\nSurely imitation in the concrete is better for results than any amount\nof gabble in the abstract. Let the rest of us philosophers gabble, but\ndon't mix us up with the interests of the art department as such! Them's\nmy sentiments.\n\nThanks for the \"cudgels\" you are taking up for the \"Will to Believe.\"\nMiller's article seems to be based solely on my little catchpenny\n_title_. Where would he have been if I had called my article \"a critique\nof pure faith\" or words to that effect? As it is, he doesn't touch a\n_single_ one of my points, and slays a mere abstraction. I shall\ngreedily read what you write.\n\nI have been too lazy and hard pressed to write to you about your\n\"Instinct and Reason,\" which contains many good things in the way of\npsychology and morals, but which--I tremble to say it before you--on the\nwhole _does_ disappoint me. The religious part especially seems to me to\nrest on too narrow a phenomenal base, and the formula to be too simple\nand abstract. But it is a good contribution to American scholarship all\nthe same, and I hope the Philippine Islanders will be forced to study\nit.\n\nForgive my brevity and levity. Yours ever,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry Rutgers Marshall._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb. 8 [1899]_.\n\nDEAR MARSHALL,--Your invitation was perhaps the finest \"tribute\" the\nJameses have ever received, but it is plumb impossible that either of us\nshould accept. Pinned down, by ten thousand jobs and duties, like two\nGullivers by the threads of the Lilliputians.\n\nI should \"admire\" to see the Kiplings again, but it is no go. Now that\nby his song-making power he is the mightiest force in the formation of\nthe \"Anglo-Saxon\" character, I wish he would hearken a bit more to his\ndeeper human self and a bit less to his shallower jingo self. If the\nAnglo-Saxon race would drop its sniveling cant it would have a good deal\nless of a \"burden\" to carry. We're the most loathsomely canting crew\nthat God ever made. Kipling knows perfectly well that our camps in the\ntropics are not college settlements or our armies bands of\nphilanthropists, slumming it; and I think it a shame that he should\nrepresent us to ourselves in that light. I wish he would try a bit\ninterpreting the savage _soul_ to us, as he _could_, instead of using\nsuch official and conventional phrases as \"half-devil and half-child,\"\nwhich leaves the whole insides out.\n\nHeigh ho!\n\nI have only had time to glance at the first 1/2 of your paper on Miller.\nI am delighted you are thus going for him. His whole paper is an\n_ignoratio elenchi_, and he doesn't touch a single one of my positions.\n\nBelieve me with great regrets and thanks, yours ever,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Henry Whitman._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _June 7, 1899_.\n\nDEAR MRS. WHITMAN,--I got your penciled letter the day before leaving.\nThe R.R. train seems to be a great stimulus to the acts of the higher\nepistolary activity and correspondential amicality in you--a fact for\nwhich I have (occasional) reason to be duly grateful. So here, in the\ncool darkness of my road-side \"sitting-room,\" with no pen in the house,\nwith the soft tap of the carpenter's hammer and the pensive scrape of\nthe distant wood-saw stealing through the open wire-netting door, along\nwith the fragrant air of the morning woods, I get stimulus responsive,\nand send you penciled return. Yes, the daylight that now seems shining\nthrough the Dreyfus case is glorious, and if the President only gets his\nback up a bit, and mows down the whole gang of Satan, or as much of it\nas can be touched, it will perhaps be a great day for the distracted\nFrance. I mean it may be one of those moral crises that become starting\npoints and high-water marks and leave traditions and rallying cries and\nnew forces behind them. One thing is certain, that no other alternative\nform of government possible to France in this century could have stood\nthe strain as this democracy seems to be standing it.\n\nApropos of which, a word about Woodberry's book.[22] I didn't know him\nto be that kind of a creature at all. The essays are grave and noble in\nthe extreme. I hail another American author. They can't be popular, and\nfor cause. The respect of him for the Queen's English, the classic\nleisureliness and explicitness, which give so rare a dignity to his\nstyle, also take from it that which our generation seems to need, the\nsudden word, the unmediated transition, the flash of perception that\nmakes reasonings unnecessary. Poor Woodberry, so high, so true, so good,\nso original in his total make-up, and yet so unoriginal if you take him\nspot-wise--and therefore so ineffective. His paper on Democracy is very\nfine indeed, though somewhat too abstract. I haven't yet read the first\nand last essays in the book, which I shall buy and keep, and even send a\nword of gratulation to the author for it.\n\nAs for me, my bed is made: I am against bigness and greatness in all\ntheir forms, and with the invisible molecular moral forces that work\nfrom individual to individual, stealing in through the crannies of the\nworld like so many soft rootlets, or like the capillary oozing of water,\nand yet rending the hardest monuments of man's pride, if you give them\ntime. The bigger the unit you deal with, the hollower, the more brutal,\nthe more mendacious is the life displayed. So I am against all big\norganizations as such, national ones first and foremost; against all big\nsuccesses and big results; and in favor of the eternal forces of truth\nwhich always work in the individual and immediately unsuccessful way,\nunder-dogs always, till history comes, after they are long dead, and\nputs them on the top.--You need take no notice of these ebullitions of\nspleen, which are probably quite unintelligible to anyone but myself.\nEver your\n\nW. J.\n\nWhen the College term ended in June, 1899, the sailing date of the\nEuropean steamer on which James had taken passage for his wife and\ndaughter and himself was still three weeks away. He turned again to the\nAdirondack Lodge and there persuaded himself, to his intense\nsatisfaction, that if he walked slowly and alone, so that there was no\ntemptation to talk while walking, or to keep on when he felt like\nstopping, he could still spend several hours a day on the mountain sides\nwithout inconvenience to his heart. But one afternoon he took a wrong\npath and did not discover his mistake until he had gone so far that it\nseemed safer to go on than to turn back. So he kept on. But the \"trail\"\nhe was following was not the one he supposed it to be and led him\nfarther and farther. He fainted twice; it grew dark; but having neither\nfood, coat, nor matches, he stumbled along until at last he came out on\nthe Keene Valley road and, at nearly eleven o'clock at night, reached a\nhouse where he could get food and a conveyance.\n\nHe ought to have avoided all exertion for weeks thereafter, but he tried\nagain to make light of what had occurred, and, on getting back to\nCambridge, spent a very active few days over final arrangements for his\nyear of absence. When his boat had sailed and the stimulus which his\nlast duties supplied had been withdrawn, he began to discover what\ncondition he was in.\n\n\n\n\nXIII\n\n1899-1902\n\n _Two years of Illness in Europe--Retirement from Active Duty at\n Harvard--The First and Second Series of the Gifford Lectures_\n\n\nWHEN James sailed for Hamburg on July 15, he planned quite definitely to\ndevote the summer to rest and the treatment of his heart, then to write\nout the Gifford Lectures during the winter, and to deliver them by the\nfollowing spring; and, happily, could not foresee that he was to spend\nnearly two years in exile and idleness. For nearly six years he had\ndriven himself beyond the true limits of his strength. Now it became\nevident that the strain of his second over-exertion in the Adirondacks\nhad precipitated a complete collapse. He had been advised during the\nwinter to go to Nauheim for a course of baths. But when he got there,\nthe eminent specialists who examined his heart ignored his nervous\nprostration. He was doubtless a difficult patient to diagnose or\nprescribe for. Matters went from bad to worse; little by little all his\nplans had to be abandoned. A year went by, and a return to regular work\nin Cambridge was unthinkable. He was no better in the summer of 1900\nthan when he landed in Germany in July of 1899. His daughter had been\nsent to school in England. The three other children remained in America.\nHe and Mrs. James moved about between England, Nauheim, the south of\nFrance, Switzerland and Rome, consulting a specialist in one place or\ntrying the baths or the climate in another--with how much homesickness,\nand with how much courage none the less, the letters will indicate.\n\nHis only systematic reading was a persistent, though frequently\nintermitted, exploration of religious biographies and the literature of\nreligious conversion, in preparation for the Gifford Lectures. During\nthe second year he managed to get one course of these lectures written\nout. Not until he had delivered them in Edinburgh, in May, 1901, did he\nknow that he had turned the corner and feel as if he had begun to live\nagain.\n\nEvery letter that came to him from his family and friends at home was\ncomforting beyond measure, and he poured out a stream of acknowledgment\nin long replies, which he dictated to Mrs. James. His own writing was\nusually limited to jottings in a note-book and to post-cards. He always\nhad a fountain-pen and a few post-cards in his pocket, and often, when\nsitting in a chair in the open air, or at a little table in one of the\noutdoor restaurants that abound in Nauheim and in southern Europe, he\nwould compress more news and messages into one of these little missives\nthan most men ever get into a letter. A few of his friends at home\ndivined his situation, and were at pains to write him regularly and\nfully. Letters that follow show how grateful he was for such devotion.\n\n * * * * *\n\nIn this state of enforced idleness he browsed through newspapers and\njournals more than he had before or than he ever did again, and so his\nletters contained more comments on daily events. It will be clear that\nwhat was happening did not always please him. He was an individualist\nand a liberal, both by temperament and by reason of having grown up with\nthe generation which accepted the doctrines of the _laissez-faire_\nschool in a thoroughgoing way. The Philippine policy of the McKinley\nadministration seemed to him a humiliating desertion of the principles\nthat America had fought for in the Revolution and the War of\nEmancipation. The military occupation of the Philippines, described by\nthe President as \"benevolent assimilation,\" and what he once called the\n\"cold pot-grease of McKinley's eloquence\" filled him with loathing. He\nsaw the Republican Party in the light in which Mr. Dooley portrayed it\nwhen he represented its leaders as praying \"that Providence might remain\nunder the benevolent influence of the present administration.\" When\nMcKinley and Roosevelt were nominated by the Republicans in 1900, he\ncalled them \"a combination of slime and grit, soap and sand, that ought\nto scour anything away, even the moral sense of the country.\" He was\nready to vote for Bryan if there were no other way of turning out the\nadministration responsible for the history of our first years in the\nPhilippines, \"although it would doubtless have been a premature victory\nof a very mongrel kind of reform.\" In the same way, the cant with which\nmany of the supporters of England's program in South Africa extolled the\nBoer War in the British press provoked his irony. The uproar over the\nDreyfus case was at its height. The \"intellectuels,\" as they were called\nin France, the \"Little Englanders\" as they were nicknamed in England,\nand the Anti-Imperialists in his own country had his entire sympathy.\nThe state of mind of a member of the liberal minority, observing the\nphase of history that was disclosing itself at the end of the century,\nis admirably indicated in his correspondence.\n\n * * * * *\n\nMiss Pauline Goldmark, next addressed, and her family were in the habit\nof spending their summers in Keene Valley, where they had a cottage that\nwas not far from the Putnam Shanty. James had often joined forces with\nthem for a day's climb when he was staying at the Shanty. The reader\nwill recall that it was their party that he had joined on Mt. Marcy the\nyear before.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Pauline Goldmark._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _Aug. 12, 1899_.\n\nMY DEAR PAULINE,--I am afraid we are stuck here till the latter half of\nSeptember. Once a donkey, always a donkey; at the Lodge in June, after\nsome slow walks which seemed to do me no harm at all, I drifted one day\nup to the top of Marcy, and then (thanks to the Trail Improvement\nSociety!) found myself in the Johns Brook Valley instead of on the Lodge\ntrail back; and converted what would have been a three-hours' downward\nsaunter into a seven-hours' scramble, emerging in Keene Valley at 10.15\nP.M. This did me no good--quite the contrary; so I have come to Nauheim\njust in time. My carelessness was due to the belief that there was only\none trail in the Lodge direction, so I didn't attend particularly, and\nwhen I found myself off the track (the trail soon stopped) I thought I\nwas going to South Meadow, and didn't reascend. Anyhow I was an ass, and\nyou ought to have been along to steer me straight. I fear we shall\nascend no more acclivities together. \"Bent is the tree that should have\ngrown full straight!\" You have no idea of the moral repulsiveness of\nthis _Curort_ life. Everybody fairly revelling in disease, and\nabandoning themselves to it with a sort of _gusto_. \"Heart,\" \"heart,\"\n\"heart,\" the sole topic of attention and conversation. As a \"phase,\"\nhowever, one ought to be able to live through it, and the extraordinary\nnerve-rest, crawling round as we do, is beneficial. Man is never\nsatisfied! Perhaps I shall be when the baths, etc., have had their\neffect. We go then straight to England.--I do hope that you are all\ngetting what you wish in Switzerland, and that for all of you the entire\nadventure is proving golden. Mrs. James sends her love, and I am, as\nalways, yours most affectionately,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. E. P. Gibbens._\n\n\nVILLA LUISE, BAD-NAUHEIM, _Aug. 22, 1899_.\n\nDARLING BELLE-M\u00c8RE,--The day seems to have come for another letter to\nyou, though my fingers are so cold that I can hardly write. We have had\na most conveniently dry season--convenient in that it doesn't coop us up\nin the house--but a deal of cloud and cold. Today is sunny but\nfrigid--like late October. Altogether the difference of weather is very\nstriking. European weather is stagnant and immovable. It is as if it got\nstuck, and needed a kick to start it; and although it is doubtless\nbetter for the nerves than ours, I find my soul thinking most kindly\nfrom this distance of our glorious quick passionate American climate,\nwith its transparency and its impulsive extremes. This weather is as if\nfed on solid pudding. We inhabit one richly and heavily furnished\nbedroom, 21 x 14, with good beds and a balcony, and are rapidly making\nup for all our estrangement, locally speaking, in the past. It is a\ngreat \"nerve-rest,\" though the listlessness that goes with all\nnerve-rest makes itself felt. Alice seems very well.... The place has\nwonderful adaptation to its purposes in the possession of a vast park\nwith noble trees and avenues and incessant benches for rest; restaurants\nwith out-of-door tables everywhere in sight; music morning, afternoon\nand night; and charming points to go to out of town. Cab-fare is cheap.\nBut nothing else.... The Gifford lectures are in complete abeyance. I\nhave word from Seth that under the circumstances the Academic Senate\nwill be sure to grant me any delay or indulgence I may ask for; so this\nrelieves tension. I can make nothing out yet about my heart.... So I\n_try_ to take long views and not fuss about temporary feelings, though I\ndare say I keep dear Alice worried enough by the fuss I imagine myself\n_not_ to make. It is a loathsome world, this medical world; and I\nconfess that the thought of another six weeks here next year doesn't\nexhilarate me, in spite of the decency of all our physical conditions. I\nstill remain faithful to Irving St. (95 and 107),[23] Chocorua, Silver\nLake, and Keene Valley!\n\nWe get almost no syllable of American news, in spite of the fact that we\ntake the London \"Chronicle.\" Pray send the \"Nation\" and the \"Literary\nDigest.\" _Don't_ send the \"Sciences\" as heretofore. Let them accumulate.\nI think that after reception of this you had better address us care of\nH. J., Rye, Sussex. We shall probably be off by the 10th or 12th of\nSept. I hope that public opinion is gathering black against the\nPhilippine policy--in spite of my absence! I hope that Salter will pitch\nin well in the fall. The still blacker nightmare of a Dreyfus case hangs\nover us; and there is little time in the day save for reading the\n\"Figaro's\" full reports of the trial. Like all French happenings, it is\nas if they were edited expressly for literary purpose. Every \"witness\"\nso-called has a power of statement equal to that of a first-class\nlawyer; and the various human types that succeed each other, exhibiting\ntheir several peculiarities in full blossom, make the thing like a\nnovel. Esterhazy seems to me the _great_ hero. How Shakespeare would\nhave enjoyed such a fantastic scoundrel,--knowing all the secrets,\nsaying what he pleases, mystifying all Europe, leading the whole French\narmy (except apparently Picquart) by the nose,--a regular Shakespearean\ntype of villain, with an insane exuberance of rhetoric and fancy about\nhis vanities and hatreds, that literature has never given yet. It would\nseem incredible that the Court-Martial should condemn. Henry was\nevidently the spy, employed by Esterhazy, and afterwards Du Paty helped\ntheir machinations, in order not to stultify his own record at the\noriginal trial--at least this seems the plausible theory. The older\ngenerals seem merely to have been passive connivers, stupidly and\nobstinately holding to the original official mistake rather than\nsurrender under fire. And such is the prestige of caste-opinion, such\nthe solidity of the professional spirit, that, incredible as it may\nseem, it is still quite probable that the officers will obey the lead of\ntheir superiors, and condemn Dreyfus again. The President, Jouaust, who\nwas supposed to be impartial, is showing an apparently bad animus\nagainst Picquart. P. is a real _hero_--a precious possession for any\ncountry. He ought to be made Minister of War; though that would\ndoubtless produce a revolution. I suppose that Loubet will pardon\nDreyfus immediately if he is recondemned. Then Dreyfus, and perhaps\nLoubet, will be assassinated by some Anti-Semite, and who knows what\nwill follow? But before you get this, you will know far more about the\ntrial than I can tell you.\n\nWe long for news from the boys--not a word from Billy since he left\nTacoma. I am glad their season promises to be shorter! Enough is as good\nas a feast! What a scattered lot we are! I hope that Margaret will be\nhappy in Montreal. As for you in your desolation, I could almost weep\nfor you. My only advice is that you should cling to Aleck as to a\nlife-preserver. I trust you got the $200 I told Higginson to send you. I\nam mortified beyond measure by that overdrawn bank account, and do not\nunderstand it at all.\n\nOceans of love from your affectionate son,\n\nWILLIAM.\n\n\n\n\n_To William M. Salter._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _Sept. 11, 1899_.\n\nDEAR MACKINTIRE,--The incredible has happened, and Dreyfus, without one\nmay say a single particle of _positive_ evidence that he was guilty, has\nbeen condemned again. The French Republic, which seemed about to turn\nthe most dangerous corner in her career and enter on the line of\npolitical health, laying down the finest set of political precedents in\nher history to serve as standards for future imitation and habit, has\nslipped Hell-ward and all the forces of Hell in the country will proceed\nto fresh excesses of insolence. But I don't believe the game is lost.\n\"Les intellectuels,\" thanks to the Republic, are now aggressively\nmilitant as they never were before, and will grow stronger and stronger;\nso we may hope. I have sent you the \"Figaro\" daily; but of course the\nreports are too long for you to have read through. The most grotesque\nthing about the whole trial is the pretension of awful holiness, of\nsemi-divinity in the diplomatic documents and waste-paper-basket scraps\nfrom the embassies--a farce kept up to the very end--these same\ndocuments being, so far as they were anything (and most of them were\nnothing), mere records of treason, lying, theft, bribery, corruption,\nand every crime on the part of the diplomatic agents. Either the German\nand Italian governments will now publish or not publish all the details\nof their transactions--give the exact documents meant by the\n_bordereaux_ and the exact names of the French traitors. If they do not,\nthere will be only two possible explanations: either Dreyfus's guilt,\nor the pride of their own sacrosanct etiquette. As it is scarcely\nconceivable that Dreyfus can have been guilty, their silences will be\ndue to the latter cause. (Of course it can't be due to what they owe in\nhonor to Esterhazy and whoever their other allies and servants may have\nbeen. E. is safe over the border, and a pension for his services will\nheal all his wounds. Any other person can quickly be put in similar\nconditions of happiness.) And they and Esterhazy will then be exactly on\na par morally, actively conspiring to have an innocent man bear the\nburden of their own sins. By their carelessness with the documents they\ngot Dreyfus accused, and now they abandon him, for the sake of their own\ndivine etiquette.\n\nThe breath of the nostrils of all these big institutions is crime--that\nis the long and short of it. We must thank God for America; and hold\nfast to every advantage of our position. Talk about our corruption! It\nis a mere fly-speck of superficiality compared with the rooted and\npermanent forces of corruption that exist in the European states. The\nonly serious permanent force of corruption in America is party spirit.\nAll the other forces are shifting like the clouds, and have no\npartnerships with any permanently organized ideal. Millionaires and\nsyndicates have their immediate cash to pay, but they have no intrenched\nprestige to work with, like the church sentiment, the army sentiment,\nthe aristocracy and royalty sentiment, which here can be brought to bear\nin favor of every kind of individual and collective crime--appealing not\nonly to the immediate pocket of the persons to be corrupted, but to the\nideals of their imagination as well.... My dear Mack, we \"intellectuals\"\nin America must all work to keep our precious birthright of\nindividualism, and freedom from these institutions. _Every_ great\ninstitution is perforce a means of corruption--whatever good it may also\ndo. Only in the free personal relation is full ideality to be found.--I\nhave vomited all this out upon you in the hope that it may wake a\nresponsive echo. One must do _something_ to work off the effect of the\nDreyfus sentence.\n\nI rejoice immensely in the purchase [on our behalf] of the two pieces of\nland [near Chocorua], and pine for the day when I can get back to see\nthem. If all the same to you, I wish that you would buy Burke's in your\nname, and Mother-in-law Forrest's in her name. But let this be exactly\nas each of you severally prefers.\n\nWe leave here in a couple of days, I imagine. I am better; but I can't\ntell how much better for a few weeks yet. I hope that you will smite the\nungodly next winter. What a glorious gathering together of the forces\nfor the great fight there will be. It seems to me as if the proper\ntactics were to pound McKinley--put the whole responsibility on him. It\nis he who by his purely drifting \"non-entanglement\" policy converted a\nsplendid opportunity into this present necessity of a conquest of\nextermination. It is he who has warped us from our continuous national\nhabit, which, if we repudiate him, it will not be impossible to resume.\n\nAffectionately thine, Mary's, Aleck's, Dinah's, Augusta's,[24] and\neveryone's,\n\nW. J.\n\nP.S. Damn it, America doesn't know the meaning of the word corruption\ncompared with Europe! Corruption is so permanently organized here that\nit isn't thought of as such--it is so transient and shifting in America\nas to make an outcry whenever it appears.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _Sept. 17, 1899_.\n\n...In two or three days more I shall be discharged (in very decent\nshape, I trust) and after ten days or so of rigorously prescribed\n\"Nachkur\" in the cold and rain of Switzerland (we have seen the sun only\nin short but entrancing glimpses since Sept. 1, and you know what bad\nweather is when it once begins in Europe), we shall pick up our Peggy at\nVevey, and proceed to Lamb House, Rye, _\u00fcber_ Paris, with all possible\nspeed. God bless the American climate, with its transparent, passionate,\nimpulsive variety and headlong fling. There are deeper, slower tones of\nearnestness and moral gravity here, no doubt, but ours is more like\nyouth and youth's infinite and touching promise. God bless America in\ngeneral! _Conspuez_ McKinley and the Republican party and the Philippine\nwar, and the Methodists, and the voices, etc., as much as you please,\nbut bless the innocence. Talk of corruption! We don't know what the word\ncorruption means at home, with our improvised and shifting agencies of\ncrude pecuniary bribery, compared with the solidly intrenched and\npermanently organized corruptive geniuses of monarchy, nobility, church,\narmy, that penetrate the very bosom of the higher kind as well as the\nlower kind of people in all the European states (except Switzerland) and\nsophisticate their motives away from the impulse to straightforward\nhandling of any simple case. _Temoin_ the Dreyfus case! But no matter!\nOf all the forms of mental crudity, that of growing earnest over\ninternational comparisons is probably the most childish. Every nation\nhas its ideals which are a dead secret to other nations, and it has to\ndevelop in its own way, in touch with them. It can only be judged by\nitself. If each of us does as well as he can in his own sphere at home,\nhe will do all he _can_ do; that is why I hate to remain so long\nabroad....\n\nWe have been having a visit from an extraordinary Pole named\nLutoslawski, 36 years old, author of philosophical writings in seven\ndifferent languages,--\"Plato's Logic,\" in English (Longmans) being his\nchief work,--and knower of several more, handsome, and to the last\ndegree genial. He has a singular philosophy--the philosophy of\nfriendship. He takes in dead seriousness what most people admit, but\nonly half-believe, viz., that we are _Souls_ (Zoolss, he pronounces it),\nthat souls are immortal, and agents of the world's destinies, and that\nthe chief concern of a soul is to get ahead by the help of other souls\nwith whom it can establish confidential relations. So he spends most of\nhis time writing letters, and will send 8 sheets of reply to a\npost-card--that is the exact proportion of my correspondence with him.\nShall I rope you in, Fanny? He has a great chain of friends and\ncorrespondents in all the countries of Europe. The worst of them is that\nthey think a secret imparted to one may at his or her discretion become,\n_de proche en proche_, the property of all. He is a _wunderlicher\nMensch_: abstractly his scheme is divine, but there is something on\nwhich I can't yet just lay my defining finger that makes one feel that\nthere is some need of the corrective and critical and arresting judgment\nin his manner of carrying it out. These Slavs seem to be the great\nradical livers-out of their theories. Good-bye, dearest Fanny....\n\nYour affectionate\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Henry Whitman._\n\n\nLAMB HOUSE, RYE, _Oct. 5, 1899_.\n\nDEAR MRS. WHITMAN,--You see where at last we have arrived, at the end of\nthe first _\u00e9tape_ of this pilgrimage--the second station of the cross,\nso to speak--with the Continent over, and England about to begin. The\nland is bathed in greenish-yellow light and misty drizzle of rain. The\nlittle town, with its miniature brick walls and houses and nooks and\ncoves and gardens, makes a curiously vivid and quaint picture,\nalternately suggesting English, Dutch, and Japanese effects that one has\nseen in pictures--all exceedingly tiny (so that one wonders how\n_families_ ever could have been reared in most of the houses) and neat\nand _zierlich_ to the last degree. _Refinement_ in architecture\ncertainly consists in narrow trim and the absence of heavy mouldings.\nModern Germany is incredibly bad from that point of view--much worse,\napparently, than America. But the German people are a good safe fact for\ngreat powers to be intrusted to--earnest and serious, and pleasant to be\nwith, as we found them, though it was humiliating enough to find how\nawfully imperfect were one's powers of conversing in their language.\nFrench not much better. I remember nothing of this extreme mortification\nin old times, and am inclined to think that it is due less to loss of\nability to speak, than to the fact that, as you grow older, you speak\nbetter English, and expect more of yourself in the way of\naccomplishment. I am sure _you_ spoke no such English as now, in the\nseventies, when you came to Cambridge! And how could I, as yet untrained\nby conversation with you?\n\nSeven mortal weeks did we spend at the _Curort_, Nauheim, for an\ninfirmity of the heart which I contracted, apparently, not much more\nthan a year ago, and which now must be borne, along with the rest of the\nwhite man's burden, until additional visits to Nauheim have removed it\naltogether for ordinary practical purposes. N. was a sweetly pretty\nspot, but I longed for more activity. A glorious week in Switzerland,\nsolid in its sometimes awful, sometimes beefy beauty; two days in\nParis, where I could gladly have stayed the winter out, merely for the\nfun of the sight of the intelligent and interesting streets; then\nhither, where H. J. has a real little _bijou_ of a house and garden, and\nseems absolutely adapted to his environment, and very well and contented\nin the leisure to write and to read which the place affords.\n\nIn a few days we go almost certainly to the said H. J.'s apartment,\nstill unlet, in London, where we shall in all probability stay till\nJanuary, the world forgetting, by the world forgot, or till such later\ndate as shall witness the completion of the awful Gifford job, at which\nI have not been able to write one line since last January. I long for\nthe definitive settlement and ability to get to work. I am very glad\nindeed, too, to be in an English atmosphere again. Of course it will\nconspire better with my writing tasks, and after all it is more\ncongruous with one's nature and one's inner ideals. Still, one loves\nAmerica above all things, for her youth, her greenness, her plasticity,\ninnocence, good intentions, friends, everything. Je veux que mes cendres\nreposent sur les bords du Charles, au milieu de ce bon peuple de Harvarr\nSquerre que j'ai tant aim\u00e9. That is what I say, and what Napoleon B.\nwould have said, had his life been enriched by your and my educational\nand other experiences--poor man, he knew too little of life, had never\neven heard of us, whilst we have heard of him!\n\nSeriously speaking, though, I believe that international comparisons are\na great waste of time--at any rate, international judgments and passings\nof sentence are. Every nation has ideals and difficulties and sentiments\nwhich are an impenetrable secret to one not of the blood. Let them\nalone, let each one work out its own salvation on its own lines. They\ntalk of the decadence of France. The hatreds, and the _coups de gueule_\nof the newspapers there are awful. But I doubt if the better ideals were\never so aggressively strong; and I fancy it is the fruit of the much\ndecried republican r\u00e9gime that they have become so. My brother\nrepresents English popular opinion as less cock-a-whoop for war than\nnewspaper accounts would lead one to imagine; but I don't know that he\nis in a good position for judging. I hope if they do go to war that the\nBoers will give them fits, and I heartily emit an analogous prayer on\nbehalf of the Philippinos.\n\nI have had pleasant news of Beverly, having had letters both from Fanny\nMorse and Paulina Smith. I hope that your summer has been a good one,\nthat work has prospered and that Society has been less _\u00e9nervante_ and\nmore nutritious for the higher life of the Soul than it sometimes is.\n_We_ have met but one person of any accomplishments or interest all\nsummer. But I have managed to read a good deal about religion, and\nreligious people, and care less for accomplishments, except where (as in\nyou) they go with a sanctified heart. Abundance of accomplishments, in\nan unsanctified heart, only make one a more accomplished devil.\n\nGood bye, angelic friend! We both send love and best wishes, both to you\nand Mr. Whitman, and I am as ever yours affectionately,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Thomas Davidson._\n\n\n34 DE VERE GARDENS,\nLONDON, _Nov. 2, 1899_.\n\nDEAR OLD T. D.,--A recent letter from Margaret Gibbens says that you\nhave gone to New York in order to undergo a most \"radical operation.\" I\nneed not say that my thoughts have been with you, and that I have felt\nanxiety mixed with my hopes for you, ever since. I do indeed hope that,\nwhatever the treatment was, it has gone off with perfect success, and\nthat by this time you are in the durable enjoyment of relief, and nerves\nand everything upon the upward track. It has always seemed to me that,\nwere I in a similar plight, I should choose a kill-or-cure operation\nrather than anything merely palliative--so poisonous to one's whole\nmental and moral being is the irritation and worry of the complaint. It\nwould truly be a spectacle for the Gods to see you rising like a\nphoenix from your ashes again, and shaking off even the memory of\ndisaster like dew-drops from a lion's mane, etc.--and I hope the\nspectacle will be vouchsafed to us men also, and that you will be\npresiding over Glenmore as if nothing had happened, different from the\nfirst years, save a certain softening of your native ferocity of heart,\nand gentleness towards the shortcomings of weaker people. Dear old East\nHill![25] I shall never forget the beauty of the morning (it had rained\nthe night before) when I took my bath in the brook, before driving down\nto Westport one day last June.\n\nWe got your letter at Nauheim, a sweet safe little place, made for\ninvalids, to which it took long to reconcile me on that account. But\nnous en avons vu bien d'autres depuis, and from my present retirement in\nmy brother's still unlet flat (he living at Rye), Nauheim seems to me\nlike New York for bustle and energy. My heart, in short, has gone back\nupon me badly since I was there, and my doctor, Bezley Thorne, the first\nspecialist here, and a man who inspires me with great confidence, is\ntrying to tide me over the crisis, by great quiet, in addition to a\ndietary of the strictest sort, and more Nauheim baths, _\u00e0 domicile_.\nProvided I can only get safely out of the Gifford scrape, the deluge has\nleave to come.--Write, dear old T. D., and tell how you are, and let it\nbe good news if possible. Give much love to the Warrens, and believe me\nalways affectionately yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\nThe woman thou gavest unto me comes out strong as a nurse, and treats me\nmuch better than I deserve.\n\n\n\n\n_To John C. Gray._\n\n\n[Dictated to Mrs. James]\n\nLONDON, _Nov. 23, 1899_.\n\nDEAR JOHN,--A week ago I learnt from the \"Nation\"--strange to have heard\nit in no directer way!--that dear old John Ropes had turned his back on\nus and all this mortal tragi-comedy. No sooner does one get abroad than\nthat sort of thing begins. I am deeply grieved to think of never seeing\nor hearing old J. C. R. again, with his manliness, good-fellowship, and\ncheeriness, and idealism of the right sort, and can't hold in any longer\nfrom expression. You, dear John, seem the only fitting person for me to\ncondole with, for you will miss him most tremendously. Pray write and\ntell me some details of the manner of his death. I hope he didn't suffer\nmuch. Write also of your own personal and family fortunes and give my\nlove to the members of our dining club collectively and individually,\nwhen you next meet.\n\nI have myself been shut up in a sick room for five weeks past, seeing\nhardly anyone but my wife and the doctor, a bad state of the heart being\nthe cause. We shall be at West Malvern in ten days, where I hope to\nbegin to mend.\n\nHurrah for Henry Higginson and his gift[26] to the University! I think\nthe Club cannot fail to be useful if they make it democratic enough.\n\nI hope that Roland is enjoying Washington, but not so far\ntransubstantiated into a politician as to think that McKinley & Co. are\nthe high-water mark of human greatness up to date.\n\nJohn Ropes, more than most men, seems as if he would be natural to meet\nagain.\n\nPlease give our love to Mrs. Gray, and believe me, affectionately yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nLAMB HOUSE, _Dec. 23, 1899_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--About a week ago I found myself thinking a good deal\nabout you.\n\nI may possibly have begun by wondering how it came that, after showing\nsuch a spontaneous tendency towards that \"clandestine correspondence\"\nearly in the season, you should recently, in spite of pathetic news\nabout me, and direct personal appeals, be showing such great epistolary\nreserve. I went on to great lengths about you; and ended by realizing\nyour existence, and its significance, as it were, very acutely. I\ncomposed a letter to you in my mind, whilst lying awake, dwelling in a\nfeeling manner on the fact that human beings are born into this little\nspan of life of which the best thing is its friendships and intimacies,\nand soon their places will know them no more, and yet they leave their\nfriendships and intimacies with no cultivation, to grow as they will by\nthe roadside, expecting them to \"keep\" by force of mere inertia; they\ncontribute nothing empirical to the relation, treating it as something\ntranscendental and metaphysical altogether; whereas in truth it\ndeserves from hour to hour the most active care and nurture and\ndevotion. \"There's that Fanny,\" thought I, \"the rarest and most\nprecious, perhaps, of all the phenomena that enter into the circle of my\nexperience. I take her for granted; I seldom see her--she _has never\npassed a night in our house!_[27] and yet of all things she is the one\nthat probably deserves the closest and most unremitting attention on my\npart. This transcendental relation of persons to each other in the\nabsolute won't do! I must write to Fanny and tell her, in spite of her\ndeprecations, just how perfect and rare and priceless a fact I know her\nexistence in this Universe eternally to be. This very morrow I will\ndictate such a letter to Alice.\" The morrow came, and several days\nsucceeded, and brought each its impediment with it, so that letter\ndoesn't get written till today. And now Alice, who had suddenly to take\nPeggy (who is with us for ten days) out to see a neighbor's little girl,\ncomes in; so I will give the pen to her.\n\n[Remainder of letter dictated to Mrs. James]\n\nSunday, 24th.\n\nBrother Harry and Peggy came in with Alice last evening, so my letter\ngot postponed till this morning. What I was going to say was this. The\nday before yesterday we received in one bunch seven letters from you,\ndating from the 20th of October to the 8th of December, and showing that\nyou, at any rate, had been alive to the duty of actively nourishing\nfriendship by deeds.... Your letters were sent to Baring Brothers,\ninstead of Brown, Shipley and Co., and it was a mercy that we ever got\nthem at all. You are a great letter-writer inasmuch as your pen flows\non, giving out easily such facts and feelings and thoughts as form the\nactual contents of your day, so that one gets a live impression of\nconcrete reality. _My_ letters, I find, tend to escape into humorisms,\nabstractions and flights of fancy, which are not nutritious things to\nimpart to friends thousands of miles away who wish to realize the facts\nof your private existence. We are now received into the shelter of H.\nJ.'s \"Lamb House,\" where we have been a week, having found West Malvern\n(where the doctor sent me after my course of baths) rather too bleak a\nretreat for the drear-nighted December. (Heaven be praised! we have just\nlived down the solstice after which the year always seems a brighter,\nhopefuller thing.) Harry's place is a most exquisite collection of\nquaint little stage properties, three quarters of an acre of\nbrick-walled English garden, little brick courts and out-houses,\nold-time kitchen and offices, paneled chambers and tiled fire-places,\nbut all very simple and on a small scale. Its host, soon to become its\nproprietor, leads a very lonely life but seems in perfect equilibrium\ntherewith, placing apparently his interest more and more in the\noperations of his fancy. His health is good, his face calm, his spirits\nequable, and he will doubtless remain here for many years to come, with\nan occasional visit to London. He has spoken of you with warm affection\nand is grateful for the letters which you send him in spite of the lapse\nof years....\n\nI have resigned my Gifford lectureship, but they will undoubtedly grant\nme indefinite postponement. I have also asked for a second year of\nabsence from Harvard, which of course will be accorded. If I improve, I\nmay be able to give my first Gifford course next year. I can do no work\nwhatsoever at present, but through the summer and half through the fall\nwas able to do a good deal of reading in religious biography. Since\nJuly, in fact, my only companions have been saints, most excellent,\nthough sometimes rather lop-sided company. In a general manner I can\nsee my way to a perfectly bully pair of volumes, the first an objective\nstudy of the \"Varieties of Religious Experience,\" the second, my own\nlast will and testament, setting forth the philosophy best adapted to\nnormal religious needs. I hope I may be spared to get the thing down on\npaper. So far my progress has been rather downhill, but the last couple\nof days have shown a change which possibly may be the beginning of\nbetter things. I mean to take great care of myself from this time on. In\nanother week or two we hope to move to a climate (possibly near Hy\u00e8res)\nwhere I may sit more out of doors. Gathering some strength there, I\ntrust to make for Nauheim in May. If I am benefited there, we shall stay\nover next winter; otherwise we return by midsummer. Were Alice not\nholding the pen, I should celebrate her unselfish devotion, etc., and\nwere I not myself dictating, I should celebrate my own uncomplaining\npatience and fortitude. As it is, I leave you to imagine both. Both are\nsimply beautiful!\n\n...There, dear Fanny, this is all I can do today in return for your\nseven glorious epistles. Take a heartful of love and gratitude from both\nof us. Remember us most affectionately to your Mother and Mary. Write\nagain soon, I pray you, but always to _Brown, Shipley and Co._ Stir up\nJim Putnam to write when he can, and believe me, lovingly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Glendower Evans._\n\n\n[Dictated to Mrs. James]\n\nCOSTEBELLE, HY\u00c8RES, _Jan. 17, 1900_.\n\nDEAR BESSIE,--Don't think that this is the first time that my spirit has\nturned towards you since our departure. Away back in Nauheim I began\nmeaning to write to you, and although that meaning was \"fulfilled\" long\nbefore you were born, in Royce's Absolute, yet there was a hitch about\nit in the finite which gave me perplexity. I think that the real reason\nwhy I kept finding myself able to dictate letters to other persons--not\nmany, 't is true--and yet postponing ever until next time my letter unto\nyou, was that my sense of your value was so much greater than almost\nanybody else's--though I wouldn't have anything in this construed\nprejudicial to Fanny Morse. Bowed as I am by the heaviest of matrimonial\nchains, ever dependent for expression on Alice here, how can my spirit\nmove with perfect spontaneity, or \"voice itself\" with the careless\nfreedom it would wish for in the channels of its choice? I am sure you\nunderstand, and under present conditions of communication anything more\nexplicit might be imprudent.\n\nShe has told you correctly all the outward facts. I feel within a week\npast as if I might really be taking a turn for the better, and I know\nyou will be glad.\n\nI have, in the last days, gone so far as to read Royce's book[28] from\ncover to cover, a task made easy by the familiarity of the thought, as\nwell as the flow of the style. It is a charming production--it is odd\nthat the adjectives \"charming\" and \"pretty\" emerge so strongly to\ncharacterize my impression. R. has got himself much more organically\ntogether than he ever did before, the result being, in its _ensemble_, a\nhighly individual and original _Weltanschauung_, well-fitted to be the\nstorm-centre of much discussion, and to form a wellspring of suggestion\nand education for the next generation of thought in America. But it\nmakes youthful anew the paradox of philosophy--so trivial and so\nponderous at once. The book leaves a total effect on you like a\npicture--a summary impression of charm and grace as light as a breath;\nyet to bring forth that light nothing less than Royce's enormous organic\ntemperament and technical equipment, and preliminary attempts, were\nrequired. The book consolidates an impression which I have never before\ngot except by glimpses, that Royce's system is through and through to be\nclassed as a light production. It is a charming, romantic sketch; and it\nis only by handling it after the manner of a sketch, keeping it within\nsketch technique, that R. can make it very impressive. In the few places\nwhere he tries to grip and reason close, the effect is rather\ndisastrous, to my mind. But I do think of Royce now in a more or less\nsettled way as primarily a sketcher in philosophy. Of course the\nsketches of some masters are worth more than the finished pictures of\nothers. But stop! if this was the kind of letter I meant to write to\nyou, it is no wonder that I found myself unable to begin weeks ago. My\nexcuse is that I only finished the book two hours ago, and my mind was\nfull to overflowing.\n\nNext Monday we are expecting to move into the neighboring Ch\u00e2teau de\nCarqueiranne, which my friend Professor Richet of Paris has offered\nconjointly to us and the Fred Myerses, who will soon arrive. A whole\ncountry house in splendid grounds and a perfect Godsend under the\nconditions. If I can only bear the talking to the Myerses without too\nmuch fatigue! But that also I am sure will come. Our present situation\nis enviable enough. A large bedroom with a balcony high up on the vast\nhotel fa\u00e7ade; a terrace below it graveled with white pebbles containing\nbeds of palms and oranges and roses; below that a downward sloping\ngarden full of plants and winding walks and seats; then a wide hillside\ncontinuing southward to the plain below, with its gray-green olive\ngroves bordered by great salt marshes with salt works on them, shut in\nfrom the sea by the causeways which lead to a long rocky island, perhaps\nthree miles away, that limits the middle of our view due south, and\nbeyond which to the East and West appears the boundless Mediterranean.\nBut delightful as this is, there is no place like home; Otis Place is\nbetter than Languedoc and Irving Street than Provence. And I am sure,\ndear Bessie, that there is no maid, wife or widow in either of these\ncountries that is half as good as you. But here I must absolutely stop;\nso with a good-night and a happy New Year to you, I am as ever,\naffectionately your friend,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\n[Dictated to Mrs. James]\n\nHOTEL D' ALBION,\nCOSTEBELLE, HY\u00c8RES, _Jan. 18, 1900_.\n\nDARLING MILLER,--Last night arrived your pathetically sympathetic letter\nin comment on the news you had just received of my dropping out for the\npresent from the active career. I want you to understand how deeply I\nvalue your unflagging feeling of friendship, and how much we have been\ntouched by this new expression of it.... My strength and spirits are\ncoming back to me with the open-air life, and I begin to feel quite\ndifferently towards the future. Even if this amelioration does not\ndevelop fast, it is a check to the deterioration, and shows that\ncurative forces are still there. I look perfectly well at present, and\nthat of itself is a very favorable sign. In a couple of weeks I mean to\nbegin the Gifford lectures, writing, say, a page a day, and having all\nnext year before me empty, am very likely to get, at any rate, the first\ncourse finished. A letter from Seth last night told me that the\nCommittee [on the Gifford Lectureship] had refused my resignation and\nsimply shoved my appointment forward by one year. So be of good cheer,\nMiller; we shall yet fight the good fight, sometimes side by side,\nsometimes agin one another, as merrily as if no interruption had\noccurred. Show this to Harry, to whom his mother will write today.\n\nWe enjoyed Royce's visit very much, and yesterday I finished reading his\nbook, which I find perfectly charming as a composition, though as far as\ncogent reasoning goes, it leaks at every joint. It is, nevertheless, a\nbig achievement in the line of philosophic fancy-work, perhaps the most\nimportant of all except religious fancy-work. He has got himself\ntogether far more intricately than ever before, and ought, after this,\nto be recognized by the world according to the measure of his real\nimportance. To me, however, the book has brought about a curious\nsettlement in my way of classing Royce. In spite of the great technical\nfreight he carries, and his extraordinary mental vigor, he belongs\nessentially among the lighter skirmishers of philosophy. A sketcher and\npopularizer, not a pile-driver, foundation-layer, or wall-builder.\nWithin his class, of course, he is simply magnificent. It all goes with\nhis easy temperament and rare good-nature in discussion. The subject is\nnot really vital to him, it is just fancy-work. All the same I do hope\nthat this book and its successor will prove a great ferment in our\nphilosophic schools. Only with schools and living masters can philosophy\n_bloom_ in a country, in a generation.\n\nNo more, dear Miller, but endless thanks. All you tell me of yourself\ndeeply interests me. I am deeply sorry about the eyes. Are you sure it\nis not a matter for glasses? With much love from both of us. Your ever\naffectionate,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Francis Boott._\n\n\n[Dictated to Mrs. James]\n\nCH\u00c2TEAU DE CARQUEIRANNE, _Jan. 31, 1900_.\n\nDEAR OLD FRIEND,--Every day for a month past I have said to Alice,\n\"Today we must get off a letter to Mr. Boott\"; but every day the\navailable strength was less than the call upon it. Yours of the 28th\nDecember reached us duly at Rye and was read at the cheerful little\nbreakfast table. I must say that you are the only person who has caught\nthe proper tone for sympathizing with an invalid's feelings. Everyone\nelse says, \"We are glad to think that you are by this time in splendid\ncondition, richly enjoying your rest, and having a great success at\nEdinburgh\"--this, where what one craves is mere pity for one's unmerited\nsufferings! _You_ say, \"it is a great disappointment, more I should\nthink than you can well bear. I wish you could give up the whole affair\nand turn your prow toward home.\" That, dear Sir, is the proper note to\nstrike--la voix du coeur qui seul au coeur arrive; and I thank you for\nrecognizing that it is a case of agony and patience. I, for one, should\nbe too glad to turn my prow homewards, in spite of all our present\nprivileges in the way of simplified life, and glorious climate. What\nwouldn't I give at this moment to be partaking of one of your recherch\u00e9s\nd\u00e9jeuners \u00e0 la fourchette, ministered to by the good Kate. From the bed\non which I lie I can \"sense\" it as if present--the succulent roast pork,\nthe apple sauce, the canned asparagus, the cranberry pie, the dates, the\n\"To Kalon,\"[29]--above all the _rire en barbe_ of the ever-youthful\nhost. Will they ever come again?\n\nDon't understand me to be disparaging our present meals which, cooked by\na broadbuilt sexagenarian Proven\u00e7ale, leave nothing to be desired.\nEspecially is the fish good and the artichokes, and the stewed lettuce.\nOur _commensaux_, the Myerses, form a good combination. The house is\nvast and comfortable and the air just right for one in my condition,\nneither relaxing nor exciting, and floods of sunshine.\n\nDo you care much about the war? For my part I think Jehovah has run the\nthing about right, so far; though on utilitarian grounds it will be very\nlikely better if the English win. When we were at Rye an interminable\ncontroversy raged about a national day of humiliation and prayer. I\nwrote to the \"Times\" to suggest, in my character of traveling American,\nthat both sides to the controversy might be satisfied by a service\narranged on principles suggested by the anecdote of the Montana settler\nwho met a grizzly so formidable that he fell on his knees, saying, \"O\nLord, I hain't never yet asked ye for help, and ain't agoin' to ask ye\nfor none now. But for pity's sake, O Lord, don't help the bear.\" The\nsolemn \"Times\" never printed my letter and thus the world lost an\nadmirable epigram. You, I know, will appreciate it.\n\nMrs. Gibbens speaks with great pleasure of your friendly visits, and I\nshould think you might find Mrs. Merriman good company. I hope you are\ngetting through the winter without any bronchial trouble, and I hope\nthat neither the influenza nor the bubonic plague has got to Cambridge\nyet. The former is devastating Europe. If you see dear Dr. Driver, give\nhim our warmest regards. One ought to stay among one's own people. I\nseem to be mending--though very slowly, and the least thing knocks me\ndown. This noon I am still in bed, a little too much talking with the\nMyerses yesterday giving me a strong pectoral distress which is not yet\nover. This dictation begins to hurt me, so I will stop. My spirits now\nare first-rate, which is a great point gained.\n\nGood-bye, dear old man! We both send our warmest love and are, ever\naffectionately yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Hugo M\u00fcnsterberg._\n\n\nCARQUEIANNE, _March 13, 1900_.\n\nDEAR M\u00dcNSTERBERG,--Your letter of the 7th \"ult.\" was a most delightful\nsurprise--all but the part of it which told of your being ill again--and\nof course the news of poor Solomons's death was a severe shock.... As\nregards Solomons, it is pathetically tragic, and I hope that you will\nsend me full details. There was something so lonely and self-sustaining\nabout poor little S., that to be snuffed out like this before he had\nfairly begun to live in the eyes of the world adds a sort of tragic\ndramatic unity to his young career. Certainly the _keenest_ intellect we\never had, and one of the loftiest characters! But there was always a\nmysterious side to me about his mind: he appeared so critical and\ndestructive, and yet kept alluding all the while to ethical and\nreligious ideals of his own which he wished to live for, and of which he\nnever vouchsafed a glimpse to anyone else. He was the only student I\nhave ever had of whose criticisms I felt afraid: and that was partly\nbecause I never quite understood the region from which they came, and\nwith the authority of which he spoke. His surface thoughts, however, of\na scientific order, were extraordinarily _treffend_ and clearly\nexpressed; in fact, the way in which he went to the heart of a subject\nin a few words was masterly. Of course he must have left, apart from his\nthesis, a good deal of MS. fit for publication. I have not seen our\nphilosophical periodicals since leaving home. Have any parts of his\nthesis already appeared? If not, the whole thing should be published as\n\"Monograph Supplement\" to the \"Psychological Review,\" and his papers\ngone over to see what else there may be. An adequate obituary of him\nought also to be written. Who knew him most intimately? I think the\nobituary and a portrait ought also to be posted in the laboratory. Can\nyou send me the address of his mother?--I think his father is dead. I\nshould also like to write a word about him to Miss S----, if you can\ngive me her address. If we had foreseen this early end to poor little\nSolomons, how much more we should have made of him, and how considerate\nwe should have been!\n\nIt pleases me much to think of so many other good young fellows, as you\nreport them, in the laboratory this year. How many candidates for Ph.D.?\nHow glad I am to be clear of those examinations, certainly the most\ndisagreeable part of the year's work....\n\n\n\n\n_To George H. Palmer._\n\n\nCARQUEIRANNE, _Apr. 2, 1900_.\n\nGLORIOUS OLD PALMER,--I had come to the point of feeling that my next\nletter _must_ be to you, when in comes your delightful \"favor\" of the\n18th, with all its news, its convincing clipping, and its enclosures\nfrom Bakewell and Sheldon. I have had many impulses to write to\nBakewell, but they have all aborted--my powers being so small and so\nmuch _in Anspruch genommen_ by correspondence already under way. I judge\nhim to be well and happy. What think you of his wife? I suppose she is\nno relation of yours. I shouldn't think any of your three candidates\nwould do for that conventional Bryn Mawr. She stoneth the prophets, and\nI wish she would get X---- and get stung. He made a _deplorable_\nimpression on me many years ago. The only comment _I_ heard when I gave\nmy address there lately (the last one in my \"Talks\") was that A---- had\nhoped for something more technical and psychological! Nevertheless, some\ngood girls seem to come out at Bryn Mawr. I am awfully sorry that Perry\nis out of place. Unless he gets something good, it seems to me that we\nought to get him for a course in Kant. He is certainly the soundest,\nmost normal all-round man of our recent production. Your list for next\nyear interests me muchly. I am glad of M\u00fcnsterberg's and Santayana's new\ncourses, and hope they'll be good. I'm glad you're back in Ethics and\nglad that Royce has \"Epistemology\"--portentous name, and small result,\nin my opinion, but a substantive _discipline_ which ought, _par le temps\nqui court_, to be treated with due formality. I look forward with\neagerness to his new volume.[30] What a colossal feat he has performed\nin these two years--all thrown in by the way, as it were.\n\nCertainly Gifford lectures are a good institution for stimulating\nproduction. They have stimulated me so far to produce two lectures of\nwishy-washy generalities. What is that for a \"showing\" in six months of\nabsolute leisure? The second lecture used me up so that I must be off a\ngood while again.\n\nNo! dear Palmer, the best I can possibly hope for at Cambridge after my\nreturn is to be able to carry one half-course. So make all calculations\naccordingly. As for Windelband, how can I ascertain anything except by\nwriting to him? I shall see no one, nor go to any University\nenvironment. My impression is that we must go in for budding genius, if\nwe seek a European. If an American, we can get a _sommit\u00e9_! But who? in\neither case? Verily there is room at the top. S---- seems to be the\nonly Britisher worth thinking of. I imagine we had better train up our\nown men. A----, B----, C----, either would no doubt do, especially A----\nif his health improves. D---- is our last card, from the point of view\nof policy, no doubt, but from that of inner organization it seems to me\nthat he may have too many points of coalescence with both M\u00fcnsterberg\nand Royce, especially the latter.\n\nThe great event in my life recently has been the reading of Santayana's\nbook.[31] Although I absolutely reject the platonism of it, I have\nliterally squealed with delight at the imperturbable perfection with\nwhich the position is laid down on page after page; and grunted with\ndelight at such a thickening up of our Harvard atmosphere. If our\nstudents now could begin really to understand what Royce means with his\nvoluntaristic-pluralistic monism, what M\u00fcnsterberg means with his\ndualistic scientificism and platonism, what Santayana means by his\npessimistic platonism (I wonder if he and Mg. have had any close\nmutually encouraging intercourse in this line?), what I mean by my crass\npluralism, what you mean by your ethereal idealism, that these are so\nmany religions, ways of fronting life, and worth fighting for, we should\nhave a genuine philosophic universe at Harvard. The best condition of it\nwould be an open conflict and rivalry of the diverse systems. (Alas!\nthat I should be out of it, just as my chance begins!) The world might\nring with the struggle, if we devoted ourselves exclusively to\nbelaboring each other.\n\nI now understand Santayana, the man. I never understood him before. But\nwhat a perfection of rottenness in a philosophy! I don't think I ever\nknew the anti-realistic view to be propounded with so impudently\nsuperior an air. It is refreshing to see a representative of moribund\nLatinity rise up and administer such reproof to us barbarians in the\nhour of our triumph. I imagine Santayana's _style_ to be entirely\nspontaneous. But it has curious classic echoes. Whole pages of pure Hume\nin style; others of pure Renan. Nevertheless, how fantastic a\nphilosophy!--as if the \"world of values\" _were_ independent of\nexistence. It is only as _being_, that one thing is better than another.\nThe idea of darkness is as good as that of light, as ideas. There is\nmore value in light's _being_. And the exquisite consolation, when you\nhave ascertained the badness of all fact, in knowing that badness is\ninferior to goodness, to the end--it only rubs the pessimism in. A man\nwhose egg at breakfast turns out always bad says to himself, \"Well, bad\nand good are not the same, anyhow.\" That is just the trouble! Moreover,\nwhen you come down to the facts, what do your harmonious and integral\nideal systems prove to be? in the concrete? Always things burst by the\ngrowing content of experience. Dramatic unities; laws of versification;\necclesiastical systems; scholastic doctrines. Bah! Give me Walt Whitman\nand Browning ten times over, much as the perverse ugliness of the latter\nat times irritates me, and intensely as I have enjoyed Santayana's\nattack. The barbarians are in the line of mental growth, and those who\ndo insist that the ideal and the real are dynamically continuous are\nthose by whom the world is to be saved. But I'm nevertheless delighted\nthat the other view, always existing in the world, should at last have\nfound so splendidly impertinent an expression among ourselves. I have\nmeant to write to Santayana; but on second thoughts, and to save myself,\nI will just ask you to send him this. It saves him from what might be\nthe nuisance of having to reply, and on my part it has the advantage of\nbeing more free-spoken and direct. He is certainly an _extraordinarily\ndistingu\u00e9_ writer. Thank him for existing!\n\nAs a contrast, read Jack Chapman's \"Practical Agitation.\" The other pole\nof thought, and a style all splinters--but a gospel for our rising\ngeneration--I hope it will have its effect.\n\nSend me your Noble lectures. I don't see how you could risk it without a\nMS. If you did fail (which I doubt) you deserved to. Anyhow the printed\npage makes everything good.\n\nI can no more! Adieu! How is Mrs. Palmer this winter? I hope entirely\nherself again. You are impartially silent of her and of my wife! The\n\"Transcript\" continues to bless us. We move from this hospitable roof to\nthe hotel at Costebelle today. Thence after a fortnight to Geneva, and\nin May to Nauheim once more, to be re\u00ebxamined and sentenced by Schott.\nAffectionately yours,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nCOSTEBELLE, _Apr. 12, 1900_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--Your letters continue to rain down upon us with a\nfidelity which makes me sure that, however it may once have been, _now_,\non the principle of the immortal Monsieur Perrichon, we must be firmly\nrooted in your affections. You can never \"throw over\" anybody for whom\nyou have made such sacrifices. All qualms which I might have in the\nabstract about the injury we must be inflicting on so busy a Being by\nmaking her, through our complaints of poverty, agony, and exile, keep us\nso much \"on her mind\" as to tune us up every two or three days by a long\nletter to which she sacrifices all her duties to the family and state,\ndisappear, moreover, when I consider the character of the letters\nthemselves. They are so easy, the facts are so much the immediate\nout-bubblings of the moment, and the delicious philosophical reflexions\nso much like the spontaneous breathings of the soul, that the _effort_\nis manifestly at the zero-point, and into the complex state of affection\nwhich necessarily arises in you for the objects of so much loving care,\nthere enter none of those curious momentary arrows of impatience and\nvengefulness which might make others say, if they were doing what you do\nfor us, that they wished we were dead or in some way put beyond reach,\nso that our eternal \"appeal\" might stop. No, Fanny! we have no repinings\nand feel no responsibilities towards you, but accept you and your\nletters as the gifts you are. The infrequency of our answering proves\nthis fact; to which you in turn must furnish the correlative, if the\noccasion comes. On the day when you temporarily hate us, or don't \"feel\nlike\" the usual letter, don't let any thought of inconsistency with your\npast acts worry you about not taking up the pen. Let us go; though it be\nfor weeks and months--I shall know you will come round again. \"Neither\nheat nor frost nor thunder shall ever do away, I ween, the marks of that\nwhich once hath been.\" And to think that you should never have spent a\nnight, and only once taken a meal, in our house! When we get back, we\nmust see each other daily, and may the days of both of us be right long\nin the State of Massachusetts! Bless her!\n\nI got a letter from J. J. Chapman praising her strongly the other day.\nAnd sooth to say the \"Transcript\" and the \"Springfield Republican,\" the\nreception of whose \"weeklies\" has become one of the solaces of my life,\ndo make a first-rate showing for her civilization. One can't just say\nwhat \"tone\" consists in, but these papers hold their own excellently in\ncomparison with the English papers. There is far less alertness of mind\nin the general make-up of the latter; and the \"respectability\" of the\nEnglish editorial columns, though it shows a correcter literary drill,\nis apt to be due to a remorseless longitude of commonplace\nconventionality that makes them deadly dull. (The \"Spectator\" appears to\nbe the only paper with a nervous system, in England--that of a\n_carnassier_ at present!) The English people seem to have positively a\npassionate hunger for this mass of prosy stupidity, never less than a\ncolumn and a quarter long. The Continental papers of course are\n\"nowhere.\" As for our yellow papers--every country has its criminal\nclasses, and with us and in France, they have simply got into journalism\nas part of their professional evolution, and they must be got out. Mr.\nBosanquet somewhere says that so far from the \"dark ages\" being over, we\nare just at the beginning of a new dark-age period. He means that\nignorance and unculture, which then were merely brutal, are now\narticulate and possessed of a literary voice, and the fight is\ntransferred from fields and castles and town walls to \"organs of\npublicity\"; but it is the same fight, of reason and goodness against\nstupidity and passions; and it must be fought through to the same kind\nof success. But it means the re\u00ebducating of perhaps twenty more\ngenerations; and by that time some altogether new kind of institutional\nopportunity for the Devil will have been evolved.\n\n_April_ 13th. I had to stop yesterday.... Six months ago, I shouldn't\nhave thought it possible that a life deliberately founded on pottering\nabout and dawdling through the day would be endurable or even possible.\nI have attained such skill that I doubt if my days ever at any time\nseemed to glide by so fast. But it corrodes one's soul nevertheless. I\nscribble a little in bed every morning, and have reached page 48 of my\nthird Gifford lecture--though Lecture II, alas! must be rewritten\nentirely. The conditions don't conduce to an energetic grip of the\nsubject, and I am afraid that what I write is pretty slack and not what\nit would be if my vital tone were different. The problem I have set\nmyself is a hard one: _first_, to defend (against all the prejudices of\nmy \"class\") \"experience\" against \"philosophy\" as being the real backbone\nof the world's religious life--I mean prayer, guidance, and all that\nsort of thing immediately and privately felt, as against high and noble\ngeneral views of our destiny and the world's meaning; and _second_, to\nmake the hearer or reader believe, what I myself invincibly do believe,\nthat, although all the special manifestations of religion may have been\nabsurd (I mean its creeds and theories), yet the life of it as a whole\nis mankind's most important function. A task well-nigh impossible, I\nfear, and in which I shall fail; but to attempt it is _my_ religious\nact.\n\nWe got a visit the other day from [a Scottish couple here who have heard\nthat I am to give the Gifford lectures]; and two days ago went to\nafternoon tea with them at their hotel, next door. _She_ enclosed a\ntract (by herself) in the invitation, and proved to be a [mass] of holy\negotism and conceit based on professional invalidism and self-worship. I\nwish my sister Alice were there to \"react\" on her with a description!\nHer husband, apparently weak, and the slave of her. No talk but\nevangelical talk. It seemed assumed that a Gifford lecturer must be one\nof Moody's partners, and it gave me rather a foretaste of what the\nEdinburgh atmosphere may be like. Well, I shall enjoy sticking a knife\ninto its gizzard--if atmospheres have gizzards? Blessed be\nBoston--probably the freest place on earth, that isn't merely heathen\nand sensual.\n\nI have been supposing, as one always does, that you \"ran in\" to the\nPutnams' every hour or so, and likewise they to No. 12. But your late\nallusion to the telephone and the rarity of your seeing Jim [Putnam]\nreminded me of the actual conditions--absurd as they are. (Really you\nand we are nearer together now at this distance than we have ever been.)\nWell, let Jim see this letter, if you care to, flattering him by saying\nthat it is more written for him than for you (which it certainly has not\nbeen till this moment!), and thanking him for existing in this naughty\nworld. His account of the Copernican revolution (studento-centric) in\nthe Medical School is highly exciting, and I am glad to hear of the\nexcellent little Cannon becoming so prominent a reformer. Speaking of\nreformers, do you see Jack Chapman's \"Political Nursery\"? of which the\nApril number has just come. (I have read it and taken my bed-breakfast\nduring the previous page of this letter, though you may not have\nperceived the fact.) If not, _do_ subscribe to it; it is awful fun. He\njust looks at things, and tells the truth about them--a strange thing\neven to _try_ to do, and he doesn't always succeed. Office 141 Broadway,\n$1.00 a year.\n\nFanny, you won't be reading as far as this in this interminable letter,\nso I stop, though 100 pent-up things are seeking to be said. The weather\nhas still been so cold whenever the sun is withdrawn that we have\ndelayed our departure for Geneva to the 22nd--a week later. We make a\nshort visit to our friends the Flournoys (a couple of days) and then\nproceed towards Nauheim _via_ Heidelberg, where I wish to consult the\ngreat Erb about the advisability of more baths in view of my nervous\ncomplications, before the great Schott examines me again. I do wish I\ncould send for Jim for a consultation. Good-bye, dearest and best of\nFannys. I hope your Mother is wholly well again. Much love to her and\nto Mary Elliot. It interested me to hear of Jack E.'s great operation.\nYours ever,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Son Alexander._\n\n\n[GENEVA, _circa May 3, 1900_.]\n\nDEAR FRAN\u00c7OIS,--Here we are in Geneva, at the Flournoys'--dear people\nand splendid children. I wish Harry could marry Alice, Billy marry\nMarguerite, and you marry Ariane-Doroth\u00e9e--the absolutely jolliest and\nbeautifullest 3-year old I ever saw. I am trying to get you engaged! I\nenclose pictures of the dog. Ariane-Doroth\u00e9e r-r-r-olls her r-r-r's like\nfury. I got your picture of the elephant--very good. Draw everything you\nsee, no matter how badly, trying to notice how the lines run--one line\nevery day!--just notice it and draw it, no matter how badly, and at the\nend of the year you'll be s'prised to see how well you can draw. Tell\nBilly to get you a big blank book at the Co\u00f6p., and every day take one\npage, just drawing down on it some _thing_, or _dog_, or _horse_, or\n_man_ or _woman_, or _part_ of a man or woman, which you have looked at\nthat day just for the purpose, to see how the lines run. I bet the last\npage of that book will be better than the first! Do this for my sake.\nKiss your dear old Grandma. P'r'aps, we shall get home this summer after\nall. In two or three days I shall see a doctor and know more about\nmyself. Will let you know. Keep motionless and listen as much as you\ncan. Take in things without speaking--it'll make you a better man. Your\nMa thinks you'll grow up into a filosopher like me and write books. It\nis easy enuff, all but the writing. You just get it out of other books,\nand write it down. Always your loving,\n\nDAD.\n\nAt this time James's thirteen-year-old daughter was living with family\nfriends--the Joseph Thatcher Clarkes--in Harrow, and was going to an\nEnglish school with their children. She had been passing through such\nmiseries as a homesick child often suffers, and had written letters\nwhich evoked the following response.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Daughter._\n\n\nVILLA LUISE,\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _May 26, 1900_.\n\nDARLING PEG,--Your letter came last night and explained sufficiently the\ncause of your long silence. You have evidently been in a bad state of\nspirits again, and dissatisfied with your environment; and I judge that\nyou have been still more dissatisfied with the inner state of trying to\nconsume your own smoke, and grin and bear it, so as to carry out your\nmother's behests made after the time when you scared us so by your\ninexplicable tragic outcries in those earlier letters. Well! I believe\nyou have been trying to do the manly thing under difficult\ncircumstances, but one learns only gradually to do the _best_ thing; and\nthe best thing for you would be to write at least weekly, if only a\npost-card, and say just how things are going. If you are in bad spirits,\nthere is no harm whatever in communicating that fact, and defining the\ncharacter of it, or describing it as exactly as you like. The bad thing\nis to pour out the _contents_ of one's bad spirits on others and leave\nthem with it, as it were, on their hands, as if it was for them to do\nsomething about it. That was what you did in your other letter which\nalarmed us so, for your shrieks of anguish were so excessive, and so\nunexplained by anything you told us in the way of facts, that we didn't\nknow but what you had suddenly gone crazy. That is the _worst_ sort of\nthing you can do. The middle sort of thing is what you do this\ntime--namely, keep silent for more than a fortnight, and when you do\nwrite, still write rather mysteriously about your sorrows, not being\nquite open enough.\n\nNow, my dear little girl, you have come to an age when the inward life\ndevelops and when some people (and on the whole those who have most of a\ndestiny) find that all is not a bed of roses. Among other things there\nwill be waves of terrible sadness, which last sometimes for days; and\ndissatisfaction with one's self, and irritation at others, and anger at\ncircumstances and stony insensibility, etc., etc., which taken together\nform a melancholy. Now, painful as it is, this is sent to us for an\nenlightenment. It always passes off, and we learn about life from it,\nand we ought to learn a great many good things if we react on it\nrightly. [_From margin._] (For instance, you learn how good a thing your\nhome is, and your country, and your brothers, and you may learn to be\nmore considerate of other people, who, you now learn, may have their\ninner weaknesses and sufferings, too.) Many persons take a kind of\nsickly delight in hugging it; and some sentimental ones may even be\nproud of it, as showing a fine sorrowful kind of sensibility. Such\npersons make a regular habit of the luxury of woe. That is the worst\npossible reaction on it. It is usually a sort of disease, when we get it\nstrong, arising from the organism having generated some poison in the\nblood; and we mustn't submit to it an hour longer than we can help, but\njump at every chance to attend to anything cheerful or comic or take\npart in anything active that will divert us from our mean, pining inward\nstate of feeling. When it passes off, as I said, we know more than we\ndid before. And we must try to make it last as short a time as possible.\nThe worst of it often is that, while we are in it, we don't _want_ to\nget out of it. We hate it, and yet we prefer staying in it--that is a\npart of the disease. If we find ourselves like that, we must make\nourselves do something different, go with people, speak cheerfully, set\nourselves to some hard work, make ourselves sweat, etc.; and that is the\ngood way of reacting that makes of us a valuable character. The disease\nmakes you think of _yourself_ all the time; and the way out of it is to\nkeep as busy as we can thinking of _things_ and of _other people_--no\nmatter what's the matter with our self.\n\nI have no doubt you are doing as well as you know how, darling little\nPeg; but we have to learn everything, and I also have no doubt that\nyou'll manage it better and better if you ever have any more of it, and\nsoon it will fade away, simply leaving you with more experience. The\ngreat thing for you _now_, I should suppose, would be to enter as\nfriendlily as possible into the interest of the Clarke children. If you\nlike them, or acted as if you liked them, you needn't trouble about the\nquestion of whether they like you or not. They probably will, fast\nenough; and if they don't, it will be their funeral, not yours. But this\nis a great lecture, so I will stop. The great thing about it is that it\nis all true.\n\nThe baths are threatening to disagree with me again, so I may stop them\nsoon. Will let you know as quick as anything is decided. Good news from\nhome: the Merrimans have taken the Irving Street house for another year,\nand the Wambaughs (of the Law School) have taken Chocorua, though at a\nreduced rent. The weather here is almost continuously cold and sunless.\nYour mother is sleeping, and will doubtless add a word to this when she\nwakes. Keep a merry heart--\"time and the hour run through the roughest\nday\"--and believe me ever your most loving\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nALTDORF, LAKE LUZERN, _July 20, [1900]_.\n\nYour last letter was, if anything, a more unmitigated blessing than its\npredecessors; and I, with my curious inertia to overcome, sit _thinking\nof letters_, and of the soul-music with which they might be filled if my\ntongue could only utter the thoughts that arise in me to youward, the\nbeauty of the world, the conflict of life and death and youth and age\nand man and woman and righteousness and evil, etc., and Europe and\nAmerica! but it stays all caked within and gets no articulation, the\npower of speech being so non-natural a function of our race. We are\nstaying above Luzern, near a big spruce wood, at \"Gutsch,\" and today\nbeing hot and passivity advisable, we came down and took the boat, for a\nwhole day on the Lake. The works both of Nature and of Man in this\nregion seem too perfect to be credible almost, and were I not a bitter\nYankee, I would, without a moment's hesitation, be a Swiss, and probably\nthen glad of the change. The _goodliness_ of this land is one of the\nthings I ache to utter to you, but can't. Some day I will write, also to\nJim P. My condition baffles me. I have lately felt better, but been bad\nagain, and altogether can _do_ nothing without repentance afterwards. We\nhave just lunched in this bowery back verandah, water trickling,\nbeautiful old convent sleeping up the hillside. Love to you all!\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _Sept. 16, 1900_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,-- ...Here I am having a little private picnic all by\nmyself, on this effulgent Sunday morning--real American September\nweather, by way of a miracle. I ordered my bath-chair man to wheel me\nout to the \"Hochwald,\" where, he having been dismissed for three hours,\nuntil two o'clock, I am lying in the said luxurious throne, writing this\non my knee, with nothing between but a number of Kuno Fischer's \"Hegel's\nLeben, Werke und Lehre,\" now in process of publication, and the\nflexibility of which accounts for the poor handwriting. I am alone, save\nfor the inevitable restaurant which hovers on the near horizon, in a\nbeautiful grove of old oak trees averaging some 16 or 18 feet apart,\nthrough whose leaves the sunshine filters and dapples the clear ground\nor grass that lies between them. Alice is still in England, having\nfinally at my command had to give up her long-cherished plan of a run\nhome to see her mother, the children, you, and all the other _dulcissima\nmundi nomina_ that make of life a thing worth living for. I _funked_ the\nidea of being alone so long when I came to the point. It is not that I\nam worse, but there will be cold weather in the next couple of months;\nand, unable to sit out of doors then, as here and now, I shall probably\neither have to over-walk or over-read, and both things will be bad for\nme.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration: \"Damn the Absolute!\"\n\nChocorua, September, 1903. One morning James and Royce strolled into the\nroad and sat down on a wall in earnest discussion. When James heard the\ncamera click, as his daughter took the upper snap-shot, he cried,\n\"Royce, you're being photographed! Look, out! I say _Damn the\nAbsolute_!\"]\n\nAs things are _now_, I get on well enough, for the bath business\n(especially the \"bath-chair\") carries one through a good deal of the\nday. The great Schott has positively forbidden me to go to England as I\ndid last year; so, early in October, our faces will be turned towards\nItaly, and by Nov. 1 we shall, I hope, be ensconced in a _pension_ close\nto the Pincian Garden in Rome, to see how long _that_ resource will\nlast. I confess I am in the mood of it, and that there is a suggestion\nof more richness about the name of Rome than about that of Rye, which,\nuntil Schott's veto, was the plan. How the Gifford lectures will fare,\nremains to be seen. I have felt strong movings towards home this\nfall, but reflection says: \"Stay another winter,\" and I confess that now\nthat October is approaching, it feels like the home-stretch and as if\nthe time were getting short and the limbs of \"next summer\" in America\nburning through the veil which seems to hide them in the shape of the\nsecond European winter months. Who knows? perhaps I may be spry and\nactive by that time! I have still one untried card up my sleeve, that\nmay work wonders. All I can say of this third course of baths is that so\nfar it seems to be doing me no harm. That it will do me any substantial\ngood, after the previous experiences, seems decidedly doubtful. But one\nmust suffer some inconvenience to please the doctors! Just as in most\nwomen there is a wife that craves to suffer and submit and be bullied,\nso in most men there is a _patient_ that needs to have a doctor and obey\nhis orders, whether they be believed in or not....\n\nDon't take the Malwida book[32] too seriously. I sent it _faute de\nmieux_. I don't think I ever told you how much I enjoyed hearing the\nLesley volume[33] read aloud by Alice. We were just in the exactly right\ncondition for enjoying that breath of old New England. Good-bye, dearest\nFanny. Give my love to your mother, Mary, J. J. P., and all your circle.\n_Leb' wohl_ yourself, and believe me, your ever affectionate,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Josiah Royce._\n\n\nNAUHEIM, _Sept. 26, 1900_.\n\nBELOVED ROYCE,--Great was my, was _our_ pleasure in receiving your long\nand delightful letter last night. Like the lioness in \u00c6sop's fable, you\ngive birth to one young one only in the year, but that one is a lion. I\ngive birth mainly to guinea-pigs in the shape of post-cards; but despite\nsuch diversities of epistolary expression, the heart of each of us is in\nthe right place. I need not say, my dear old boy, how touched I am at\nyour expressions of affection, or how it pleases me to hear that you\nhave missed me. I too miss you profoundly. I do not find in the hotel\nwaiters, chambermaids and bath-attendants with whom my lot is chiefly\ncast, that unique mixture of erudition, originality, profundity and\nvastness, and human wit and leisureliness, by accustoming me to which\nduring all these years you have spoilt me for inferior kinds of\nintercourse. You are still the centre of my gaze, the pole of my mental\nmagnet. When I write, 'tis with one eye on the page, and one on you.\nWhen I compose my Gifford lectures mentally, 'tis with the design\nexclusively of overthrowing your system, and ruining your peace. I lead\na parasitic life upon you, for my highest flight of ambitious ideality\nis to become your conqueror, and go down into history as such, you and I\nrolled in one another's arms and silent (or rather loquacious still) in\none last death-grapple of an embrace. How then, O my dear Royce, can I\nforget you, or be contented out of your close neighborhood? Different as\nour minds are, yours has nourished mine, as no other social influence\never has, and in converse with you I have always felt that my life was\nbeing lived importantly. Our minds, too, are not different in the\n_Object_ which they envisage. It is the whole paradoxical\nphysico-moral-spiritual Fatness, of which most people single out some\nskinny fragment, which we both cover with our eye. We \"aim at him\ngenerally\"--and most others don't. I don't believe that we shall dwell\napart forever, though our formulas may.\n\nHome and Irving Street look very near when seen through these few winter\nmonths, and tho' it is still doubtful what I may be able to do in\nCollege, for social purposes I shall be available for probably numerous\nyears to come. I haven't got at work yet--only four lectures of the\nfirst course written (strange to say)--but I am decidedly better today\nthan I have been for the past ten months, and the matter is all ready in\nmy mind; so that when, a month hence, I get settled down in Rome, I\nthink the rest will go off fairly quickly. The second course I shall\nhave to resign from, and write it out at home as a book. It must seem\nstrange to you that the way from the mind to the pen should be as\nintraversable as it has been in this case of mine--you in whom it always\nseems so easily pervious. But Miller will be able to tell you all about\nmy condition, both mental and physical, so I will waste no more words on\nthat to me decidedly musty subject.\n\nI fully understand your great aversion to letters and other off-writing.\nYou have done a perfectly Herculean amount of the most difficult\nproductive work, and I believe you to be much more tired than you\nprobably yourself suppose or know. Both mentally and physically, I\nimagine that a long vacation, in other scenes, with no sense of duty,\nwould do you a world of good. I don't say the full fifteen months--for I\nimagine that one summer and one academic half-year would perhaps do the\nbusiness better--you could preserve the relaxed and desultory condition\nas long as that probably, whilst later you'd begin to chafe, and _then_\nyou'd better be back in your own library. If _my_ continuing abroad is\nhindering this, my sorrow will be extreme. Of course I must some time\ncome to a definite decision about my own relations to the College, but I\nam reserving that till the end of 1900, when I shall write to Eliot in\nfull. There is still a therapeutic card to play, of which I will say\nnothing just now, and I don't want to commit myself before that has been\ntried.\n\nYou say nothing of the second course of Aberdeen lectures, nor do you\nspeak at all of the Dublin course. Strange omissions, like your not\nsending me your Ingersoll lecture! I assume that the publication of\n[your] Gifford Volume II will not be very long delayed. I am eager to\nread them. I can read philosophy now, and have just read the first three\n_Lieferungen_ of K. Fischer's \"Hegel.\" I must say I prefer the original\ntext. Fischer's paraphrases always flatten and dry things out; and he\ngives no rich sauce of his own to compensate. I have been sorry to hear\nfrom Palmer that he also has been very tired. One can't keep going\nforever! P. has been like an archangel in his letters to me, and I am\ninexpressibly grateful. Well! everybody has been kinder than I\ndeserve....\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nROME, _Dec. 25, 1900_.\n\n...Rome is simply the most satisfying lake of picturesqueness and guilty\nsuggestiveness known to this child. Other places have single features\nbetter than anything in Rome, perhaps, but for an _ensemble_ Rome seems\nto beat the world. Just a FEAST for the eye from the moment you leave\nyour hotel door to the moment you return. Those who say that beauty is\nall made up of suggestion are well disproved here. For the things the\neyes most gloat on, the inconceivably corrupted, besmeared and ulcerated\nsurfaces, and black and cavernous glimpses of interiors, have no\nsuggestions save of moral horror, and their \"tactile values,\" as\nBerenson would say, are pure gooseflesh. Nevertheless the sight of them\ndelights. And then there is such a geologic stratification of history! I\ndote on the fine equestrian statue of Garibaldi, on the Janiculum,\nquietly bending his head with a look half-meditative, half-strategical,\nbut wholly victorious, upon Saint Peter's and the Vatican. What luck for\na man and a party to have opposed to it an enemy that stood up for\n_nothing_ that was ideal, for _everything_ that was mean in life.\nAustria, Naples, and the Mother of harlots here, were enough to deify\nanyone who defied them. What glorious things are some of these Italian\ninscriptions--for example on Giordano Bruno's statue:--\n\nA BRUNO\n\n_il secolo da lui divinato\nqui\ndove il rogo arse_.\n\n--\"here, where the faggots burned.\" It makes the tears come, for the\npoetic justice; though I imagine B. to have been a very pesky sort of a\ncrank, worthy of little sympathy had not the \"rogo\" done its work on\nhim. Of the awful corruptions and cruelties which this place suggests\nthere is no end.\n\nOur neighbors in rooms and _commensaux_ at meals are the J. G.\nFrazers--he of the \"Golden Bough,\" \"Pausanias,\" and other three-and\nsix-volume works of anthropological erudition, Fellow of Trinity\nCollege, Cambridge, and a sucking babe of humility, unworldliness and\nmolelike sightlessness to everything except _print_.... He, after Tylor,\nis the greatest authority now in England on the religious ideas and\nsuperstitions of primitive peoples, and he knows nothing of psychical\nresearch and thinks that the trances, etc., of savage soothsayers,\noracles and the like, are all _feigned_! Verily science is amusing! But\nhe is conscience incarnate, and I have been stirring him up so that I\nimagine he will now proceed to put in big loads of work in the morbid\npsychological direction.\n\nDear Fanny ... I can write no more this morning. I hope your Christmas\nis \"merry,\" and that the new year will be \"happy\" for you all. Pray take\nour warmest love, give it to your mother and Mary, and some of it to the\nbrothers. I will write better soon. Your ever grateful and affectionate\n\nW. J.\n\nDon't let up on your own writing, so say we both! Your letters are pure\nblessings.\n\n\n\n\n_To James Sully._\n\n\nROME, _Mar. 3, 1901_.\n\nDEAR SULLY,--Your letter of Feb. 8th arrived duly and gave me much\npleasure _qua_ epistolary manifestation of sympathy, but less _qua_\nrevelation of depression on your own part. I have been so floundering up\nand down, now above and now below the line of bad nervous prostration,\nthat I have written no letters for three weeks past, hoping thereby the\nbetter to accomplish certain other writing; but the other writing had to\nbe stopped so letters and post-cards may begin.\n\nI see you take the war still very much to heart, and I myself think that\nthe blundering way in which the Colonial Office drove the Dutchmen into\nit, with no conception whatever of the psychological situation, is only\noutdone by our still more anti-psychological blundering in the\nPhilippines. Both countries have lost their moral prestige--we far more\ncompletely than you, because for our conduct there is literally _no_\nexcuse to be made except _absolute_ stupidity, whilst you can make out a\nvery fair case, as such cases go. But we can, and undoubtedly shall,\ndraw back, whereas that for an Empire like yours seems politically\nimpossible. Empire anyhow is half crime by necessity of Nature, and to\nsee a country like the United States, lucky enough to be born outside of\nit and its fatal traditions and inheritances, perversely rushing to\nwallow in the mire of it, shows how strong these ancient race instincts\nbe. And that is my consolation! We are no worse than the best of men\nhave ever been. We are simply not superhuman; and the loud reaction\nagainst the brutal business, in both countries, shows how the _theory_\nof the matter has really advanced during the last century.\n\nYes! H. Sidgwick is a sad loss, with all his remaining philosophic\nwisdom unwritten. I feel greatly F. W. H. Myers's loss also. He suffered\nterribly with suffocation, but bore it stunningly well. He died in this\nvery hotel, where he had been not more than a fortnight. I don't know\n_how_ tolerant (or intolerant) you are towards his pursuits and\nspeculations. I regard them as fragmentary and conjectural--of course;\nbut as most laborious and praiseworthy; and knowing how much\npsychologists as a rule have counted him out from their profession, I\nhave thought it my duty to write a little tribute to his service to\npsychology to be read on March 8th, at a memorial meeting of the S. P.\nR. in his honor. It will appear, whether read or not, in the\nProceedings, and I hope may not appear to you exaggerated. I seriously\nbelieve that the general problem of the subliminal, as Myers propounds\nit, promises to be one of the _great_ problems, possibly even the\ngreatest problem, of psychology....\n\nWe leave Rome in three days, booked for Rye the first of April. I _must_\nget into the _country!_ If I do more than just pass through London, I\nwill arrange for a meeting. My Edinburgh lectures begin early in\nMay--after that I shall have freedom. Ever truly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nFLORENCE, _March 18, 1901_.\n\nThus far towards home, thank Heaven! after a week at Perugia and Assisi.\nGlorious air, memorable scenes. Made acquaintance of Sabatier, author of\nSt. Francis's life--very jolly. Best of all, made acquaintance with\nFrancis's retreat in the mountain. _Navrant!_--it makes one see medieval\nChristianity face to face. The lair of the individual wild animal, and\nthat animal the saint! I hope you saw it. Thanks for your last letter to\nAlice. Lots of love.\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\nRYE, _April 13, 1901_.\n\nDEAR SCHILLER,--You are showering benedictions on me. I return the bulky\nones, keeping the lighter weights. I think the parody on Bradley\namazingly good--if I had his book here I would probably revive my memory\nof his discouraged style and scribble a marginal contribution of my own.\nHe is, really, an extra humble-minded man, I think, but even more\nhumble-minded about his reader than about himself, which gives him that\nfalse air of arrogance. How you concocted those epigrams, _\u00e0 la_ preface\nof B., I don't see. In general I don't see how an epigram, being a pure\nbolt from the blue, with no introduction or cue, ever gets itself writ.\nOn the Limericks, as you call them, I set less store, much less. If\neverybody is to come in for a share of allusion, I am willing, but I\ndon't want my name to figure in the ghostly ballet with but few\ncompanions. Royce wrote a _very_ funny thing in pedantic German some\nyears ago, purporting to be the proof by a distant-future professor that\nI was an habitual drunkard, based on passages culled from my writings.\nHe may have it yet. If I ever get any animal spirits again, I may get\nwarmed up, by your example, into making jokes, and may then contribute.\nBut I beg you let this thing mull till you get a _lot_ of matter--and\nthen _sift_. It's the only way. But Oxford seems a better climate for\nepigram than is the rest of the world.\n\nI shall stay here--I find myself much more comfortable thoracically\nalready than when I came--until my Edinburgh lectures begin on May 16th,\nthough I shall have to run up to London towards the end of the month to\nget some clothes made, and to meet my son who arrives from home. I much\nregret that it will be quite impossible for me to go either to Oxford or\nCambridge--though, if things took an unexpectedly good turn, I might\nindeed do so after June 18th, when my lecture course ends. Do you\nmeanwhile keep hearty and \"funny\"! I stopped at Gersau half a day and\nfound it a sweet little place. Fondly yours,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nROXBURGHE HOTEL,\nEDINBURGH, _May 15, 1901_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--You see where we are! I give _you_ the first news of\nlife's journey being so far advanced! It is a deadly enterprise, I'm\nafraid, with the social entanglements that lie ahead, and I feel a cake\nof ice in my epigastrium at the prospect, but _le vin est vers\u00e9, il faut\nle boire_, and from the other point of view, that it is real life\nbeginning once more, it is perfectly glorious, and I feel as if\nyesterday in leaving London I had said good-bye to a rather dreadful\nand death-bound segment of life. As regards the sociability, it is\nfortunately a time of year in which only the medical part of the\nUniversity is present. The professors of the other faculties are already\nin large part scattered, I think,--at least the two Seths (who are the\nonly ones I directly know) are away, and I have written to the Secretary\nof the Academic Senate, Sir Ludovic Grant of the Law Faculty, that I am\nunable to \"dine out\" or attend afternoon receptions, so we may be pretty\nwell left alone. I always hated lecturing except as regular instruction\nto students, of whom there will probably be none now in the audience.\nBut to compensate, there begins next week a big convocation here of all\nministers in Scotland, and there will doubtless be a number of them\npresent, which, considering the matter to be offered, is probably\nbetter.\n\nWe had a splendid journey yesterday in an American (almost!) train,\nfirst-class, and had the pleasure of some talk with our Cambridge\nneighbor, Mrs. Ole Bull, on her way to Norway to the unveiling of a\nmonument to her husband. She was accompanied by an extraordinarily fine\ncharacter and mind--odd way of expressing myself!--a young Englishwoman\nnamed Noble, who has Hinduized herself (converted by Vivekananda to his\nphilosophy) and lives now for the Hindu people. These free individuals\nwho live their own life, no matter what domestic prejudices have to be\nsnapped, are on the whole a refreshing sight to me, who can do nothing\nof the kind myself. And Miss Noble[34] is a most deliberate and balanced\nperson--no frothy enthusiast in point of character, though I believe her\nphilosophy to be more or less false. Perhaps no more so than anyone\nelse's!\n\nWe are in one of those deadly respectable hotels where you have to ring\nthe front-door-bell. Give me a cheerful, blackguardly place like the\nCharing Cross, where we were in London. The London tailor and\nshirtmaker, it being in the height of the Season, didn't fulfill their\npromises; and as I sloughed my ancient cocoon at Rye, trusting to pick\nup my iridescent wings the day before yesterday in passing through the\nmetropolis, I am here with but two _chemises_ at present (one of them\nnow in the wash) and fear that tomorrow, in spite of tailors' promises\nto send, I may have to lecture in my pyjamas--that would give a cachet\nof American originality. The weather is fine--we have just finished\nbreakfast.\n\nOur son Harry ... and his mother will soon sally out to explore the\ntown, whilst I lie low till about noon, when I shall report my presence\nand receive instructions from my boss, Grant, and prepare to meet the\nstorm. It is astonishing how pusillanimous two years of invalidism can\nmake one. Alice and Harry both send love, and so do I in heaps and\nsteamer-loads, dear Fanny, begging your mother to take of it as much as\nshe requires for her share. I will write again--doubtless--tomorrow.\n\n_May 17._\n\nIt proved quite impossible to write to you yesterday, so I do it the\nfirst thing this morning. I have made my plunge and the foregoing chill\nhas given place to the warm \"reaction.\" The audience was more numerous\nthan had been expected, some 250, and exceedingly sympathetic, laughing\nat everything, even whenever I used a polysyllabic word. I send you the\n\"Scotsman,\" with a skeleton report which might have been much worse\nmade. I am all right this morning again, so have no doubts of putting\nthe job through, if only I don't have too much sociability. I have got\na week free of invitations so far, and all things considered, fancy\nthat we shan't be persecuted.\n\nEdinburgh is surely the noblest city ever built by man. The weather has\nbeen splendid so far, and cold and bracing as the top of Mount\nWashington in early April. Everyone here speaks of it however as \"hot.\"\nOne needs fires at night and an overcoat out of the sun. The full-bodied\nair, half misty and half smoky, holds the sunshine in that way which one\nsees only in these islands, making the shadowy side of everything quite\nblack, so that all perspectives and vistas appear with objects cut\nblackly against each other according to their nearness, and plane rising\nbehind plane of flat dark relieved against flat light in ever-receding\ngradation. It is magnificent.\n\nBut I mustn't become a Ruskin!--the purpose of this letter being merely\nto acquaint you with our well-being and success so far. We have found\nbully lodgings, spacious to one's heart's content, upon a cheerful\nsquare, and actually with a book-shelf fully two feet wide and two\nstories high, upon the wall, the first we have seen for two years!\n(There were of course book-cases enough at Lamb House, but all tight\npacked already.) We now go out to take the air. I feel as if a decidedly\nbad interlude in the journey of my life were closed, and the real honest\nthing gradually beginning again. Love to you all! Your ever affectionate\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nEDINBURGH, _May 30, 1901_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,-- ...Beautiful as the spring is here, the words you so\noften let drop about American weather make me homesick for that article.\nIt is blasphemous, however, to pine for anything when one is in\nEdinburgh in May, and takes an open drive every afternoon in the\nsurrounding country by way of a constitutional. The green is of the\nvividest, splendid trees and acres, and the air itself an _object_,\nholding watery vapor, tenuous smoke, and ancient sunshine in solution,\nso as to yield the most exquisite minglings and gradations of silvery\nbrown and blue and pearly gray. As for the city, its vistas are\nmagnificent.\n\nWe are _combl\u00e9s_ with civilities, which Harry and Alice are to a certain\nextent enjoying, though I have to hang back and spend much of the time\nbetween my lectures in bed, to rest off the aortic distress which that\noperation gives. I call it aortic because it feels like that, but I can\nget no information from the Drs., so I won't swear I'm right. My heart,\nunder the influence of that magical juice, tincture of digitalis,--only\n6 drops daily,--is performing _beautifully_ and gives no trouble at all.\nThe audiences grow instead of dwindling, and in spite of rain, being\nabout 300 and just crowding the room. They sit as still as death and\nthen applaud magnificently, so I am sure the lectures are a success.\nPrevious Gifford lectures have had audiences beginning with 60 and\ndwindling to 15. In an hour and a half (I write this in bed) I shall be\nbeginning the fifth lecture, which will, when finished, put me half way\nthrough the arduous job. I know you will relish these details, which\nplease pass on to Jim P. I would send you the reports in the \"Scotsman,\"\nbut they distort so much by their sham continuity with vast omission\n(the reporters get my MS.), that the result is caricature. Edinburgh is\n_spiritually_ much like Boston, only stronger and with more temperament\nin the people. But we're all growing into much of a sameness everywhere.\n\nI have dined out once--an almost fatal experiment! I was introduced to\nLord Somebody: \"How often do you lecture?\"--\"Twice a week.\"--\"What do\nyou do between?--play golf?\" Another invitation: \"Come at 6--the dinner\nat 7.30--and we can walk or play bowls till dinner so as not to fatigue\nyou\"--I having pleaded my delicacy of constitution.\n\nI rejoice in the prospect of Booker W.'s[35] book, and thank your mother\nheartily. My mouth had been watering for just that volume.\nAutobiographies take the cake. I mean to read nothing else. Strange to\nsay, I am now for the first time reading Marie Bashkirtseff. It takes\nhold of me tremenjus. I feel as if I had lived inside of her, and in\nspite of her hatefulness, esteem and even like her for her incorruptible\nway of telling the truth. I have not seen Huxley's life yet. It must be\ndelightful, only I can't agree to what seems to be becoming the\nconventionally accepted view of him, that he possessed the exclusive\nspecialty of living for the truth. A good deal of humbug about that!--at\nleast when it becomes a professional and heroic attitude.\n\nYour base remark about Aguinaldo is clean forgotten, if ever heard. I\nknow you wouldn't harm the poor man, who, unless Malay human nature is\nweaker than human nature elsewhere, has pretty surely some surprises up\nhis sleeve for us yet. Best love to you all. Your affectionate\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry W. Rankin._\n\n\nEDINBURGH, _June 16, 1901_.\n\nDEAR MR. RANKIN,--I have received all your letters and missives,\ninclusive of the letter which you think I must have lost, some months\nback. I professor-ed you because I had read your name printed with that\ntitle in a newspaper letter from East Northfield, and supposed that, by\ncourtesy at any rate, that title was conferred on you by a public\nopinion to which I liked to conform.\n\nI have given nine of my lectures and am to give the tenth tomorrow. They\nhave been a success, to judge by the numbers of the audience (300-odd)\nand their non-diminution towards the end. No previous \"Giffords\" have\ndrawn near so many. It will please you to know that I am stronger and\ntougher than when I began, too; so a great load is off my mind. You have\nbeen so extraordinarily brotherly to me in writing of your convictions\nand in furnishing me ideas, that I feel ashamed of my churlish and chary\nreplies. You, however, have forgiven me. Now, at the end of this first\ncourse, I feel my \"matter\" taking firmer shape, and it will please you\nless to hear me say that I believe myself to be (probably) permanently\nincapable of believing the Christian scheme of vicarious salvation, and\nwedded to a more continuously evolutionary mode of thought. The reasons\nyou from time to time have given me, never better expressed than in your\nletter before the last, have somehow failed to convince. In these\nlectures the ground I am taking is this: The mother sea and\nfountain-head of all religions lie in the mystical experiences of the\nindividual, taking the word mystical in a very wide sense. All\ntheologies and all ecclesiasticisms are secondary growths superimposed;\nand the experiences make such flexible combinations with the\nintellectual prepossessions of their subjects, that one may almost say\nthat they have no proper _intellectual_ deliverance of their own, but\nbelong to a region deeper, and more vital and practical, than that which\nthe intellect inhabits. For this they are also indestructible by\nintellectual arguments and criticisms. I attach the mystical or\nreligious consciousness to the possession of an extended subliminal\nself, with a thin partition through which messages make irruption. We\nare thus made convincingly aware of the presence of a sphere of life\nlarger and more powerful than our usual consciousness, with which the\nlatter is nevertheless continuous. The impressions and impulsions and\nemotions and excitements which we thence receive help us to live, they\nfound invincible assurance of a world beyond the sense, they melt our\nhearts and communicate significance and value to everything and make us\nhappy. They do this for the individual who has them, and other\nindividuals follow him. Religion in this way is absolutely\nindestructible. Philosophy and theology give their conceptual\ninterpretations of this experiential life. The farther margin of the\nsubliminal field being unknown, it can be treated as by Transcendental\nIdealism, as an Absolute mind with a part of which we coalesce, or by\nChristian theology, as a distinct deity acting on us. Something, not our\nimmediate self, does act on our life! So I seem doubtless to my audience\nto be blowing hot and cold, explaining away Christianity, yet defending\nthe more general basis from which I say it proceeds. I fear that these\nbrief words may be misleading, but let them go! When the book comes out,\nyou will get a truer idea.\n\nBelieve me, with profound regards, your always truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Charles Eliot Norton._\n\n\nRYE, _June 26, 1901_.\n\nDEAR CHARLES NORTON,--Your delightful letter of June 1st has added one\nmore item to my debt of gratitude to you; and now that the Edinburgh\nstrain is over, I can sit down and make you a reply a little more\nadequate than heretofore has been possible. The lectures went off most\nsuccessfully, and though I got tired enough, I feel that I am\nessentially tougher and stronger for the old familiar functional\nactivity. My _tone_ is changed immensely, and that is the main point. To\nbe actually earning one's salt again, after so many months of listless\nwaiting and wondering whether such a thing will ever again become\npossible, puts a new heart into one, and I now look towards the future\nwith aggressive and hopeful eyes again, though perhaps not with quite\nthe cannibalistic ones of the youth of the new century.\n\nEdinburgh is great. A strong broad city, and, in its spiritual essence,\nalmost exactly feeling to me like old Boston, _nuclear_ Boston, though\non a larger, more important scale. People were very friendly, but we had\nto dodge invitations--_hoffentlich_ I may be able to accept more of them\nnext year. The audience was extraordinarily attentive and reactive--I\nnever had an audience so keen to catch every point. I flatter myself\nthat by blowing alternately hot and cold on their Christian prejudices I\nsucceeded in baffling them completely till the final quarter-hour, when\nI satisfied their curiosity by showing more plainly my hand. Then, I\nthink, I permanently dissatisfied both extremes, and pleased a mean\nnumerically quite small. _Qui vivra verra_. London seemed curiously\nprofane and free-and-easy, not exactly _shabby_, but go-as-you-please,\nin aspect, as we came down five days ago. Since then I spent a day with\npoor Mrs. Myers.... I mailed you yesterday a notice I wrote in Rome of\nhim.[36] He \"looms\" upon me after death more than he did in life, and I\nthink that his forthcoming book about \"Human Personality\" will probably\nrank hereafter as \"epoch-making.\"\n\nAt London I saw Theodora [Sedgwick] and the W. Darwins. Theodora was as\ngood and genial as ever, and Sara [Darwin] looked, I thought,\nwonderfully \"distinguished\" and wonderfully little changed considering\nthe length of intervening years and the advance of the Enemy. I was too\ntired to look up Leslie Stephen, or anyone else save Mrs. John Bancroft\nwhen in London, although I wanted much to see L. S. The first volume of\nhis \"Utilitarians\" seems to me a wonderfully spirited performance--I\nhaven't yet got at the other two.\n\nI am hoping to get off to Nauheim tomorrow, leaving Alice and Harry to\nfollow a little later. I confess that the Continent \"draws\" me again. I\ndon't know whether it be the essential identity of soul that expresses\nitself in English things, and makes them seem known by heart already and\nintellectually dead and unexciting, or whether it is the singular lack\nof visible _sentiment_ in England, and absence of \"charm,\" or the\noppressive ponderosity and superfluity and prominence of the\nunnecessary, or what it is, but I'm blest if I ever wish to be in\nEngland again. Any continental country whatever stimulates and refreshes\nvastly more, in spite of so much strong picturesqueness here, and so\nbeautiful a Nature. England is ungracious, unamiable and heavy; whilst\nthe Continent is everywhere light and amiably quaint, even where it is\nugly, as in many elements it is in Germany. To tell the truth, I long to\nsteep myself in America again and let the broken rootlets make new\nadhesions to the native soil. A man coquetting with too many countries\nis as bad as a bigamist, and loses his soul altogether.\n\nI suppose you are at Ashfield and I hope surrounded, or soon to be so,\nby more children than of late, and all well and happy. Don't feel too\nbad about the country. We've thrown away our old privileged and\nprerogative position among the nations, but it only showed we were less\nsincere about it than we supposed we were. The eternal fight of\nliberalism has now to be fought by us on much the same terms as in the\nolder countries. We have still the better chance in our freedom from all\nthe corrupting influences from on top from which they suffer.--Good-bye\nand love from both of us, to you all. Yours ever faithfully,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Nathaniel S. Shaler._\n\n\n[1901?]\n\nDEAR SHALER,--Being a man of methodical sequence in my reading, which in\nthese days is anyhow rather slower than it used to be, I have only just\ngot at your book.[37] Once begun, it slipped along \"like a novel,\" and I\nmust confess to you that it leaves a good taste behind; in fact a sort\nof _haunting_ flavor due to its individuality, which I find it hard to\nexplain or define.\n\nTo begin with, it doesn't seem exactly like you, but rather like some\nquiet and conscientious old passive contemplator of life, not bristling\nas you are with \"points,\" and vivacity. Its light is dampened and\nsuffused--and all the better perhaps for that. Then it is essentially a\nconfession of faith and a religious attitude--which one doesn't get so\nmuch from you upon the street, although even there 'tis clear that you\nhave that within which passeth show. The optimism and healthy-mindedness\nare yours through and through, so is the wide imagination. But the\nmoderate and non-emphatic way of putting things is not; nor is the\nabsence of any \"American humor.\" So I don't know just when or where or\nhow you wrote it. I can't place it in the Museum or University Hall.\nProbably it was in Quincy Street, and in a sort of Piperio-Armadan\ntrance! Anyhow it is a sincere book, and tremendously impressive by the\ngravity and dignity and peacefulness with which it suggests rather than\nproclaims conclusions on these eternal themes. No more than you can I\nbelieve that death is due to selection; yet I wish you had framed some\nhypothesis as to the physico-chemical necessity thereof, or discussed\nsuch hypotheses as have been made. I think you deduce a little too\neasily from the facts the existence of a general guiding tendency toward\nends like those which our mind sets. We never know what ends may have\nbeen kept from realization, for the dead tell no tales. The surviving\nwitness would in any case, and whatever he were, draw the conclusion\nthat the universe was planned to make him and the like of him succeed,\nfor it actually did so. But your argument that it is millions to one\nthat it didn't do so by chance doesn't apply. It would apply if the\nwitness had pre\u00ebxisted in an independent form and framed his scheme, and\nthen the world had realized it. Such a coincidence would prove the world\nto have a kindred mind to his. But there has been no such coincidence.\nThe world has come but once; the witness is there after the fact and\nsimply approves, dependently. As I understand improbability, it only\nexists where independents coincide. Where only one fact is in question,\nthere is no relation of \"probability\" at all. I think, therefore, that\nthe excellences we have reached and now approve may be due to no general\ndesign but merely to a succession of the short designs we actually know\nof, taking advantage of opportunity, and adding themselves together from\npoint to point. We are all you say we are, as heirs; we are a mystery of\ncondensation, and yet of extrication and individuation, and we must\nworship the soil we have so wonderfully sprung from. Yet I don't think\nwe are necessitated to worship it as the Theists do, in the shape of one\nall-inclusive and all-operative designing power, but rather like\npolytheists, in the shape of a collection of beings who have each\ncontributed and are now contributing to the realization of ideals more\nor less like those for which we live ourselves. This more pluralistic\nstyle of feeling seems to me both to allow of a warmer sort of loyalty\nto our past helpers, and to tally more exactly with the mixed condition\nin which we find the world as to its ideals. What if we did come where\nwe are by chance, or by mere fact, with no one general design? What is\ngained, is gained, all the same. As to what may have been lost, who\nknows of it, in any case? or whether it might not have been much better\nthan what came? But if it might, that need not prevent _us_ from\nbuilding on what _we_ have.\n\nThere are lots of impressive passages in the book, which certainly will\nlive and be an influence of a high order. Chapters 8, 10, 14, 15 have\nstruck me most particularly.\n\nI gave at Edinburgh two lectures on \"The Religion of\nHealthy-Mindedness,\" contrasting it with that of \"the sick soul.\" I\nshall soon have to quote your book as a healthy-minded document of the\nfirst importance, though I believe myself that the sick soul must have\nits say, and probably carries authority too.... Ever yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nNAUHEIM, _July 10, 1901_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--Your letter of June 28th comes just as I was working\nmyself up to a last European farewell to you, anyhow, the which has far\nmore instigative spur now, with your magnificent effusion in my hands.\nDear Fanny, whatever you do, don't _die_ before our return! In these\ntwo short years so many of my best friends have been mown down, that I\nfeel uncertainty everywhere, and gasp till the interval is over. John\nRopes, Henry Sidgwick, F. Myers, T. Davidson, Carroll Everett, Edward\nHooper, John Fiske, all intimate and valuable, some of them extremely\nso, and the circle grows ever smaller and will grow so to the end of\none's own life. Now comes Whitman, whom I never knew very well, but whom\nI always liked thoroughly, and wish I had known better.... It will be\ninteresting to know what new turn it will give to S. W.'s existence. I\nhaven't the least idea how it will affect her outward life. Doubtless\nshe will be freer to come abroad; but I hope and trust she will not be\ntaking to staying any time in London or Paris, in the brutal cynical\natmosphere of which places her little eagerness and efflorescences and\ncordialities would receive no such sympathetic treatment as they do with\nus, until she had stayed long enough for people to know her thoroughly\nand conquered a position by living down the first impression. Nothing so\n_anti-English_ as S. W.'s whole \"sphere.\" So keep her at home--with\noccasional sallies abroad; and if she must ever winter abroad, let it be\nin delightful slipshod old Rome! All which, as you perceive, is somewhat\nconfidential. I trust that the present failure of health with her is\nsomething altogether transient, and that she will keep swimming long\nafter everyone else has put into shore.\n\nWhich simile reminds me of Mrs. Holmes's panel, with its superb\ninscription.[38] What a sense she has for such things! and how I thank\nyou for quoting it! With your and her permission, I shall make a vital\nuse of it in a future book. It sums up the attitude towards life of a\ngood philosophic pluralist, and that is what, in my capacity of author\nof that book, I am to be. I thank you also for the reference to I\nCorinthians, 1, 28, etc.[39] I had never expressly noticed that text;\nbut it will make the splendidest motto for Myers's two posthumous\nvolumes, and I am going to write to Mrs. Myers to suggest the same. I\nthank you also for your sympathetic remarks about my paper on Myers.\nFifty or a hundred years hence, people will know better than now whether\nhis instinct for truth was a sound one; and perhaps will then pat me on\nthe back for backing him. At present they give us the cold shoulder. We\nare righter, in any event, than the M\u00fcnsterbergs and Jastrows are,\nbecause we don't undertake, as a condition of our investigating\nphenomena, to bargain with them that they shan't upset our\n\"presuppositions.\"\n\nIt is a beautiful summer morning, and I write under an awning on the\nhigh-perched corner balcony of the bedroom in which we live, of a corner\nhouse on the edge of the little town, with houses on the west of us and\nthe fertile country spreading towards the east and south. A lovely\nregion, though a climate terribly _flat_. I expect to take my last bath\ntoday, and to get my absolution from the terrible Schott; whereupon we\nshall leave tomorrow morning for Strassburg and the Vosges, for a week\nof touring up in higher air, and thence, _\u00fcber_ Paris, as straight as\nmay be for Rye. I keep in a state of subliminal excitement over our\nsailing on the 31st. It seems too good to be really possible. Yet the\nratchet of time will work along its daily cogs, and doubtless bring it\nsafe within our grasp. Last year I felt no distinctly beneficial effect\nfrom the baths. This year it is distinct. I have, in other words,\ncontinued pretty steadily getting better for four months past; so it is\nevident that I am in a genuinely ameliorative phase of my existence, of\nwhich the acquired momentum may carry me beyond any living man of my\nage. At any rate, I set no limits now!\n\nWhen we return I shall go straight up to Chocorua to the Salters'. What\nI _crave_ most is some wild American country. It is a curious\norganic-feeling need. One's social relations with European landscape are\nentirely different, everything being so fenced or planted that you can't\nlie down and sprawl. Kipling, alluding to the \"bleeding raw\" appearance\nof some of our outskirt settlements, says, \"Americans don't mix much\nwith their landscape as yet.\" But we mix a darned sight more than\nEuropeans, so far as our individual organisms go, with our camping and\ngeneral wild-animal personal relations. Thank Heaven that our Nature is\nso much less \"redeemed\"!...\n\nYou see, Fanny, that we are in good spirits on the whole, although my\npoor dear Alice has long sick-headaches that consume a good many\ndays--she is just emerging from a bad one. Happiness, I have lately\ndiscovered, is no positive feeling, but a negative condition of freedom\nfrom a number of restrictive sensations of which our organism usually\nseems to be the seat. When they are wiped out, the clearness and\ncleanness of the contrast is happiness. This is why anesthetics make us\nso happy. But don't you take to drink on that account! Love to your\nmother, Mary, and all. Write to us no more. How happy _that_\nresponsibility gone must make you! We both send warmest love,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _July 11, [1901]_.\n\nYour letter and paper, with the shock of John Fiske's death, came\nyesterday. It is too bad, for he had lots of good work in him yet, and\nis a loss to American letters as well as to his family. Singularly\nsimple, solid, honest creature, he will be hugely missed by many!\nEverybody seems to be going! _We_ stay. Life here is absolutely\nmonotonous, but very sweet. The country is so innocently pretty. I sit\nup here on a terrace-restaurant, looking down on park and town, with the\nleaves playing in the warm breeze above me, and the little Gothic town\nof Friedberg only a mile off, in the midst of the great fertile plain\nall chequer-boarded with the different tinted crops and framed in a\nfar-off horizon of low hills and woods. Alice and Harry, kept in by the\nheat, come later. He went for a distant walk yesterday P.M. and, not\nreturning till near eleven, we thought he might have got lost in the\nwoods. Yale beat the University race, _but_ Bill's four[-oared crew]\nbeat the Yale four. On such things is human contentment based. The baths\nstir up my aortic feeling and make me depressed, but I've had 6 of them,\nand the rest will pass quickly. Love.\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To E. L. Godkin._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _July 25, 1901_.\n\nDEAR GODKIN,--Yours of the 9th, which came duly, gave me great pleasure,\nfirst because it showed that your love for me had not grown cold, and,\nsecond, because it seemed to reveal in you tendencies towards\nsociability at large which are incompatible with a very alarming\ncondition of health. Nothing can give us greater pleasure than to come\nand see you before we sail. We shall stick here, probably, for a\nfortnight longer, then go for a week to the Hartz mountains to brace up\na little--the baths being very debilitating and the air of Nauheim\nsedative. Then straight to Rye until we sail--on August 31st. I hope\nthat you enjoy the \"New Forest\"--the \"Children\" thereof, by Capt. Mayne\nReid, I think, was one of my most mysteriously impressive books about\nthe age of ten. But I fear that there is not much primeval forest to be\nseen there nowadays. Nauheim is a sweet little place. One never sees a\nsoldier and wouldn't know that _Militarismus_ existed. There are two\npolicemen, one of them an old fellow of 70 who shuffles along to keep\nhis weak knees from giving way. I went on business to the police office\nt' other day. The building stood in a fine cabbage garden, and over the\nfirst door one met on entering stood the word _K\u00fcche_[40] in large\nletters. Quite like the old idyllic pre-Sadowan German days. My heart is\ngetting _well_! I made an excursion to Homburg yesterday, with J. B.\nWarner of Cambridge, counsellor at law, and general disputant. For about\nsix hours we discussed the Philippine question, he damning the\nanti-Imperialists--yet my thoracic contents remained as solid as if cast\nin Portland cement. Six months ago I should have had the wildest\ncommotion there. Congratulate me! Kindest regards to you both, in which\nmy wife joins. Yours ever affectionately,\n\nWm. James.\n\nIt should perhaps be explained that E. L. Godkin had had a cerebral\nhemorrhage the year before. It had left him clear in mind, but a\npermanent invalid, with little power of locomotion. James spent several\ndays with him at Castle Malwood near Stony Cross before he sailed for\nhome; and when he was in England again the next year, he repeated the\nvisit.\n\n[Illustration: William James and Henry James posing for a Kodak in\n1900.]\n\n\n\n_To E. L. Godkin._\n\n\nLAMB HOUSE, _Aug. 29, 1901_.\n\nMY DEAR GODKIN,--Just a line to bid you both farewell! We leave for\nLondon tomorrow morning and at four on Saturday we shall be ploughing\nthe deep. All goes well, save that the wife has sprained her ankle, and\nwith the \"firmness\" that characterizes her lovely sex insists on\nhobbling about and doing all the packing. I shan't be aisy till I see\nher in her berth.\n\nAfter all, in spite of you and Henry, and all Americo-phobes, I'm glad\nI'm going back to my own country again. Notwithstanding its\n\"humble\"ness, its fatigues, and its complications, there's no place like\nhome--though I think the New Forest might come near it as a substitute.\nEngland in general is too padded and cushioned for my rustic taste.\n\nThe most elevating _moral_ thing I've seen during these two years\nabroad, after Myers's heroic exit from this world at Rome last winter,\nhas been the gentleness and cheerful spirit with which you are still\nable to remain in it after such a blow as you have received. Who could\nsuppose so much public ferocity to cover so much private sweetness?\nSeriously speaking, it is more edifying to us others, dear Godkin, than\nyou yourself can understand it to be, and I for one have learned by the\nexample. I pray that your winter problems may gradually solve themselves\nwithout perplexity, and that next spring may find you relieved of all\nthis helplessness. It is a very slow progress, with many steps\nbackwards, but if the length of the forward steps preponderates, one\nmay be well content. Good-bye and bless you both. Affectionately yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\nJames returned to America in early September, in advance of the\nbeginning of the College term. But from this time on he limited his\nteaching to one half-course during the year. His intention was to\nhusband his strength for writing. The course which he offered during the\nfirst half of the College year was accordingly announced as a course on\n\"The Psychological Elements of Religious Life.\" By the end of the\nwinter, the second series of Gifford lectures, constituting the last\nhalf of the \"Varieties,\" had been written out.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Pauline Goldmark._\n\n\nSILVER LAKE, N. H., _Sept. 14, 1901_.\n\nDEAR PAULINE,--Your kind letter (excuse pencil--pen won't write) appears\nto have reached London after our departure and has just followed us\nhither. I had hoped for a word from you, first at Nauheim, then on the\nsteamer, then at Cambridge; but this makes everything right. How good to\nthink of you as the same old loveress of woods and skies and waters, and\nof your Bryn-Mawr friends. May none of the lot of you ever grow\ninsufficient or forsake each other! The sight of you sporting in\nNature's bosom once lifted me into a sympathetic region, and made a\nbetter boy of me in ways which it would probably amuse and surprise you\nto learn of, so strangely are characters useful to each other, and so\nsubtly are destinies intermixed. But with you on the mountain-tops of\nexistence still, and me apparently destined to remain grubbing in the\ncellar, we seem far enough apart at present and may have to remain so.\nAlas! how brief is life's glory, at the best. I can't get to Keene\nValley this year, and [may] possibly never get there. Give a kindly\nthought, my friend, to the spectre who once for a few times trudged by\nyour side, and who would do so again if he could. I'm a \"motor,\" and\nmorally ill-adapted to the game of patience. I have reached home in\npretty poor case, but I think it's mainly \"nerves\" at present, and\ntherefore remediable; so I live on the future, but keep my expectations\nmodest. Two years away has been too long, and the \"strangeness\" which I\ndreaded (from past experience of it) covers all things American as with\na veil. Pathetic and poverty-stricken is all I see! This will pass away,\nbut I don't want good things to pass away also, so I beseech you,\nPauline, to sit down and write me a good intimate letter telling me what\nyour life and interest were in New York last winter.\n\nI am very sorry to hear of your sister Susan's illness, and pray that\nthe summer will set her right. Did you see much of Miller this summer? I\nhate to think of his having grown so delicate! Did you see Perry again?\nHe was at the Putnam Camp? How is Adler after his _Cur_?--or is he not\nyet back? What have you read? What have you cared for? Be indulgent to\nme, and write to me here--I stay for 10 days longer--the family--all\nwell--remain in Cambridge. I find letters a great thing to keep one from\nslipping out of life.\n\nLove to you all! Your\n\nW. J.\n\nThe next letter was written across the back of a circular invitation to\njoin the American Philosophical Association, then being formed, of which\nProfessor Gardiner was Secretary.\n\n\n\n\n_To H. N. Gardiner._\n\n\nCambridge, _Nov. 14, 1901_.\n\nDEAR GARDINER,--I am still pretty poorly and can't \"jine\" anything--but,\napart from that, I don't foresee much good from a Philosophical Society.\nPhilosophical discussion proper only succeeds between intimates who have\nlearned how to converse by months of weary trials and failure. The\nphilosopher is a lone beast dwelling in his individual burrow.--Count me\n_out_!--I hope all goes well with you. I expect to get well, but it\nneeds _patience_.\n\nWm. James.\n\nOn April 1, 1902, James sailed for England, to deliver the second\n\"course\" of his series of Gifford Lectures in Edinburgh.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\nHATLEY ST. GEORGE,\nTORQUAY, _Apr. 20, 1902_.\n\nMY DEAR SCHILLER,--I could shed tears that you should have been so near\nme and yet been missed. I got your big envelope on Thursday at the\nhotel, and your two other missives here this morning. Of the Axioms\npaper I have only read a sheet and a half at the beginning and the\nsuperb conclusion which has just arrived. I shall fairly _gloat_ upon\nthe whole of it, and will write you my impressions and criticisms, if\ncriticisms there be. It is an uplifting thought that truth is to be told\nat last in a radical and attention-compelling manner. I think I know,\nthough, how the attention of many will find a way not to be\ncompelled--their will is so set on having a technically and artificially\nand _professionally_ expressed system, that all talk carried on as yours\nis on principles of common-sense activity is as remote and little\nworthy of being listened to as the slanging each other of boys in the\nstreet as we pass. Men disdain to notice that. It is only after our\n(_i.e._ your and my) general way of thinking gets organized enough to\nbecome a regular part of the _bureaucracy_ of philosophy that we shall\nget a serious hearing. Then, I feel inwardly convinced, our day will\nhave come. But then, you may well say, the brains will be out and the\nman will be dead. Anyhow, _vive_ the Anglo-Saxon amateur, disciple of\nLocke and Hume, and _pereat_ the German professional!\n\nWe are here for a week with the Godkins--poor old G., once such a power,\nand now an utter wreck after a stroke of paralysis three years ago.\nBeautiful place, southeast gale, volleying rain and streaming panes and\nvolumes of soft sea-laden wind.\n\nI hope you are not serious about an Oxford degree for your humble\nservant. If you are, pray drop the thought! I am out of the race for all\nsuch vanities. Write me a degree on parchment and send it yourself--in\nany case it would be but your award!--and it will be cheaper and more\nveracious. I _had_ to take the Edinburgh one, and accepted the Durham\none to please my wife. Thank you, no coronation either! I am a poor New\nHampshire rustic, in bad health, and long to get back, after four\nsummers' absence, to my own cottage and children, and never come away\nagain for lectures or degrees or anything else. It all depends on a\nman's age; and after sixty, if ever, one feels as if one ought to come\nto some sort of equilibrium with one's native environment, and by means\nof a regular life get one's small message to mankind on paper. That\nnowadays is my only aspiration. The Gifford lectures are all facts and\nno philosophy--I trust that you may receive the volume by the middle of\nJune.\n\nWhen, oh, when is your volume to appear? The sheet you send me leaves\noff just at the point where Boyle-Gibson begins to me to be most\ninteresting! Ever fondly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\nYour ancient President, Schurman, was also at Edinburgh getting LL.D'd.\nHe is conducting a campaign in favor of Philippino independence with\nmasterly tactics, which reconcile me completely to him, laying his\nfinger on just the right and telling points.\n\n\n\n\n_To Charles Eliot Norton._\n\n\nLAMB HOUSE, RYE, _May 4, 1902_.\n\nDEAR NORTON,--I hear with grief and concern that you have had a bad\nfall. In a letter received this morning you are described as better, so\nI hope it will have had no untoward consequences beyond the immediate\nshock. We need you long to abide with us in undiminished vigor and\nhealth. Our voyage was smooth, though cloudy, and we found Miss Ward a\nvery honest and lovable girl. Henry D. Lloyd, whose name you know as\nthat of a state-socialist writer, sat opposite to us, and proved one of\nthe most \"winning\" men it was ever my fortune to know.\n\nWe went to Stratford for the first time. The absolute extermination and\nobliteration of every record of Shakespeare save a few sordid material\ndetails, and the general suggestion of narrowness and niggardliness\nwhich ancient Stratford makes, taken in comparison with the way in which\nthe spiritual quantity \"Shakespeare\" has mingled into the soul of the\nworld, was most uncanny, and I feel ready to believe in almost any\nmythical story of the authorship. In fact a visit to Stratford now seems\nto me the strongest appeal a Baconian can make. The country round about\nwas exquisite. Still more so the country round about Torquay, where we\nstayed with the Godkins for eight days--he holding his own, as it seemed\nto me, but hardly improving, she earning palms of glory by her strength\nand virtue. A regular little trump! They have taken for the next two\nmonths the most beautiful country place I ever saw, occupying an elbow\nof the Dart, and commanding a view up and down. We are here for but a\nweek, my lectures beginning on the 13th. H. J. seems tranquil and happy\nin his work, though he has been much pestered of late by gout.\n\nI suppose you are rejoicing as much as I in the public interest finally\naroused in the Philippine conquest. A personal scandal, it seems, is\nreally the only thing that will wake the ordinary man's attention up. It\nshould be the first aim of every good leader of opinion to rake up one\non the opposite side. It should be introduced among our Faculty methods!\n\nDon't think, dear Norton, that you must answer this letter, which only\nyour accident has made me write. We shall be home so soon that I shall\nsee you face to face. The wife sends love, as I do, to you all. No warm\nweather whatever as yet--I am having chilblains!! Ever affectionately\nyours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Henry Whitman._\n\n\nR.M.S. IVERNIA, _June 18, 1902_.\n\nDEAR MRS. WHITMAN,--We ought to be off Boston tonight. After a cold and\nwet voyage, including two days of head-gale and heavy sea, and one of\nunbroken fog with lugubriously moo-ing fog-horn, the sun has risen upon\nAmerican weather, a strong west wind like champagne, blowing out of a\nsaturated blue sky right in our teeth, the sea all effervescing and\nsparkling with white caps and lace, the strong sun lording it in the\nsky, and hope presiding in the heart. What more natural than to report\nall this happy turn of affairs to you, buried as you probably still are\nin the blankets of the London atmosphere, beautiful opalescent blankets\nthough they be, and (when one's vitals once are acclimated) yielding\nmore wonderful artistic effects than anything to be seen in America.\n\"C'est le pays de la couleur,\" as my brother is fond of saying in the\nwords of Alphonse Daudet! But no matter for international comparisons,\nwhich are the least profitable of human employments. Christ died for us\nall, so let us all be as we are, save where we want to reform ourselves.\n(The only unpardonable crime is that of wanting to reform _one another_,\nafter the fashion of the U. S. in the Philippines.) ... Your sweet\nletter of several dates reached us just before we left Edinburgh--excuse\nthe insipid adjective \"sweet,\" which after all does express something\nwhich less simple vocables may easily miss--and gave an impression of\nharmony and inner health which it warms the heart to become sensible of.\nI understand your temptation to stay over, but I also understand your\ntemptation to get back; and I imagine that more and more you will solve\nthe problem by a good deal of alternation in future years. It is curious\nhow utterly distinct the three countries of England, Ireland and\nScotland are, which we so summarily lump together--Scotland so\ndemocratic and so much like New England in many respects. But it would\nbe a waste of time for you to go there. Keep to the South and spend one\nwinter in Rome, before you die, and a spring in the smaller Italian\ncities!\n\nI hope that Henry will have managed to get you and Miss Tuckerman to Rye\nfor a day--it is so curiously quaint and characteristic. I had a bad\nconscience about leaving him, for I think he feels lonely as he grows\nold, and friends pass over to the majority. He and I are so utterly\ndifferent in all our observances and springs of action, that we can't\nrightly judge each other. I even feel great shrinking from urging him to\npay us a visit, fearing it might yield him little besides painful\nshocks--and, after all, what besides pain and shock _is_ the right\nreaction for anyone to make upon our vocalization and pronunciation? The\ncareful consonants and musical cadences of the Scotchwomen were such a\nbalm to the ear! I wish that you and poor Henry could become really\nintimate. He is at bottom a very tender-hearted and generous being! No\nmore paper! so I cross! I wish when we once get settled again at\nChocorua that we might enclose you under our roof, even if only for one\nnight, on your way to or from the Merrimans. I should like to show you\ntrue simplicity.\n\n[_No signature_.]\n\nThe Gifford Lectures were published as \"The Varieties of Religious\nExperience, a Study in Human Nature,\" in June, 1902. The immediate\n\"popularity\" of this psychological survey of man's religious\npropensities was great; and the continued sales of the book contributed\nnot a little to relieve James of financial anxiety during the last years\nof his life.\n\nThe cordiality with which theological journals and private\ncorrespondents of many creeds greeted the \"Varieties,\" as containing a\nfair treatment of facts which other writers had approached with a\nsectarian or anti-theological bias, was striking. James was amused at\nbeing told that the book had \"supplied the protestant pulpits with\nsermons for a twelve-month.\" Regarding himself as \"a most protestant\nprotestant,\" as he once said, he was especially pleased by the manner in\nwhich it was received by Roman Catholic reviewers.\n\nCertain philosophical conclusions were indicated broadly in the\n\"Varieties\" without being elaborated. The book was a survey, an\nexamination, of the facts. James had originally conceived of the Gifford\nappointment as giving him \"an opportunity for a certain amount of\npsychology and a certain amount of metaphysics,\" and so had thought of\nmaking the first series of lectures descriptive of man's religious\npropensities and the second series a metaphysical study of their\nsatisfaction through philosophy. The psychological material had grown to\nunforeseen dimensions, and it ended by filling the book. The\nmetaphysical study remained to be elaborated; and to such work James now\nturned.\n\n\n\n\nXIV\n\n1902-1905\n\n_The Last Period (I)--Philosophical Writing--Statements of Religious\nRelief_\n\n\nJAMES now limited his teaching in Harvard University, as has been said,\nto half a course a year and tried to devote his working energies to\nformulating a statement of his philosophical conceptions. For two years\nhe published almost nothing; then the essays which were subsequently\ncollected in the volumes called \"Pragmatism,\" \"The Pluralistic\nUniverse,\" \"The Meaning of Truth,\" and \"Essays in Radical Empiricism,\"\nbegan to appear in the philosophic journals, or were delivered as\nspecial lectures. Whenever he accepted invitations to lecture outside\nthe College, as he still did occasionally, it was with the purpose of\ngetting these conceptions expressed and of throwing them into the arena\nof discussion. But demands which correspondents and callers from all\nparts of the globe now made on his time and sympathy were formidable,\nfor he could not rid himself of the habit of treating the most trivial\nof these with consideration, or acquire the habit of using a secretary.\nIn this way there continued to be a constant drain on his strength. \"It\nis probably difficult [thus he wrote wearily to Mr. Lutoslawski, who had\nbegged him to collaborate with him on a book in 1904] for a man whose\ncerebral machine works with such facility as yours does to imagine the\nkind of consciousness of men like Flournoy and myself. The background of\nmy consciousness, so far as my own achievements go, is composed of a\n_sense of impossibility_--a sense well warranted by the facts. For\ninstance, two years ago, the 'Varieties' being published, I decided\nthat everything was cleared and that my duty was immediately to begin\nwriting my metaphysical system. Up to last October, when the academic\nyear began, I had written some 200 pages of _notes_, _i.e._ disconnected\n_brouillons_. I hoped this year to write 400 or 500 pages of straight\ncomposition, and could have done so without the interruptions. As a\nmatter of fact, with the best will in the world, I have written exactly\n32 pages! For an academic year's work, that is not brilliant! You see\nthat, when I refuse your request, it is, after a fashion, in order to\nsave my own life. My working day is anyhow, _at best_, only three hours\nlong--by working I mean writing and reading philosophy.\" This estimate\nof his \"notes\" was, as always, self-deprecatory; but there was no\ndenying a great measure of truth to the statement. Frequently his health\nmade it necessary for him to escape from Cambridge and his desk. These\nincidents will be noted separately wherever the context requires.\n\nYet in spite of these difficulties and notwithstanding his complaints of\nconstant frustration, the spirit with which James still did his work\nemerges from the essays of this time as well as from his letters. It was\nas if the years that had preceded had been years of preparation for just\nwhat he was now doing. At the age of sixty-three he turned to the\nformulation of his empirical philosophy with the eagerness of a\nschoolboy let out to play. Misunderstanding disturbed him only\nmomentarily, opposition stimulated him, he rejoiced openly in the\ncontroversies which he provoked, and engaged in polemics with the good\nhumor and vigor that were the essence of his genius. His \"truth\" must\nprevail! the Absolute should suffer its death-blow! Flournoy, Bergson,\nSchiller, Papini, and others too were \"on his side.\" He made merry at\nthe expense of his critics, or bewailed the perversity of their\nopposition; but he always encouraged them to \"lay on.\" The imagery of\ncontest and battle appeared in the letters which he threw off, and he\nexpressed himself as freely as only a man can who has outgrown the\nreserves of his youth.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry L. Higginson._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _July 3, 1902_.\n\nDEAR HENRY,--Thanks for your letter of the other day, etc. Alice tells\nme of a queer conversation you and she had upon the cars. I am not\nanxious about money, beyond wishing not to live on capital.... As I have\nfrequently said, I mean to support you in your old age. In fact the hope\nof that is about all that I now live for, being surfeited with the glory\nof academic degrees just escaped, like this last one which, in the\nfriendliness of its heart, your [Harvard] Corporation designed sponging\nupon me at Commencement.[41] Boil it and solder it up from the microbes,\nand it may do for another year, if I am not in prison! The friendliness\nof such recognition is a delightful thing to a man about to graduate\nfrom the season of his usefulness. \"La renomm\u00e9 vient,\" as I have heard\nJohn La Farge quote, \"\u00e0 ceux qui ont la patience d'attendre, et\ns'accroit \u00e0 raison de leur imbecillit\u00e9.\" Best wishes to you all. Yours\never,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Grace Norton._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _Aug. 29, 1902_.\n\nMY DEAR GRACE,--Will you kindly let me know, by the method of\neffacement, on the accompanying post-card, whether the box from Germany\nof which I wrote you some time ago has or has not yet been left at your\nhouse. I paid the express, over twenty dollars, on it three weeks ago,\ndirecting it to be left with you.\n\nThe ice being thus broken, let me ramble on! How do-ist thou? And how is\nthe moist and cool summer suiting thee? I hope, well! It has certainly\nbeen a boon to most people. Our house has been full of company of which\ntomorrow the last boys will leave, and I confess I shall enjoy the\nchange to no responsibility. The scourge of life is _responsibility_--always\nthere with its scowling face, and when it ceases to someone else, it\nbegins to yourself, or to your God, if you have one. Consider the\nlilies, how free they are from it, and yet how beautiful the expression\nof their face. Especially should those emerging from \"nervous\nprostration\" be suffered to be without it--they have trouble enough in\nany case. I am getting on famously, but for that drawback, on which my\ntemper is liable to break; but I _walk_ somewhat as in old times, and\nthat is the main corner to have turned. The country seems as beautiful\nas ever--it is good that, when age takes away the zest from so many\nthings, it seems to make no difference at all in one's capacity for\nenjoying landscape and the aspects of Nature. We are all well, and shall\nvery soon be buzzing about Irving Street as of yore. Keep well yourself,\ndear Grace; and believe me ever your friend,\n\nWm. James.\n\nTo this word about enjoying the aspects of nature may be added a few\nlines from a letter to his son William, which James wrote from Europe in\n1900:--\n\n\"Scenery seems to wear in one's consciousness better than any other\nelement in life. In this year of much solemn and idle meditation, I\nhave often been surprised to find what a predominant part in my own\nspiritual experience it has played, and how it stands out as almost the\nonly thing the memory of which I should like to carry over with me\nbeyond the veil, unamended and unaltered. From the midst of every thing\nelse, almost, _surgit amari aliquid_; but from the days in the open air,\nnever any bitter whiff, save that they are gone forever.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nSTONEHURST,\nINTERVALE, N. H., _Sept. 18, 1902_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--How long it is since we have exchanged salutations and\nreported progress! Happy the country which is without a history! _I_\nhave had no history to communicate, and I hope that you have had none\neither, and that the summer has glided away as happily for you as it has\nfor us. Now it begins to fade towards the horizon over which so many\nancient summers have slipped, and our household is on the point of\n\"breaking up\" just when the season invites one most imperiously to stay.\n_Dang_ all schools and colleges, say I. Alice goes down tomorrow (I\nbeing up here with the Merrimans only for one day) to start Billy for\nEurope--he will spend the winter at Geneva University--and to get \"the\nhouse\" ready for our general reception on the 26th. I may possibly make\nout to stay up here till the Monday following, and spend the interval of\na few days by myself among the mountains, having stuck to the domestic\nhearth unusually tight all summer....\n\nWe have had guests--too many of them, rather, at one time, for me--and a\nlittle reading has been done, mostly philosophical technics, which, by\nthe strange curse laid upon Adam, certain of his descendants have been\ndoomed to invent and others, still more damned, to learn. But I've also\nread Stevenson's letters, which everybody ought to read just to know how\ncharming a human being can be, and I've read a good part of Goethe's\n_Gedichte_ once again, which are also to be read, so that one may\nrealize how absolutely healthy an organization may every now and then\neventuate into this world. To have such a lyrical gift and to treat it\nwith so little solemnity, so that most of the output consists of mere\nescape of the over-tension into bits of occasional verse, irresponsible,\nunchained, like smoke-wreaths!--it _du_ give one a great impression of\npersonal power. In general, though I'm a traitor for saying so, it seems\nto me that the German race has been a more massive organ of expression\nfor the travail of the Almighty than the Anglo-Saxon, though we did seem\nto have something more like it in Elizabethan times. Or are clearness\nand dapperness the absolutely final shape of creation? Good-bye! dear\nFanny--you see how mouldy I am temporarily become. The moment I take my\npen, I can write in no other way. Write thou, and let me know that\nthings are greener and more vernal where you are. Alice would send much\nlove to you, were she here. Give mine to your mother, brother, and\nsister-in-law, and all. Your loving,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry L. Higginson._\n\n\nCAMBRIDGE, MASS., _Nov. 1, 1902_.\n\nDEAR HENRY,--I am emboldened to the step I am taking by the\nconsciousness that though we are both at least sixty years old and have\nknown each other from the cradle, I have never but once (or possibly\ntwice) traded on your well-known lavishness of disposition to swell any\n\"subscription\" which I was trying to raise.\n\nNow the doomful hour has struck. The altar is ready, and I take the\nvictim by the ear. I choose you for a victim because you still have some\nundesiccated human feeling about you and can think in terms of pure\ncharity--for the love of God, without ulterior hopes of returns from the\ninvestment.\n\nThe subject is a man of fifty who can be recommended to no other kind of\na benefactor. His story is a long one, but it amounts to this, that\nHeaven made him with no other power than that of thinking and writing,\nand he has proved by this time a truly pathological inability to keep\nbody and soul together. He is abstemious to an incredible degree, is the\nmost innocent and harmless of human beings, isn't propagating his kind,\nhas never had a dime to spend except for vital necessities, and never\nhas had in his life an hour of what such as _we_ call freedom from care\nor of \"pleasure\" in the ordinary exuberant sense of the term. He is\nrefinement itself mentally and morally; and his writings have all been\nprinted in first-rate periodicals, but are too scanty to \"pay.\" There's\nno excuse for him, I admit. But God made him; and after kicking and\ncuffing and prodding him for twenty years, I have now come to believe\nthat he ought to be treated in charity pure and simple (even though that\nbe a vice) and I want to guarantee him $350 a year as a pension to be\npaid to the Mills Hotel in Bleecker Street, New York, for board and\nlodging and a few cents weekly over and above. I will put in $150. I\nhave secured $100 more. Can I squeeze \u00a350 a year out of you for such a\nnon-public cause? If not, don't reply and forget this letter. If \"ja\"\nand you think you really can afford it, and it isn't wicked, let me\nknow, and I will dun you regularly every year for the $50. Yours as\never,\n\nWm. James.\n\nIt is a great compliment that I address you. Most men say of such a\ncase, \"Is the man deserving?\" Whereas the real point is, \"Does he need\nus?\" What is deserving nowadays?\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe beneficiary of this appeal was that same unfulfilled promise of a\nmetaphysician who appeared as \"X\" on page 292 of the first volume--a man\nupon whom, in Cicero's phrase, none but a philosopher could look without\na groan. There were more parallels to X's case than it would be\npermissible to cite here. James did not often appeal to others to help\nsuch men with money, but he did things for them himself, even after it\nhad become evident that they could give nothing to the world in return,\nand even when they had exhausted his patience. \"Damn your\nhalf-successes, your imperfect geniuses!\" he exclaimed of another who\nshall be called Z. \"I'm tired of making allowances for them and propping\nthem up.... Z has never constrained himself in his life. Selfish,\nconceited, affected, a monster of desultory intellect, he has become now\na seedy, almost sordid, old man without even any intellectual residuum\nfrom his work that can be called a finished construction; only\n'suggestions' and a begging old age.\" But Z, too, was helped to the end.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henri Bergson._\n\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 14, 1902_.\n\nMY DEAR SIR,--I read the copy of your \"Mati\u00e8re et M\u00e9moire\" which you so\nkindly sent me, immediately on receiving it, four years ago or more. I\nsaw its great originality, but found your ideas so new and vast that I\ncould not be sure that I fully understood them, although the _style_,\nHeaven knows, was lucid enough. So I laid the book aside for a second\nreading, which I have just accomplished, slowly and carefully, along\nwith that of the \"Donn\u00e9es Imm\u00e9diates,\" etc.\n\nI think I understand the main lines of your system very well at\npresent--though of course I can't yet trace its proper relations to the\naspects of experience of which you do not treat. It needs much building\nout in the direction of Ethics, Cosmology and Cosmogony, Psychogenesis,\netc., before one can apprehend it fully. That I should take it in so\nmuch more easily than I did four years ago shows that even at the age of\nsixty one's mind can grow--a pleasant thought.\n\nIt is a work of exquisite genius. It makes a sort of Copernican\nrevolution as much as Berkeley's \"Principles\" or Kant's \"Critique\" did,\nand will probably, as it gets better and better known, open a new era of\nphilosophical discussion. It fills _my_ mind with all sorts of new\nquestions and hypotheses and brings the old into a most agreeable\nliquefaction. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.\n\nThe _Hauptpunkt_ acquired for me is your conclusive demolition of the\ndualism of object and subject in perception. I believe that the\n\"transcendency\" of the object will not recover from your treatment, and\nas I myself have been working for many years past on the same line, only\nwith other general conceptions than yours, I find myself most agreeably\ncorroborated. My health is so poor now that work goes on very slowly;\nbut I am going, if I live, to write a general system of metaphysics\nwhich, in many of its fundamental ideas, agrees closely with what you\nhave set forth and the agreement inspires and encourages me more than\nyou can well imagine. It would take far too many words to attempt any\ndetail, but some day I hope to send you the book.[42]\n\nHow good it is sometimes simply to _break away_ from all old categories,\ndeny old worn-out beliefs, and restate things _ab initio_, making the\nlines of division fall into entirely new places!\n\nI send you a little popular lecture of mine on immortality,[43]--no\npositive theory but merely an _argumentum ad hominem_ for the ordinary\ncerebralistic objection,--in which it may amuse you to see a formulation\nlike your own that the brain is an organ of _filtration_ for spiritual\nlife.\n\nI also send you my last book, the \"Varieties of Religious Experience,\"\nwhich may some time beguile an hour. Believe, dear Professor Bergson,\nthe high admiration and regard with which I remain, always sincerely\nyours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Louis Agassiz._\n\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 15, 1902_.\n\nDEAR MRS. AGASSIZ,--I never dreamed of your replying to that note of\nmine (of Dec. 5th). If you are replying to all the notes you received on\nthat eventful day, it seems to me a rather heavy penalty for becoming an\noctogenarian.[44] But glad I am that you replied to mine, and so\nbeautifully. Indeed I do remember the meeting of those two canoes, and\nthe dance, over the river from Manaos; and many another incident and\nhour of that wonderful voyage.[45] I remember your freshness of\ninterest, and readiness to take hold of everything, and what a blessing\nto me it was to have one civilized lady in sight, to keep the memory of\ncultivated conversation from growing extinct. I remember my own folly in\nwishing to return home after I came out of the hospital at Rio; and my\ngeneral greenness and incapacity as a naturalist afterwards, with my\neyes gone to pieces. It was all because my destiny was to be a\n\"philosopher\"--a fact which then I didn't know, but which only means, I\nthink, that, if a man is good for nothing else, he can at least teach\nphilosophy. But I'm going to write one book worthy of you, dear Mrs.\nAgassiz, and of the Thayer expedition, if I am spared a couple of years\nlonger.\n\nI hope you were not displeased at the _applause_ the other night, as you\nwent out. _I_ started it; if I hadn't, someone else would a moment\nlater, for the tension had grown intolerable.\n\nHow delightful about the Radcliffe building!\n\nWell, once more, dear Mrs. Agassiz, we both thank you for this beautiful\nand truly affectionate letter. Your affectionate,\n\nWm. James.\n\nE. L. Godkin had recently died, and at the date of the next letter a\nmovement was on foot to raise money for a memorial in commemoration of\nhis public services. The money was soon subscribed and the Memorial took\nshape in the endowment of the Godkin Lectureship at Harvard. James had\nstarted discussion of the project at a meeting of the dinner Club and\nHenry L. Higginson had continued it in a letter to which the following\nreplied.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry L. Higginson._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb. 8, 1903_.\n\nDEAR HENRY,--I am sorry to have given a wrong impression, and made you\ntake the trouble of writing--nutritious though your letters be to\nreceive. My motive in mentioning the Godkin testimonial was pure\ncuriosity, and not desire to promote it. We were ten \"liberals\"\ntogether, and I wanted to learn how many of us had been alienated from\nGodkin by his temper in spite of having been influenced by his writing.\nI found that it was just about half and half. I never said--Heaven bear\nme witness--that I had learned more from G. than from anyone. I said I\nhad got more _political_ education from him. You see the \"Nation\" took\nme at the age of 22--you were already older and wickeder. If you follow\nmy advice now, you don't subscribe a cent to this memorial. _I_ shall\nsubscribe $100, for mixed reasons. Godkin's \"home life\" was very\ndifferent from his life against the world. When a man differed in type\nfrom him, and consequently reacted differently on public matters; he\nthought him a preposterous monster, pure and simple, and so treated him.\nHe couldn't imagine a different kind of creature from himself in\npolitics. But in private relations he was simplicity and sociability and\naffectionateness incarnate, and playful as a young opossum. I never knew\nhis first wife well, but I admire the pluck and fidelity of the second,\nand I note your chivalrous remarks about the sex, including Mrs. W. J.,\nto whom report has been made of them, making her blush with pleasure.\n\nDon't subscribe, dear Henry. I am not trying to raise subscriptions. You\nleft too early Friday eve. Ever affectionately yours,\n\nW. J.\n\nJames's college class finished its work at the end of the first half of\nthe academic year, and in early February he turned for a few days to the\nthought of a Mediterranean voyage, as a vacation and a means of escape\nfrom Cambridge during the bad weather of March. While considering this\nplan, he cabled M. Bergson to inquire as to the possibility of a meeting\nin Paris or elsewhere.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henri Bergson._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb. 25, 1903_.\n\nDEAR PROFESSOR BERGSON,--Your most obliging cablegram (with 8 words\ninstead of four!) arrived duly a week ago, and now I am repenting that I\never asked you to send it, for I have been feeling so much less fatigued\nthan I did a month ago, that I have given up my passage to the\nMediterranean, and am seriously doubting whether it will be necessary to\nleave home at all. I _ought_ not to, on many grounds, unless my health\nimperatively requires it. Pardon me for having so frivolously stirred\nyou up, and permit me at least to pay the cost (as far as I can\nascertain it) of the despatch which you were so liberal as to send.\n\nThere is still a bare possibility (for I am so strongly tempted) that I\nmay, after the middle of March, take a cheaper vessel direct to England\nor to France, and spend ten days or so in Paris and return almost\nimmediately. In that case, we could still have our interview. I think\nthere must be great portions of your philosophy which you have not yet\npublished, and I want to see how well they combine with mine. _Writing_\nis too long and laborious a process, and I would not inflict on you the\ntask of answering my questions by letter, so I will still wait in the\nhope of a personal interview some time.\n\nI am convinced that a philosophy of _pure experience_, such as I\nconceive yours to be, can be made to work, and will reconcile many of\nthe old inveterate oppositions of the schools. I think that your radical\ndenial (the manner of it at any rate) of the notion that the brain can\nbe in any way the _causa fiendi_ of consciousness, has introduced a very\nsudden clearness, and eliminated a part of the idealistic paradox. But\nyour unconscious or subconscious permanence of memories is in its turn a\nnotion that offers difficulties, seeming in fact to be the equivalent of\nthe \"soul\" in another shape, and the manner in which these memories\n\"insert\" themselves into the brain action, and in fact the whole\nconception of the difference between the outer and inner worlds in your\nphilosophy, still need to me a great deal of elucidation. But behold me\nchallenging you to answer me _par \u00e9crit_!\n\nI have read with great delight your article in the \"Revue de\nM\u00e9taphysique\" for January, agree thoroughly with all its critical part,\nand wish that I might see in your _intuition m\u00e9taphysique_ the full\nequivalent for a philosophy of concepts. _Neither_ seems to be a full\nequivalent for the other, unless indeed the intuition becomes completely\nmystical (and that I am willing to believe), but I don't think that that\nis just what _you_ mean. The _Syllabus_[46] which I sent you the other\nday is (I fear), from its great abbreviation, somewhat unintelligible,\nbut it will show you the sort of lines upon which I have been working. I\nthink that a normal philosophy, like a science, must live by\nhypotheses--I think that the indispensable hypothesis in a philosophy of\npure experience is that of many kinds of other experience than ours,\n\n { co-consciousness }\nthat the question of { } (its conditions, etc.)\n { conscious synthesis }\n\nbecomes a most urgent question, as does also the question of the\nrelations of what is possible only to what is actual, what is past or\nfuture to what is present. These are all urgent matters in your\nphilosophy also, I imagine. How exquisitely you do _write_! Believe me,\nwith renewed thanks for the telegram, yours most sincerely,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 30, 1903_.\n\nMY DEAR FLOURNOY,--I forget whether I wrote you my applause or not, on\nreading your chapter on religious psychology in the \"Archives.\" I\nthought it a splendid thing, and well adapted to set the subject in the\nproper light before students. Abauzit has written to me for\nauthorization to translate my book, and both he and W. J., Junior, have\nquoted you as assured of his competency. I myself feel confident of it,\nand have given him the authorization required. Possibly you may supply\nhim with as much of your own translation as you have executed, so that\nthe time you have spent on the latter may not be absolutely lost.\n\"Billy\" also says that you have executed a review of Myers's book,[47]\nfinding it a more difficult task than you had anticipated. I am highly\ncurious to see what you have found to say. I, also, wrote a notice of\nthe volumes, and found it exceeding difficult to know how to go at the\njob. At last I decided just to skeletonize the points of his reasoning,\nbut on correcting the proof just now, what I have written seems deadly\nflat and unprofitable and makes me wish that I had stuck to my original\nintention of refusing to review the book at all. The fact is, such a\nbook need not be _criticized_ at all at present. It is obviously too\nsoon for it to be either refuted or established by mere criticism. It\nis a hypothetical construction of genius which must be kept hanging up,\nas it were, for new observations to be referred to. As the years\naccumulate these in a more favorable or in a more unfavorable sense, it\nwill tend to stand or to fall. I confess that reading the volumes has\ngiven me a higher opinion than ever of Myers's constructive gifts, but\non the whole a lower opinion of the objective solidity of the system. So\nmany of the facts which form its pillars are still dubious.[48]\n\nBill says that you were again convinced by Eusapia,[49] but that the\nconditions were not satisfactory enough (so I understood) to make the\nexperiments likely to convince absent hearers. Forever baffling is all\nthis subject, and I confess that I begin to lose my interest. Believe\nme, in whatever difficulties your review of Myers may have occasioned\nyou, you have my fullest sympathy!\n\nBill has had a perfectly splendid winter in Geneva, thanks almost\nentirely to your introductions, and to the generous manner in which you\ntook him into your own family. I wish we could ever requite you by\nsimilar treatment of Henri, or of _ces demoiselles_. He seems to labor\nunder an apprehension of not being able to make you all believe how\nappreciative and grateful he is, and he urges me to \"Make you understand\nit\" when I write. I imagine that you understand it anyhow, so far as he\nis concerned, so I simply assure you that _our_ gratitude here is of the\nstrongest and sincerest kind. I imagine that this has been by far the\nmost profitable and educative winter of his life, and I rejoice\nexceedingly that he has obtained in so short a time so complete a sense\nof being at home in, and so lively an affection for, the Swiss people\nand country. (As for _your_ family he has written more than once that\nthe Flournoy family seems to be \"the finest family\" he has ever seen in\nhis life.)\n\nHis experience is a good measure of the improvement in the world's\nconditions. Thirty years ago _I_ spent nine months in Geneva--but in how\ninferior an \"Academy,\" and with what inferior privileges and\nexperiences! Never inside a private house, and only after three months\nor more familiar enough with other students to be admitted to\nZofingue.[50] Ignorant of 1000 things which have come to my son and\nyours in the course of education. It _is_ a more evolved world, and no\nmistake.\n\nI find myself very tired and unable to work this spring, but I think it\nwill depart when I get to the country, as we soon shall. I am neither\nwriting nor lecturing, and reading nothing heavy, only Emerson's works\nagain (divine things, some of them!) in order to make a fifteen-minute\naddress about him on his centennial birthday. What I want to get at, and\nlet no interruptions interfere, is (at last) my _system of tychistic and\npluralistic philosophy of pure experience_.\n\nI wish, and even more ardently does Alice wish, that you and Mrs.\nFlournoy, and all the children, or any of them, might pay us a visit. I\ndon't _urge_ you, for there is so little in America that pays one to\ncome, except sociological observation. But in the big slow steamers, the\nvoyage is always interesting--and once here, how happy we should be to\nharbor you. In any case, perhaps Henri and one of his sisters will come\nand spend a year. From the point of view of education, Cambridge is\nfirst-rate. Love to you all from us both.\n\nWm. James.\n\nLate in April came a letter from Henry James in which he spoke, as if\nwith many misgivings, of returning to America for a six months' visit.\n\"I should wish,\" he said, \"to write a book of 'impressions' and to that\nend get quite away from Boston and New York--really _see_ the country at\nlarge. On the other hand I don't see myself prowling alone in Western\ncities and hotels or finding my way about by myself, and it is all\ndarksome and tangled. Some light may break--but meanwhile next Wednesday\n(awful fact) is my 60th birthday.\" He had not been in America for more\nthan twenty years, and had never known anything of the country outside\nof New England and New York.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCambridge, _May 3, 1903_.\n\n...Your long and _inhaltsvoll_ letter of April 10th arrived duly, and\nconstituted, as usual, an \"event.\" Theodora had already given us your\nmessage of an intended visit to these shores; and your letter made Alice\npositively overflow with joyous anticipations. On my part they are less\nunmixed, for I feel more keenly a good many of the _d\u00e9sagr\u00e9ments_ to\nwhich you will inevitably be subjected, and imagine the sort of physical\nloathing with which many features of our national life will inspire you.\nIt takes a long time to notice such things no longer. One thing, for\nexample, which would reconcile _me_ most easily to abandoning my native\ncountry forever would be the certainty of immunity, when traveling, from\nthe sight of my fellow beings at hotels and dining-cars having their\nboiled eggs brought to them, broken by a negro, two in a cup, and eaten\nwith butter. How irrational this dislike is, is proved both by logic,\nand by the pleasure taken in the custom by the \u00e9lite of mankind over\nhere.... Yet of such irrational sympathies and aversions (quite\nconventional for the most part) does our pleasure in a country depend,\nand in your case far more than in that of most men. The _vocalization_\nof our countrymen is really, and not conventionally, so ignobly awful\nthat the process of hardening oneself thereto is very slow, and would in\nyour case be impossible. It is simply incredibly loathsome. I should\nhate to have you come and, as a result, feel that you had now _done_\nwith America forever, even in an ideal and imaginative sense, which\nafter a fashion you can still indulge in. As far as your copyright\ninterests go, couldn't they be even more effectually and just as cheaply\nor more cheaply attended to by your [engaging an agent] over here. Alice\nforesees Lowell [Institute] lectures; but lectures have such an awful\nside (when not academic) that I myself have foresworn them--it is a sort\nof prostitution of one's person. This is rather a throwing of cold\nwater; but it is well to realize both sides, and I think I can realize\ncertain things for you better than the sanguine and hospitable Alice\ndoes.\n\nNow for the other side, there are things in the American out-of-door\nnature, as well as comforts indoors that can't be beat, and from which\n_I_ get an infinite pleasure. If you avoided the _banalit\u00e9_ of the\nEastern cities, and traveled far and wide, to the South, the Colorado,\nover the Canadian Pacific to that coast, possibly to the Hawaiian\nIslands, etc., you would get some reward, at the expense, it is true, of\na considerable amount of cash. I think you ought to come in March or\nApril and stay till the end of October or into November. The hot summer\nmonths you could pass in an absolutely quiet way--if you wished to--at\nChocorua with us, where you could do as much writing as you liked,\ncontinuous, and undisturbed, and would (I am sure) grow fond of, as you\ngrew more and more intimate with, the sweet rough country there. After\nJune, 1904, _I_ shall be free, to go and come as I like, for I have\nfully decided to resign, and nothing would please me so well (if I found\nthen that I could afford it) as to do some of that proposed traveling\nalong with you. I could take you into certain places that perhaps you\nwouldn't see alone. Don't come therefore, if you do come, before the\nspring of 1904!\n\nI have been doing nothing in the way of work of late, and consequently\nhave kept my fatigue somewhat at bay. The reading of the divine Emerson,\nvolume after volume, has done me a lot of good, and, strange to say, has\nthrown a strong practical light on my own path. The incorruptible way in\nwhich he followed his own vocation, of seeing such truths as the\nUniversal Soul vouchsafed to him from day to day and month to month, and\nreporting them in the right literary form, and thereafter kept his\nlimits absolutely, refusing to be entangled with irrelevancies however\nurging and tempting, knowing both his strength and its limits, and\nclinging unchangeably to the rural environment which he once for all\nfound to be most propitious, seems to me a moral lesson to all men who\nhave any genius, however small, to foster. I see now with absolute\nclearness, that greatly as I have been helped and enlarged by my\nUniversity business hitherto, the time has come when the remnant of my\nlife must be passed in a different manner, contemplatively namely, and\nwith leisure and simplification for the one remaining thing, which is to\nreport in one book, at least, such impression as my own intellect has\nreceived from the Universe. This I mean to stick to, and am only sorry\nthat I am obliged to stay in the University one other year. It is giving\nup the inessentials which have grown beyond one's powers, for the sake\nof the duties which, after all, are most essentially imposed on one by\nthe nature of one's powers.\n\nEmerson is exquisite! I think I told you that I have to hold forth in\npraise of him at Concord on the 25th--in company with Senator Hoar, T.\nW. Higginson, and Charles Norton--quite a _vieille garde_, to which I\nnow seem to belong. You too have been leading an Emersonian life--though\nthe environment differs to suit the needs of the different\npsychophysical organism which you present.\n\nI have but little other news to tell you. Charles Peirce is lecturing\nhere--queer being.... Boott is in good spirits, and as sociable as ever.\nGrace Norton ditto. I breakfasted this Sunday morning, as of yore, with\nTheodora [Sedgwick], who had a bad voyage in length but not in quality,\nthough she lay in her berth the whole time. I can hardly conceive of\nbeing willing to travel under such conditions. Otherwise we are well\nenough, except Peggy, whose poor condition I imagine to result from\ninfluenza. Aleck has been regenerated through and through by \"bird\nlore,\" happy as the day is long, and growing acquainted with the country\nall about Boston. All in consequence of a neighboring boy on the street,\n14 years old and an ornithological genius, having taken him under his\nprotection. Yesterday, all day long in the open air, from seven to\nseven, at Wayland, spying and listening to birds, counting them, and\nwriting down their names!\n\nI shall go off tomorrow or next day to the country again, by myself,\njoining Henry Higginson and a colleague at the end of the week, and\nreturning by the 14th for Ph.D. examinations which I hate profoundly. H.\nH. has bought some five miles of the shore of Lake Champlain adjoining\nhis own place there, and thinks of handing it over to the University for\nthe surveying, engineering, forestry and mining school. He is as\nliberal-hearted a man as the Lord ever walloped entrails into....\n\nWhat a devil of a bore your forced purchase of the unnecessary\nneighboring land must have been. _I_ am just buying 150 acres more at\nChocorua, to round off our second estate there. Keep well and\nprolific--everyone speaks praise of your \"Better Sort,\" which I am\nkeeping for the country....\n\n\n\n\n_To his Daughter._\n\n\nFABYANS, N. H., _May 6, 1903_.\n\nSWEET MARY,--Although I wrote to thy mother this P.M. I can't refrain\nfrom writing to thee ere I go up to bed. I left Intervale at 3.30 under\na cloudy sky and slight rain, passing through the gloomy Notch to\nCrawford's and then here, where I am lodged in a house full of working\nmen, though with a good clean bedroom. I write this in the office, with\nan enormous air-tight stove, a parrot and some gold-fish as my\ncompanions. I took a slow walk of an hour and a half before supper over\nthis great dreary mountain plateau, pent in by hills and woods still\nfree from buds. Although it is only 1500 feet high, the air is real\nmountain air, soft and strong at once. I wish that you could have taken\nthat four-hour drive with Topsy[51] and me this morning. You would\nalready be well--it had so healing an influence. Poverty-stricken this\nNew Hampshire country may be--weak in a certain sense, shabby, thin,\npathetic--say all that, yet, like \"Jenny,\" it _kissed_ me; and it is not\n_vulgar_--even H. J. can't accuse it of that--or of \"stodginess,\"\nespecially at this emaciated season. It remains pure, and clear and\ndistinguished--Bless it! Once more, would thou hadst been along! I have\njust been reading Emerson's \"Representative Men.\" What luminous truths\nhe communicates about their home-life--for instance: \"Nature never\nsends a Great Man into the planet without confiding the secret to\nanother soul\"--namely your mother's! How he hits her off, and how I\nrecognized whom he meant immediately. Kiss the dear tender-hearted\nthing.\n\nCommon men also have their advantages. I have seen all day long such a\nsuccession of handsome, stalwart, burnt-faced, out-of-door workers as\nmade me glad to be, however degenerate myself, one of their tribe.\nSplendid, honest, good-natured fellows.\n\nGood-night! I'm now going to bed, to read myself to sleep with a tiptop\nnovel sent me by one Barry, an old pupil of mine. 'T is called \"A\nDaughter of Thespis.\" Is this the day of your mother's great and noble\nlunch? If so, I pray that it may have gone off well. Kisses to her, and\nall. Your loving\n\nPAPA.\n\nThe next letter describes the Emerson Centenary at Concord. The Address\nwhich James delivered was published in the special volume commemorative\nof the proceedings, and also in \"Memories and Studies.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nCambridge, _May 26, 1903_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--On Friday I called at your house and to my sorrow found\nthe blinds all down. I had not supposed that you would leave so soon,\nthough I might well have done so if I had reflected. It has been a\nsorrow to me to have seen so little of you lately, but so goes the\n_train du monde_. Collapsed condition, absences, interruptions of all\nsorts, have made the year end with most of the desiderata postponed to\nnext year. I meant to write to you on Friday evening, then on Saturday\nmorning. But I went to Lincoln on Saturday P.M. and stayed over the\nEmerson racket, without returning home, and have been packing and\nwinding up affairs all day in order to get off to Chocorua tomorrow at\n7.30. These windings up of unfinished years continue till the unfinished\nlife winds up.\n\nI wish that you had been at Concord. It was the most harmoniously\n\u00e6sthetic or \u00e6sthetically harmonious thing! The weather, the beauty of\nthe village, the charming old meeting-house, the descendants of the\ngrand old man in such profusion, the mixture of Concord and Boston\nheads, so many of them of our own circle, the allusions to great\nthoughts and things, and the old-time New England rusticity and\nrurality, the silver polls and ancient voices of the _vieille garde_ who\ndid the orating (including this 'yer child), all made a matchless\ncombination, took one back to one's childhood, and made that rarely\nrealized marriage of reality with ideality, that usually only occurs in\nfiction or poetry.\n\nIt was a sweet and memorable day, and I am glad that I had an active\nshare in it. I thank you for your sweet words to Alice about my address.\nI let R. W. E. speak for himself, and I find now, hearing so much from\nothers of him, that there are only a few things that _can_ be said of\nhim; he was so squarely and simply himself as to impress every one in\nthe same manner. Reading the whole of him over again continuously has\nmade me feel his real greatness as I never did before. He's really a\ncritter to be thankful for. Good-night, dear Fanny. I shall be back here\nby Commencement, and somehow we must see you at Chocorua this summer.\n\nLove to your mother as well as to yourself, from your ever affectionate\n\nWm. James.\n\nThe letter of May 3rd drew from Henry James a long reply which may be\nfound in the \"Letters of Henry James,\" under date of May 24th; the\nreply, in its turn, elicited this response:--\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _June 6, 1903_.\n\nDEAREST HENRY,--Your long and excitingly interesting type-written letter\nabout coming hither arrived yesterday, and I hasten to retract all my\ndampening remarks, now that I understand the motives fully. The only\nones I had imagined, blindling that I am, were fraternal piety and\npatriotic duty. Against those I thought I ought to proffer the thought\nof \"eggs\" and other shocks, so that when they came I might be able to\nsay that you went not unwarned. But the moment it appears that what you\ncrave is millions of just such shocks, and that a new lease of artistic\nlife, with the lamp of genius fed by the oil of twentieth-century\nAmerican life, is to be the end and aim of the voyage, all my stingy\ndoubts wither and are replaced by enthusiasm that you are still so\nyoung-feeling, receptive and hungry for more raw material and\nexperience. It cheers me immensely, and makes me feel more so myself. It\nis pathetic to hear you talk so about your career and its going to seed\nwithout the contact of new material; but feeling as you do about the new\nmaterial, I augur a great revival of energy and internal effervescence\nfrom the execution of your project. Drop your English ideas and take\nAmerica and Americans as they take themselves, and you will certainly\nexperience a rejuvenation. This is all I have to say _today_--merely to\nlet you see how the prospect exhilarates us.\n\nAugust, 1904, will be an excellent time to begin. I should like to go\nSouth with you,--possibly to Cuba,--but as for California, I fear the\nexpense. I am sending you a decidedly moving book by a mulatto\nex-student of mine, Du Bois, professor of history at Atlanta (Georgia)\nnegro College.[52] Read Chapters VII to XI for local color, etc.\n\nWe have been up here for ten days; the physical luxury of the\nsimplification is something that money can't buy. Every breath is a\npleasure--this in spite of the fact that the whole country is drying up\nand burning up--it makes one ashamed that one can be so happy. The smoke\nhere has been so thick for five days that the opposite shore [of the\nLake] is hidden. We have a first-rate hired man, a good cow, nice horse,\ndog, cook, second-girl, etc. Come up and see us in August, 1904! Your\never loving\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry W. Rankin._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _June 10, 1903_.\n\nMY DEAR RANKIN,--Once more has my graphophobia placed me heavily in your\ndebt. Your two long letters, though unanswered, were and are\nappreciated, in spite of the fact that, as you know, I do not (and I\nfear cannot) follow the gospel scheme as you do, and that the Bible\nitself, in both its testaments (omitting parts of John and the\nApocalypse) seems to me, by its intense naturalness and humanness, the\nmost fatal document that one can read against the orthodox theology, in\nso far as the latter claims the words of the Bible to be its basis. I\nmyself believe that the orthodox theology contains elements that are\npermanently true, and that such writers as Emerson, by reason of their\nextraordinary healthy-mindedness and \"once-born\"-ness, are incapable of\nappreciating. I believe that they will have to be expressed in any\nultimately valid religious philosophy; and I see in the temper of\nfriendliness of such a man as you for such writings as Emerson's and\nmine (_magnus comp. parvo_) a foretaste of the day when the abstract\nessentials of belief will be the basis of communion more than the\nparticular forms and concrete doctrines in which they articulate\nthemselves. Your letter about Emerson seemed to me so admirably written\nthat I was on the point of sending it back to you, thinking it might be\nwell that you should publish it somewhere. I will still do so, if you\nask me. I have myself been a little scandalized at the non-resisting\nmanner in which orthodox sheets have celebrated his anniversary. An\n\"Emerson number\" of \"Zion's Herald\" strikes me as _tant soit peu_ of an\nanomaly, and yet I am told that such a number appeared. Rereading him\n_in extenso_, almost _in toto_, lately, has made him loom larger than\never to me as a human being, but I feel the distinct lack in him of too\nlittle understanding of the morbid side of life.\n\nI have been in the country two weeks, delicious in spite of drought and\nsmoke, and still more delicious now that rain has come, and I cannot\nbear to think of you still lingering in Brooklyn. Perhaps you are\nalready at Northfield. Indeed I hope so, and that the long Brooklyn\nwinter will have put you in a condition for its better enjoyment, and\nfor better cooperation with its work.\n\nI shall get at Shields some day--but I'm slow in getting round! Yours\never faithfully,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Aug. 18, 1903_.\n\nDEAR M.,-- ...I am in good condition, but in somewhat of a funk about my\nlectures,[53] now that the audience draws near. I have got my mind\nworking on the infernal old problem of mind and brain, and how to\nconstruct the world out of pure experiences, and feel foiled again and\ninwardly sick with the fever. But I verily believe that it is only work\nthat makes one sick in that way that has any chance of breaking old\nshells and getting a step ahead. It is a sort of madness however when it\nis on you. The total result is to make me admire \"Common Sense\" as\nhaving done by far the biggest stroke of genius ever made in philosophy\nwhen it reduced the chaos of crude experience to order by its luminous\n_Denkmittel_ of the stable \"thing,\" and its dualism of thought and\nmatter.\n\nI find Strong's book charming and a wonderful piece of clear and\nthorough work--quite classical in fact, and surely destined to renown.\nThe Clifford-Prince-Strong theory has now full rights to citizenship.\n\nNevertheless, in spite of his so carefully blocking every avenue which\nleads sideways from his conclusion, he has not convinced me yet. But I\ncan[not] say briefly why.... Yours in haste,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Henry Whitman._\n\n\nHOTEL ----,\nPORT HENRY, N.Y., _Aug. 22, 1903_.\n\nDEAR FRIEND,--Obliged to \"stop over\" for the night at this loathsome\nspot, for lack of train connexion, what is more natural than that I\nshould seek to escape the odious actual by turning to the distant\nIdeal--by which term you will easily recognize _Yourself_. I didn't\nwrite the conventional letter to you after leaving your house in June,\npreferring to wait till the tension should accumulate, and knowing your\nindulgence of my unfashionable ways. I haven't heard a word about you\nsince that day, but I hope that the times have treated you kindly, and\nthat you have not been \"overdoing\" in your usual naughty way. I, with\nthe exception of six days lately with the Merrimans, have been sitting\nsolidly at home, and have found myself in much better condition than I\nwas in last summer, and consequently better than for several years. It\nis pleasant to find that one's organism has such reparative capacities\neven after sixty years have been told out. But I feel as if the\nremainder couldn't be very long, at least for \"creative\" purposes, and I\nfind myself eager to get ahead with work which unfortunately won't allow\nitself to be done in too much of a hurry. I am convinced that the desire\nto formulate truths is a virulent disease. It has contracted an alliance\nlately in me with a feverish personal ambition, which I never had\nbefore, and which I recognize as an unholy thing in such a connexion. I\nactually dread to die until I have settled the Universe's hash in one\nmore book, which shall be _epoch-machend_ at last, and a title of honor\nto my children! Childish idiot--as if formulas about the Universe could\nruffle its majesty, and as if the common-sense world and its duties were\nnot eternally the really real!--I am on my way from Ashfield, where I\nwas a guest at the annual dinner, to _feu_ Davidson's \"school\" at\nGlenmore, where, in a sanguine hour, I agreed to give five discourses.\nApparently they are having a good season there. Mrs. Booker Washington\nwas the hero of the Ashfield occasion--a big hearty handsome natural\ncreature, quite worthy to be her husband's mate. Fred Pollock made a\ntip-top speech.... Charles Norton appeared to great advantage as a\nbenignant patriarch, and the place was very pretty. Have you read Loti's\n\"Inde sans les Anglais\"? If not, then begin. I seem to myself to have\nbeen doing some pretty good reading this summer, but when I try to\nrecall it, nothing but philosophic works come up. Good-bye! and Heaven\nkeep you! Yours affectionately,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _Sept. 24, 1903_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--It is so long since we have held communion that I think\nit is time to recommence. Our summer is ending quietly enough, not only\nyou, but Theodora and Mary Tappan, having all together conspired to\nleave us in September solitude, and some young fellows, companions of\nHarry and Billy, having just gone down. The cook goes tomorrow for a\nfortnight of vacation, but Alice and I, and probably both the older\nboys, hope to stay up here more or less until the middle of October. My\n\"seminary\" begins on Friday, October 2nd, and for the rest of the year\nFriday is my only day with a college exercise in it--an arrangement\nwhich leaves me extraordinarily free, and of which I intend to take\nadvantage by making excursions. Hitherto, during the entire 30 years of\nmy College service, I have had a midday exercise every day in the week.\nThis has always kept me tied too tight to Cambridge. I am _vastly_\nbetter in nervous tone than I was a year ago, my work is simplified down\nto the exact thing I want to do, and I ought to be happy in spite of the\nlopping off of so many faculties of activity. The only thing to do, as\nwith the process of the suns one finds one's faculties dropping away one\nby one, is to be good-natured about it, remember that the next\ngeneration is as young as ever, and try to live and have a sympathetic\nshare in their activities. I spent three days lately (only three, alas!)\nat the \"Shanty\" [in Keene Valley], and was moved to admiration at the\nfoundation for a consciousness that was being laid in the children by\nthe bare-headed and bare-legged existence \"close to nature\" of which the\nmemory was being stored up in them in these years. They lay around the\ncamp-fire at night at the feet of their elders, in every attitude of\nsoft recumbency, heads on stomachs and legs mixed up, happy and dreamy,\njust like the young of some prolific carnivorous species. The coming\ngeneration ought to reap the benefit of all this healthy animality. What\nwouldn't I give to have been educated in it!...\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. Henry Whitman._\n\n\nCambridge, _Oct. 29, 1903_.\n\nMY DEAR \"S. W.,\"--On inquiry at your studio last Monday I was told that\nyou would be in the country for ten days or a fortnight more. I confess\nthat this pleased me much for it showed you both happy and prudent.\nSurely the winter is long enough, however much we cut off of this\nend--the city winter I mean; and the country this month has been little\nshort of divine.\n\nWe came down on the 16th, and I have to get mine (my country, I mean)\nfrom the \"Norton Woods.\" But they are very good indeed,--indeed, indeed!\n\nI am better, both physically and morally, than for years past. The whole\nJames family thrives; and were it not for one's \"duties\" one could be\nhappy. But that things should give pain proves that something is being\n_effected_, so I take that consolation. I have the duty on Monday of\nreporting at a \"Philosophical Conference\" on the Chicago School of\nThought. Chicago University has during the past six months given birth\nto the fruit of its ten years of gestation under John Dewey. The result\nis wonderful--a _real school_, and _real Thought_. Important thought,\ntoo! Did you ever hear of such a city or such a University? Here we\nhave thought, but no school. At Yale a school, but no thought. Chicago\nhas both.... But this, dear Madam, is not intended as a letter--only a\nword of greeting and congratulation at your absence. I don't know why it\nmakes me so happy to hear of anyone being in the country. I suppose\n_they_ must be happy.\n\nYour last letter went to the right spot--but I don't expect to hear from\nyou now until I see you. Ever affectionately yours,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nNEWPORT, _Jan. 20, 1904_.\n\n...I came down here the night before last, to see if a change of air\nmight loosen the grip of my influenza, now in its sixth week and me\nstill weak as a baby, almost, from its virulent effects.... Yesterday\nA.M. the thermometer fell to 4 below zero. I walked as far as Tweedy's\n(I am staying at a boarding-house, Mrs. Robinson's, Catherine St., close\nto Touro Avenue, Daisy Waring being the only other boarder)--the snow\nloudly creaking under foot and under teams however distant, the sky\nluminously white and dazzling, no distance, everything equally near to\nthe eye, and the architecture in the town more huddled, discordant,\ncheap, ugly and contemptible than I had ever seen it. It brought back\nold times so vividly. So it did in the evening, when I went after sunset\ndown Kay Street to the termination. That low West that I've so often fed\non, with a sombre but intense crimson vestige smouldering close to the\nhorizon-line, economical but profound, and the western well of sky\nshading upward from it through infinite shades of transparent luminosity\nin darkness to the deep blue darkness overhead. It was purely American.\nYou never see that western sky anywhere else. Solemn and wonderful. I\nshould think you'd like to see it again, if only for the sake of\nshuddering at it!...\n\n\n\n\n_To Fran\u00e7ois Pillon._\n\n\nCambridge, _June 12, 1904_.\n\nDEAR PILLON,--Once more I get your faithful and indefatigable \"Ann\u00e9e\"\nand feel almost ashamed of receiving it thus from you, year after year,\nwhen I make nothing of a return! So you are 75 years old--I had no idea\nof it, but thought that you were much younger. I am only(!) 62, and wish\nthat I could expect another 13 years of such activity as you have shown.\nI fear I cannot. My arteries are senile, and none of my ancestors, so\nfar as I know of them, have lived past 72, many of them dying much\nearlier. This is my last day in Cambridge; tomorrow I get away into the\ncountry, where \"the family\" already is, for my vacation. I shall take\nyour \"Ann\u00e9e\" with me, and shall be greatly interested in both Danriac's\narticle and yours. What a mercy it is that your eyes, in spite of\ncataract-operations, are still good for reading. I have had a very bad\nwinter for work--two attacks of influenza, one very long and bad, three\nof gout, one of erysipelas, etc., etc. I expected to have written at\nleast 400 or 500 pages of my magnum opus,--a general treatise on\nphilosophy which has been slowly maturing in my mind,--but I have\nwritten only 32 pages! That tells the whole story. I resigned from my\nprofessorship, but they would not accept my resignation, and owing to\ncertain peculiarities in the financial situation of our University just\nnow, I felt myself obliged in honor to remain.\n\nMy philosophy is what I call a radical empiricism, a pluralism, a\n\"tychism,\" which represents order as being gradually won and always in\nthe making. It is theistic, but not _essentially_ so. It rejects all\ndoctrines of the Absolute. It is finitist; but it does not attribute to\nthe question of the Infinite the great methodological importance which\nyou and Renouvier attribute to it. I fear that you may find my system\ntoo _bottomless_ and romantic. I am sure that, be it in the end judged\ntrue or false, it is essential to the evolution of clearness in\nphilosophic thought that _someone_ should defend a pluralistic\nempiricism radically. And all that I fear is that, with the impairment\nof my working powers from which I suffer, the Angel of Death may\novertake me before I can get my thoughts on to paper. Life here in the\nUniversity consists altogether of _interruptions_.\n\nI thought much of you at the time of Renouvier's death, and I wanted to\nwrite; but I let that go, with a thousand other things that had to go.\nWhat a life! and what touching and memorable last words were those which\nM. Pratt published in the \"Revue de M\u00e9taphysique\"--memorable, I mean\nfrom the mere fact that the old man could dictate them at all. I have\nleft unread his last publications, except for some parts of the\n\"Monadologie\" and the \"Personalisme.\" He will remain a great figure in\nphilosophic history; and the sense of his absence must make a great\ndifference to your consciousness and to that of Madame Pillon. My own\nwife and children are well.... Ever affectionately yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCambridge, _June 28, 1904_.\n\nDEAR H.,--I came down from Chocorua yesterday A.M. to go to--\n\nMrs. Whitman's funeral!\n\nShe had lost ground steadily during the winter. The last time I saw her\nwas five weeks ago, when at noon I went up to her studio thinking she\nmight be there.... She told me that she was to go on the following day\nto the Massachusetts General Hospital, for a cure of rest and seclusion.\nThere she died last Friday evening, having improved in her cardiac\nsymptoms, but pneumonia supervening a week ago. It's a great mercy that\nthe end was so unexpectedly quick. What I had feared was a slow\ndeterioration for a year or more to come, with all the nameless\nmisery--peculiarly so in her case--of death by heart disease. As it was,\nshe may be said to have died standing, a thing she always wished to do.\nShe went to every dinner-party and evening party last winter, had an\nextension, a sort of ball-room, built to her Mount Vernon house, etc.\nThe funeral was beautiful both in Trinity Church and at the grave in Mt.\nAuburn. I was one of the eight pall-bearers--the others of whom you\nwould hardly know. The flowers and greenery had been arranged in\nabsolutely Whitmanian style by Mrs. Jack Gardner, Mrs. Henry Parkman,\nand Sally Fairchild. The scene at the grave was _beautiful_. She had no\nblood relatives, and all Boston--I mean the few whom we know--had gone\nout, and seemed swayed by an overpowering emotion which abolished all\nestrangement and self-consciousness. It was the sort of ending that\nwould please her, could she know of it. An extraordinary and indefinable\ncreature! I used often to feel coldly towards her on account of her way\nof taking people as a great society \"business\" proceeding, but now that\nher agitated life of tip-toe reaching in so many directions, of\ngenuinest amiability, is over, pure tenderness asserts its own. Against\nthat dark background of natural annihilation she seems to have been a\npathetic little slender worm, writhing and curving blindly through its\nlittle day, expending such intensities of consciousness to terminate in\nthat small grave.\n\nShe was a most peculiar person. I wish that you had known her whole life\nhere more intimately, and understood its significance. You might then\nwrite a worthy article about her. For me, it is impossible to define\nher. She leaves a dreadful vacuum in Boston. I have often wondered\nwhether I should survive her--and here it has come in the night, without\nthe sound of a footstep, and the same world is here--but without her as\nits witness....\n\n\n\n\n_To Charles Eliot Norton._\n\n\nCambridge, _June 30, 1904_.\n\nDEAR CHARLES,--I have just read the July \"Atlantic,\" and am so moved by\nyour Ruskin letters that I can't refrain from overflowing. They seem to\nme immortal documents--as the clouds clear away he will surely take his\nstable place as one of the noblest of the sons of men. Mere sanity is\nthe most philistine and (at bottom) unimportant of a man's attributes.\nThe chief \"cloud\" is the bulk of \"Modern Painters\" and the other\nartistic writings, which have made us take him primarily as an\nart-connoisseur and critic. Regard all that as inessential, and his\ninconsistencies and extravagances fall out of sight and leave the Great\nHeart alone visible.\n\nDo you suppose that there are many other correspondents of R. who will\nyield up their treasures in our time to the light? I wish that your\nmodesty had not suppressed certain passages which evidently expressed\ntoo much regard for yourself. The point should have been _his_\nexpression of that sort of thing--no matter to whom addressed! I\nunderstand and sympathize fully with his attitude about our war. Granted\nhim and his date, that is the way he ought to have felt, and I revere\nhim perhaps the more for it....\n\nS. W.'s sudden defection is a pathetic thing! It makes one feel like\nclosing the ranks.\n\nAffectionately--to all of you--including Theodora,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To L. T. Hobhouse._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _Aug. 12, 1904_.\n\nDEAR BROTHER HOBHOUSE,--Don't you think it a _tant soit peu_ scurvy\ntrick to play on me ('tis true that you don't name me, but to the\ninformed reader the reference is transparent--I say nothing of poor\nSchiller's case) to print in the \"Aristotelian Proceedings\" (pages 104\n_ff_.)[54] a beautiful duplicate of my own theses in the \"Will to\nBelieve\" essay (which should have been called by the less unlucky title\nthe _Right_ to Believe) in the guise of an _alternative and substitute_\nfor my doctrine, for which latter you, in the earlier pages of your\ncharmingly written essay, _substitute a travesty_ for which I defy any\ncandid reader to find a single justification in my text? My essay hedged\nthe license to indulge in private over-beliefs with so many restrictions\nand signboards of danger that the outlet was narrow enough. It made of\ntolerance the essence of the situation; it defined the permissible\ncases; it treated the faith-attitude as a necessity for individuals,\nbecause the total \"evidence,\" which only the race can draw, has to\ninclude their experiments among its data. It tended to show only that\nfaith could not be absolutely _vetoed_, as certain champions of\n\"science\" (Clifford, Huxley, etc.) had claimed it ought to be. It was a\nfunction that might lead, and probably does lead, into a wider world.\nYou say identically the same things; only, from your special polemic\npoint of view, you emphasize more the dangers; while I, from _my_\npolemic point of view, emphasized more the right to run their risk.\n\nYour essay, granting that emphasis and barring the injustice to me,\nseems to me exquisite, and, taking it as a unit, I subscribe\nunreservedly to almost every positive word.--I say \"positive,\" for I\ndoubt whether you have seen enough of the extraordinarily invigorating\neffect of mind-_cum_-philosophy on certain people to justify your\nsomewhat negative treatment of that subject; and I say \"almost\" because\nyour distinction between \"spurious\" and \"genuine\" courage (page 91)\nreminds me a bit too much of \"true\" and \"false\" freedom, and other\nsanctimonious come-offs.--Could you not have made an equally sympathetic\nreading of _me_?\n\nI shouldn't have cared a copper for the misrepresentation were it not a\n\"summation of stimuli\" affair. I have just been reading Bradley on\nSchiller in the July \"Mind,\" and A. E. Taylor on the Will to Believe in\nthe \"McGill Quarterly\" of Montreal. Both are vastly worse than you; and\nI cry to Heaven to tell me of what insane root my \"leading\ncontemporaries\" have eaten, that they are so smitten with blindness as\nto the meaning of printed texts. Or are we others absolutely incapable\nof making our meaning clear?\n\nI imagine that there is neither insane root nor unclear writing, but\nthat in these matters each man writes from out of a field of\nconsciousness of which the bogey in the background is the chief object.\nYour bogey is superstition; my bogey is desiccation; and each, for his\ncontrast-effect, clutches at any text that can be used to represent the\nenemy, regardless of exegetical proprieties.\n\nIn my essay the evil shape was a vision of \"Science\" in the form of\nabstraction, priggishness and sawdust, lording it over all. Take the\nsterilest scientific prig and cad you know, compare him with the\nrichest religious intellect you know, and you would not, any more than I\nwould, give the former the exclusive right of way. But up to page 104 of\nyour essay he will deem you altogether on his side.\n\nPardon the familiarity of this epistle. I like and admire your theory of\nKnowledge so much, and you re-duplicate (I _don't_ mean _copy_) my views\nso beautifully in this article, that I hate to let you go unchidden.\n\nBelieve me, with the highest esteem (plus some indignation, for you\nought to know better!), Yours faithfully,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Edwin D. Starbuck._\n\n\nSALISBURY, CONN. _Aug, 24, 1904_.\n\nDEAR STARBUCK,-- ...Of the strictures you make [in your review of my\n\"Varieties\"], the first one (undue emphasis on extreme case) is, I find,\nalmost universally made; so it must in some sense be correct. Yet it\nwould never do to study the passion of love on examples of ordinary\nliking or friendly affection, or that of homicidal pugnacity on examples\nof our ordinary impatiences with our kind. So here it must be that the\nextreme examples let us more deeply into the secrets of the religious\nlife, explain why the tamer ones value their religion so much, tame\nthough it be, because it is so continuous with a so much acuter ideal.\nBut I have long been conscious that there is on this matter something to\nbe said which neither my critics have said, nor I can say, and which I\nmust therefore commit to the future.\n\nThe second stricture (in your paragraph 4 on pages 104 _ff_.) is of\ncourse deeply important, if true. At present I can see but vaguely just\nwhat sort of outer relations our inner organism might respond to, which\nour feelings and intellect interpret by religious thought. You ought to\nwork your program for all it is worth in the way of growth in\ndefiniteness. I look forward with great eagerness to your forthcoming\nbook, and meanwhile urge strongly that you should publish the advance\narticle you speak of in Hall's new Journal. I can't see any possible\nrisk. It will objectify a part of your material for you, and possibly,\nby arousing criticism, enable you to strengthen your points.\n\nYour third stricture, about Higher Powers, is also very important, and I\nam not at all sure that you may not be right. I have frankly to confess\nthat my \"Varieties\" carried \"theory\" as far as I could then carry it,\nand that I can carry it no farther today. I can't see clearly over that\nedge. Yet I am sure that tracks have got to be made there--I think that\nthe fixed point with me is the conviction that our \"rational\"\nconsciousness touches but a portion of the real universe and that our\nlife is fed by the \"mystical\" region as well. I have no mystical\nexperience of my own, but just enough of the germ of mysticism in me to\nrecognize the region from which their voice comes when I hear it.\n\nI was much disappointed in Leuba's review of my book in the\n\"International Journal of Ethics.\" ... I confess that the way in which\nhe stamps out all mysticism whatever, using the common pathological\narguments, seemed to me unduly crude. I wrote him an expostulatory\nletter, which evidently made no impression at all, and which he possibly\nmight send you if you had the curiosity to apply.\n\nI am having a happy summer, feeling quite hearty again. I congratulate\nyou on being settled, though I know nothing of the place. I congratulate\nyou and Mrs. Starbuck also on airy fairy Lilian, who makes, I believe,\nthe third. Long may they live and make their parents proud. With best\nregards to you both, I am yours ever truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\nThe \"expostulatory\" letter to Professor Leuba began with a series of\nobjections to statements which he had made, and continued with the\npassage which follows.\n\n\n\n\n_To James Henry Leuba._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 17, 1904_.\n\n...My personal position is simple. I have no living sense of commerce\nwith a God. I envy those who have, for I know the addition of such a\nsense would help me immensely. The Divine, for my _active_ life, is\nlimited to abstract concepts which, as ideals, interest and determine\nme, but do so but faintly, in comparison with what a feeling of God\nmight effect, if I had one. It is largely a question of intensity, but\ndifferences of intensity may make one's whole centre of energy shift.\nNow, although I am so devoid of _Gottesbewustsein_ in the directer and\nstronger sense, yet there is _something in me_ which _makes response_\nwhen I hear utterances made from that lead by others. I recognize the\ndeeper voice. Something tells me, \"_thither lies truth_\"--and I am\n_sure_ it is not old theistic habits and prejudices of infancy. Those\nare Christian; and I have grown so out of Christianity that entanglement\ntherewith on the part of a mystical utterance has to be abstracted from\nand overcome, before I can listen. Call this, if you like, my mystical\n_germ_. It is a very common germ. It creates the rank and file of\nbelievers. As it withstands in my case, so it will withstand in most\ncases, all purely atheistic criticism, but _interpretative_ criticism\n(not of the mere \"hysteria\" and \"nerves\" order) it can energetically\ncombine with. Your criticism seems to amount to a pure _non possumus_:\n\"Mystical deliverances must be infallible revelations in every\nparticular, or nothing. Therefore they are _nothing_, for anyone else\nthan their owner.\" Why may they not be _something_, although not\neverything?\n\nYour only consistent position, it strikes me, would be a dogmatic\natheistic naturalism; and, without any mystical germ in us, that, I\nbelieve, is where we all should _unhesitatingly_ be today.\n\nOnce allow the mystical germ to influence our beliefs, and I believe\nthat we are in my position. Of course the \"subliminal\" theory is an\ninessential hypothesis, and the question of pluralism or monism is\nequally inessential.\n\nI am letting loose a deluge on you! Don't reply at length, or at all.\n_I_ hate to reply to anybody, and will sympathize with your silence. But\nI had to restate my position more clearly. Yours truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\nThe following document is not a letter, but a series of answers to a\nquestionnaire upon the subject of religious belief, which was sent out\nin 1904 by Professor James B. Pratt of Williams College, and to which\nJames filled out a reply at an unascertained date in the autumn of that\nyear.\n\n\n QUESTIONNAIRE[55]\n\n\n It is being realized as never before that religion, as one of the\n most important things in the life both of the community and of the\n individual, deserves close and extended study. Such study can be of\n value only if based upon the personal experiences of many\n individuals. If you are in sympathy with such study and are willing\n to assist in it, will you kindly write out the answers to the\n following questions and return them with this questionnaire, as\n soon as you conveniently can, to JAMES B. PRATT, 20 Shepard Street,\n Cambridge, Mass.\n\n Please answer the questions at length and in detail. Do not give\n philosophical generalizations, but your own personal experience.\n\n 1. What does religion mean to you personally? Is it\n\n (1) A belief that something exists? _Yes._\n\n (2) An emotional experience? _Not powerfully so, yet a_ social\n _reality_.\n\n (3) A general attitude of the will toward God or toward\n righteousness! _It involves these._\n\n (4) Or something else?\n\n If it has several elements, which is for you the most important?\n _The social appeal for corroboration, consolation, etc., when\n things are going wrong with my causes (my truth denied)_, etc.\n\n\n 2. What do you mean by God? _A combination of Ideality and (final)\n efficacity._\n\n (1) Is He a person--if so, what do you mean by His being a person?\n _He must be cognizant and responsive in some way._\n\n (2) Or is He only a Force? _He must_ do.\n\n (3) Or is God an attitude of the Universe toward you? _Yes, but\n more conscious. \"God\" to me, is not the only spiritual reality to\n believe in. Religion means primarily a universe of spiritual\n relations surrounding the earthly practical ones, not merely\n relations of \"value,\" but agencies and their activities. I suppose\n that the chief premise for my hospitality towards the religious\n testimony of others is my conviction that \"normal\" or \"sane\"\n consciousness is so small a part of actual experience. What e'er be\n true, it is not true exclusively, as philistine scientific opinion\n assumes. The other kinds of consciousness bear witness to a much\n wider universe of experiences, from which our belief selects and\n emphasizes such parts as best satisfy our needs._\n\nHow do you apprehend his relation to mankind }\n and to you personally? }\n } _Uncertain._\nIf your position on any of these matters is uncertain, }\n please state the fact. }\n\n\n 3. Why do you believe in God? Is it\n\n (1) From some argument? _Emphatically, no._\n\n Or (2) Because you have experienced His presence? _No, but rather\n because I need it so that it \"must\" be true._\n\n Or (3) From authority, such as that of the Bible or of some\n prophetic person? _Only the whole tradition of religious people, to\n which something in me makes admiring response._\n\n Or (4) From any other reason? _Only for the social reasons._\n\nIf from several of these reasons, please indicate carefully the order of\ntheir importance.\n\n\n4. Or do you not so much _believe_ in God as want to _use_ Him? _I can't\nuse him very definitely, yet I believe._ Do you accept Him not so much\nas a real existent Being, but rather as an ideal to live by? _More as a\nmore powerful ally of my own ideals._ If you should become thoroughly\nconvinced that there was no God, would it make any great difference in\nyour life--either in happiness, morality, or in other respects? _Hard to\nsay. It would surely make some difference._\n\n\n5. Is God very real to you, as real as an earthly friend, though\ndifferent? _Dimly [real]; not [as an earthly friend]._\n\nDo you feel that you have experienced His presence? If so, please\ndescribe what you mean by such an experience. _Never._\n\nHow vague or how distinct is it? How does it affect you mentally and\nphysically?\n\nIf you have had no such experience, do you accept the testimony of\nothers who claim to have felt God's presence directly? Please answer\nthis question with special care and in as great detail as possible.\n_Yes! The whole line of testimony on this point is so strong that I am\nunable to pooh-pooh it away. No doubt there is a germ in me of something\nsimilar that makes response._\n\n\n6. Do you pray, and if so, why? That is, is it purely from habit, and\nsocial custom, or do you really believe that God hears your prayers? _I\ncan't possibly pray--I feel foolish and artificial._\n\nIs prayer with you one-sided or two-sided--_i.e._, do you sometimes feel\nthat in prayer you receive something--such as strength or the divine\nspirit--from God? Is it a real communion?\n\n\n7. What do you mean by \"spirituality\"? _Susceptibility to ideals, but\nwith a certain freedom to indulge in imagination about them. A certain\namount of \"other worldly\" fancy. Otherwise you have mere morality, or\n\"taste.\"_\n\nDescribe a typical spiritual person. _Phillips Brooks._\n\n\n8. Do you believe in personal immortality? _Never keenly; but more\nstrongly as I grow older._ If so, why? _Because I am just getting fit to\nlive._\n\n\n9. Do you accept the Bible as _authority_ in religious matters? Are your\nreligious faith and your religious life based on it? If so, how would\nyour belief in God and your life toward Him and your fellow men be\naffected by loss of faith in the _authority_ of the Bible? _No. No. No.\nIt is so human a book that I don't see how belief in its divine\nauthorship can survive the reading of it._\n\n10. What do you mean by a \"religious experience\"? _Any moment of life\nthat brings the reality of spiritual things more \"home\" to one._\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Pauline Goldmark._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _Sept. 21, 1904_.\n\nDEAR PAULINE,--Alice went off this morning to Cambridge, to get the\nhouse ready for the advent of the rest of us a week hence--viz.,\nWednesday the 28th. Having breakfasted at 6:30 to bid her God speed, the\nweather was so lordly fine (after a heavy rain in the night) that I\ntrudged across lots to our hill-top, which you never saw, and now lie\nthere with my back against a stone, scribbling you these lines at\nhalf-past nine. The vacation has run down with an appalling rapidity,\nbut all has gone well with us, and I have been extraordinarily well and\nhappy, and mean to be a good boy all next winter, to say nothing of\nremoter futures. My brother Henry stayed a delightful fortnight, and\nseemed to enjoy nature here intensely--found so much _sentiment_ and\nfeminine delicacy in it all. It is a pleasure to be with anyone who\ntakes in things through the eyes. Most people don't. The two \"savans\"\nwho were here noticed _absolutely nothing_, though they had never been\nin America before.\n\nNaturally I have wondered what things your eyes have been falling on.\nMany views from hill-tops? Many magic dells and brooks? I hope so, and\nthat it has all done you endless good. Such a green and gold and scarlet\nmorn as this would raise the dead. I hope that your sister Susan has\nalso got great good from the summer, and that the fair Josephine is glad\nto be at home again, and your mother reconciled to losing you. Perhaps\neven now you are preparing to go down. I have only written as a\n_Lebenszeichen_ and to tell you of our dates. I expect no reply, till\nyou write a word to say when you are to come to Boston. Unhappily we\ncan't ask you to Irving St, being mortgaged three deep to foreigners.\nEver yours,\n\nW. J.\n\nIt will be recalled that the St. Louis Exposition had occurred shortly\nbefore the date of the last letter and had led a number of learned and\nscientific associations to hold international congresses in America.\nJames kept away from St. Louis, but asked several foreign colleagues to\nvisit him at Chocorua or in Cambridge before their return to Europe.\nAmong them were Dr. Pierre Janet of Paris and his wife, Professor C.\nLloyd Morgan of Bristol, and Professor Harold H\u00f6ffding of Copenhagen.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Oct. 26, 1904_.\n\nDEAR SCHILLER,-- ...Last night the Janets left us--a few days previous,\nLloyd Morgan. I am glad to possess my soul for a while alone. Make much\nof dear old H\u00f6ffding, who is a good pluralist and irrationalist. I took\nto him immensely and so did everybody. Lecturing to my class, he told\nagainst the Absolutists an anecdote of an \"American\" child who asked his\nmother if God made the world in six days. \"Yes.\"--\"The whole of\nit?\"--\"Yes.\"--\"Then it is finished, all done?\"--\"Yes.\"--\"Then in what\nbusiness now is God?\" If he tells it in Oxford you must reply: \"Sitting\nfor his portrait to Royce, Bradley, and Taylor.\"\n\nDon't return the \"McGill Quarterly\"!--I have another copy. Good-bye!\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. J. E. Woodbridge._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb. 6, 1905_.\n\nDEAR WOODBRIDGE,--I appear to be growing into a graphomaniac. Truth\nboils over from my organism as muddy water from a Yellowstone Geyser.\nHere is another contribution to my radical empiricism, which I send hot\non the heels of the last one. I promise that, with the possible\nexception of one post-scriptual thing, not more than eight pages of MS.\nlong, I shall do no more writing this academic year. So if you accept\nthis,[56] you have not much more to fear.... I think, on the whole, that\nthough the present article directly hitches on to the last words of my\nlast article, \"The Thing and Its Relations,\" the article called the\n\"Essence of Humanism\" had better appear before it.... Always truly yours\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Edwin D. Starbuck._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb. 12, 1905_.\n\nDEAR STARBUCK,--I have read your article in No. 2 of Hall's Journal with\ngreat interest and profit. It makes me eager for the book, but pray take\ngreat care of your style in that--it seems to me that this article is\nless well written than your \"Psychology of Religion\" was, less clear,\nmore involved, more technical in language--probably the result of\nrapidity. Our American philosophic literature is dreadful from a\nliterary point of view. Pierre Janet told me he thought it was much\nworse than German stuff--and I begin to believe so; technical and\nsemi-technical language, half-clear thought, fluency, and no\ncomposition! Turn your face resolutely the other way! But I didn't start\nto say this. Your thought in this article is both important and\noriginal, and ought to be worked out in the clearest possible manner....\nYour thesis needs to be worked out with great care, and as concretely as\npossible. It is a difficult one to put successfully, on account of the\nvague character of all its terms. One point you should drive home is\nthat the anti-religious attitudes (Leuba's, Huxley's, Clifford's), so\nfar as there is any \"pathos\" in them, obey exactly the same logic. The\nreal crux is when you come to define objectively the ideals to which\nfeeling reacts. \"God is a Spirit\"--_darauf geht es an_--on the last\navailable definition of the term Spirit. It may be very abstract.\n\nLove to Mrs. Starbuck. Yours always truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. J. E. Woodbridge._\n\n\n[_Feb. 22, 1905._]\n\nDEAR WOODBRIDGE,--Here's another! But I solemnly swear to you that this\nshall be my very last offense for some months to come. This is the\n\"postscriptual\" article[57] of which I recently wrote you, and I have\nnow cleaned up the pure-experience philosophy from all the objections\nimmediately in sight.... Truly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\nXV\n\n1905-1907\n\n _The Last Period (II)--Italy and Greece--Philosophical Congress in\n Rome--Stanford University--The Earthquake--Resignation of\n Professorship_\n\n\nIn the spring of 1905 an escape from influenza, from Cambridge duties,\nand from correspondents, became imperative. James had long wanted to see\nAthens with his own eyes, and he sailed on April 3 for a short southern\nholiday. During the journey he wrote letters to almost no one except his\nwife. On his way back from Athens he stopped in Rome with the purpose of\nseeing certain young Italian philosophers. A Philosophical Congress was\nbeing held there at the time; and James, though he had originally\ndeclined the invitation to attend it, inevitably became involved in its\nproceedings and ended by seizing the occasion to discuss his theory of\nconsciousness. It was obvious that the appropriate language in which to\naddress a full meeting of the Congress would be French, and so he shut\nhimself up in his hotel and composed \"La Notion de Conscience.\" His\nexperience in writing this paper threw an instructive sidelight on his\nprocess of composition. Ordinarily--when he was writing in\nEnglish--twenty-five sheets of manuscript, written in a large hand and\ncorrected, were a maximum achievement for one day. The address in Rome\nwas not composed in English and then translated, but was written out in\nFrench. When he had finished the last lines of one day's work, James\nfound to his astonishment that he had completed and corrected over forty\npages of manuscript. The inhibitions which a habit of careful attention\nto points of style ordinarily called into play were largely inoperative\nwhen he wrote in a language which presented to his mind a smaller\nvariety of possible expressions, and thus imposed limits upon his\nself-criticism.\n\nIn the following year (1906), James took leave of absence from Harvard\nin January and accepted an invitation from Stanford University to give a\ncourse during its spring term. He planned the course as a general\nintroduction to Philosophy. Had he not been interrupted by the San\nFrancisco earthquake, he would have rehearsed much of the projected\n\"Introductory Textbook of Philosophy,\" in which he meant to outline his\nmetaphysical system. But the earthquake put an end to the Stanford\nlectures in April, as the reader will learn more fully. In the ensuing\nautumn and winter (1907), James made the same material the basis of a\nhalf-year's work with his last Harvard class.\n\nIn November, 1906, the lectures which compose the volume called\n\"Pragmatism\" were written out and delivered in November at the Lowell\nInstitute in Boston. In January, 1907, they were repeated at Columbia\nUniversity, and then James published them in the spring.\n\nThe time had now come for him to stop regular teaching altogether. He\nhad been continuing to teach, partly in deference to the wishes of the\nCollege; but it had become evident that he must have complete freedom to\nuse his strength and time for writing when he could write, for special\nlectures, like the series on Pragmatism, when such might serve his ends,\nand for rest and change when recuperation became necessary. So, in\nFebruary, 1907, he sent his resignation to the Harvard Corporation. The\nlast meeting of his class ended in a way for which he was quite\nunprepared. His undergraduate students presented him with a silver\nloving-cup, the graduate students and assistants with an inkwell. There\nwere a couple of short speeches, and words were spoken by which he was\nvery much moved. Unfortunately there was no record of what was said.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. James._\n\n\nAMALFI, _Mar. 30, 1905_.\n\n...It is good to get something in full measure, without haggling or\nstint, and today I have had the picturesque ladled out in buckets full,\nheaped up and running over. I never realized the beauties of this shore,\nand forget (in my habit of never noticing proper names till I have been\nthere) whether you have ever told me of the drive from Sorrento to this\nplace. Anyhow, I wish that you could have taken it with me this day.\n\"Thank God for this day!\" We came to Sorrento by steamer, and at 10:30\ngot away in a carriage, lunching at the half-way village of Positano;\nand proceeding through Amalfi to Ravello, high up on the mountain side,\nwhence back here in time for a 7:15 o'clock dinner. Practically six\nhours driving through a scenery of which I had never realized the\nbeauty, or rather the interest, from previous descriptions. The\nlime-stone mountains are as _strong_ as anything in Switzerland, though\nof course much smaller. The road, a _Cornice_ affair cut for the most\npart on the face of cliffs, and crossing little ravines (with beaches)\non the side of which nestle hamlets, is positively ferocious in its\ngrandeur, and on the side of it the azure sea, dreaming and blooming\nlike a bed of violets. I didn't look for such Swiss strength, having\nheard of naught but beauty. It seems as if this were a race such that,\nwhen anyone wished to express an emotion of any kind, he went and built\na bit of stone-wall and limed it onto the rock, so that now, when they\nhave accumulated, the works of God and man are inextricably mixed, and\nit is as if mankind had been a kind of immemorial coral insect. Every\npossible square yard is terraced up, reclaimed and planted, and the\nhuman dwellings are the fiercest examples of cliff-building,\ncave-habitation, staircase and foot-path you can imagine. How I do wish\nthat you could have been along today....\n\n\n_Mar. 31, 1905_.\n\nFrom half-past four to half-past six I walked alone through the _old_\nNaples, hilly streets, paved from house to house and swarming with the\nvery poor, vocal with them too (their voices carry so that every child\nseems to be calling to the whole street, goats, donkeys, chickens, and\nan occasional cow mixed in), and no light of heaven getting indoors. The\nstreet floor composed of cave-like shops, the people doing their work on\nchairs in the street for the sake of light, and in the black inside,\nbeds and a stove visible among the implements of trade. Such light and\nshade, and grease and grime, and swarm, and apparent amiability would be\nhard to match. I have come here too late in life, when the picturesque\nhas lost its serious reality. Time was when hunger for it haunted me\nlike a passion, and such sights would have then been the solidest of\nmental food. I put up then with such inferior substitutional suggestions\nas Geneva and Paris afforded--but these black old Naples streets are not\nsuggestions, they are the reality itself--full orchestra. I have got\nsuch an impression of the essential sociability of this race, especially\nin the country. A smile will go so far with them--even without the\naccompanying copper. And the children are so sweet. Tell Aleck to drop\nhis other studies, learn _Italian_ (real Italian, not the awful\ngibberish I try to speak), cultivate his beautiful smile, learn a\nsentimental song or two, bring a tambourine or banjo, and come down\nhere and fraternize with the common people along the coast--he can go\nfar, and make friends, and be a social success, even if he should go\nback to a clean hotel of some sort for sleep every night....\n\n\n\n\n_To his Daughter._\n\n\nOn board S.S. Or\u00e9nogne, approaching\nPIR\u00c6US, GREECE, _Apr. 3, 1905_.\n\nDARLING PEG,--Your loving Dad is surely in luck sailing over this almost\noily sea, under the awning on deck, past the coast of Greece (whose\nsnow-capped mountains can be seen on the horizon), towards the Pir\u00e6us,\nwhere we are due to arrive at about two. I had some misgivings about the\nsteamer from Marseilles, but she has turned out splendid, and the voyage\nperfect. A 4000-ton boat, bran new as to all her surface equipment,\nstateroom all to myself, by a happy stroke of luck (the boat being\nfull), clean absolutely, large open window, sea like Lake Champlain,\nwith the color of Lake Leman, about a hundred and twenty first-class\npassengers of the most interesting description, one sixth English\narcheologists, one sixth English tourists, one third French\narcheologists, etc.,--an international archeological congress opens at\nAthens this week,--the rest Dagoes _quelconques_, many distinguished\nmen, almost all educated and pronounced individualities, and so much\nacquaintance and sociability, that the somewhat small upper deck on\nwhich I write resounds with conversation like an afternoon tea. The\nmeals are tip-top, and the whole thing almost absurdly ideal in its\nkind. I only wish your mother could be wafted here for one hour, to sit\nby my side and enjoy the scene. The best feature of the boat is little\nMiss Boyd, the Cretan excavatress, from Smith College, a perfect little\ntrump of a thing, who has been through the Greco-Turkish war as nurse\n(as well as being nurse at Tampa during our Cuban war), and is the\nsimplest, most generally intelligent little thing, who knows Greece by\nheart and can smooth one's path beautifully. Waldstein of Cambridge is\non board, also M. Sylvain of the Th\u00e9\u00e2tre Fran\u00e7ais, and his\ndaughter--going to recite prologues or something at the representation\nof Sophocles's \"Antigone,\" which is to take place--he looking just like\nyour uncle Henry--both eminent comedians--I mean the two Sylvains. On\nthe bench opposite me is the most beautiful woman on board, a sort of\nMary Salter translated into French, though she is with rather common\nmen. Well, now I will stop, and use my Zeiss glass on the land, which is\ngetting nearer. My heart wells over with love and gratitude at having\nsuch a family--meaning Alice, you, Harry, Bill, Aleck, and\nMother-in-law--and resolutions to live so as to be more worthy of them.\nI will finish this on land.\n\n * * * * *\n\nWell, dear family,--We got in duly in an indescribable _embrouillement_\nof small boats (our boatman, by the way, when Miss Boyd asked him his\nname, replied \"Dionysos\"; our wine-bottle was labelled \"John Solon and\nCo.\"), sailing past the Island of \u00c6gina and the Bay of Salamis, with the\nParthenon visible ahead--a worthy termination to a delightful voyage. We\ndrove the three miles from the Pir\u00e6us in a carriage, common and very\ndusty country road, also close by the Parthenon, through the cheap\nlittle town to this hotel, after which George Putnam and I, washing our\nhands, strolled forth to see what we could, the first thing being Mrs.\nSam Hoar at the theatre of Bacchus. Then the rest of the Acropolis,\nwhich is all and more than all the talk. There is a mystery of\n_rightness_ about that Parthenon that I cannot understand. It sets a\nstandard for other human things, showing that absolute rightness is not\nout of reach. But I am not in descriptive mood, so I spare you. Suffice\nit that I couldn't keep the tears from welling into my eyes. \"J'ai vu la\nbeaut\u00e9 parfaite.\" Santayana is in a neighboring hotel, but we have\nmissed each other thrice. The Forbeses are on the Peloponnesus, but\nexpected back tomorrow. Well, dear ones all, good-night! Thus far, and\nno farther! Hence I turn westward again. The Greek lower orders seem far\nless avid and rapacious than the Southern Italians. God bless you all. I\nmust get to another hotel, and be more to myself. Good and dear as the\nPutnams are and extremely helpful as they've been, it keeps me too much\nin company. Good-night again. Your loving father, _respective_ husband,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. James._\n\n\nROME, _Apr. 25, 1905_.\n\n...Strong telegraphed me yesterday from Lausanne that he ... expected to\nbe at Cannes on the 4th of May. I was glad of this, for I had been\nfeeling more and more as if I ought to stay here, and it makes\neverything square out well. This morning I went to the meeting-place of\nthe Congress to inscribe myself definitely, and when I gave my name, the\nlady who was taking them almost fainted, saying that all Italy loved me,\nor words to that effect, and called in poor Professor de Sanctis, the\nVice President or Secretary or whatever, who treated me in the same\nmanner, and finally got me to consent to make an address at one of the\ngeneral meetings, of which there are four, in place of Sully, Flournoy,\nRichet, Lipps, and Brentano, who were announced but are not to come. I\nfancy they have been pretty unscrupulous with their program here,\nprinting conditional futures as categorical ones. So I'm in for it\nagain, having no power to resist flattery. I shall try to express my\n\"Does Consciousness Exist?\" in twenty minutes--and possibly in the\nFrench tongue! Strange after the deep sense of nothingness that has been\nbesetting me the last two weeks (mere fatigue symptom) to be told that\n_my_ name was attracting many of the young professors to the Congress!\n\nThen I went to the Museum in the baths of Diocletian or whatever it is,\noff there by the R. R., then to the Capitol, and then to lunch off the\nCorso, at a restaurant, after buying a French book whose author says in\nhis preface that Sully, W. J., and Bergson are his masters. And I am\nabsolute 0 in my own home!...\n\n\n_Apr. 30, 1905._ 7 P.M.\n\n...If you never had a tired husband, at least you've got one now! The\n_ideer_ of being in such delightful conditions and interesting\nsurroundings, and being conscious of nothing but one's preposterous\nphysical distress, is too ridiculous! I have just said good-bye to my\ncircle of admirers, relatively youthful, at the hotel door, under the\npretext (a truth until this morning) that I had to get ready to go to\nLausanne tonight, and I taper off my activity by subsiding upon you.\nYesterday till three, and the day before till five, I was writing my\naddress, which this morning I gave--in French. I wrote it carefully and\nsurprised myself by the ease with which I slung the Gallic accent and\nintonation, being excited by the occasion.[58] Janet expressed himself\nas _stup\u00e9fait_, from the linguistic point of view. The thing lasted 40\nminutes, and was followed by a discussion which showed that the critics\nwith one exception had wholly failed to catch the point of view; but\nthat was quite _en r\u00e9gle_, so I don't care; and I have given the thing\nto Clapar\u00e8de to print in Flournoy's \"Archives.\" The Congress was far\ntoo vast, but filled with strange and interesting creatures of all\nsorts, and socially _very_ nutritious to anyone who can stand\nsociability without distress. A f\u00eate of some sort every day--this P.M. I\nhave just returned from a great afternoon tea given us by some\n\"Minister\" at the Borghese Palace--in the Museum. (The King, you know,\nhas bought the splendid Borghese park and given it to the City of Rome\nas a democratic possession _in perpetuo_. A splendid gift.) The pictures\ntoo! Tonight there is a great banquet with speeches, to which of course\nI can't go. I lunched at the da Vitis,--a big table full, she very\nsimple and nice,--and I have been having this afternoon a very good and\nrather intimate talk with the little band of \"pragmatists,\" Papini,\nVailati, Calderoni, Amendola, etc., most of whom inhabit Florence,\npublish the monthly journal \"Leonardo\" at their own expense, and carry\non a very serious philosophic movement, apparently _really_ inspired by\nSchiller and myself (I never could believe it before, although Ferrari\nhad assured me), and show an enthusiasm, and also a literary swing and\nactivity that I know nothing of in our own land, and that probably our\ndamned academic technics and Ph.D.-machinery and university organization\nprevents from ever coming to a birth. These men, of whom Ferrari is one,\nare none of them _Fach-philosophers_, and few of them teachers at all.\nIt has given me a certain new idea of the way in which truth ought to\nfind its way into the world.\n\nI have seen such a lot of _important_-looking faces,--probably\neverything in the stock in the shop-window,--and witnessed such\ncharmingly gracious manners, that it is a lesson. The woodenness of our\nAnglo-Saxon social ways! I had a really splendid audience for quality\nthis A.M. (about 200), even though they didn't understand....\n\n\n\n\n_To George Santayana._\n\n\nORVIETO, _May 2, 1905_.\n\nDEAR SANTAYANA,--I came here yesterday from Rome and have been enjoying\nthe solitude. I stayed at the exquisite Albergo de Russie, and didn't\nshirk the Congress--in fact they stuck me for a \"general\" address, to\nfill the vacuum left by Flournoy and Sully, who had been announced and\ncame not (I spoke _agin_ \"consciousness,\" but nobody understood) and I\ngot _fearfully tired_. On the whole it was an agreeable\nnightmare--agreeable on account of the perfectly charming _gentillezza_\nof the bloody Dagoes, the way they caress and flatter you--\"il piu grand\npsicologo del mondo,\" etc., and of the elaborate provisions for general\nentertainment--nightmare, because of my absurd bodily fatigue. However,\nthese things are \"neither here nor there.\" What I really write to you\nfor is to tell you to send (if not sent already) your \"Life of Reason\"\nto the \"Revue de Philosophie,\" or rather to its editor, M. Peillaube,\nRue des Revues 160, and to the editor of \"Leonardo\" (the great little\nFlorentine philosophical journal), Sig. Giovanni Papini, 14 Borgo\nAlbizi, Florence. The most interesting, and in fact genuinely edifying,\npart of my trip has been meeting this little _c\u00e9nacle_, who have taken\nmy own writings, _entre autres, au grand s\u00e9rieux_, but who are carrying\non their philosophical mission in anything but a technically serious\nway, inasmuch as \"Leonardo\" (of which I have hitherto only known a few\nodd numbers) is devoted to good and lively literary form. The sight of\ntheir belligerent young enthusiasm has given me a queer sense of the\ngray-plaster temperament of our bald-headed young Ph.D.'s, boring each\nother at seminaries, writing those direful reports of literature in the\n\"Philosophical Review\" and elsewhere, fed on \"books of reference,\" and\nnever confounding \"\u00c6sthetik\" with \"Erkentnisstheorie.\" Faugh! I shall\nnever deal with them again--on _those_ terms! Can't you and I, who in\nspite of such divergence have yet so much in common in our\n_Weltanschauung_, start a systematic movement at Harvard against the\ndesiccating and pedantifying process? I have been cracking you up\ngreatly to both Peillaube and Papini, and quoted you twice in my speech,\nwhich was in French and will be published in Flournoy's \"Archives de\nPsychologie.\" I hope you're enjoying the Eastern Empire to the full, and\nthat you had some Grecian \"country life.\" M\u00fcnsterberg has been called to\nKoenigsberg and has refused. Better be America's ancestor than Kant's\nsuccessor! Ostwald, to my great delight, is coming to us next year, not\nas your replacer, but in exchange with Germany for F. G. Peabody. I go\nnow to Cannes, to meet Strong, back from his operation. Ever truly\nyours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. James._\n\n\nCANNES, _May 13, 1905_.\n\n...I came Sunday night, and this is Saturday. The six days have been\nbusy ones in one sense, but have rested me very much in another. No\nsight-seeing fatigues, but more usual, and therefore more normal\noccupations.... I have written some 25 letters, long and short, to\nEuropean correspondents since being here, have walked and driven with\nStrong, and have had philosophy hot and heavy with him almost all the\ntime. I never knew such an unremitting, untiring, monotonous addiction\nas that of his mind to truth. He goes by points, pinning each one\ndefinitely, and has, I think, the very clearest mind I ever knew. Add to\nit his absolute sincerity and candor and it is no wonder that he is a\n\"growing\" man. I suspect that he will outgrow us all, for his rate\naccelerates, and he never stands still. He is an admirable philosophic\nfigure, and I am glad to say that in most things he and I are fully in\naccord. He gains a great deal from such talks, noting every point down\nafterwards, and I gain great stimulation, though in a vaguer way. I\nshall be glad, however, on Monday afternoon, to relax....\n\n\n\n\n_To Mrs. James._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nGENEVA, _May 17, 1905_.\n\nSo far, thank Heaven, on my way towards home! A rather useful time with\nthe superior, but sticky X----, at Marseilles, and as far as Lyons in\nthe train, into which an hour beyond Lyons there came (till then I was\nalone in my compartment) a Spanish bishop, canon and \"familar,\" an aged\nholy woman, sister of the bishop, a lay-brother and sister, a dog, and\nmore baggage than I ever saw before, including a feather-bed. They spoke\nno French--the bishop about as much Italian as I, and the lay-sister as\nmuch of English as I of Spanish. They took out their rosaries and began\nmumbling their litanies forthwith, whereon I took off my hat, which\nseemed to touch them so, when they discovered I was a Protestant, that\nwe all grew very affectionate and I soon felt ashamed of the way in\nwhich I had at first regarded their black and superstitious invasion of\nmy privacy. Good, saintly people on their way to Rome. I go now to our\nold haunts and to the Flournoys'....\n\nW.\n\n\n\n\n_To H. G. Wells._\n\n\nS. S. CEDRIC, _June 6, 1905_.\n\nMY DEAR MR. WELLS,--I have just read your \"Utopia\" (given me by F. C. S.\nSchiller on the one day that I spent in Oxford on my way back to\nCambridge, Mass., after a few weeks on the Continent), and\n\"Anticipations,\" and \"Mankind in the Making\" having duly preceded,\ntogether with numerous other lighter volumes of yours, the \"summation of\nstimuli\" reaches the threshold of discharge and I can't help overflowing\nin a note of gratitude. You \"have your faults, as who has not?\" but your\nvirtues are unparalleled and transcendent, and I believe that you will\nprove to have given a shove to the practical thought of the next\ngeneration that will be amongst the greatest of its influences for good.\nAll in the line of the English genius too, no wire-drawn French\ndoctrines, and no German shop technicalities inflicted in an\n_unerbittlich consequent_ manner, but everywhere the sense of the full\nconcrete, and the air of freedom playing through all the joints of your\nargument. You have a tri-dimensional human heart, and to use your own\nmetaphor, don't see different levels projected on one plane. In this\nlast book you beautifully soften cocksureness by the penumbra of the\noutlines--in fact you're a trump and a jewel, and for human perception\nyou beat Kipling, and for hitting off a thing with the right word, you\nare unique. Heaven bless and preserve you!--You are now an eccentric;\nperhaps 50 years hence you will figure as a classic! Your Samurai\nchapter is magnificent, though I find myself wondering what developments\nin the way of partisan politics those same Samurai would develop, when\nit came to questions of appointment and running this or that man in.\n_That_ I believe to be human nature's ruling passion. Live long! and\nkeep writing; and believe me, yours admiringly and sincerely,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry L. Higginson._\n\n\nCambridge, _July 18 [1905]_.\n\nDEAR H.,--You asked me how rich I was getting by my own (as\ndistinguished from _your_) exertions....\n\nI find on reaching home today a letter from Longmans, Green & Co. with a\ncheck ... which I have mailed to your house in State Street....\n\nThis ought to please you slightly; but don't reply! Instead, think of\nthe virtues of Roosevelt, either as permanent sovereign of this great\ncountry, or as President of Harvard University. I've been having a\ndiscussion with Fanny Morse about him, which has resulted in making me\nhis faithful henchman for life, Fanny was so violent. Think of the\nmighty good-will of him, of his enjoyment of his post, of his power as a\npreacher, of the number of things to which he gives his attention, of\nthe safety of his second thoughts, of the increased courage he is\nshowing, and above all of the fact that he is an open, instead of an\nunderground leader, whom the voters can control once in four years, when\nhe runs away, whose heart is in the right place, who is an enemy of red\ntape and quibbling and everything that in general the word \"politician\"\nstands for. That significance of him in the popular mind is a great\nnational asset, and it would be a shame to let it run to waste until it\nhas done a lot more work for us. His ambitions are not selfish--he wants\nto do good only! Bless him--and damn all his detractors like you and F.\nM.![59]\n\nDon't reply, but vote! Your affectionately\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To T. S. Perry._\n\n\nCambridge, _Aug. 24, 1905_.\n\nDEAR THOS!--You're a _philosophe sans le savoir_ and, when you write\nyour treatise against philosophy, you will be classed as the\narch-metaphysician. Every philosopher (W. J., _e.g._) pretends that all\nthe others are metaphysicians against whom he is simply defending the\nrights of common sense. As for Nietzsche, the worst break of his I\nrecall was in a posthumous article in one of the French reviews a few\nmonths back. In his high and mighty way he was laying down the law about\nall the European countries. Russia, he said, is \"the only one that has\nany possible future--and that she owes to the strength of the principle\nof autocracy to which she alone remains faithful,\" Unfortunately one\ncan't appeal to the principle of democracy to explain Japan's recent\nsuccesses.\n\nI am very glad you've done something about poor dear old John Fiske, and\nI should think that you would have no difficulty in swelling it up to\nthe full \"Beacon Biography\" size. If you want an extra anecdote, you\nmight tell how, when Chauncey Wright, Chas. Peirce, St. John Green,\nWarner and I appointed an evening to discuss the \"Cosmic Philosophy,\"\njust out, J. F. went to sleep under our noses.\n\nI hope that life as a farmer agrees with you, and that your \"womenkind\"\nwish nothing better than to be farmers' wives, daughters or other\nrelatives. Unluckily we let our farm this summer; so I am here in\nCambridge with Alice, both of us a prey to as bad an attack of grippe as\nthe winter solstice ever brought forth. Today, the 10th day, I am weaker\nthan any kitten. Don't ever let _your_ farm! Affectionately,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Nov. 10, 1905_.\n\nDEAR MILLER,--W. R. Warren has just been here and says he has just seen\nyou; the which precipitates me into a letter to you which has long hung\nfire. I hope that all goes well. You must be in a rather cheerful\nquarter of the City. Do you go home Sundays, or not? I hope that the\nwork is congenial. How do you like your students as compared with those\nhere? I reckon you get more out of your colleagues than you did\nhere--barring of course _der Einzige_. We are all such old stories to\neach other that we say nothing. Santayana is the only [one] about whom\nwe had any curiosity, and he has now quenched that. Perry and Holt have\nsome ideas in reserve.... The fact is that the classroom exhausts our\npowers of speech. Royce has never made a syllable of reference to all\nthe stuff I wrote last year--to me, I mean. He may have spoken of it to\nothers, if he has read, it, which I doubt. So we live in parallel\ntrenches and hardly show our heads.\n\nSantayana's book[60] is a great one, if the inclusion of opposites is a\nmeasure of greatness. I think it will probably be reckoned great by\nposterity. It has no _rational_ foundation, being merely one man's way\nof viewing things: so much of experience admitted and no more, so much\ncriticism and questioning admitted and no more. He is a paragon of\nEmersonianism.--declare your intuitions, though no other man share them;\nand the integrity with which he does it is as fine as it is rare. And\nhis naturalism, materialism, Platonism, and atheism form a combination\nof which the centre of gravity is, I think, very deep. But there is\nsomething profoundly alienating in his unsympathetic tone, his\n\"preciousness\" and superciliousness. The book is Emerson's first rival\nand successor, but how different the reader's feeling! The same things\nin Emerson's mouth would sound entirely different. E. receptive,\nexpansive, as if handling life through a wide funnel with a great\nindraught; S. as if through a pin-point orifice that emits his cooling\nspray outward over the universe like a nose-disinfectant from an\n\"atomizer.\" ... I fear that the real originality of the book will be\nlost on nineteen-twentieths of the members of the Philosophical and\nPsychological Association!! The enemies of Harvard will find lots of\nblasphemous texts in him to injure us withal. But it is a great feather\nin our cap to harbor such an absolutely free expresser of individual\nconvictions. But enough!\n\n\"Phil. 9\" is going well. I think I _lecture_ better than I ever did; in\nfact I know I do. But this professional evolution goes with an\ninvolution of all miscellaneous faculty. I am well, and efficient\nenough, but purposely going slow so as to keep efficient into the Palo\nAlto summer, which means that I have written nothing. I am pestered by\ndoubts as to whether to put my resignation through this year, in spite\nof opposition, or to drag along another year or two. I think it is\ninertia against energy, energy in my case meaning being my own man\nabsolutely. American philosophers, young and old, seem scratching where\nthe wool is short. Important things are being published; but all of them\ntoo technical. The thing will never clear up satisfactorily till someone\nwrites out its resultant in decent English....\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe reader will have understood \"the Palo Alto summer\" to refer to the\nlectures to be delivered at Stanford University during the coming\nspring. The Stanford engagement was again in James's mind when he spoke,\nin the next letter, of \"dreading the prospect of lecturing till\nmid-May.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 6, 1905_.\n\nDEAR MILLER,-- ...You seem to take radical empiricism more simply than I\ncan. What I mean by it is the thesis that there is no fact \"not\nactually experienced to be such.\" In other words, the concept of \"being\"\nor \"fact\" is not wider than or prior to the concept \"content of\nexperience\"; and you can't talk of _experiences being_ this or that, but\nonly of _things experienced as being_ this or that. But such a thesis\nwould, it seems to me, if literally taken, force one to drop the notion\nthat in point of fact one experience is _ex_ another, so long as the\n_ex_-ness is not itself a \"content\" of experience. In the matter of two\nminds not having the same content, it seems to me that your view commits\nyou to an assertion _about their experiences_; and such an assertion\nassumes a realm in which the experiences lie, which overlaps and\nsurrounds the \"content\" of them. This, it seems to me, breaks down\nradical empiricism, which I hate to do; and I can't yet clearly see my\nway out of the quandary. I am much boggled and muddled; and the total\nupshot with me is to see that all the hoary errors and prejudices of man\nin matters philosophical are based on something pretty inevitable in the\nstructure of our thinking, and to distrust summary executions by\nconviction of contradiction. I suspect your execution of being too\nsummary; but I have copied the last paragraph of the sheets (which I\nreturn with heartiest thanks) for the extraordinarily neat statement....\n\nI dread the prospect of lecturing till mid-May, but the wine being\nordered, I must drink it. I dislike lecturing more and more. Have just\ndefinitely withdrawn my candidacy for the Sorbonne job, with great\ninternal relief, and wish I could withdraw from the whole business, and\nget at writing.[61] Not a line of writing possible this year--except of\ncourse occasional note-making. All the things that one is really\nconcerned with are too nice and fine to use in lectures. You remember\nthe definition of T. H. Greene's student: \"The universe is a thick\ncomplexus of intelligible relations.\" Yesterday I got _my_ system\nsimilarly defined in an examination-book, by a student whom I appear to\nhave converted to the view that \"the Universe is a vague pulsating mass\nof next-to-next movement, always feeling its way along to a good\npurpose, or trying to.\" That is about as far as lectures can carry them.\nI particularly like the \"trying to.\"\n\nI wish I could have been at your recent discussion. I am getting\nimpatient with the awful abstract rigmarole in which our American\nphilosophers obscure the truth. It will be fatal. It revives the palmy\ndays of Hegelianism. It means utter relaxation of intellectual duty, and\nGod will smite it. If there's anything he hates, it is that kind of oozy\nwriting.\n\nI have just read Busse's book, in which I find a lot of reality by the\nway, but a pathetic waste of work on side issues--for against the\nStrong-Heymans view of things, it seems to me that he brings no solid\nobjection whatever. Heymans's book is a wonder.[62] Good-bye, dear\nMiller. _Come to us_, if you can, as soon as your lectures are over.\n\nYour affectionate\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 9. 1905_.\n\n\"My idea of Algebra,\" says a non-mathematically-minded student, \"is that\nit is a sort of form of low cunning.\"\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Daniel Merriman._\n\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 9, 1905_.\n\nNo, dear Merriman, not \"e'en for thy sake.\" After an unblemished record\nof declining to give addresses, successfully maintained for four years\n(I have certainly declined 100 in the past twelve-month), I am not going\nto break down now, for Abbot Academy, and go dishonored to my grave. It\nis better, as the \"Bhagavat-Gita\" says, to lead your own life, however\nbad, than to lead another's, however good. Emerson teaches the same\ndoctrine, and I live by it as bad and congenial a life as I can. If\nthere is anything that God despises more than a man who is constantly\nmaking speeches, it is another man who is constantly accepting\ninvitations. What must he think, when they are both rolled into one? Get\nthee behind me, Merriman,--I 'm sure that your saintly partner would\nnever have sent me such a request,--and believe me, as ever, fondly\nyours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Pauline Goldmark._\n\n\nEL TOVAR,\nGRAND CANYON, ARIZONA, _Jan. 3, 1906_.\n\nDEAR PAOLINA,--I am breaking my journey by a day here, and it seems a\ngood place from which to date my New Year's greeting to you. But we\ncorrespond so rarely that when it comes to the point of tracing actual\nwords with the pen, the last impressions of one's day and the more\npermanent interest of one's life block the way for each other. I think,\nhowever, that a word about the Canyon may fitly take precedence. It\ncertainly is equal to the brag; and, like so many of the more stupendous\nfreaks of nature, seems at first-sight smaller and more manageable than\none had supposed. But it grows in immensity as the eye penetrates it\nmore intimately. It is so entirely alone in character, that one has no\nhabits of association with \"the likes\" of it, and at first it seems a\nforeign curiosity; but already in this one day I am feeling myself grow\nnearer, and can well imagine that, with greater intimacy, it might\nbecome the passion of one's life--so far as \"Nature\" goes. The\nconditions have been unfavorable for intimate communion. Three degrees\nabove zero, and a spring overcoat, prevent that forgetting of \"self\"\nwhich is said to be indispensable to absorption in Beauty. Moreover, I\nhave kept upon the \"rim,\" seeing the Canyon from several points some\nmiles apart. I meant to go down, having but this day; but they couldn't\nsend me or any one today; and I confess that, with my precipice-disliking\nsoul, I was relieved, though it very likely would have proved less\nuncomfortable than I have been told. (I resolved to go, in order to be\nworthy of being your correspondent.) As Chas. Lamb says, there is\nnothing so nice as doing good by stealth and being found out by\naccident, so I now say it is even nicer to make heroic decisions and to\nbe prevented by \"circumstances beyond your control\" from even trying to\nexecute them. But if ever I get here in summer, I shall go straight down\nand live there. I'm sure that it is indispensable. But it is vain to\nwaste descriptive words on the wondrous apparition, with its symphonies\nof architecture and of color. I have just been watching its peaks blush\nin the setting sun, and slowly lose their fire. Night nestling in the\ndepths. Solemn, solemn! And a unity of design that makes it seem like an\nindividual, an animated being. Good-night, old chasm!...\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nSTANFORD UNIVERSITY, _Feb. 1, 1906_.\n\nBELOVED H.,--Verily 'tis long since I have written to thee, but I have\nhad many and mighty things to do, and lately many business letters to\nwrite, so I came not at it. Your last was your delightful reply to my\nremarks about your \"third manner,\" wherein you said that you would\nconsider your bald head dishonored if you ever came to pleasing _me_ by\nwhat you wrote, so shocking was my taste.[63] Well! only write _for_ me,\nand leave the question of pleasing open! I have to admit that in \"The\nGolden Bowl\" and \"The Wings of the Dove,\" you have succeeded _in getting\nthere_ after a fashion, in spite of the perversity of the method and its\n_longness_, which I am not the only one to deplore.\n\nBut enough! let me tell you of my own fortunes!\n\nI got here (after five pestilentially close-aired days in the train, and\none entrancing one off at the Grand Canyon of the Colorado) on the 8th,\nand have now given nine lectures, to 300 enrolled students and about 150\nvisitors, partly colleagues. I take great pains, prepare a printed\nsyllabus, very fully; and really feel for the first time in my life, as\nif I were lecturing _well_. High time, after 30 years of practice! It\nearns me $5000, if I can keep it up till May 27th; but apart from that,\nI think it is a bad way of expending energy. I ought to be writing my\neverlastingly postponed book, which this job again absolutely adjourns.\nI can't write a line of it while doing this other thing. (A propos to\nwhich, I got a telegram from Eliot this A.M., asking if I would be\nHarvard Professor for the first half of next year at the University of\nBerlin. I had no difficulty in declining that, but I probably shall not\ndecline _Paris_, if they offer it to me year after next.) I am expecting\nAlice to arrive in a fortnight. I have got a very decent little second\nstory, just enough for the two of us, or rather amply enough, sunny,\ngood fire-place, bathroom, little kitchen, etc., on one of the three\nresidential streets of the University land, and with a boarding-house\nfor meals just opposite, we shall have a sort of honeymoon picnic time.\nAnd, sooth to say, Alice must need the simplification....\n\nYou've seen this wonderful spot, so I needn't describe it. It is really\na miracle; and so simple the life and so benign the elements, that for a\nyoung ambitious professor who wishes to leave his mark on Pacific\ncivilization while it is most plastic, or for _any one_ who wants to\nteach and work under the most perfect conditions for eight or nine\nmonths, and _who is able to get to the East, or Europe, for the\nremaining three_, I can't imagine anything finer. It is Utopian.\nPerfection of weather. Cold nights, though above freezing. Fire pleasant\nuntil 10 o'clock A.M., then unpleasant. In short, the \"simple life\" with\nall the essential higher elements thrown in as communal possessions. The\ndrawback is, of course, the great surrounding human vacuum--the historic\nsilence fairly rings in your ears when you listen--and the social\ninsipidity. I'm glad I came, and with God's blessing I may pull through.\nOne calendar month is over, anyway. Do you know aught of G. K.\nChesterton? I've just read his \"Heretics.\" A tremendously strong writer\nand true thinker, despite his mannerism of paradox. Wells's \"Kipps\" is\ngood. Good-bye. Of course you 're breathing the fog of London while I am\nbathed in warmest lucency. Keep well. Your loving,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nSTANFORD UNIVERSITY, _Feb. 9, 1906_.\n\nDEAR FLOURNOY.--Your post-card of Jan. 22nd arrives and reminds me how\nlittle I have communicated with you during the past twelve months....\n\nLet me begin by congratulating Mlle. Alice, but more particularly Mr.\nWerner, on the engagement which you announce. Surely she is a splendid\nprize for anyone to capture. I hope that it has been a romantic\nlove-affair, and will remain so to the end. May her paternal and\nmaternal example be the model which their married life will follow! They\ncould find no better model. You do not tell the day of the\nwedding--probably it is not yet appointed.\n\nYes! [Richard] Hodgson's death was ultra-sudden. He fell dead while\nplaying a violent game of \"hand-ball.\" He was tremendously athletic and\nhad said to a friend only a week before that he thought he could\nreasonably count on twenty-five years more of life. None of his work was\nfinished, vast materials amassed, which no one can ever get acquainted\nwith as he had gradually got acquainted; so now good-bye forever to at\nleast two unusually solid and instructive books which he would have soon\nbegun to write on \"psychic\" subjects. As a _man_, Hodgson was splendid,\na real man; as an investigator, it is my private impression that he\nlately got into a sort of obsession about Mrs. Piper, cared too little\nfor other clues, and continued working with her when all the sides of\nher mediumship were amply exhibited. I suspect that our American Branch\nof the S.P.R. will have to dissolve this year, for lack of a competent\nsecretary. Hodgson was our only worker, except Hyslop, and _he_ is\nengaged in founding an \"Institute\" of his own, which will employ more\npopular methods. To tell the truth, I 'm rather glad of the prospect of\nthe Branch ending, for the Piper-investigation--and nothing else--had\nbegun to bore me to extinction....\n\nTo change the subject--you ought to see this extraordinary little\nUniversity. It was founded only fourteen years ago in the absolute\nwilderness, by a pair of rich Californians named Stanford, as a memorial\nto their only child, a son who died at 16. Endowed with I know not how\nmany square miles of land, which some day will come into the market and\nyield a big income, it has already funds that yield $750,000 yearly, and\nbuildings, of really _beautiful_ architecture, that have been paid for\nout of income, and have cost over $5,000,000. (I mention the cost to let\nyou see that they must be solid.) There are now 1500 students of both\nsexes, who pay nothing for tuition, and a town of 15,000 inhabitants has\ngrown up a mile away, beyond the gates. The landscape is exquisite and\nclassical, San Francisco only an hour and a quarter away by train; the\nclimate is one of the most perfect in the world, life is absolutely\nsimple, no one being rich, servants almost unattainable (most of the\nhouse-work being done by students who come in at odd hours), many of\nthem Japanese, and the professors' wives, I fear, having in great\nmeasure to do their own cooking. No social excesses or complications\ntherefore. In fact, nothing but essentials, and _all_ the essentials.\nFine music, for example, every afternoon, in the Church of the\nUniversity. There couldn't be imagined a better environment for an\nintellectual man to teach and work in, for eight or nine months in the\nyear, if he were then free to spend three or four months in the crowded\ncentres of civilization--for the social insipidity is great here, and\nthe historic vacuum and silence appalling, and one ought to be free to\nchange.\n\nUnfortunately the authorities of the University seem not to be gifted\nwith imagination enough to see its proper r\u00f4le. Its geographical\nenvironment and material basis being unique, they ought to aim at unique\nquality all through, and get _sommit\u00e9s_ to come here to work and teach,\nby offering large stipends. They might, I think, thus easily build up\nsomething very distinguished. Instead of which, they pay small sums to\nyoung men who chafe at not being able to travel, and whose wives get\nworn out with domestic drudgery. The whole thing _might_ be Utopian; it\n_is_ only half-Utopian. A characteristic American affair! But the\nhalf-success is great enough to make one see the great advantages that\ncome to this country from encouraging public-spirited millionaires to\nindulge their freaks, however eccentric. In what the Stanfords have\nalready done, there is an assured potentiality of great things of _some_\nsort for all future time. My coming here is an exception. They have had\npsychology well represented from the first by Frank Angell and Miss\nMartin; but no philosophy except for a year at a time. I start a new\nr\u00e9gime--next year they will have two good professors.\n\nI lecture three times a week to 400 listeners, printing a syllabus\ndaily, and making them read Paulsen's textbook for examinations. I find\nit hard work,[64] and only pray that I may have strength to run till\nJune without collapsing. The students, though rustic, are very earnest\nand wholesome.\n\nI am pleased, but also amused, by what you say of Woodbridge's Journal:\n\"la palme est maintenant \u00e0 l'Am\u00e9rique.\" It is true that a lot of\nyoungsters in that Journal are doing some real thinking, but of all the\n_bad writing_ that the world has seen, I think that our American writing\nis getting to be the worst. X----'s ideas have unchained formlessness of\nexpression that beats the bad writing of the Hegelian epoch in Germany.\nI can hardly believe you sincere when you praise that journal as you do.\nI am so busy teaching that I do no writing and but little reading this\nyear. I have declined to go to Paris next year, and also declined an\ninvitation to Berlin, as \"International Exchange\" [Professor]. The year\nafter, if asked, I _may_ go to Paris--but never to Berlin. We have had\nOstwald, a most delightful human _Erscheinung_, as international\nexchange at Harvard this year. But I don't believe in the system....\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\nHOTEL DEL MONTE,\nMONTEREY, CAL., _Apr. 7, 1906_.\n\n...What I really want to write about is Papini, the concluding chapter\nof his \"Crepuscolo dei Filosofi,\" and the February number of the\n\"Leonardo.\" Likewise Dewey's \"Beliefs and Realities,\" in the\n\"Philosophical Review\" for March. I must be very damp powder, slow to\nburn, and I must be terribly respectful of other people, for I confess\nthat it is only after reading these things (in spite of all you have\nwritten to the same effect, and in spite of your tone of announcing\njudgment to a sinful world), that I seem to have grasped the full import\nfor life and regeneration, the _great_ perspective of the programme, and\nthe renovating character for _all things_, of Humanism; and the\noutwornness as of a scarecrow's garments, simulating life by flapping in\nthe wind of nightfall, of all intellectualism, and the blindness and\ndeadness of all who worship intellectualist idols, the Royces and\nTaylors, and, worse than all, their followers, who, with no inward\nexcuse of nature (being too unoriginal really to _prefer_ anything),\njust blunder on to the wrong scent, when it is so easy to catch the\nright one, and then stick to it with the fidelity of inorganic matter.\nHa! ha! would that I were young again with this inspiration! Papini is a\njewel! To think of that little Dago putting himself ahead of every one\nof us (even of you, with his _Uomo-Dio_) at a single stride. And what a\nwriter! and what fecundity! and what courage (careless of nicknames, for\nit is so easy to call him now the Cyrano de Bergerac of Philosophy)! and\nwhat humor and what truth! Dewey's powerful stuff seems also to ring the\ndeath-knell of a sentenced world. Yet none of _them_ will see it--Taylor\nwill still write his refutations, etc., etc., when the living world will\nall be drifting after _us_. It is queer to be assisting at the\n_\u00e9closion_ of a great new mental epoch, life, religion, and philosophy\nin one--I wish I didn't have to lecture, so that I might bear some part\nof the burden of writing it all out, as we must do, pushing it into all\nsort of details. But I must for one year longer. We don't get back till\nJune, but pray tell Wells (whose address _fehlt mir_) to make our house\nhis headquarters if he gets to Boston and finds it the least convenient\nto do so. Our boys will hug him to their bosoms. Ever thine,\n\nW. J.\n\nThe San Francisco earthquake occurred at about five o'clock in the\nmorning on April 18. Rumors of the destruction wrought in the city\nreached Stanford within a couple of hours and were easily credited, for\nbuildings had been shaken down at Stanford. Miss L. J. Martin, a member\nof the philosophical department, was thrown into great anxiety about\nrelatives of hers who were in the city, and James offered to accompany\nher in a search for them, and left Stanford with her by an early morning\ntrain. He also promised Mrs. Wm. F. Snow to try to get her news of her\nhusband. Miss Martin found her relatives, and James met Dr. Snow early\nin the afternoon, and then spent several hours in wandering about the\nstricken city. He subsequently wrote an account of the disaster, which\nmay be found in \"Memories and Studies.\"[65]\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nSTANFORD UNIVERSITY, _Apr. 22, 1906_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--Three letters from you and nary one from us in all these\nweeks! Well, I have been heavily burdened, and although disposed to\nwrite, have kept postponing; and with Alice--cooking, washing dishes and\ndoing housework, as well as keeping up a large social life--it has been\nvery much the same. All is now over, since the earthquake; I mean that\nlectures and syllabuses are called off, and no more exams to be held\n(\"ill-wind,\" etc.), so one can write. We shall get East again as soon as\nwe can manage it, and tell you face to face. We can now pose as experts\non Earthquakes--pardon the egotistic form of talking about the latter,\nbut it makes it more real. The last thing Bakewell said to me, while I\nwas leaving Cambridge, was: \"I hope they'll treat you to a little bit of\nan earthquake while you're there. It's a pity you shouldn't have that\nlocal experience.\" Well, when I lay in bed at about half-past five that\nmorning, wide-awake, and the room began to sway, my first thought was,\n\"Here's Bakewell's earthquake, after all\"; and when it went crescendo\nand reached fortissimo in less than half a minute, and the room was\nshaken like a rat by a terrier, with the most vicious expression you can\npossibly imagine, it was to my mind absolutely an _entity_ that had been\nwaiting all this time holding back its activity, but at last saying,\n\"Now, _go_ it!\" and it was impossible not to conceive it as animated by\na will, so vicious was the temper displayed--everything _down_, in the\nroom, that could go down, bureaus, etc., etc., and the shaking so rapid\nand vehement. All the while no fear, only admiration for the way a\nwooden house could prove its elasticity, and glee over the vividness of\nthe manner in which such an \"abstract idea\" as \"earthquake\" could verify\nitself into sensible reality. In a couple of minutes everybody was in\nthe street, and then we saw, what I hadn't suspected in my room, the\nextent of the damage. Wooden houses almost all intact, but every chimney\ndown but one or two, and the higher University buildings largely piles\nof ruins. Gabble and babble, till at last automobiles brought the\ndreadful news from San Francisco.\n\nI boarded the only train that went to the City, and got out in the\nevening on the only train that left. I shouldn't have done it, but that\nour co-habitant here, Miss Martin, became obsessed by the idea that she\n_must_ see what had become of her sister, and I had to stand by her. Was\nvery glad I did; for the spectacle was memorable, of a whole population\nin the streets with what baggage they could rescue from their houses\nabout to burn, while the flames and the explosions were steadily\nadvancing and making everyone move farther. The fires most beautiful in\nthe effulgent sunshine. Every vacant space was occupied by trunks and\nfurniture and people, and thousands have been sitting by them now for\nfour nights and will have to longer. The fire seems now controlled, but\nthe city is practically wiped out (thank Heaven, as to much of its\narchitecture!). The order has been wonderful, even the criminals struck\nsolemn by the disaster, and the military has done great service.\n\nBut you will know all these details by the papers better than I know\nthem now, before this reaches you, and in three weeks we shall be back.\n\nI am very glad that Jim's [Putnam] lectures went off so well. He wrote\nme himself a good letter--won't you, by the way, send him this one as a\npartial answer?--and his syllabus was first-rate and the stuff must have\nbeen helpful. It is jolly to think of both him and Marian really getting\noff together to enjoy themselves! But between Vesuvius and San Francisco\nenjoyment has small elbow-room. Love to your mother, dearest Fanny, to\nMary and the men folks, from us both. Your ever affectionate,\n\nW. J.\n\nA few days after the earthquake, train-service from Stanford to the East\nwas re\u00ebstablished and James and his wife returned to Cambridge. The\nreader will infer correctly from the next letter that Henry James (and\nWilliam James, Jr., who was staying with him in Rye) had been in great\nanxiety and had been by no means reassured by the brief cablegram which\nwas the only personal communication that it was possible to send them\nduring the days immediately following the disaster.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James and William James, Jr._\n\n\nCambridge, _May 9, 1906_.\n\nDEAREST BROTHER AND SON,--Your cablegram of response was duly received,\nand we have been also \"joyous\" in the thought of your being together. I\nknew, of course, Henry, that you would be solicitous about us in the\nearthquake, but didn't reckon at all on the extremity of your anguish as\nevinced by your frequent cablegrams home, and finally by the letter to\nHarry which arrived a couple of days ago and told how you were unable to\nsettle down to any other occupation, the thought of our mangled forms,\nhollow eyes, starving bodies, minds insane with fear, haunting you so.\nWe never reckoned on this extremity of anxiety on your part, I say, and\nso never thought of cabling you direct, as we might well have done from\nOakland on the day we left, namely April 27th. I much regret this\ncallousness on our part. For _all_ the anguish was yours; and in general\nthis experience only rubs in what I have always known, that in battles,\nsieges and other great calamities, the pathos and agony is in general\nsolely felt by those at a distance; and although physical pain is\nsuffered most by its immediate victims, those at the _scene of action_\nhave no _sentimental_ suffering whatever. Everyone at San Francisco\nseemed in a good hearty frame of mind; there was work for every moment\nof the day and a kind of uplift in the sense of a \"common lot\" that took\naway the sense of loneliness that (I imagine) gives the sharpest edge to\nthe more usual kind of misfortune that may befall a man. But it was a\nqueer sight, on our journey through the City on the 26th (eight days\nafter the disaster), to see the inmates of the houses of the quarter\nleft standing, all cooking their dinners at little brick camp-fires in\nthe middle of the streets, the chimneys being condemned. If such a\ndisaster had to happen, somehow it couldn't have chosen a better place\nthan San Francisco (where everyone knew about camping, and was familiar\nwith the creation of civilizations out of the bare ground), and at\nfive-thirty in the morning, when few fires were lighted and everyone,\nafter a good sleep, was in bed. Later, there would have been great loss\nof life in the streets, and the more numerous foci of conflagration\nwould have burned the city in one day instead of four, and made things\nvastly worse.\n\nIn general you may be sure that when any disaster befalls our country it\nwill be _you_ only who are wringing of hands, and we who are smiling\nwith \"interest or laughing with gleeful excitement.\" I didn't hear one\npathetic word uttered at the scene of disaster, though of course the\ncrop of \"nervous wrecks\" is very likely to come in a month or so.\n\nAlthough we have been home six days, such has been the stream of broken\noccupations, people to see, and small urgent jobs to attend to, that I\nhave written no letter till now. Today, one sees more clearly and begins\nto rest. \"Home\" looks extraordinarily pleasant, and though damp and\nchilly, it is the divine budding moment of the year. Not, however, the\nlustrous light and sky of Stanford University....\n\nI have just read your paper on Boston in the \"North American Review.\" I\nam glad you threw away the scabbard and made your critical remarks so\nstraight. What you say about \"pay\" here being the easily won \"salve\" for\nprivations, in view of which we cease to \"mind\" them, is as true as it\nis strikingly pat. _Les intellectuels_, wedged between the millionaires\nand the handworkers, are the really pinched class here. They feel the\nfrustrations and they can't get the salve. _My_ attainment of so much\npay in the past few years brings home to me what an all-benumbing salve\nit is. That whole article is of your best. We long to hear from W., Jr.\nNo word yet. Your ever loving,\n\nW. J.\n\nIn \"The Energies of Men\" there is a long quotation from an unnamed\nEuropean correspondent who had been subjecting himself to Yoga\ndisciplinary exercise. What follows is a comment written upon the first\nreceipt of the report quoted in the \"Energies.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To W. Lutoslawski._\n\n\nCambridge, _May 6, 1906_.\n\n...Your long and beautiful letter about Yoga, etc., greets me on my\nreturn from California. It is a most precious human document, and some\nday, along with that sketch of your religious evolution and other\nshorter letters of yours, it must see the light of day. What strikes me\nfirst in it is the evidence of improved moral \"tone\"--a calm, firm,\nsustained joyousness, hard to describe, and striking a new note in your\nepistles--which is already a convincing argument of the genuineness of\nthe improvement wrought in you by Yoga practices....\n\nYou are mistaken about my having tried Yoga discipline--I never meant to\nsuggest that. I have read several books (A. B., by the way, used to be a\nstudent of mine, but in spite of many noble qualities, he always had an\nunbalanced mind--obsessed by certain morbid ideas, etc.), and in the\nslightest possible way tried breathing exercises. These go terribly\nagainst the grain with me, are extremely disagreeable, and, even when\ntried this winter (somewhat perseveringly), to put myself asleep, after\nlying awake at night, failed to have any soporific effect. What\nimpresses me most in your narrative is the obstinate strength of will\nshown by yourself and your chela in your methodical abstentions and\nexercises. When could I hope for such will-power? I find, when my\ngeneral energy is _in Anspruch genommen_ by hard lecturing and other\nprofessional work, that then particularly what little _ascetic_ energy I\nhave has to be remitted, because the exertion of inhibitory and\nstimulative will required increases my general fatigue instead of\n\"tonifying\" me.\n\nBut your sober experience gives me new hopes. Your whole narrative\nsuggests in me the wonder whether the Yoga discipline may not be, after\nall, in all its phases, simply a methodical way of _waking up deeper\nlevels of will-power than are habitually used_, and thereby increasing\nthe individual's vital tone and energy. I have no doubt whatever that\nmost people live, whether physically, intellectually or morally, in a\nvery restricted circle of their potential being. They _make use_ of a\nvery small portion of their possible consciousness, and of their soul's\nresources in general, much like a man who, out of his whole bodily\norganism, should get into a habit of using and moving only his little\nfinger. Great emergencies and crises show us how much greater our vital\nresources are than we had supposed. Pierre Janet discussed lately some\ncases of pathological impulsion or obsession in what he has called the\n\"psychasthenic\" type of individual, bulimia, exaggerated walking, morbid\nlove of feeling pain, and explains the phenomenon as based on the\nunderlying _sentiment d'incompl\u00e9tude_, as he calls it, or _sentiment de\nl'irr\u00e9el_ with which these patients are habitually afflicted, and which\nthey find is abolished by the violent appeal to some exaggerated\nactivity or other, discovered accidentally perhaps, and then used\nhabitually. I was reminded of his article in reading your descriptions\nand prescriptions. May the Yoga practices not be, after all, methods of\ngetting at our deeper functional levels? And thus only be substitutes\nfor entirely different crises that may occur in other individuals,\nreligious crises, indignation-crises, love-crises, etc.?\n\nWhat you say of diet is in striking accordance with the views lately\nmade popular by Horace Fletcher--I dare say you have heard of them. You\nsee I am trying to generalize the Yoga idea, and redeem it from the\npretension that, for example, there is something intrinsically holy in\nthe various grotesque postures of Hatha Yoga. I have spoken with various\nHindus, particularly with three last winter, one a Yogi and apostle of\nVedanta; one a \"Christian\" of scientific training; one a Bramo-Somaj\nprofessor. The former made great claims of increase of \"power,\" but\nadmitted that those who had it could in no way demonstrate it _ad\noculos_, to outsiders. The other two both said that Yoga was less and\nless frequently practised by the more intellectual, and that the\nold-fashioned _Guru_ was becoming quite a rarity.\n\nI believe with you, fully, that the so-called \"normal man\" of commerce,\nso to speak, the healthy philistine, is a mere extract from the\npotentially realizable individual whom he represents, and that we all\nhave reservoirs of life to draw upon, of which we do not dream. The\npractical problem is \"how to get at them.\" And the answer varies with\nthe individual. Most of us never can, or never do get at them. _You_\nhave indubitably got at your own deeper levels by the Yoga methods. I\nhope that what you have gained will never again be lost to you. You must\nkeep there! _My_ deeper levels seem very hard to find--I am so\nrebellious at all formal and prescriptive methods--a dry and bony\n_individual_, repelling fusion, and avoiding voluntary exertion. No\nmatter, art is long! and _qui vivra verra_. I shall try fasting and\nagain try breathing--discovering perhaps some individual rhythm that is\nmore tolerable....\n\n\n\n\n_To John Jay Chapman._\n\n\nCambridge, _May 18, 1906_.\n\nDEAR OLD JACK C.,--Having this minute come into the possession of a new\ntype-writer, what can I do better than express my pride in the same by\nwriting to you?[66]\n\nI spent last night at George Dorr's and he read me several letters from\nyou, telling me also of your visit, and of how well you seemed. For\nyears past I have been on the point of writing to you to assure [you] of\nmy continued love and to express my commiseration for your poor wife,\nwho has had so long to bear the brunt of your temper--you see I have\nbeen there already and I know how one's irritability is exasperated by\nconditions of nervous prostration--but now I can write and congratulate\nyou on having recovered, temper and all. (As I write, it bethinks me\nthat in a previous letter I have made identical jokes about your temper\nwhich, I fear, will give Mrs. Chapman a very low opinion of my\nhumoristic resources, and in sooth they are small; but we are as God\nmakes us and must not try to be anything else, so pray condone the\nsilliness and let it pass.) The main thing is that you seem practically\nto have recovered, in spite of everything; and I am heartily glad.\n\nI too am well enough for all practical purposes, but I have to go slow\nand not try to do too many things in a day. Simplification of life and\nconsciousness I find to be the great thing, but a hard thing to compass\nwhen one lives in city conditions. How our dear Sarah Whitman lived in\nthe sort of railroad station she made of her life--I confess it's a\nmystery to me. If I lived at a place called Barrytown, it would probably\ngo better--don't you ever go back to New York to live!\n\nAlice and I had a jovial time at sweet little Stanford University. It\nwas the simple life in the best sense of the term. I am glad for once to\nhave been part of the working machine of California, and a pretty deep\npart too, as it afterwards turned out. The earthquake also was a\nmemorable bit of experience, and altogether we have found it\nmind-enlarging and are very glad we ben there. But the whole\nintermediate West is awful--a sort of penal doom to have to live there;\nand in general the result with me of having lived 65 years in America is\nto make me feel as if I had at least bought the right to a certain\ncapriciousness, and were free now to live for the remainder of my days\nwherever I prefer and can make my wife and children consent--it is more\nlikely to be in rural than in urban surroundings, and in the maturer\nthan in the _rawrer_ parts of the world. But the first thing is to get\nout of the treadmill of teaching, which I hate and shall resign from\nnext year. After that, I can use my small available store of energy in\nwriting, which is not only a much more economical way of working it, but\nmore satisfactory in point of quality, and more lucrative as well.\n\nNow, J. C., when are you going to get at writing again? The world is\nhungry for your wares. No one touches certain deep notes of moral truth\nas you do, and your humor is _k\u00f6stlich_ and _impayable_. You ought to\njoin the band of \"pragmatistic\" or \"humanistic\" philosophers. I almost\nfear that Barrytown may not yet have begun to be disturbed by the rumor\nof their achievements, the which are of the greatest, and seriously I du\nthink that the world of thought is on the eve of a renovation no less\nimportant than that contributed by Locke. The leaders of the new\nmovement are Dewey, Schiller of Oxford, in a sense Bergson of Paris, a\nyoung Florentine named Papini, and last and least worthy, W. J. H. G.\nWells ought to be counted in, and if I mistake not G. K. Chesterton as\nwell.[67] I hope you know and love the last-named writer, who seems to\nme a great teller of the truth. His systematic preference for\ncontradictions and paradoxical forms of statement seems to me a\nmannerism somewhat to be regretted in so wealthy a mind; but that is a\nblemish from which some of our very greatest intellects are not\naltogether free--the philosopher of Barrytown himself being not wholly\nexempt. Join us, O Jack, and in the historic and perspective sense your\nfame will be secure. All future Histories of Philosophy will print your\nname.\n\nBut although my love for you is not exhausted, my type-writing energy\nis. It communicates stiffness and cramps, both to the body and the mind.\nNevertheless I think I have been doing pretty well for a first attempt,\ndon't you? If you return me a good long letter telling me more\nparticularly about the process of your recovery, I will write again,\neven if I have to take a pen to do it, and in any case I will do it much\nbetter than this time.\n\nBelieve me, dear old J. C., with hearty affection and delight at your\nrecovery--all these months I have been on the brink of writing to find\nout how you were--and with very best regards to your wife, whom some day\nI wish we may be permitted to know better. Yours very truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\nEveryone dead! Hodgson, Shaler, James Peirce this winter--to go no\nfurther afield! _Resserrons les rangs!_\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCambridge, _Sept. 10, 1906_.\n\nDEAREST H.,--I got back from the Adirondacks, where I had spent a\nfortnight, the night before last, and in three or four hours Alice,\nAleck and I will be spinning towards Chocorua, it being now five A.M.\nElly [Temple] Hunter will join us, with Grenville, in a few days; but\nfor the most part, thank Heaven, we shall be alone till the end of the\nmonth. I found two letters from you awaiting me, and two from Bill. They\nall breathed a spirit of happiness, and brought a waft of the beautiful\nEuropean summer with them. It has been a beautiful summer here too; and\nnow, sad to say, it is counting the last beads of its chaplet of hot\ndays out--the hot days which are really the absolutely friendly ones to\nman--you wish they would get cooler when you have them, and when they\nare departed, you wish you could have their exquisite gentleness again.\nI have just been reading in the volume by Richard Jefferies called the\n\"Life of the Fields\" a wonderful rhapsody, \"The Pageant of Summer.\" It\nneeds to be read twice over and very attentively, being nothing but an\nenumeration of all the details visible in the corner of an old field\nwith a hedge and ditch. But rightly taken in, it is probably the highest\nflight of human genius in the direction of nature-worship. I don't see\nwhy it should not count as an immortal thing. You missed it, when here,\nin not getting to Keene Valley, where I have just been, and of which the\nsylvan beauty, especially by moonlight, is probably unlike aught that\nEurope has to show. Imperishable freshness!...\n\nThis is definitely my last year of lecturing, but I wish it were my\nfirst of non-lecturing. Simplification of the field of duties I find\nmore and more to be the _summum bonum_ for me; and I live in\napprehension lest the Avenger should cut me off before I get my message\nout. Not that the message is particularly needed by the human race,\nwhich can live along perfectly well without any one philosopher; but\nobjectively I hate to leave the volumes I have already published without\ntheir logical complement. It is an esthetic tragedy to have a bridge\nbegun, and stopped in the middle of an arch.\n\nBut I hear Alice stirring upstairs, so I must go up and finish packing.\nI hope that you and W. J., Jr., will again form a harmonious\ncombination. I hope also that he will stop painting for a time. He will\ndo all the better, when he gets home, for having had a fallow interval.\n\nGood-bye! and my blessing upon both of you. Your ever loving,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To H. G. Wells._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _Sept. 11, 1906_.\n\nDEAR MR. WELLS,--I've read your \"Two Studies in Disappointment\" in\n\"Harper's Weekly,\" and must thank you from the bottom of my heart. _Rem\nacu tetegisti!_ Exactly that callousness to abstract justice is _the_\nsinister feature and, to me as well as to you, the incomprehensible\nfeature, of our U. S. civilization. How you hit upon it so neatly and\nsingled it out so truly (and talked of it so tactfully!) God only knows:\nHe evidently created you to do such things! I never heard of the\nMacQueen case before, but I've known of plenty of others. When the\nordinary American hears of them, instead of the idealist within him\nbeginning to \"see red\" with the higher indignation, instead of the\nspirit of English history growing alive in his breast, he begins to\npooh-pooh and minimize and tone down the thing, and breed excuses from\nhis general fund of optimism and respect for expediency. \"It's probably\nright enough\"; \"Scoundrelly, as you say,\" but understandable, \"from the\npoint of view of parties interested\"--but understandable in onlooking\ncitizens only as a symptom of the moral flabbiness born of the exclusive\nworship of the bitch-goddess SUCCESS. That--with the squalid cash\ninterpretation put on the word success--is our national disease. Hit it\nhard! Your book _must_ have a great effect. Do you remember the glorious\nremarks about success in Chesterton's \"Heretics\"? You will undoubtedly\nhave written _the_ medicinal book about America. And what good humor!\nand what tact! Sincerely yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Theodora Sedgwick._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _Sept. 13, 1906_.\n\nDEAR THEODORA,--Here we are in this sweet delicate little place, after a\npretty agitated summer, and the quiet seems very nice. Likewise the\nstillness. I have thought often of you, and _almost_ written; but there\nnever seemed exactly to be time or place for it, so I let the sally of\nthe heart to-you-ward suffice. A week ago, I spent a night with H. L.\nHigginson, whom I found all alone at his house by the Lake, and he told\nme your improvement had been continuous and great, which I heartily hope\nhas really been the case. I don't see why it should not have been the\ncase, under such delightful conditions. What good things friends are!\nAnd what better thing than lend it, can one do with one's house? I was\nstruck by Henry Higginson's high level of mental tension, so to call it,\nwhich made him talk, incessantly and passionately about one subject\nafter another, never running dry, and reminding me more of myself when I\nwas twenty years old. It isn't so much a man's eminence of elementary\nfaculties that pulls him through. They may be rare, and he do nothing.\nIt is the steam pressure to the square inch behind that moves the\nmachine. The amount of that is what makes the great difference between\nus. Henry has it high. Previous to seeing him I had spent ten days in\nbeautiful Keene Valley, dividing them between the two ends. The St.\nHubert's end is, I verily believe, one of the most beautiful things in\nthis beautiful world--too dissimilar to anything in Europe to be\ncompared therewith, and consequently able to stand on its merits all\nalone. But the great [forest] fire of four years ago came to the very\nedge of wiping it out! And any year it may go.\n\nI also had a delightful week all alone on the Maine Coast, among the\nislands.\n\nBack here, one is oppressed by sadness at the amount of work waiting to\nbe done on the place and no one to be hired to do it. The entire meaning\nand essence of \"land\" is something to be worked over--even if it be only\na wood-lot, it must be kept trimmed and cleaned. And for one who _can_\nwork and who _likes_ work with his arms and hands, there is nothing so\ndelightful as a piece of land to work over--it responds to every hour\nyou give it, and smiles with the \"improvement\" year by year. I neither\ncan work now, nor do I like it, so an irremediable bad conscience\nafflicts my ownership of this place. With Cambridge as headquarters for\nAugust, and a little lot of land there, I think I could almost be ready\nto give up this place, and trust to the luck of hotels, and other\nopportunities of rustication without responsibility. But perhaps we can\nget this place [taken care of?] some day!\n\nI don't know how much you read. I've taken great pleasure this summer in\nBielshowski's \"Life of Goethe\" (a wonderful piece of art) and in\nBirukoff's \"Life of Tolstoy.\"\n\nAlice is very well and happy in the stillness here. Elly Hunter is\ncoming this evening, tomorrow the Merrimans for a day, and then Mrs.\nHodder till the end of the month.\n\nFaithful love from both of us, dear Theodora. Your affectionate\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Daughter._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan. 20, 1907_, 6.15 P.M.\n\nSWEET PEGLEIN,--Just before tea! and your Grandam, Mar, and I going to\nhear the Revd. Percy Grant in the College chapel just after. We are\ngetting to be great church-goers. 'T will have to be Crothers next. He,\nsweet man, is staying with the Brookses. After him, the Christian\nScience Church, and after that the deluge!\n\nI have spent all day preparing next Tuesday's lecture, which is my last\nbefore a class in Harvard University, so help me God amen! I am almost\n_afraid_ at so much freedom. Three quarters of an hour ago Aleck and I\nwent for a walk in Somerville; warm, young moon, bare trees, clearing in\nthe west, stars out, old-fashioned streets, not sordid--a beautiful\nwalk. Last night to Bernard Shaw's ex-_quis_-ite play of \"C\u00e6sar and\nCleopatra\"--exquisitely acted too, by F. Robertson and Maxine Elliot's\nsister Gert. Your Mar will have told you that, after these weeks of\npersistent labor, culminating in New York, I am going to take sanctuary\non Saturday the 2nd of Feb. in your arms at Bryn Mawr. I do not want,\nwish, or desire to \"talk\" to the crowd, but your mother pushing so, if\nyou and the philosophy club also pull, I mean pull _hard_, Jimmy[68]\nwill try to articulate something not too technical. But it will have to\nbe, if ever, on that Saturday night. It will also have to be very short;\nand the less of a \"reception,\" the better, after it.\n\nYour two last letters were tiptop. I never seen such _growth_!\n\nI go to N. Y., to be at the Harvard Club, on Monday the 28th. K\u00fchnemann\nleft yesterday. A most dear man. Your loving\n\nDAD.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James and William James, Jr._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb. 14, 1907_.\n\nDEAR BROTHER AND SON,--I dare say that you will be together in Paris\nwhen you get this, but I address it to Lamb House all the same. You\ntwain are more \"blessed\" than I, in the way of correspondence this\nwinter, for you give more than you receive, Bill's letters being as\nremarkable for wit and humor as Henry's are for copiousness, considering\nthat the market value of what he either writes or types is so many\nshillings a word. When _I_ write other things, I find it almost\nimpossible to write letters. I've been at it _stiddy_, however, for\nthree days, since my return from New York, finding, as I did, a great\nstack of correspondence to attend to. The first impression of New York,\nif you stay there not more than 36 hours, which has been my limit for\ntwenty years past, is one of repulsion at the clangor, disorder, and\npermanent earthquake conditions. But this time, installed as I was at\nthe Harvard Club (44th St.) in the centre of the cyclone, I caught the\npulse of the machine, took up the rhythm, and vibrated _mit_, and found\nit simply magnificent. I'm surprised at you, Henry, not having been more\nenthusiastic, but perhaps that superbly powerful and beautiful subway\nwas not opened when you were there. It is an _entirely_ new New York, in\nsoul as well as in body, from the old one, which looks like a village in\nretrospect. The courage, the heaven-scaling audacity of it all, and the\n_lightness_ withal, as if there was nothing that was not easy, and the\ngreat pulses and bounds of progress, so many in directions all\nsimultaneous that the co\u00f6rdination is indefinitely future, give a kind\nof _drumming background_ of life that I never felt before. I'm sure that\nonce _in_ that movement, and at home, all other places would seem\ninsipid. I observe that your book,--\"The American Scene,\"--dear H., is\njust out. I must get it and devour again the chapters relative to New\nYork. On my last night, I dined with Norman Hapgood, along with men who\nwere successfully and happily in the vibration. H. and his most\nwinning-faced young partner, Collier, Jerome, Peter Dunne, F. M. Colby,\nand Mark Twain. (The latter, poor man, is only good for monologue, in\nhis old age, or for dialogue at best, but he's a dear little genius all\nthe same.) I got such an impression of easy efficiency in the midst of\ntheir bewildering conditions of speed and complexity of adjustment.\nJerome, particularly, with the world's eyes on his court-room, in the\nvery crux of the Thaw trial, as if he had nothing serious to do. Balzac\nought to come to life again. His Rastignac imagination sketched the\npossibility of it long ago. I lunched, dined, and sometimes breakfasted,\nout, every day of my stay, vibrated between 44th St., seldom going\nlower, and 149th, with Columbia University at 116th as my chief relay\nstation, the magnificent space-devouring Subway roaring me back and\nforth, lecturing to a thousand daily,[69] and having four separate\ndinners at the Columbia Faculty Club, where colleagues severally\ncompassed me about, many of them being old students of mine, wagged\ntheir tongues at me and made me explain.[70] It was certainly the high\ntide of my existence, so far as _energizing_ and being \"recognized\" were\nconcerned, but I took it all very \"easy\" and am hardly a bit tired.\nTotal abstinence from every stimulant whatever is the one condition of\nliving at a rapid pace. I am now going whack at the writing of the rest\nof the lectures, which will be more original and (I believe) important\nthan my previous works....\n\n\n\n\n_To Moorfield Storey._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb._ 21, 1907.\n\nDEAR MOORFIELD,--Your letter of three weeks ago has inadvertently lain\nunnoticed--not because it didn't do me good, but because I went to New\nYork for a fortnight, and since coming home have been too druv to pay\nany tributes to friendship. I haven't got many letters either of\ncondolence or congratulation on my retirement,--which, by the way,\ndoesn't take place till the end of the year,--the papers have railroaded\nme out too soon.[71] But I confess that the thought is sweet to me of\nbeing able to hear the College bell ring without any tendency to \"move\"\nin consequence, and of seeing the last Thursday in September go by, and\nremaining in the country careless of what becomes of its youth. It's the\n_harness_ and the _hours_ that are so galling! I expect to shed truths\nin dazzling profusion on the world for many years.\n\nAs for you, retire too! Let you, Eliot, Roosevelt and me, first relax;\nthen take to landscape painting, which has a very soothing effect; then\nwrite out all the truths which a long life of intimacy with mankind has\nrecommended to each of us as most useful. I think we can use the ebb\ntide of our energies best in that way. I'm sure that _your_\ncontributions would be the most useful of all. Affectionately yours,\n\nWM. JAMES.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nCambridge, _Mar._ 26, 1907.\n\nDEAR FLOURNOY,--Your dilectissime letter of the 16th arrived this\nmorning and I must scribble a word of reply. That's the way to write to\na man! Caress him! flatter him! tell him that all Switzerland is hanging\non his lips! You have made me really _happy_ for at least twenty-four\nhours! My dry and businesslike compatriots never write letters like\nthat. They write about themselves--you write about _me_. You know the\ndefinition of an egotist: \"a person who insists on talking about\n_himself_, when you want to talk about _yourself_.\" Reverdin has told me\nof the success of your lectures on pragmatism, and if you have been\ncommuning in spirit with me this winter, so have I with you. I have\ngrown more and more deeply into pragmatism, and I rejoice immensely to\nhear you say, \"je m'y sens tout gagn\u00e9.\" It is absolutely the only\nphilosophy with _no_ humbug in it, and I am certain that it is _your_\nphilosophy. Have you read Papini's article in the February \"Leonardo\"?\nThat seems to me really splendid. You say that my ideas have formed the\nreal _centre de ralliment_ of the pragmatist tendencies. To me it is the\nyouthful and _empanach\u00e9_ Papini who has best put himself at the centre\nof equilibrium whence all the motor tendencies start. He (and Schiller)\nhas given me great confidence and courage. I shall dedicate my book,\nhowever, to the memory of J. S. Mill.\n\nI hope that you are careful to distinguish in my own work between the\npragmatism and the \"radical empiricism\" (Conception de Conscience,[72]\netc.) which to my own mind have no necessary connexion with each other.\nMy first proofs came in this morning, along with your letter, and the\nlittle book ought to be out by the first of June. You shall have a very\nearly copy. It is exceedingly untechnical, and I can't help suspecting\nthat it will make a real impression. M\u00fcnsterberg, who hitherto has been\nrather pooh-poohing my thought, now, after reading the lecture on truth\nwhich I sent you a while ago, says I seem to be ignorant that Kant ever\nwrote, Kant having already said all that I say. I regard this as a very\ngood symptom. The third stage of opinion about a new idea, already\narrived: _1st_: absurd! _2nd_: trivial! _3rd_: _we_ discovered it! I\ndon't suppose you mean to print these lectures of yours, but I wish you\nwould. If you would translate my lectures, what could make me happier?\nBut, as I said apropos of the \"Varieties,\" I hate to think of you doing\nthat drudgery when you might be formulating your own ideas. But, in one\nway or the other, I hope you will join in the great strategic\ncombination against the forces of rationalism and bad abstractionism! A\ngood _coup de collier_ all round, and I verily believe that a new\nphilosophic movement will begin....\n\nI thank you for your congratulations on my retirement. It makes me very\nhappy. A professor has two functions: (1) to be learned and distribute\nbibliographical information; (2) to communicate truth. The _1st_\nfunction is the essential one, officially considered. The _2nd_ is the\nonly one I care for. Hitherto I have always felt like a humbug as a\nprofessor, for I am weak in the first requirement. Now I can live for\nthe second with a free conscience. I envy you now at the Italian Lakes!\nBut good-bye! I have already written you a long letter, though I only\n_meant_ to write a line! Love to you all from\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Charles A. Strong._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr._ 9, 1907.\n\nDEAR STRONG,--Your tightly woven little letter reached me this A.M.,\njust as I was about writing to you to find out how you are. Your long\nsilence had made me apprehensive about your condition, and this news\ncheers me up very much. Rome is great; and I like to think of you there;\nif I spend another winter in Europe, it shall be mainly in Rome. You\ndon't say where you're staying, however, so my imagination is at fault,\nI hope it may be at the _Russie_, that most delightful of hotels. I am\noverwhelmed with duties, so I must be very brief _in re religionis_.\nYour warnings against my superstitious tendencies, for such I suppose\nthey are,--this is the second heavy one I remember,--touch me, but not\nin the prophetic way, for they don't weaken my trust in the healthiness\nof my own attitude, which in part (I fancy) is less remote from your own\nthan you suppose. For instance, my \"God of things as they are,\" being\npart of a pluralistic system, is responsible for only such of them as he\nknows enough and has enough power to have accomplished. For the rest he\nis identical with your \"ideal\" God. The \"omniscient\" and \"omnipotent\"\nGod of theology I regard as a disease of the philosophy-shop. But,\nhaving thrown away so much of the philosophy-shop, you may ask me why I\ndon't throw away the whole? That would mean too strong a negative\nwill-to-believe for me. It would mean a dogmatic disbelief in any extant\nconsciousness higher than that of the \"normal\" human mind; and this in\nthe teeth of the extraordinary vivacity of man's psychological commerce\nwith something ideal that _feels as if it_ were also actual (I have no\nsuch commerce--I wish I had, but I can't close my eyes to its vitality\nin others); and in the teeth of such analogies as Fechner uses to show\nthat there may be other-consciousness than man's. If other, then why not\nhigher and bigger? Why _may_ we not be in the universe as our dogs and\ncats are in our drawing-rooms and libraries? It's a will-to-believe on\nboth sides: I am perfectly willing that others should disbelieve: why\nshould you not be tolerantly interested in the spectacle of my belief?\nWhat harm does the little residuum or germ of actuality that I leave in\nGod do? If ideal, why (except on epiphenomenist principles) may he not\nhave got himself at least partly real by this time? I do not believe it\nto be healthy-minded to nurse the notion that ideals are self-sufficient\nand require no actualization to make us content. It is a quite\nunnecessarily heroic form of resignation and sour grapes. Ideals ought\nto aim at the _transformation of reality_--no less! When you defer to\nwhat you suppose a certain authority in scientists as confirming these\nnegations, I am surprised. Of all insufficient authorities as to the\ntotal nature of reality, give me the \"scientists,\" from M\u00fcnsterberg up,\nor down. Their interests are most incomplete and their professional\nconceit and bigotry immense. I know no narrower sect or club, in spite\nof their excellent authority in the lines of fact they have explored,\nand their splendid achievement there. Their only authority _at large_ is\nfor _method_--and the pragmatic method completes and enlarges them\nthere. When you shall have read my whole set of lectures (now with the\nprinter, to be out by June 1st) I doubt whether you will find any great\nharm in the God I patronize--the poor thing is so largely an ideal\npossibility. Meanwhile I take delight, or _shall_ take delight, in any\nefforts you may make to negate all superhuman consciousness, for only by\nthese counter-attempts can a finally satisfactory modus vivendi be\nreached. I don't feel sure that I know just what you mean by\n\"freedom,\"--but no matter. Have you read in Schiller's new Studies in\nHumanism what seem to me two excellent chapters, one on \"Freedom,\" and\nthe other on the \"making of reality\"?...\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr._ 19, 1907.\n\nDEAR SCHILLER,--Two letters and a card from you within ten days is\npretty good. I have been in New York for a week, so haven't written as\npromptly as I should have done.\n\nAll right for the Gilbert Murrays! We shall be glad to see them.\n\nToo late for \"humanism\" in my book--all in type! I dislike \"pragmatism,\"\nbut it seems to have the _international_ right of way at present. Let's\nboth go ahead--God will know his own!\n\nWhen your book first came I lent it to my student Kallen (who was\nwriting a thesis on the subject), thereby losing it for three weeks.\nThen the grippe, and my own proofs followed, along with much other\nbusiness, so that I've only read about a quarter of it even now. The\nessays on Freedom and the Making of Reality seem to be written with my\nown heart's blood--it's startling that two people should be found to\nthink so exactly alike. A great argument for the truth of what they say,\ntoo! I find that my own chapter on Truth printed in the J. of P.\nalready,[73] convinces no one as yet, not even my most _gleichgesinnten_\ncronies. It will have to be worked in by much future labor, for I _know_\nthat I see all round the subject and they don't, and I think that the\ntheory of truth is the key to all the rest of our positions.\n\nYou ask what I am going to \"reply\" to Bradley. But why need one reply to\neverything and everybody? B.'s article is constructive rather than\npolemic, is evidently sincere, softens much of his old outline, is\ndifficult to read, and ought, I should think, to be left to its own\ndestiny. How sweetly, by the way, he feels towards me as compared with\nyou! All because you have been too bumptious. I confess I think that\nyour _gaudium certaminis_ injures your influence. _We_'ve got a thing\nbig enough to set forth now affirmatively, and I think that readers\ngenerally hate _minute_ polemics and recriminations. All polemic of ours\nshould, I believe, be either very broad statements of contrast, or fine\npoints treated singly, and as far as possible impersonally. Inborn\nrationalists and inborn pragmatists will never convert each other. We\nshall always look on them as spectral and they on us as\ntrashy--irredeemably both! As far as the rising generation goes, why not\nsimply express ourselves positively, and trust that the truer view\nquietly will displace the other. Here again \"God will know his own.\"\nFalse views don't need much direct refutation--they get superseded, and\nI feel absolutely certain of the supersessive power of pragmato-humanism,\nif persuasively enough set forth.... The world is wide enough to harbor\nvarious ways of thinking, and the present Bradley's units of mental\noperation are so diverse from ours that the labor of reckoning over from\none set of terms to the other doesn't bring reward enough to pay for it.\nOf course his way of treating \"truth\" as an entity trying all the while\nto identify herself with reality, while reality is equally trying to\nidentify herself with the more ideal entity truth, isn't _false_. It's\none way, very remote and allegorical, of stating the facts, and it\n\"agrees\" with a good deal of reality, but it has so little pragmatic\nvalue that its tottering form can be left for time to deal with. The\ngood it does him is small, for it leaves him in this queer, surly,\ngrumbling state about the best that can be done by it for philosophy.\nHis great vice seems to me his perversity in logical activities, his bad\nreasonings. I vote to go on, from now on, not trying to keep account of\nthe relations of his with our system. He can't be influencing disciples,\nbeing himself nowadays so difficult. And once for all, there _will_ be\nminds who _cannot_ _help_ regarding our growing universe as _sheer\ntrash_, metaphysically considered. Yours ever,\n\nW. J.\n\nThe next letter is addressed to an active promoter of reform in the\ntreatment of the insane, the author of \"A Mind that Found Itself.\" The\nConnecticut Society for Mental Hygiene and the National Committee for\nMental Hygiene have already performed so great a public service, that\nanyone may now see that in 1907 the time had come to employ such\ninstrumentalities in improving the care of the insane. But when Mr.\nBeers, just out of an asylum himself, appeared with the manuscript of\nhis own story in his hands, it was not so clear that these agencies were\nneeded, nor yet evident to anyone that he was a person who could bring\nabout their organization.\n\nJames's own opinion as to the treatment of the insane is not in the\nleast overstated in the following letter. He recognized the genuineness\nof Mr. Beers's personal experience and its value for propaganda, and he\nimmediately helped to get it published. From his first acquaintance with\nMr. Beers, he gave time, counsel, and money to further the organization\nof the Mental Hygiene Committee; and he even departed, in its interest,\nfrom his fixed policy of \"keeping out of Committees and Societies.\" He\nlived long enough to know that the movement had begun to gather\nmomentum; and he drew great satisfaction from the knowledge.\n\n\n\n\n_To Clifford W. Beers._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 21, 1907_.\n\nDEAR MR. BEERS,--You ask for my opinion as to the advisability and\nfeasibility of a National Society, such as you propose, for the\nimprovement of conditions among the insane.\n\nI have never ceased to believe that such improvement is one of the most\n\"crying\" needs of civilization; and the functions of such a Society seem\nto me to be well drawn up by you. Your plea for its being founded\nbefore your book appears is well grounded, you being an author who\nnaturally would like to cast seed upon a ground already prepared for it\nto germinate practically without delay.\n\nI have to confess to being myself a very impractical man, with no\nexperience whatever in the details, difficulties, etc., of philanthropic\nor charity organization, so my opinion as to the _feasibility_ of your\nplan is worth nothing, and is undecided. Of course the first\nconsideration is to get your money, the second, your Secretary and\nTrustees. All that _I_ wish to bear witness to is the great need of a\nNational Society such as you describe, or failing that, of a State\nSociety somewhere that might serve as a model in other States.\n\nNowhere is there massed together as much suffering as in the asylums.\nNowhere is there so much sodden routine, and fatalistic insensibility in\nthose who have to treat it. Nowhere is an ideal treatment more costly.\nThe officials in charge grow resigned to the conditions under which they\nhave to labor. They cannot plead their cause as an auxiliary\norganization can plead it for them. Public opinion is too glad to remain\nignorant. As mediator between officials, patients, and the public\nconscience, a society such as you sketch is absolutely required, and the\nsooner it gets under way the better.[74] Sincerely yours,\n\nWILLIAM JAMES.\n\nAt the date of the next letter William James, Jr., was studying painting\nin Paris.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Son William._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 24, 1907_.\n\nDEAREST BILL,--I haven't written to you for ages, yet you keep showering\nthe most masterly and charming epistles upon all of us in turn,\nincluding the fair Rosamund.[75] Be sure they are appreciated! Your Ma\nand I dined last night at Ellen and Loulie Hooper's to meet Rosalind\nHuidekoper and her swain. Loulie had heard from Bancel [La Farge] of\nyour getting a \"mention\"--if for the model, I'm not surprised; if for\nthe composition, I'm immensely pleased. Of course you'll tell us of it!\nWe've had a very raw cold April, and today it's blowing great guns from\nall quarters of the sky, preparatory to clearing from the N.W., I think.\nWe are rooting up the entire lawn to a depth of 18 inches to try to\nregenerate it. Four diggers and two carts have been at it for a week,\nwith your mother, bareheaded and cloaked, and ruddy-cheeked, sticking to\nthem like a burr. She doesn't handle pick or shovel, but she stands\nthere all day long in a way it would do your heart good to see; and so\ndemocratic and hearty withal that I'm sure they like it, though working\nunder such a great taskmaster's eye deprives them of those intervals of\nstolen leisure so dear to \"workers\" of every description. She makes it\nup to them by inviting them to an afternoon tea daily, with piles of\ncake and doughnuts. I fancy they like her well.\n\nWe've let Chocorua to the Goldmarks. Aleck took his April recess along\nwith his schoolmate Henderson and Gerald Thayer, partly on the summit,\npartly around the base, of Monadnock. The weather was fiercely wintry,\nand your mother and I said \"poor blind little Aleck--he's got to learn\nthru experience.\" [She said \"through\"!] He came back happier and more\nexultant than I've ever seen him, and six months older morally and\nintellectually for the week with Gerald and Abbott Thayer. A great step\nforward. They burglarized the Thayer house, and were tracked and\narrested by the posse, and had a paragraph in the Boston \"Globe\" about\nthe robbery. As the thing involved an ascent of Monadnock after dark,\nwith their packs, in deep snow, a day and a night there in snowstorm, a\n16-mile walk and out of bed till 2 A.M.. the night of the burglary, a\n\"lying low\" indoors all the next day at the Hendersons' empty house,\nthree in a bed and the police waking them at dawn, I ventured to suggest\na doubt as to whether the Thayer household were the greatest victims of\nthe illustrious practical joke. \"What,\" cries Aleck, starting to his\nfeet, \"nine men with revolvers and guns around your bed, and a revolver\npointed close to your ear as you wake--don't you call that a success, I\nshould like to know?\" The Tom Sawyer phase of evolution is immortal!\nGerald, who is staying with us now, is really a splendid fellow. I'm so\nglad he's taken to Aleck, who now is aflame with plans for being an\nartist. I wish he might--it would certainly suit his temperament better\nthan \"business.\"\n\nThere 's the lunch bell.\n\nI have got my \"Pragmatism\" proofs all corrected. The most important\nthing I've written yet, and bound, I am sure, to stir up a lot of\nattention. But I'm dog-tired; and, in order to escape the social\nengagements that at this time of year grow more frequent than ever, I'm\ngoing off on Friday (this is Wednesday) to the country somewhere for ten\ndays. If only there might be warm weather! We've just backed out from a\ndinner to William Leonard Darwin and his wife, and the Geo. Hodgeses,\netc. W. T. Stead spent three hours here on Sunday and lectured in the\nUnion on Monday--a splendid fellow whom I could get along with after a\nfashion. Let no one run him down to you. I've been to New York to the\nPeace Congress. Interesting but tiresome.\n\nMary Salter is with us. Margaret and Rosamund just arrived at 107. No\nnews else! Yours,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nSALISBURY, CONN., _May 4, 1907_.\n\nDEAREST H.-- ...I've been so overwhelmed with work, and the mountain of\nthe _Unread_ has piled up so, that only in these days here have I really\nbeen able to settle down to your \"American Scene,\" which in its peculiar\nway seems to me _supremely great_. You know how opposed your whole\n\"third manner\" of execution is to the literary ideals which animate my\ncrude and Orson-like breast, mine being to say a thing in one sentence\nas straight and explicit as it can be made, and then to drop it forever;\nyours being to avoid naming it straight, but by dint of breathing and\nsighing all round and round it, to arouse in the reader who may have had\na similar perception already (Heaven help him if he hasn't!) the\nillusion of a solid object, made (like the \"ghost\" at the Polytechnic)\nwholly out of impalpable materials, air, and the prismatic interferences\nof light, ingeniously focused by mirrors upon empty space. But you _do_\nit, that's the queerness! And the complication of innuendo and\nassociative reference on the enormous scale to which you give way to it\ndoes so _build out_ the matter for the reader that the result is to\nsolidify, by the mere bulk of the process, the like perception from\nwhich _he_ has to start. As air, by dint of its volume, will weigh like\na corporeal body; so his own poor little initial perception, swathed in\nthis gigantic envelopment of suggestive atmosphere, grows like a germ\ninto something vastly bigger and more substantial. But it's the rummest\nmethod for one to employ systematically as you do nowadays; and you\nemploy it at your peril. In this crowded and hurried reading age, pages\nthat require such close attention remain unread and neglected. You can't\nskip a word if you are to get the effect, and 19 out of 20 worthy\nreaders grow intolerant. The method seems perverse: \"Say it _out_, for\nGod's sake,\" they cry, \"and have done with it.\" And so I say now, give\nus _one_ thing in your older directer manner, just to show that, in\nspite of your paradoxical success in this unheard-of method, you _can_\nstill write according to accepted canons. Give us that interlude; and\nthen continue like the \"curiosity of literature\" which you have become.\nFor gleams and innuendoes and felicitous verbal insinuations you are\nunapproachable, but the _core_ of literature is solid. Give it to us\n_once_ again! The bare perfume of things will not support existence, and\nthe effect of solidity you reach is but perfume and simulacrum.\n\nFor God's sake don't _answer_ these remarks, which (as Uncle Howard used\nto say of Father's writings) are but the peristaltic belchings of my own\ncrabbed organism. For one thing, your account of America is largely one\nof its omissions, silences, vacancies. You work them up like solids, for\nthose readers who already germinally perceive them (to others you are\n_totally_ incomprehensible). I said to myself over and over in reading:\n\"How much greater the triumph, if instead of dwelling thus only upon\nAmerica's vacuities, he could make positive suggestion of what in\n'Europe' or Asia may exist to fill them.\" That would be nutritious to so\nmany American readers whose souls are only too ready to leap to\nsuggestion, but who are now too inexperienced to know what is meant by\nthe contrast-effect from which alone your book is written. If you could\nsupply the background which is the foil, in terms more full and\npositive! At present it is supplied only by the abstract geographic term\n\"Europe.\" But of course anything of that kind is excessively difficult;\nand you will probably say that you _are_ supplying it all along by your\nnovels. Well, the verve and animal spirits with which you can keep your\nmethod going, first on one place then on another, through all those\ntightly printed pages is something marvelous; and there are pages surely\ndoomed to be immortal, those on the \"drummers,\" _e.g._, at the beginning\nof \"Florida.\" They are in the best sense Rabelaisian.\n\nBut a truce, a truce! I had no idea, when I sat down, of pouring such a\nbath of my own subjectivity over you. Forgive! forgive! and don't reply,\ndon't at any rate in the sense of defending yourself, but only in that\nof attacking _me_, if you feel so minded. I have just finished the\nproofs of a little book called \"Pragmatism\" which even you _may_ enjoy\nreading. It is a very \"sincere\" and, from the point of view of ordinary\nphilosophy-professorial manners, a very unconventional utterance, not\nparticularly original at any one point, yet, in the midst of the\nliterature of the way of thinking which it represents, with just that\namount of squeak or shrillness in the voice that enables one book to\n_tell_, when others don't, to supersede its brethren, and be treated\nlater as \"representative.\" I shouldn't be surprised if ten years hence\nit should be rated as \"epoch-making,\" for of the definitive triumph of\nthat general way of thinking I can entertain no doubt whatever--I\nbelieve it to be something quite like the protestant reformation.\n\nYou can't tell how happy I am at having thrown off the nightmare of my\n\"professorship.\" As a \"professor\" I always felt myself a sham, with its\nchief duties of being a walking encyclopedia of erudition. I am now at\nliberty to be a _reality_, and the comfort is unspeakable--literally\nunspeakable, to be my own man, after 35 years of being owned by others.\nI can now live for truth pure and simple, instead of for truth\naccommodated to the most unheard-of requirements set by others.... Your\naffectionate\n\nW. J.\n\nThis letter appears never to have been answered, although Henry James\nwrote on May 31, 1907: \"You shall have, after a little more patience, a\nreply to your so rich and luminous reflections on my book--a reply\nalmost as interesting as, and far more illuminating than, your letter\nitself.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\nCambridge, _May 18, 1907_.\n\n...One word about the said proof [of your article]. It convinces me that\nyou ought to be an academic personage, a \"professor.\" For thirty-five\nyears I have been suffering from the exigencies of being one, the\npretension and the duty, namely, of meeting the mental needs and\ndifficulties of other persons, needs that I couldn't possibly imagine\nand difficulties that I couldn't possibly understand; and now that I\nhave shuffled off the professorial coil, the sense of freedom that comes\nto me is as surprising as it is exquisite. I wake up every morning with\nit. What! not to have to accommodate myself to this mass of alien and\nrecalcitrant humanity, not to think under resistance, not to have to\nsquare myself with others at every step I make--hurrah! it is too good\nto be true. To be alone with truth and God! _Es ist nicht zu glauben!_\nWhat a future! What a vision of ease! But here you are loving it and\ncourting it unnecessarily. You're fit to continue a professor in all\nyour successive reincarnations, with never a release. It was so easy to\nlet Bradley with his approximations and grumblings alone. So few people\nwould find these last statements of his seductive enough to build them\ninto their own thought. But you, for the pure pleasure of the operation,\nchase him up and down his windings, flog him into and out of his\ncorners, stop him and cross-reference him and counter on him, as if\nrequired to do so by your office. It makes very difficult reading, it\nobliges one to re-read Bradley, and I don't believe there are three\npersons living who will take it in with the pains required to estimate\nits value. B. himself will very likely not read it with any care. It is\nsubtle and clear, like everything you write, but it is too minute. And\nwhere a few broad comments would have sufficed, it is too complex, and\ntoo much like a criminal conviction in tone and temper. Leave him in his\n_dunklem Drange_--he is drifting in the right direction evidently, and\nwhen a certain amount of positive construction on our side has been\nadded, he will say that that was what he had meant all along--and the\nworld will be the better for containing so much difficult polemic\nreading the less.\n\nI admit that your remarks are penetrating, and let air into the joints\nof the subject; but I respectfully submit that they are not _called for_\nin the interests of the final triumph of truth. That will come by the\nway of displacement of error, quite effortlessly. I can't help\nsuspecting that you unduly magnify the influence of Bradleyan Absolutism\non the undergraduate mind. Taylor is the only fruit so far--at least\nwithin my purview. One practical point: I don't quite like your first\nparagraph, and wonder if it be too late to have the references to me at\nleast expunged. I can't recognize the truth of the ten-years' change of\nopinion about my \"Will to Believe.\" I don't find anyone--not even my\ndearest friends, as Miller and Strong--one whit persuaded. Taylor's and\nHobhouse's attacks are of recent date, etc. Moreover, the reference to\nBradley's relation to me in this article is too ironical not to seem a\nlittle \"nasty\" to some readers; therefore out with it, if it be not too\nlate.\n\nSee how different our methods are! All that Humanism needs now is to\nmake applications of itself to special problems. Get a school of\nyoungsters at work. Refutations of error should be left to the\nrationalists alone. They are a stock function of that school....\n\nI'm fearfully _tired_, but expect the summer to get me right again.\nAffectionately thine,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\nXVI\n\n1907-1909\n\n_The Last Period (III)--Hibbert Lectures in Oxford--The Hodgson Report_\n\n\nThe story of the remaining years is written so fully in the letters\nthemselves as to require little explanation.\n\nAngina pectoris and such minor ailments as are only too likely to\nafflict a man of sixty-five years and impaired constitution interrupted\nthe progress of reading and writing more and more. Physical exertion,\nparticularly that involved in talking long to many people, now brought\non pain and difficulty in breathing. But James still carried himself\nerect, still walked with a light step, and until a few weeks before his\ndeath wore the appearance of a much younger and stronger man than he\nreally was. None but those near to him realized how often he was in\ndiscomfort or pain, or how constantly he was using himself to the limit\nof his endurance. He bore his ills without complaint and ordinarily\nwithout mention; although he finally made up his mind to try to\ndiscourage the appeals and requests of all sorts that still harassed\nhim, by proclaiming the fact that he was an invalid. As his power of\nwork became more and more reduced, frustrations became harder to bear,\nand the sense that they were unavoidable oppressed him. When an\ninvitation to deliver a course of lectures on the Hibbert Foundation at\nManchester College, Oxford, arrived, he was torn between an impulse to\nclutch at this engagement as a means of hastening the writing-out of\ncertain material that was in his mind, and the fear, only too\nreasonable, that the obligation to have the lectures ready by a certain\ndate would strain him to the snapping point. After some hesitation he\nagreed, however, and the lectures were, ultimately, prepared and\ndelivered successfully.\n\nIn proportion as the number of hours a day that he could spend on\nliterary work and professional reading decreased, James's general\nreading increased again. He began for the first time to browse in\nmilitary biographies, and commenced to collect material for a study\nwhich he sometimes spoke of as a \"Psychology of Jingoism,\" sometimes as\na \"Varieties of Military Experience.\" What such a work would have been,\nhad he ever completed it, it is impossible to tell. It was never more\nthan a rather vague project, turned to occasionally as a diversion. But\nit is safe to reckon that two remarkable papers--the \"Energies of Men\"\n(written in 1906) and the \"Moral Equivalent of War\" (written in\n1909)--would have appeared to be related to this study. That it would\nnot have been a utopian flight in the direction of pacifism need hardly\nbe said. However he might have described it, James was not disposed to\nunderestimate the \"fighting instinct.\" He saw it as a persistent and\nhighly irritable force, underlying the society of all the dominant\nraces; and he advocated international courts, reduction of armaments,\nand any other measures that might prevent appeals to the war-waging\npassion as commendable devices for getting along without arousing it.\n\n\"The fatalistic view of the war-function is to me nonsense, for I know\nthat war-making is due to definite motives and subject to prudential\nchecks and reasonable criticisms, just like any other form of\nenterprise.... All these beliefs of mine put me squarely into the\nanti-militarist party. But I do not believe that peace either ought to\nbe or will be permanent on this globe, unless the states pacifically\norganized preserve some of the old elements of army-discipline.... In\nthe more or less socialistic future towards which mankind seems\ndrifting, we must still subject ourselves collectively to those\nseverities which answer to our real position upon this only partly\nhospitable globe. We must make new energies and hardihoods continue the\nmanliness to which the military mind so faithfully clings. Martial\nvirtues must be the enduring cement; intrepidity, contempt of softness,\nsurrender of private interest, obedience to command, must still remain\nthe rock upon which states are built--unless, indeed, we wish for\ndangerous reactions against commonwealths fit only for contempt, and\nliable to invite attack whenever a centre of crystallization for\nmilitary-minded enterprise gets formed anywhere in their\nneighborhood.\"[76]\n\nAny utterances about war, arbitration, and disarmament, are now likely\nto have their original meaning distorted by reason of what may justly be\ncalled the present fevered state of public opinion on such questions. It\nshould be clear that the foregoing sentences were not directed to any\nparticular question of domestic or foreign policy. They were part of a\nbroad picture of the fighting instinct, and led up to a suggestion for\ndiverting it into non-destructive channels. As to particular instances,\ncircumstances were always to be reckoned with. James believed in\norganizing and strengthening the machinery of arbitration, but did not\nthink that the day for universal arbitration had yet come. He saw a\ndanger in military establishments, went so far--in the presence of the\n\"jingoism\" aroused by Cleveland's Venezuela message--as to urge\nopposition to any increase of the American army and navy, encouraged\npeace-societies, and was willing to challenge attention by calling\nhimself a pacifist.[77] \"The first thing to learn in intercourse with\nothers is non-interference with their own peculiar ways of being happy,\nprovided those ways do not presume to interfere by violence with\nours.\"[78] Tolerance--social, religious, and political--was fundamental\nin his scheme of belief; but he took pains to make a proviso, and drew\nthe line at tolerating interference or oppression. Where he recognized a\nmilitary danger, there he would have had matters so governed as to meet\nit, not evade it. Writing of the British garrison in Halifax in 1897, he\nsaid: \"By Jove, if England should ever be licked by a Continental army,\nit would only be Divine justice upon her for keeping up the Tommy Atkins\nrecruiting system when the others have compulsory service.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nIn the case of one undertaking, which was much too troublesome to be\nreckoned as a diversion, he let himself be drawn away from his\nmetaphysical work. He had taken no active part in the work of the\nSociety for Psychical Research since 1896. In December, 1905, Richard\nHodgson, the secretary of the American Branch, had died suddenly, and\nalmost immediately thereafter Mrs. Piper, the medium whose trances\nHodgson had spent years in studying, had purported to give\ncommunications from Hodgson's departed spirit. In 1909 James made a\nreport to the S. P. R. on \"Mrs. Piper's Hodgson control.\" The full\nreport will be found in its Proceedings for 19O9,[79] and the concluding\npages, in which James stated, more analytically than elsewhere, the\nhypotheses which the phenomena suggested to him, have been reprinted in\nthe volume of \"Collected Essays and Reviews.\" At the same time he wrote\nout a more popular statement, in a paper which will be found in\n\"Memories and Studies.\" As to his final opinion of the spirit-theory,\nthe following letter, given somewhat out of its chronological place,\nstates what was still James's opinion in 1910.\n\n\n\n\n_To Charles Lewis Slattery._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 21, 1907_.\n\nDEAR MR. SLATTERY,--My state of mind is this: Mrs. Piper has supernormal\nknowledge in her trances; but whether it comes from \"tapping the minds\"\nof living people, or from some common cosmic reservoir of memories, or\nfrom surviving \"spirits\" of the departed, is a question impossible for\n_me_ to answer just now to my own satisfaction. The spirit-theory is\nundoubtedly not only the most natural, but the simplest, and I have\ngreat respect for Hodgson's and Hyslop's arguments when they adopt it.\nAt the same time the electric current called _belief_ has not yet closed\nin my mind.\n\nWhatever the explanation be, trance-mediumship is an excessively complex\nphenomenon, in which many concurrent factors are engaged. That is why\ninterpretation is so hard.\n\nMake any use, public or private, that you like of this.\n\nIn great haste, yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\nThe next letter should be understood as referring to the abandonment of\nan excursion to Lake Champlain with Henry L. Higginson. The celebration\nalluded to in the last part of the letter had been arranged by the\nCambridge Historical Society in honor of the hundredth anniversary of\nthe birth of Louis Agassiz.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry L. Higginson._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, N. H., _circa, June 1, 1907_.\n\nDEAR HENRY,--On getting your resignation by telephone, I came straight\nup here instead, without having time to write you my acceptance as I\nmeant to; and now comes your note of the fourth, before I have done so.\n\nI am exceedingly sorry, my dear old boy, that it is the doctor's advice\nthat has made you fear to go. I hope the liability to relapse will soon\nfade out and leave you free again; for say what they will of _Alters\nSchw\u00e4che_ and resignation to decay, and _entbehren sollst du, sollst\nentbehren_, it means only sour grapes, and the insides of one always\nwant to be doing the free and active things. However, a river can still\nbe lively in a shrunken bed, and we must not pay too much attention to\nthe difference of level. If you should summon me again this summer, I\ncan probably respond. I shall be here for a fortnight, then back to\nCambridge again for a short time.\n\nI thought the Agassiz celebration went off very nicely indeed, didn't\nyou?--John Gray's part in it being of course the best. X---- was heavy,\nbut respectable, and the heavy respectable _ought_ to be one ingredient\nin anything of the kind. But how well Shaler would have done that part\nof the job had he been there! Love to both of you!\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To W. Cameron Forbes._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _June 11, 1907_.\n\nDEAR CAMERON FORBES,--Your letter from Baguio of the 18th of April\ntouches me by its genuine friendliness, and is a tremendous temptation.\nWhy am I not ten years younger? Even now I hesitate to say no, and the\nonly reason why I don't say yes, with a roar, is that certain rather\nserious drawbacks in the way of health of late seem to make me unfit for\nthe various activities which such a visit ought to carry in its train. I\nam afraid my program from now onwards ought to be sedentary. I ought to\nbe getting out a book next winter. Last winter I could hardly do any\nwalking, owing to a trouble with my heart.\n\nDoes your invitation mean to include my wife? And have you a good\ncrematory so that she might bring home my ashes in case of need?\n\nI think if you had me on the spot you would find me a less impractical\nkind of an anti-imperialist than you have supposed me to be. I think\nthat the manner in which the McKinley administration railroaded the\ncountry into its policy of conquest was abominable, and the way the\ncountry pucked up its ancient soul at the first touch of temptation, and\nfollowed, was sickening. But with the establishment of the civil\ncommission McKinley did what he could to redeem things and now what the\nIslands want is CONTINUITY OF ADMINISTRATION to form new habits that may\nto some degree be hoped to last when we, as controllers, are gone. WHEN?\nthat is the question. And much difference of opinion may be fair as to\nthe answer. That we can't stay forever seems to follow from the fact\nthat the educated Philippinos differ from all previous colonials in\nhaving been inoculated before our occupation with the ideas of the\nFrench Revolution; and that is a virus to which history shows as yet no\nanti-toxine. As I am at present influenced, I think that the U. S. ought\nto solemnly proclaim a date for our going (or at least for a plebiscitum\nas to whether we should go) and stand by all the risks. _Some_ date,\nrather than indefinitely drift. And shape the whole interval towards\nsecuring things in view of the change. As to this, I may be wrong, and\nam always willing to be convinced. I wish I could go, and see you all\nat work. Heaven knows I admire the spirit with which you are animated--a\nnew thing in colonial work.\n\nIt must have been a great pleasure to you to see so many of the family\nat once. I have seen none of them since their return, but hope to do so\nere the summer speeds. The only dark spot was poor F----'s death.\n\nBelieve me, with affectionate regards, yours truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\nI am ordering a little book of mine, just out, to be sent to you. Some\none of your circle may find entertainment in it.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nCHOCORUA, _June_ 13, 1907.\n\nYours of the 27th ult. received and highly appreciated. I'm glad you\nrelish my book so well. You go on playing the Boreas and I shedding the\nsunbeams, and between us we'll get the cloak off the philosophic\ntraveler! But _have_ you read Bergson's new book?[80]It seems to me that\nnothing is important in comparison with that divine apparition. All\n_our_ positions, real time, a growing world, asserted magisterially, and\nthe beast intellectualism killed absolutely _dead_! The whole flowed\nround by a style incomparable as it seems to me. Read it, and digest it\nif you can. Much of it I can't yet assimilate.\n\n[_No signature._]\n\n\n\n\n_To Henri Bergson._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _June 13, 1907_.\n\nO my Bergson, you are a magician, and your book is a marvel, a real\nwonder in the history of philosophy, making, if I mistake not, an\nentirely new era in respect of matter, but unlike the works of genius of\nthe \"transcendentalist\" movement (which are so obscurely and abominably\nand inaccessibly written), a pure classic in point of form. You may be\namused at the comparison, but in finishing it I found the same\nafter-taste remaining as after finishing \"Madame Bovary,\" such a flavor\nof persistent _euphony_, as of a rich river that never foamed or ran\nthin, but steadily and firmly proceeded with its banks full to the brim.\nThen the aptness of your illustrations, that never scratch or stand out\nat right angles, but invariably simplify the thought and help to pour it\nalong! Oh, indeed you are a magician! And if your next book proves to be\nas great an advance on this one as this is on its two predecessors, your\nname will surely go down as one of the great creative names in\nphilosophy.\n\nThere! have I praised you enough? What every genuine philosopher (every\ngenuine man, in fact) craves most is _praise_--although the philosophers\ngenerally call it \"recognition\"! If you want still more praise, let me\nknow, and I will send it, for my features have been on a broad smile\nfrom the first page to the last, at the chain of felicities that never\nstopped. I feel rejuvenated.\n\nAs to the content of it, I am not in a mood at present to make any\ndefinite reaction. There is so much that is absolutely new that it will\ntake a long time for your contemporaries to assimilate it, and I imagine\nthat much of the development of detail will have to be performed by\nyounger men whom your ideas will stimulate to coruscate in manners\nunexpected by yourself. To me at present the vital achievement of the\nbook is that it inflicts an irrecoverable death-wound upon\nIntellectualism. It can never resuscitate! But it will die hard, for all\nthe inertia of the past is in it, and the spirit of professionalism and\npedantry as well as the \u00e6sthetic-intellectual delight of dealing with\ncategories logically distinct yet logically connected, will rally for a\ndesperate defense. The _\u00e9lan vital_, all contentless and vague as you\nare obliged to leave it, will be an easy substitute to make fun of. But\nthe beast _has_ its death-wound now, and the manner in which you have\ninflicted it (interval _versus_ temps d'arr\u00eat, etc.) is masterly in the\nextreme. I don't know why this later _r\u00e9daction_ of your critique of the\nmathematics of movement has seemed to me so much more telling than the\nearly statement--I suppose it is because of the wider _use_ made of the\nprinciple in the book. You will be receiving my own little \"pragmatism\"\nbook simultaneously with this letter. How jejune and inconsiderable it\nseems in comparison with your great system! But it is so congruent with\nparts of your system, fits so well into interstices thereof, that you\nwill easily understand why I am so enthusiastic. I feel that at bottom\nwe are fighting the same fight, you a commander, I in the ranks. The\nposition we are rescuing is \"Tychism\" and a really growing world. But\nwhereas I have hitherto found no better way of defending Tychism than by\naffirming the spontaneous addition of _discrete_ elements of being (or\ntheir subtraction), thereby playing the game with intellectualist\nweapons, you set things straight at a single stroke by your fundamental\nconception of the continuously creative nature of reality. I think that\none of your happiest strokes is your reduction of \"finality,\" as usually\ntaken, to its status alongside of efficient causality, as the\ntwin-daughters of intellectualism. But this vaguer and truer finality\nrestored to its rights will be a difficult thing to give content to.\nAltogether your reality lurks so in the background, in this book, that I\nam wondering whether you _couldn't_ give it any more development _in\nconcreto_ here, or whether you perhaps were holding back developments,\nalready in your possession, for a future volume. They are sure to come\nto you later anyhow, and to make a new volume; and altogether, the clash\nof these ideas of yours with the traditional ones will be sure to make\nsparks fly that will illuminate all sorts of dark places and bring\ninnumerable new considerations into view. But the process may be slow,\nfor the ideas are so revolutionary. Were it not for your style, your\nbook might last 100 years unnoticed; but your way of writing is so\nabsolutely commanding that your theories have to be attended to\nimmediately. I feel very much in the dark still about the relations of\nthe progressive to the regressive movement, and this great precipitate\nof nature subject to static categories. With a frank pluralism of\n_beings_ endowed with vital impulses you can get oppositions and\ncompromises easily enough, and a stagnant deposit; but after my one\nreading I don't exactly \"catch on\" to the way in which the continuum of\nreality resists itself so as to have to act, etc., etc.\n\nThe only part of the work which I felt like positively criticising was\nthe discussion of the idea of nonentity, which seemed to me somewhat\noverelaborated, and yet didn't leave me with a sense that the last word\nhad been said on the subject. But all these things must be very slowly\ndigested by me. I can see that, when the tide turns in your favor, many\nprevious tendencies in philosophy will start up, crying \"This is nothing\nbut what _we_ have contended for all along.\" Schopenhauer's blind will,\nHartmann's unconscious, Fichte's aboriginal freedom (re\u00ebdited at Harvard\nin the most \"unreal\" possible way by M\u00fcnsterberg) will all be claimants\nfor priority. But no matter--all the better if you are in some ancient\nlines of tendency. Mysticism also must make claims and doubtless just\nones. I say nothing more now--this is just my first reaction; but I am\nso enthusiastic as to have said only two days ago, \"I thank heaven that\nI have lived to this date--that I have witnessed the Russo-Japanese war,\nand seen Bergson's new book appear--the two great modern turning-points\nof history and of thought!\" Best congratulations and cordialest regards!\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To T. S. Perry._\n\n\nSILVER LAKE, N.H., _June 24, 1907_.\n\n\nDEAR THOS.,--Yours of the 11th is at hand, true philosopher that you\nare. No one but one bawn & bred in the philosophic briar-patch could\nappreciate Bergson as you do, without in the least understanding him. I\nam in an identical predicament. This last of his is the _divinest_ book\nthat has appeared in _my_ life-time, and (unless I am the falsest\nprophet) it is destined to rank with the greatest works of all time. The\nstyle of it is as wonderful as the matter. By all means send it to Chas.\nPeirce, but address him Prescott Hall, Cambridge. I am sending you my\n\"Pragmatism,\" which Bergson's work makes seem like small potatoes\nenough.\n\nAre you going to Russia to take Stolypin's place? or to head the\nRevolution? I would I were at Giverny to talk metaphysics with you, and\nenjoy a country where I am not responsible for the droughts and the\ngarden. Have been here two weeks at Chocorua, getting our place ready\nfor a tenant.\n\nAffectionate regards to you all.\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nLINCOLN, MASS., _Aug. 5, 1907_.\n\nDEAR MILLER,--I got your letter about \"Pragmatism,\" etc., some time ago.\nI hear that you are booked to review it for the \"Hibbert Journal.\" Lay\non, Macduff! as hard as you can--I want to have the weak places pointed\nout. I sent you a week ago a \"Journal of Philosophy\"[81] with a word\nmore about Truth in it, written _at_ you mainly; but I hardly dare hope\nthat I have cleared up my position. A letter from Strong, two days ago,\nwritten after receiving a proof of that paper, still thinks that I deny\nthe existence of realities outside of the thinker; and [R. B.] Perry,\nwho seems to me to have written far and away the most important critical\nremarks on Pragmatism (possibly the _only_ important ones), accused\nPragmatists (though he doesn't name _me_) of ignoring or denying that\nthe real object plays any part in deciding what ideas are true. I\nconfess that such misunderstandings seem to me hardly credible, and cast\na \"lurid light\" on the mutual understandings of philosophers generally.\nApparently it all comes from the _word_ Pragmatism--and a most unlucky\nword it may prove to have been. I am a natural realist. The world _per\nse_ may be likened to a cast of beans on a table. By themselves they\nspell nothing. An onlooker may group them as he likes. He may simply\ncount them all and map them. He may select groups and name these\ncapriciously, or name them to suit certain extrinsic purposes of his.\nWhatever he does, so long as he _takes account_ of them, his account is\nneither false nor irrelevant. If neither, why not call it true? It\n_fits_ the beans-_minus_-him, and _expresses_ the _total_ fact, of\nbeans-_plus_-him. Truth in this total sense is partially ambiguous,\nthen. If he simply counts or maps, he obeys a subjective interest as\nmuch as if he traces figures. Let that stand for pure \"intellectual\"\ntreatment of the beans, while grouping them variously stands for\nnon-intellectual interests. All that Schiller and I contend for is that\nthere is _no_ \"truth\" without _some_ interest, and that non-intellectual\ninterests play a part as well as intellectual ones. Whereupon we are\naccused of denying the beans, or denying being in anyway constrained by\nthem! It's too silly!...\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Pauline Goldmark._\n\n\nPUTNAM SHANTY,\nKEENE VALLEY, _Sept. 14, 1907_.\n\n\nDEAR PAULINE,-- ...No \"camping\" for me this side the grave! A party of\nfourteen left here yesterday for Panther Gorge, meaning to return by the\nRange, as they call your \"summit trail.\" Apparently it is easier than\nwhen on that to me memorable day we took it, for Charley Putnam swears\nhe has done it in five and a half hours. I don't well understand the\ndifference, except that they don't reach Haystack over Marcy as we did,\nand there is now a good trail. Past and future play such a part in the\nway one feels the present. To these youngsters, as to me long ago, and\nto you today, the rapture of the connexion with these hills is partly\nmade of the sense of future power over them and their like. That being\nremoved from me, I can only mix memories of past power over them with\nthe present. But I have always observed a curious _fading_ in what\nTennyson calls the \"passion\" of the past. Memories awaken little or no\nsentiment when they are too old; and I have taken everything here so\nprosily this summer that I find myself wondering whether the time-limit\nhas been exceeded, and whether for emotional purpose I am a new self.\nWe know not what we shall become; and that is what makes life so\ninteresting. Always a turn of the kaleidoscope; and when one is utterly\nmaimed for action, then the glorious time for _reading_ other men's\nlives! I fairly revel in that prospect, which in its full richness has\nto be postponed, for I'm not sufficiently maimed-for-action yet. By\ngoing slowly and alone, I find I can compass such things as the Giant's\nWashbowl, Beaver Meadow Falls, etc., and they make me feel very good. I\nhave even been dallying with the temptation to visit Cameron Forbes at\nManila; but I have put it behind me for this year at least. I think I\nshall probably give some more lectures (of a much less \"popular\" sort)\nat Columbia next winter--so you see there's life in the old dog yet.\nNevertheless, how different from the life that courses through _your_\narteries and capillaries! Today is the first honestly fine day there has\nbeen since I arrived here on the 2nd. (They must have been heavily\nrained on at Panther Gorge yesterday evening.) After writing a couple\nmore letters I will take a book and repair to \"Mosso's Ledge\" for the\nenjoyment of the prospect....\n\n\n\n\n_To W. Jerusalem_ (Vienna).\n\n\nST. HUBERT'S, N.Y. _Sept._ 15, 1907.\n\nDEAR PROFESSOR JERUSALEM,--Your letter of the 1st of September,\nforwarded from Cambridge, reaches me here in the Adirondack Mountains\ntoday. I am glad the publisher is found, and that you are enjoying the\ndrudgery of translating [\"Pragmatism\"]. Also that you find the book more\nand more in agreement with your own philosophy. I fear that its\nuntechnicality of style--or rather its deliberate\n_anti_-technicality--will make the German _Gelehrtes Publikum_,[82] as\nwell as the professors, consider it _oberfl\u00e4chliches Zeug_[83]--which\nit assuredly is not, although, being only a sketch, it ought to be\nfollowed by something _tighter_ and abounding in discriminations.\nPragmatism is an unlucky word in some respects, and the two meanings I\ngive for it are somewhat heterogeneous. But it was already in vogue in\nFrance and Italy as well as in England and America, and it was\n_tactically_ advantageous to use it....\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nSTONEHURST, INTERVALE, N.H., _Oct._ 6, 1907.\n\nDEAREST BROTHER,--I write this at the [James] Bryces', who have taken\nthe Merrimans' house for the summer, and whither I came the day before\nyesterday, after closing our Chocorua house, and seeing Alice leave for\nhome. We had been there a fortnight, trying to get some work done, and\nhaving to do most of it with our own hands, or rather with Alice's\nheroic hands, for mine are worth almost nothing in these degenerate\ndays. It is enough to make your heart break to see the scarcity of\n\"labor,\" and the whole country tells the same story. Our future at\nChocorua is a somewhat problematic one, though I think we shall manage\nto pass next summer there and get it into better shape for good renting,\nthereafter, at any cost (not the renting but the shaping). After that\nwhat _I_ want is a free foot, and the children are now not dependent on\na family summer any longer....\n\nI spent the first three weeks of September--warm ones--in my beloved and\nexquisite Keene Valley, where I was able to do a good deal of uphill\nwalking, with good rather than bad effects, much to my joy. Yesterday I\ntook a three hours walk here, three quarters of an hour of it uphill. I\nhave to go alone, and slowly; but it's none the worse for that and makes\none feel like old times. I leave this P.M. for two more days at\nChocorua--at the hotel. The fall is late, but the woods are beginning\nto redden beautifully. With the sun behind them, some maples look like\nstained-glass windows. But the penury of the human part of this region\nis depressing, and I begin to have an appetite for Europe again. Alice\ntoo! To be at Cambridge with no lecturing and no students to nurse along\nwith their thesis-work is an almost incredibly delightful prospect. I am\ngoing to settle down to the composition of another small book, more\noriginal and ground-breaking than anything I have yet put forth(!),\nwhich I expect to print by the spring; after which I can lie back and\nwrite at leisure more routine things for the rest of my days.\n\nThe Bryces are wholly unchanged, excellent friends and hosts, and I like\nher as much as him. The trouble with him is that his insatiable love of\ninformation makes him try to pump _you_ all the time instead of letting\nyou pump _him_, and I have let my own tongue wag so, that, when gone, I\nshall feel like a fool, and remember all kinds of things that I have\nforgotten to ask him. I have just been reading to Mrs. B., with great\ngusto on her part and renewed gusto on mine, the first few pages of your\nchapter on Florida in \"The American Scene.\" _K\u00f6stlich_ stuff! I had just\nbeen reading to myself almost 50 pages of the New England part of the\nbook, and fairly melting with delight over the Chocorua portion.\nEvidently that book will last, and bear reading over and over again--a\nfew pages at a time, which is the right way for \"literature\" fitly so\ncalled. It all makes me wish that we had you here again, and you will\ndoubtless soon come. I mustn't forget to thank you for the gold\npencil-case souvenir. I have had a plated silver one for a year past,\nnow worn through, and experienced what a \"comfort\" they are. Good-bye,\nand Heaven bless you. Your loving\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan._ 2, 1908.\n\n...I am just back from the American Philosophical Association, which had\na really delightful meeting at Cornell University in the State of New\nYork. Mostly epistemological. We are getting to know each other and\nunderstand each other better, and shall do so year by year, Everyone\ncursed my doctrine and Schiller's about \"truth.\" I think it largely is\nmisunderstanding, but it is also due to our having expressed our meaning\nvery ill. The general blanket-word pragmatism covers so many different\nopinions, that it naturally arouses irritation to see it flourished as a\nrevolutionary flag. I am also partly to blame here; but it was\n_tactically_ wise to use it as a title. Far more persons have had their\nattention attracted, and the result has been that everybody has been\nforced to think. Substantially I have nothing to alter in what I have\nsaid....\n\nI have just read the first half of Fechner's \"Zend-Avesta,\" a wonderful\nbook, by a wonderful genius. He had his vision and he knows how to\ndiscuss it, as no one's vision ever was discussed.\n\nI may tell you in confidence (I don't talk of it here because my damned\narteries may in the end make me give it up--for a year past I have a\nsort of angina when I make efforts) that I have accepted an invitation\nto give eight public lectures at Oxford next May. I was ashamed to\nrefuse; but the work of preparing them will be hard (the title is \"The\nPresent Situation in Philosophy\"[84]) and they doom me to relapse into\nthe \"popular lecture\" form just as I thought I had done with it forever.\n(What I wished to write this winter was something ultra dry in form,\nimpersonal and exact.) I find that my free and easy and personal way of\nwriting, especially in \"Pragmatism,\" has made me an object of loathing\nto many respectable academic minds, and I am rather tired of awakening\nthat feeling, which more popular lecturing on my part will probably\ndestine me to increase.\n\n...I have been with Strong, who goes to Rome this month. Good,\ntruth-loving man! and a very penetrating mind. I think he will write a\ngreat book. We greatly enjoyed seeing your friend Schwarz, the teacher.\nA fine fellow who will, I hope, succeed.\n\nA happy New Year to you now, dear Flournoy, and loving regards from us\nall to you all. Yours as ever\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Norman Kemp Smith._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nCambridge, _Jan._ 31, 1908.\n\nI have only just \"got round\" to your singularly solid and compact study\nof Avenarius in \"Mind.\" I find it clear and very clarifying, after the\ninnumerable hours I have spent in trying to dishevel him. I have read\nthe \"Weltbegriff\" three times, and have half expected to have to read\nboth books over again to assimilate his immortal message to man, of\nwhich I have hitherto been able to make nothing. You set me free! I\nshall not re-read him! but leave him to his spiritual dryness and\npreposterous pedantry. His only really original idea seems to be that of\nthe _Vitalreihe_, and that, so far as I can see, is quite false,\ncertainly no improvement on the notion of adaptive reflex actions.\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Daughter._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr._ 2, 1908,\n\nDARLING PEG,--You must have wondered at my silence since your dear\nmother returned. I hoped to write to you each day, but the strict\nroutine of my hours now crowded it out. I write on my Oxford job till\none, then lunch, then nap, then to my ... doctor at four daily, and from\nthen till dinner-time making calls, and keeping \"out\" as much as\npossible. To bed as soon after 8 as possible--all my odd reading done\nbetween 3 and 5 A.M., an hour not favorable for letter-writing--so that\nmy necessary business notes have to get in just before dinner (as now)\nor after dinner, which I hate and try to avoid. I think I see my way\nclear to go [to Oxford] now, if I don't get more fatigued than at\npresent. Four and a quarter lectures are fully written, and the rest are\ndown-hill work, much raw material being ready now....\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCambridge, _April_ 15, 1908.\n\nDEAREST HENRY,--Your good letter to Harry has brought news of your play,\nof which I had only seen an enigmatic paragraph in the papers. I'm right\nglad it is a success, and that such good artists as the Robertsons are\nin it. I hope it will have a first-rate run in London. Your apologies\nfor not writing are the most uncalled-for things--your assiduity and the\nlength of your letters to this family are a standing marvel--especially\nconsidering the market-value of your \"copy\"! So waste no more in that\ndirection. 'Tis I who should be prostrating myself--silent as I've been\nfor months in spite of the fact that I'm so soon to descend upon you.\nThe fact is I've been trying to compose the accursed lectures in a state\nof abominable brain-fatigue--a race between myself and time. I've got\nsix now done out of the eight, so I'm safe, but sorry that the infernal\nnervous condition that with me always accompanies literary production\nmust continue at Oxford and add itself to the other fatigues--a fixed\nhabit of wakefulness, etc. I ought not to have accepted, but they've\npanned out good, so far, and if I get through them successfully, I shall\nbe very glad that the opportunity came. They will be a good thing to\n_have done_. Previously, in such states of fatigue, I have had a break\nand got away, but this time no day without its half dozen pages--but the\nthing hangs on so long!...\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nR. M. S. IVERNIA,\n[Arriving at Liverpool], _Apr. 29, 1908_.\n\nDEAR H.,--Your letter of the 26th, unstamped or post-marked, has just\nbeen wafted into our lap--I suppose mailed under another cover to the\nagent's care.\n\nI'm glad you're not hurrying from Paris--I feared you might be awaiting\nus in London, and wrote you a letter yesterday to the Reform Club, which\nyou will doubtless get ere you get this, telling you of our prosperous\nthough tedious voyage in good condition.\n\nWe cut out London and go straight to Oxford, _via_ Chester. I have been\nsleeping like a top, and feel in good fighting trim again, eager for the\nscalp of the Absolute. My lectures will put his wretched clerical\ndefenders fairly on the defensive. They begin on Monday. Since you'll\nhave the whole months of May and June, if you urge it, to see us, I pray\nyou not to hasten back from \"gay Paree\" for the purpose.... Up since two\nA.M.\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Pauline Goldmark._\n\n\nPATTERDALE, ENGLAND, _July 2, 1908_.\n\nYour letter, beloved Pauline, greeted me on my arrival here three hours\nago.... How I _do wish_ that I could be in Italy alongside of you now,\nnow or any time! You could do me so much good, and your ardor of\nenjoyment of the country, the towns and the folk would warm up my cold\nsoul. I might even learn to speak Italian by conversing in that tongue\nwith you. But I fear that you'd find me betraying the coldness of my\nsoul by complaining of the heat of my body--a most unworthy attitude to\nstrike. Dear Paolina, never, never think of whether your body is hot or\ncold; live in the _objective_ world, above such miserable\nconsiderations. I have been up here eight days, Alice having gone down\nlast Saturday, the 27th, to meet Peggy and Harry at London, after only\ntwo days of it. After all the social and other fever of the past six and\na half weeks (save for the blessed nine days at Bibury), it looked like\nthe beginning of a real vacation, and it would be such but for the\nextreme heat, and the accident of one of my recent malignant \"colds\"\nbeginning. I have been riding about on stage-coaches for five days past,\nbut the hills are so treeless that one gets little shade, and the sun's\nglare is tremendous. It is a lovely country, however, for\npedestrianizing in cooler weather. Mountains and valleys compressed\ntogether as in the Adirondacks, great reaches of pink and green hillside\nand lovely lakes, the higher parts quite fully alpine in character but\nfor the fact that no snow mountains form the distant background. A\nstrong and noble region, well worthy of one's life-long devotion, if one\nwere a Briton. And on the whole, what a magnificent land and race is\nthis Britain! Every thing about them is of better quality than the\ncorresponding thing in the U.S.--with but few exceptions, I imagine. And\nthe equilibrium is so well achieved, and the human tone so cheery,\nblithe and manly! and the manners so delightfully good. Not one\n_unwholesome_-looking man or woman does one meet here for 250 that one\nmeets in America. Yet I believe (or suspect) that ours is eventually\nthe bigger destiny, if we can only succeed in living up to it, and thou\nin 22nd St. and I in Irving St. must do our respective strokes, which\nafter 1000 years will help to have made the glorious collective\nresultant. Meanwhile, as my brother Henry once wrote, thank God for a\nworld that holds so rich an England, so rare an Italy! Alice is entirely\n_aufgegangen_ in her idealization of it. And truly enough, the gardens,\nthe manners, the manliness are an excuse.\n\nBut profound as is my own moral respect and admiration, for a _vacation_\ngive me the Continent! The civilization here is too heavy, too _stodgy_,\nif one could use so unamiable a word. The very stability and good-nature\nof all things (of course we are leaving out the slum-life!) rest on the\nbasis of the national stupidity, or rather unintellectuality, on which\nas on a safe foundation of non-explosible material, the magnificent\nminds of the \u00e9lite of the race can coruscate as they will, safely. Not\nuntil those weeks at Oxford, and these days at Durham, have I had any\nsense of what a part the Church plays in the national life. So massive\nand all-pervasive, so authoritative, and on the whole so decent, in\nspite of the iniquity and farcicality of the whole thing. Never were\nincompatibles so happily yoked together. Talk about the genius of\nRomanism! It's nothing to the genius of Anglicanism, for Catholicism\nstill contains some haggard elements, that ally it with the Palestinian\ndesert, whereas Anglicanism remains obese and round and comfortable and\ndecent with this world's decencies, without an _acute_ note in its whole\nlife or history, in spite of the shrill Jewish words on which its ears\nare fed, and the nitro-glycerine of the Gospels and Epistles which has\nbeen injected into its veins. Strange feat to have achieved! Yet the\nsuccess is great--the whole Church-machine makes for all sorts of graces\nand decencies, and is not incompatible with a high type of Churchman,\nhigh, that is, on the side of moral and worldly virtue....\n\nHow I wish you were beside me at this moment! A breeze has arisen on the\nLake which is spread out before the \"smoking-room\" window at which I\nwrite, and is very grateful. The lake much resembles Lake George. Your\never grateful and loving\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Charles Eliot Norton._\n\n\nPATTERDALE, ENGLAND, _July 6, 1908_.\n\nDEAR CHARLES,--Going to Coniston Lake the other day and seeing the\nmoving little Ruskin Museum at Coniston (admission a penny) made me\nthink rather vividly of you, and make a resolution to write to you on\nthe earliest opportunity. It was truly moving to see such a collection\nof R.'s busy handiwork, exquisite and loving, in the way of drawing,\nsketching, engraving and note-taking, and also such a varied lot of\nphotographs of him, especially in his old age. Glorious old Don Quixote\nthat he was! At Durham, where Alice and I spent three and a half\ndelightful days at the house of F. B. Jevons, Principal of one of the\ntwo colleges of which the University is composed, I had a good deal of\ntalk with the very remarkable octogenarian Dean of the Cathedral and\nLord of the University, a thorough liberal, or rather radical, in his\nmind, with a voice like a bell, and an alertness to match, who had been\na college friend of Ruskin's and known him intimately all his life, and\nloved him. He knew not of his correspondence with you, of which I have\nbeen happy to be able to order Kent of Harvard Square to send him a\ncopy. His name is Kitchin.\n\nThe whole scene at Durham was tremendously impressive (though York\nCathedral made the stronger impression on me). It was so unlike Oxford,\nso much more American in its personnel, in a way, yet nestling in the\nvery bosom of those medi\u00e6val stage-properties and ecclesiastical-principality\nsuggestions. Oxford is all spread out in length and breadth, Durham\nconcentrated in depth and thickness. There is a great deal of flummery\nabout Oxford, but I think if I were an Oxonian, in spite of my\nradicalism generally, I might vote against all change there. It is an\nabsolutely unique fruit of human endeavor, and like the cathedrals, can\nnever to the end of time be reproduced, when the conditions that once\nmade it are changed. Let other places of learning go in for all the\nimprovements! The world can afford to keep her one Oxford unreformed. I\nknow that this is a superficial judgment in both ways, for Oxford does\nmanage to keep pace with the utilitarian spirit, and at the same time\npreserve lots of her flummery unchanged. On the whole it is a thoroughly\n_democratic_ place, so far as aristocracy in the strict sense goes. But\nI'm out of it, and doubt whether I want ever to put foot into it\nagain....\n\nEngland has changed in many respects. The West End of London, which used\nat this season to be so impressive from its splendor, is now a mixed and\nmongrel horde of straw hats and cads of every description. Motor-buses\nof the most brutal sort have replaced the old carriages, Bond and Regent\nStreets are cheap-jack shows, everything is tumultuous and confused and\nhas run down in quality. I have been \"motoring\" a good deal through this\n\"Lake District,\" owing to the kindness of some excellent people in the\nhotel, dissenters who rejoice in the name of Squance and inhabit the\nneighborhood of Durham. It is wondrous fine, but especially adapted to\ntrampers, which I no longer am. Altogether England seems to have got\nitself into a magnificently fine state of civilization, especially in\nregard to the cheery and wholesome tone of manners of the people,\nimproved as it is getting to be by the greater infusion of the\ndemocratic temper. Everything here seems about twice as good as the\ncorresponding thing with us. But I suspect we have the bigger eventual\ndestiny after all; and give us a thousand years and we may catch up in\nmany details. I think of you as still at Cambridge, and I do hope that\nphysical ills are bearing on more gently. Lily, too, I hope is her well\nself again. You mustn't think of answering this, which is only an\nejaculation of friendship--I shall be home almost before you can get an\nanswer over. Love to all your circle, including Theodora, whom I miss\ngreatly. Affectionately yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henri Bergson._\n\n\nLAMB HOUSE, _July 28, 1908_.\n\nDEAR BERGSON,--(can't we cease \"Professor\"-ing each other?--that title\nestablishes a \"disjunctive relation\" between man and man, and our\nrelation should be \"endosmotic\" socially as well as intellectually, I\nthink),--\n\n_Jacta est alea_, I am not to go to Switzerland! I find, after a week or\nmore here, that the monotony and simplification is doing my nervous\ncentres so much good, that my wife has decided to go off with our\ndaughter to Geneva, and to leave me alone with my brother here, for\nrepairs. It is a great disappointment in other ways than in not seeing\nyou, but I know that it is best. Perhaps later in the season the\n_Zusammenkunft_ may take place, for nothing is decided beyond the next\nthree weeks.\n\nMeanwhile let me say how rarely delighted your letter made me. There are\nmany points in your philosophy which I don't yet grasp, but I have\nseemed to myself to understand your anti-intellectualistic campaign very\nclearly, and that I have really done it so well in your opinion makes me\nproud. I am sending your letter to Strong, partly out of vanity, partly\nbecause of your reference to him. It does seem to me that philosophy is\nturning towards a new orientation. Are you a reader of Fechner? I wish\nthat you would read his \"Zend-Avesta,\" which in the second edition\n(1904, I think) is better printed and much easier to read than it looks\nat the first glance. He seems to me of the real race of prophets, and I\ncannot help thinking that _you_, in particular, if not already\nacquainted with this book, would find it very stimulating and\nsuggestive. His day, I fancy, is yet to come. I will write no more now,\nbut merely express my regret (and hope) and sign myself, yours most\nwarmly and sincerely,\n\nWm. James.\n\nThe subject of the next letter was a volume of \"Essays Philosophical and\nPsychological, in Honor of William James,\"[85] by nineteen contributors,\nwhich had been issued by Columbia University in the spring of 1908. A\nnote at the beginning of the book said: \"This volume is intended to mark\nin some degree its authors' sense of Professor James's memorable\nservices in philosophy and psychology, the vitality he has added to\nthose studies, and the encouragement that has flowed from him to\ncolleagues without number. Early in 1907, at the invitation of Columbia\nUniversity, he delivered a course of lectures there, and met the members\nof the Philosophical and Psychological Departments on several occasions\nfor social discussion. They have an added motive for the present work in\nthe recollections of this visit.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To John Dewey._\n\n\nRYE, SUSSEX, _Aug. 4, 1908_.\n\nDEAR DEWEY,--I don't know whether this will find you in the Adirondacks\nor elsewhere, but I hope 'twill be on East Hill. My own copy of the\nEssays in my \"honor,\" which took me by complete surprise on the eve of\nmy departure, was too handsome to take along, so I have but just got\nround to reading the book, which I find at my brother Henry's, where I\nhave recently come. It is a masterly set of essays of which we may all\nbe proud, distinguished by good style, direct dealing with the facts,\nand hot running on the trail of truth, regardless of previous\nconventions and categories. I am sure it hitches the subject of\nepistemology a good day's journey ahead, and proud indeed am I that it\nshould be dedicated to my memory.\n\nYour own contribution is to my mind the most _weighty_--unless perhaps\nStrong's should prove to be so. I rejoice exceedingly that you should\nhave got it out. No one yet has succeeded, it seems to me, in jumping\ninto the centre of your vision. Once there, all the perspectives are\nclear and open; and when you or some one else of us shall have spoken\nthe exact word that opens the centre to everyone, mediating between it\nand the old categories and prejudices, people will wonder that there\never could have been any other philosophy. That it is the philosophy of\nthe future, I'll bet my life. Admiringly and affectionately yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nLAMB HOUSE, RYE, _Aug. 9, 1908_.\n\nDEAR FLOURNOY,--I can't make out from my wife's letters whether she has\nseen you face to face, or only heard accounts of you from Madame\nFlournoy. She reports you very tired from the \"Congress\"--but I don't\nknow what Congress has been meeting at Geneva just now. I don't suppose\nthat you will go to the philosophical congress at Heidelberg--I\ncertainly shall not. I doubt whether philosophers will gain so much by\ntalking with each other as other classes of _Gelehrten_ do. One needs to\n_frequenter_ a colleague daily for a month before one can begin to\nunderstand him. It seems to me that the collective life of philosophers\nis little more than an organization of misunderstandings. I gave eight\nlectures at Oxford, but besides Schiller and one other tutor, only two\npersons ever _mentioned_ them to me, and those were the two heads of\nManchester College by whom I had been invited. Philosophical work it\nseems to me must go on in silence and in print exclusively.\n\nYou will have heard (either directly or indirectly) from my wife of my\nreasons for not accompanying them to Geneva. I have been for more than\nthree weeks now at my brother's, and am much better for the\nsimplification. I am very sorry not to have met with you, but I think I\ntook the prudent course in staying away.\n\nI have just read Miss Johnson's report in the last S. P. R.\n\"Proceedings,\" and a good bit of the proofs of Piddington's on\ncross-correspondences between Mrs. Piper, Mrs. Verrall, and Mrs.\nHolland, which is to appear in the next number. You will be much\ninterested, if you can gather the philosophical energy, to go through\nsuch an amount of tiresome detail. It seems to me that these reports\nopen a new chapter in the history of automatism; and Piddington's and\nJohnson's ability is of the highest order. Evidently \"automatism\" is a\nword that covers an extraordinary variety of fact. I suppose that you\nhave on the whole been gratified by the \"vindication\" of Eusapia\n[Paladino] at the hands of Morselli _et al._ in Italy. Physical\nphenomena also seem to be entering upon a new phase in their history.\n\nWell, I will stop, this is only a word of greeting and regret at not\nseeing you. I got your letter of many weeks ago when we were at Oxford.\nDon't take the trouble to _write_ now--my wife will bring me all the\nnews of you and your family, and will have given you all mine. Love to\nMadame F. and all the young ones, too, please. Your ever affectionate\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Shadworth H. Hodgson._\n\n\nPAIGNTON, S. DEVON, _Oct. 3, 1908_.\n\nDEAR HODGSON,--I have been five months in England (you have doubtless\nheard of my lecturing at Oxford) yet never given you a sign of life. The\nreason is that I have sedulously kept away from London, which I admire,\nbut at my present time of life abhor, and only touched it two or three\ntimes for thirty-six hours to help my wife do her \"shopping\" (strange\nuse for an elderly philosopher to be put to). The last time I was in\nLondon, about a month ago, I called at your affectionately remembered\nNo. 45, only to find you gone to Yorkshire, as I feared I should. I go\nback in an hour, en route for Liverpool, whence, with wife and daughter,\nI sail for Boston in the Saxonia. I am literally enchanted with rural\nEngland, yet I doubt whether I ever return. I never had a fair chance of\ngetting acquainted with the country here, and if I were a stout\npedestrian, which I no longer am, I think I should frequent this land\nevery summer. But in my decrepitude I must make the best of the more\neffortless relations which I enjoy with nature in my own country. I have\nseen many philosophers, at Oxford, especially, and James Ward at\nCambridge; but, apart from _very_ few conversations, didn't get at\nclose quarters with any of them, and they probably gained as little\nfrom me as I from them. \"We are columns left alone, of a temple once\ncomplete.\" The power of mutual misunderstanding in philosophy seems\ninfinite, and grows discouraging. Schiller of course, and his pragmatic\nfriend Captain Knox, James Ward, and McDougall, stand out as the most\nsatisfactory talkers. But there is too much fencing and scoring of\n\"points\" at Oxford to make construction active.\n\nGood-bye! dear Hodgson, and pray think of me with a little of the\naffection and intellectual interest with which I always think of you. My\nOxford lectures won't appear till next April. Don't read the extracts\nwhich the \"Hibbert Journal\" is publishing. They are torn out of their\nnatural setting. I have, as you probably know, ceased teaching and am\nenjoying a Carnegie pension. Yours ever fondly,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nLONDON, _Oct. 4, 1908_.\n\nDEAR FLOURNOY,--I got your delightful letter duly two weeks ago, or\nmore. I always have a bad conscience on receiving a letter from you,\nbecause I feel as if I _forced_ you to write it, and I know too well by\nyour own confessions (as well as by my own far less extreme experience\nof reluctance to write) what a nuisance and an effort letters are apt to\nbe. But no matter! this letter of yours was a good one indeed....\n\nWe sail from Liverpool the day after tomorrow, and tomorrow will be a\nbusy day winding up our affairs and making some last purchases of small\nthings. Alice has an insatiable desire (as Mrs. Flournoy may have\nnoticed at Geneva) to increase her possessions, whilst I, like an\nAmerican Tolstoy, wish to diminish them. The most convenient\narrangement for a Tolstoy is to have an anti-Tolstoyan wife to \"run the\nhouse\" for him. We have been for three days in Devonshire, and for four\ndays at Oxford previous to that. Extraordinary warm summer weather, with\nexquisite atmospheric effects. I am extremely glad to leave England with\nmy last optical images so beautiful. In any case the harmony and\nsoftness of the landscape of rural England probably excels everything in\nthe world in that line.\n\nAt Oxford I saw McDougall and Schiller quite intimately, also Schiller's\nfriend, Capt. Knox, who, retired from the army, lives at Gr\u00fcndelwald,\nand is an extremely acute mind, and fine character, I should think. He\nis a militant \"Pragmatist.\" Before that I spent three days at Cambridge,\nwhere again I saw James Ward intimately. I prophesy that if he gets his\nhealth again ... he will become also a militant pluralist of some sort.\nI think he has worked out his original monistic-theistic vein and is\nsteering straight towards a \"critical point\" where the umbrella will\nturn inside out, and not go back. I hope so! I made the acquaintance of\nBoutroux here last week. He came to the \"Moral Education Congress\" where\nhe made a very fine address. I find him very _simpatico_.\n\n[Illustration: William James and Henry Clement, at the \"Putnam Shanty,\"\nin the Adirondacks (1907?).]\n\nBut the best of all these meetings has been one of three hours this very\nmorning with Bergson, who is here visiting his relatives. So modest and\nunpretending a man, but such a genius intellectually! We talked very\neasily together, or rather _he_ talked easily, for he talked much more\nthan I did, and although I can't say that I follow the folds of his\nsystem much more clearly than I did before, he has made some points much\nplainer. I have the strongest suspicions that the tendency which he has\nbrought to a focus will end by prevailing, and that the present epoch\nwill be a sort of turning-point in the history of philosophy. So many\nthings converge towards an anti-rationalistic crystallization.\n\n_Qui vivra verra!_\n\nI am very glad indeed to go on board ship. For two months I have been\nmore than ready to get back to my own habits, my own library and\nwriting-table and bed.... I wish you, and all of you, a prosperous and\nhealthy and resultful winter, and am, with old-time affection, your ever\nfaithful friend,\n\nWm. James.\n\nIf the duty of writing weighs so heavily on you, why obey it? Why, for\nexample, write any more reviews? I absolutely refuse to, and find that\none great alleviation.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henri Bergson._\n\n\nLONDON, _Oct. 4, 1908_.\n\nDEAR BERGSON,--My brother was sorry that you couldn't come. He wishes me\nto say that he is returning to Rye the day after tomorrow and is so\nengaged tomorrow that he will postpone the pleasure of meeting you to\nsome future opportunity.\n\nI need hardly repeat how much I enjoyed our talk today. You must take\ncare of yourself and economize all your energies for your own creative\nwork. I want very much to see what you will have to say on the\n_Substanzbegriff_! Why should life be so short? I wish that you and I\nand Strong and Flournoy and McDougall and Ward could live on some\nmountain-top for a month, together, and whenever we got tired of\nphilosophizing, calm our minds by taking refuge in the scenery.\n\nAlways truly yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To H. G. Wells._\n\n\nCambridge, _Nov. 28, 1908_.\n\nDEAR WELLS,--\"First and Last Things\" is a great achievement. The first\ntwo \"books\" should be entitled \"philosophy without humbug\" and used as a\ntextbook in all the colleges of the world. You have put your finger\naccurately on the true emphases, and--in the main--on what seem to me\nthe true solutions (you are more monistic in your faith than I should\nbe, but as long as you only call it \"faith,\" that's your right and\nprivilege), and the simplicity of your statements ought to make us\n\"professionals\" blush. I have been 35 years on the way to similar\nconclusions--simply because I started as a professional and had to\n_d\u00e9brouiller_ them from all the traditional school rubbish.\n\nThe other two books exhibit you in the character of the Tolstoy of the\nEnglish world. A sunny and healthy-minded Tolstoy, as he is a\npessimistic and morbid-minded Wells. Where the \"higher synthesis\" will\nbe born, who shall combine the pair of you, Heaven only knows. But you\nare carrying on the same function, not only in that neither of your\nminds is boxed and boarded up like the mind of an ordinary human being,\nbut all the contents down to the very bottom come out freely and\nunreservedly and simply, but in that you both have the power of\ncontagious speech, and set the similar mood vibrating in the reader. Be\nhappy in that such power has been put into your hands! This book is\nworth any 100 volumes on Metaphysics and any 200 of Ethics, of the\nordinary sort.\n\nYours, with friendliest regards to Mrs. Wells, most sincerely,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry James._\n\n\nCambridge, _Dec. 19, 1908_.\n\nDEAREST H.,-- ...I write this at 6.30 [A.M.], in the library, which the\nblessed hard-coal fire has kept warm all night. The night has been\nstill, thermometer 20\u00b0, and the dawn is breaking in a pure red line\nbehind Grace Norton's house, into a sky empty save for a big morning\nstar and the crescent of the waning moon. Not a cloud--a true American\nwinter effect. But somehow \"le grand puits de l'aurore\" doesn't appeal\nto my sense of life, or challenge my spirits as formerly. It suggests no\nmore enterprises to the decrepitude of age, which vegetates along,\ndrawing interest merely on the investment of its earlier enterprises.\nThe accursed \"thoracic symptom\" is a killer of enterprise with me, and I\ndare say that it is little better with you. But the less said of it the\nbetter--it doesn't diminish!\n\nMy time has been consumed by interruptions almost totally, until a week\nago, when I finally got down seriously to work upon my Hodgson report.\nIt means much more labor than one would suppose, and very little result.\nI wish that I had never undertaken it. I am sending off a preliminary\ninstallment of it to be read at the S. P. R. meeting in January. That\ndone, the rest will run off easily, and in a month I expect to actually\nbegin the \"Introduction to Philosophy,\" which has been postponed so\nlong, and which I hope will add to income for a number of years to come.\nYour Volumes XIII and XIV arrived the other day--many thanks. We're\nsubscribing to two copies of the work, sending them as wedding presents.\nI hope it will sell. Very enticing-looking, but I can't settle down to\nthe prefaces as yet, the only thing I have been able to read lately\nbeing Lowes Dickinson's last book, \"Justice and Liberty,\" which seems to\nme a decidedly big achievement from every point of view, and probably\ndestined to have a considerable influence in moulding the opinion of the\neducated. Stroke upon stroke, from pens of genius, the competitive\nr\u00e9gime, so idolized 75 years ago, seems to be getting wounded to death.\nWhat will follow will be something better, but I never saw so clearly\nthe slow effect of [the] accumulation of the influence of successive\nindividuals in changing prevalent ideals. Wells and Dickinson will\nundoubtedly make the biggest steps of change....\n\nWell dear brother! a merry Christmas to you--to you both, I trust, for I\nfancy Aleck will be with you when this arrives--and a happy New Year at\nits tail! Your loving\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To T. S. Perry._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan. 29, 1909_.\n\nBELOVED THOMAS, cher ma\u00eetre et confr\u00e8re,--Your delightful letter about\nmy Fechner article and about your having become a professional\nphilosopher yourself came to hand duly, four days ago, and filled the\nheart of self and wife with joy. I always knew you was one, for to be a\nreal philosopher all that is necessary is to _hate_ some one else's type\nof thinking, and if that some one else be a representative of the\n\"classic\" type of thought, then one is a pragmatist and owns the fulness\nof the truth. Fechner is indeed a dear, and I am glad to have\nintroduced, so to speak, his speculations to the English world, although\nthe Revd. Elwood Worcester has done so in a somewhat more limited manner\nin a recent book of his called \"The Living Word\"-(Worcester of Emmanuel\nChurch, I mean, whom everyone has now begun to fall foul of for trying\nto reanimate the Church's healing virtue). Another case of newspaper\ncrime! The reporters all got hold of it with their megaphones, and made\nthe nation sick of the sound of its name. Whereas in former ages men\nstrove hard for fame, obscurity is now the one thing to be _striven_\nfor. For _fame_, all one need do is to exist; and the reporter will do\nthe rest--especially if you give them the address of your fotographer. I\nhope you're a spelling reformer--I send you the last publication from\nthat quarter. I'm sure that simple spelling will make a page look\nbetter, just as a crowd looks better if everyone's clothes fit.\n\nApropos of pragmatism, a learned Theban named---- has written a\ncircus-performance of which he is the clown, called \"Anti-pragmatisme.\"\nIt has so much verve and good spirit that I feel like patting him on the\nback, and \"sicking him on,\" but Lord! what a fool! I think I shall leave\nit unnoticed. I'm tired of re\u00ebxplaining what is already explained to\nsatiety. Let _them_ say, now, for it is their turn, what the relation\ncalled truth consists in, what it is known as!\n\nI have had you on my mind ever since Jan. 1st, when we had our Friday\nevening Club-dinner, and I was deputed to cable you a happy New Year.\nThe next day I couldn't get to the telegraph office; the day after I\nsaid to myself, \"I'll save the money, and save him the money, for if he\ngets a cable, he'll be sure to cable back; so I'll write\"; the following\nday, I forgot to; the next day I postponed the act; so from postponement\nto postponement, here I am. Forgive, forgive! Most affectionate remarks\nwere made about you at the dinner, which generally doesn't err by\nwasting words on absentees, even on those gone to eternity....\n\nI have just got off my report on the Hodgson control, which has stuck to\nmy fingers all this time. It is a hedging sort of an affair, and I don't\nknow what the Perry family will think of it. The truth is that the\n\"case\" is a particularly poor one for testing Mrs. Piper's claim to\nbring back spirits. It is _leakier_ than any other case, and\nintrinsically, I think, no stronger than many of her other good cases,\ncertainly weaker than the G. P. case. I am also now engaged in writing a\npopular article, \"the avowals of a psychical researcher,\" for the\n\"American Magazine,\" in which I simply state without argument my own\nconvictions, and put myself on record. I think that public opinion is\njust now taking a step forward in these matters--_vide_ the Eusapian\nboom! and possibly both these _Schriften_ of mine will add their\ninfluence. Thank you for the Charmes reception and for the earthquake\ncorrespondence! I envy you in clean and intelligent Paris, though our\nwinter is treating us very mildly. A lovely sunny day today! Love to all\nof you! Yours fondly,\n\nW. J.\n\nThe \"Charmes reception\" was a report of the speeches at the French\nAcademy's reception of Francis Charmes. The \"Eusapian boom\" will have\nbeen understood to refer to current discussions of the medium Eusapia\nPaladino.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe next letter refers to a paper in which both James and M\u00fcnsterberg\nhad been \"attacked\" in such a manner that M\u00fcnsterberg proposed to send a\nprotest to the American Psychological Association.\n\n\n\n\n_To Hugo M\u00fcnsterberg._\n\n\nCambridge, _Mar. 16, 1909_.\n\nDEAR M\u00dcNSTERBERG,--Witmer has sent me the _corpus delicti_, and I find\nmyself curiously unmoved. In fact he takes so much trouble over me, and\ngoes at the job with such zest that I feel like \"sicking him on,\" as\nthey say to dogs. Perhaps the honor of so many pages devoted to one\nmakes up for the dishonor of their content. It is really a great\ncompliment to have anyone take so much trouble about one. Think of\ncopying all Wundt's notes!\n\nBut, dear M\u00fcnsterberg, I hope you'll withdraw a second time your\nprotest. I think it undignified to take such an attack seriously. Its\nexcessive dimensions (in my case at any rate), and the smallness and\nremoteness of the provocation, stamp it as simply eccentric, and to show\nsensitiveness only gives it importance in the eyes of readers who\notherwise would only smile at its extravagance. Besides, since these\ntemperamental antipathies exist--why isn't it healthy that they should\nexpress themselves? For my part, I feel rather glad than otherwise that\npsychology is so live a subject that psychologists should \"go for\" each\nother in this way, and I think it all ought to happen _inside_ of our\nAssociation. We ought to cultivate tough hides there, so I hope that you\nwill withdraw the protest. I have mentioned it only to Royce, and will\nmention it to no one else. I don't like the notion of Harvard people\nseeming \"touchy\"! Your fellow victim,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To John Jay Chapman._\n\n\nCambridge, _Apr. 30, 1909_.\n\nDEAR JACK C.,--I'm not expecting you to _read_ my book, but only to\n\"give me a thought\" when you look at the cover. A certain witness at a\npoisoning case was asked how the corpse looked. \"Pleasant-like and\nfoaming at the mouth,\" was the reply. A good description of you,\ndescribing philosophy, in your letter. All that you say is true, and yet\nthe conspiracy has to be carried on by us professors. Reality has to be\n_returned to_, after this long circumbendibus, though _Gavroche_ has it\nalready. There _are_ concepts, anyhow. I am glad you lost the volume.\nIt makes one less in existence and ought to send up the price of the\nremainder.\n\nBlessed spring! blessed spring! Love to you both from yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\nThe next post-card was written in acknowledgment of Professor Palmer's\ncomments on \"A Pluralistic Universe.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To G. H. Palmer._\n\n[Post-card]\n\n\nCambridge, _May 13, 1909_.\n\n\"The finest critical mind of our time!\" No one can mix the honey and the\ngall as you do! My conceit appropriates the honey--for the gall it makes\nindulgent allowance, as the inevitable watering of a pair of aged\nrationalist eyes at the effulgent sunrise of a new philosophic day!\nThanks! thanks! for the honey.\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\nTO THEODORE FLOURNOY.\n\n\nCHOCORUA, JUNE 18, 1909.\n\nMY DEAR FLOURNOY,--You must have been wondering during all these weeks\nwhat has been the explanation of my silence. It has had two simple\ncauses; 1st, laziness; and 2nd, uncertainty, until within a couple of\ndays, about whether or not I was myself going to Geneva for the\nUniversity Jubilee. I have been strongly tempted, not only by the\n\"doctorate of theology,\" which you confidentially told me of (and which\nwould have been a fertile subject of triumph over my dear friend Royce\non my part, and of sarcasm on his part about academic distinctions, as\nwell as a diverting episode generally among my friends,--I being so\nessentially profane a character), but by the hope of seeing you, and by\nthe prospect of a few weeks in dear old Switzerland again. But the\neconomical, hygienic and domestic reasons were all against the journey;\nso a few days ago I ceased coquetting with the idea of it, and have\nfinally given it up. This postpones any possible meeting with you till\nnext summer, when I think it pretty certain that Alice and I and Peggy\nwill go to Europe again, and probably stay there for two years....\n\nWhat with the Jubilee and the Congress, dear Flournoy, I fear that your\nown summer will not yield much healing repose. \"Go through it like an\nautomaton\" is the best advice I can give you. I find that it is\npossible, on occasions of great strain, to get relief by ceasing all\nvoluntary control. _Do_ nothing, and I find that something will do\nitself! and not so stupidly in the eyes of outsiders as in one's own.\nClapar\u00e8de will, I suppose, be the chief executive officer at the\nCongress. It is a pleasure to see how he is rising to the top among\npsychologists, how large a field he covers, and with both originality\nand \"humanity\" (in the sense of the omission of the superfluous and\ntechnical, and preference for the probable). When will the Germans learn\nthat part? I have just been reading Driesch's Gifford lectures, Volume\nII. Very exact and careful, and the work of a most powerful intellect.\nBut why lug in, as he does, all that Kantian apparatus, when the\nquestions he treats of are real enough and important enough to be\nhandled directly and not smothered in that opaque and artificial veil? I\nfind the book extremely suggestive, and should like to believe in its\nthesis, but I can't help suspecting that Driesch is unjust to the\npossibilities of purely mechanical action. Candle-flames, waterfalls,\neddies in streams, to say nothing of \"vortex atoms,\" seem to perpetuate\nthemselves and repair their injuries. You ought to receive very soon my\nreport on Mrs. Piper's Hodgson control. Some theoretic remarks I make at\nthe end may interest you. I rejoice in the triumph of Eusapia all along\nthe line--also in Ochorowicz's young Polish medium, whom you have seen.\nIt looks at last as if something definitive and positive were in sight.\n\nI am correcting the proofs of a collection of what I have written on the\nsubject of \"truth\"--it will appear in September under the title of \"The\nMeaning of Truth, a Sequel to Pragmatism.\" It is already evident from\nthe letters I am getting about the \"Pluralistic Universe\" that that book\nwill 1st, be _read_; 2nd, be _rejected_ almost unanimously at first, and\nfor very diverse reasons; but, 3rd, will continue to be bought and\nreferred to, and will end by strongly influencing English philosophy.\nAnd now, dear Flournoy, good-bye! and believe me with sincerest\naffection for Mrs. Flournoy and the young people as well as for\nyourself, yours faithfully,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Theodora Sedgwick._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, _July 12, 1909_.\n\nDEAR THEODORA,--We got your letter a week ago, and were very glad to\nhear of your prosperous installation, and good impressions of the place.\nI am sorry that Harry couldn't go to see you the first Sunday, but hope,\nif he didn't go for yesterday, that he will do so yet. When your social\ncircle gets established, and routine life set up, I am sure that you\nwill like Newport very much. As for ourselves, the place is only just\nbeginning to smooth out. The instruments of labor had well-nigh all\ndisappeared, and had to come piecemeal, each forty-eight hours after\nbeing ordered, so we have been using the cow as a lawn-mower, silver\nknives to carve with, and finger-nails for technical purposes\ngenerally. There is no labor known to man in which Alice has not\nindulged, and I have sought safety among the mosquitoes in the woods\nrather than remain to shirk my responsibilities in full view of them. We\nhave hired a little mare, fearless of automobiles, we get our mail\ndally, we had company to dinner yesterday, relatives of Alice, the\nchildren will be here by the middle of the week, the woods are\ndeliciously fragrant, and the weather, so far, cool--in fact we are\n_launched_ and the regular summer equilibrium will soon set in. The\nplace is both pathetic and irresistible; I want to sell it, Alice wants\nto enlarge it--we shall end by doing neither, but discuss it to the end\nof our days.\n\nI have just read Shaler's autobiography, and it has fairly haunted me\nwith the overflowing impression of his myriad-minded character. Full of\nexcesses as he was, due to his intense vivacity, impulsiveness, and\nimaginativeness, his centre of gravity was absolutely steady, and I knew\nno man whose sense of the larger relation of things was always so true\nand right. Of all the minds I have known, his leaves the largest\nimpression, and I miss him more than I have missed anyone before. You\nought to read the book, especially the autobiographic half. Good-bye,\ndear Theodora. Alice joins her love to mine, and I am, as ever, yours\naffectionately,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To F. C. S. Schiller._\n\n\n_Chocorua_, _Aug. 14, 1909_.\n\nDEAR SCHILLER,-- ...I got the other day a very candid letter from A. S.\nPringle-Pattison, about my \"Pluralistic Universe,\" in which he said: \"It\nis supremely difficult to accept the conclusion of an actually growing\nuniverse, an actual addition to the sum of being or (if that expression\nbe objectionable) to the intensity and scope of existence, to a growing\nGod, in fact.\"--This seems to me very significant. On such minute little\nsnags and hooks, do all the \"difficulties\" of philosophy hang. Call them\ncategories, and sacred laws, principles of reason, etc., and you have\nthe actual state of metaphysics, calling all the analogies of phenomenal\nlife impossibilities.\n\nNo more lecturing from W. J., thank you! either at Oxford or elsewhere.\nAffectionately thine,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nCHOCORUA, S_ept. 28, 1909_.\n\nDEAR FLOURNOY,--We had fondly hoped that before now you might both,\naccepting my half-invitation, half-suggestion, be with us in this\nuncared-for-nature, so different from Switzerland, and you getting\nstrengthened and refreshed by the change. _Dieu dispose_, indeed! The\nfact that _is_ never entered into our imagination! I give up all hope of\nyou this year, unless it be for Cambridge, where, however, the\nconditions of repose will be less favorable for you.... I am myself\ngoing down to Cambridge on the fifth of October for two days of\n\"inauguration\" ceremonies of our new president, Lawrence Lowell....\nThere are so many rival universities in our country that advantage has\nto be taken of such changes to make the newspaper talk, and keep the\nname of Harvard in the public ear, so the occasion is to be almost as\nelaborate as a \"Jubilee\"; but I shall keep as much out of it as is\nofficially possible, and come back to Chocorua on the 8th, to stay as\nlate into October as we can, though probably not later than the 20th,\nafter which the Cambridge winter will begin. It hasn't gone well with my\nhealth this summer, and beyond a little reading, I have done no work at\nall. I have, however, succeeded during the past year in preparing a\nvolume on the \"Meaning of Truth\"--already printed papers for the most\npart--which you will receive in a few days after getting this letter,\nand which I think may help you to set the \"pragmatic\" account of\nKnowledge in a clearer light. I will also send you a magazine article on\nthe mediums, which has just appeared, and which may divert you.[86]\nEusapia Paladino, I understand, has just signed a contract to come to\nNew York to be at the disposition of Hereward Carrington, an expert in\nmedium's tricks, and author of a book on the same, who, together with\nFielding and Bagally, also experts, formed the Committee of the London\nS. P. R., who saw her at Naples.... After Courtier's report on Eusapia,\nI don't think any \"investigation\" here will be worth much\n\"scientifically\"--the only advantage of her coming may possibly be to\nget some scientific men to believe that there is really a problem. Two\nother cases have been reported to me lately, which are worth looking up,\nand I shall hope to do so.\n\nHow much your interests and mine keep step with each other, dear\nFlournoy. \"Functional psychology,\" and the twilight region that\nsurrounds the clearly lighted centre of experience! Speaking of\n\"functional\" psychology, Clark University, of which Stanley Hall is\npresident, had a little international congress the other day in honor of\nthe twentieth year of its existence. I went there for one day in order\nto see what Freud was like, and met also Yung of Z\u00fcrich, who professed\ngreat esteem for you, and made a very pleasant impression. I hope that\nFreud and his pupils will push their ideas to their utmost limits, so\nthat we may learn what they are. They can't fail to throw light on\nhuman nature; but I confess that he made on me personally the impression\nof a man obsessed with fixed ideas. I can make nothing in my own case\nwith his dream theories, and obviously \"symbolism\" is a most dangerous\nmethod. A newspaper report of the congress said that Freud had condemned\nthe American religious therapy (which has such extensive results) as\nvery \"dangerous\" because so \"unscientific.\" Bah!\n\nWell, it is pouring rain and so dark that I must close. Alice joins me,\ndear Flournoy, in sending you our united love, in which all your\nchildren have a share. Ever yours,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Shadworth H. Hodgson._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan._ 1, 1910.\n\nA happy New Year to you, dear Hodgson, and may it bring a state of mind\nmore recognizant of truth when you see it! Your jocose salutation of my\naccount of truth is an epigrammatic commentary on the cross-purposes of\nphilosophers, considering that on the very day (yesterday) of its\nreaching me, I had replied to a Belgian student writing a thesis on\npragmatism, who had asked me to name my sources of inspiration, that I\ncould only recognize two, Peirce, as quoted, and \"S. H. H.\" with his\nmethod of attacking problems, by asking what their terms are \"Known-as.\"\nUnhappy world, where grandfathers can't recognize their own\ngrandchildren! Let us love each other all the same, dear Hodgson, though\nthe grandchild be in your eyes a \"prodigal.\" Affectionately yours,\n\nWM. JAMES.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe news of James's election as _Associ\u00e9 \u00e9tranger_ of the Acad\u00e9mie des\nSciences Morales et Politiques, which had appeared in the Boston\n\"Journal\" a day or two before the next letter, had, of course, reached\nthe American newspapers directly from Paris. The unread book by Bergson\nof which Mr. Chapman was to forward his manuscript-review was obviously\n\"Le Rire,\" and Mr. Chapman's review may be found, not where the next\nletter but one might lead one to seek it, but in the files of the\n\"Hibbert Journal.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To John Jay Chapman._\n\n\nCambridge, _Jan._ 30, 1910.\n\nDEAR JACK,--Invincible epistolary laziness and a conscience humbled to\nthe dust have conspired to retard this letter. God sent me straight to\nyou with my story about Bergson's cablegram--the only other person to\nwhom I have told it was Henry Higginson. _One_ of you must have put it\ninto the Boston \"Journal\" of the next day,--_you_ of course, to\nhumiliate me still the more,--so now I lie in the dust, spurning all the\ndecorations and honors under which the powers and principalities are\ntrying to bury me, and seeking to manifest the naked truth in my\nuncomely form. Never again, never again! Naked came I into life, and\nthis world's vanities are not for me! You, dear Jack, are the only\nreincarnation of Isaiah and Job, and I praise God that he has let me\nlive in your day. _Real_ values are known only to _you_!\n\nAs for Bergson, I think your change of the word \"comic\" into the word\n\"tragic\" throughout his book is _impayable_, and I have no doubt it is\ntrue. I have only read half of him, so don't know how he is coming out.\nMeanwhile send me your own foolishness on the same subject, commend me\nto your liege lady, and believe me, shamefully yours,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To John Jay Chapman._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb._ 8, 1910.\n\nDEAR JACK,--Wonderful! wonderful! Shallow, incoherent, obnoxious to its\nown criticism of Chesterton and Shaw, off its balance, accidental,\nwhimsical, false; but with central fires of truth \"blazing fuliginous\nmid murkiest confusion,\" telling the reader nothing of the Comic except\nthat it's smaller than the Tragic, but _readable_ and splendid, showing\nthat the _man who wrote it_ is more than anything he can write!\n\nPray patch some kind of a finale to it and send it to the \"Atlantic\"!\nYours ever fondly,\n\nW. J.\n(Membre de I'Institut!)\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe \"specimen\" which was enclosed with the following note has been lost.\nIt was perhaps a bit of adulatory verse. What is said about \"Harris and\nShakespeare,\" as also in a later letter to Mr. T. S. Perry on the same\nsubject, was written apropos of a book entitled \"The Man Shakespeare,\nHis Tragic Life-Story.\"[87]\n\n\n\n\n_To John Jay Chapman._\n\n\nCambridge, _Feb._ 15, 1910.\n\nDEAR JACK,--Just a word to say that it pleases me to hear you write this\nabout Harris and Shakespeare. H. is surely false in much that he claims;\nyet 'tis the only way in which Shakespeare ought to be handled, so his\n_is_ the best book. The trouble with S. was his intolerable fluency. He\nimprovised so easily that it kept down his level. It is hard to see how\nthe man that wrote his best things could possibly have let himself do\nranting bombast and complication on such a large scale elsewhere. 'T is\nmighty fun to read him through in order.\n\nI send you a specimen of the kind of thing that tends to hang upon me as\nthe ivy on the oak. When will the day come? Never till, like me, you\ngive yourself out as a poetry-hater. Thine ever,\n\n[Illustration: signature\n\nmy new signature]\n\n\n\n\n_To Dickinson S. Miller._\n\n\nCambridge, _Mar. 26, 1910_.\n\nDEAR MILLER,--Your study of me arrives! and I have pantingly turned the\npages to find the eulogistic adjectives, and find them in such abundance\nthat my head swims. Glory to God that I have lived to see this day! to\nhave so much said about me, and to be embalmed in literature like the\ngreat ones of the past! I didn't know I was so much, was all these\nthings, and yet, as I read, I see that I was (or am?), and shall boldly\nassert myself when I go abroad.\n\nTo speak in all dull soberness, dear Miller, it touches me to the quick\nthat you should have hatched out this elaborate description of me with\nsuch patient and loving incubation. I have only spent five minutes over\nit so far, meaning to take it on the steamer, but I get the impression\nthat it is almost unexampled in our literature as a piece of profound\nanalysis of an individual mind. I'm sorry you stick so much to my\npsychological phase, which I care little for, now, and never cared much.\nThis epistemological and metaphysical phase seems to me more original\nand important, and I haven't lost hopes of converting you entirely yet.\nMeanwhile, thanks! thanks! [\u00c9mile] Boutroux, who is a regular angel, has\njust left our house. I've written an account of his lectures which the\n\"Nation\" will print on the 31st. I should like you to look it over,\nhasty as it is.\n\n...I hope that all these lectures on contemporaries (What a live place\nColumbia is!) will appear together in a volume. I can't easily believe\nthat any will compare with yours as a thorough piece of interpretative\nwork.\n\nWe sail on Tuesday next. My thorax has been going the wrong way badly\nthis winter, and I hope that Nauheim may patch it up.\n\nStrength to your elbow! Affectionately and gratefully yours,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\nXVII\n\n1910\n\n_Final Months--The End_\n\n\nSEVERAL reasons combined to take James to Europe in the early spring of\n1910. His heart had been giving him more discomfort. He wished to\nconsult a specialist in Paris from whom an acquaintance of his,\nsimilarly afflicted, had received great benefit. He believed that\nanother course of Nauheim baths would be helpful. Last, and not least,\nhe wished to be within reach of his brother Henry, who was ill and\nconcerning whose condition he was much distressed. In reality it was he,\nnot his brother, who already stood in the shadow of Death's door.\n\nAccordingly he sailed for England with Mrs. James, and went first to\nLamb House. Thence he crossed alone to Paris, and thence went on to\nNauheim, leaving Mrs. James to bring his brother to Nauheim to join him.\nThe Parisian specialist could do nothing but confirm previous diagnoses.\n\nToo much \"sitting up and talking\" with friends in Paris exhausted him\nseriously, and, after leaving Paris, he failed for the first time to\nshake off his fatigue. The immediate effect of the Nauheim baths proved\nto be very debilitating, and, again, he failed to rally and improve when\nhe had finished them. By July, after trying the air of Lucerne and\nGeneva, only to find that the altitude caused him unbearable distress,\nhe despaired of any relief beyond what now looked like the incomparable\nconsolations of being at rest in his own home. So he turned his face\nwestward.\n\nThe next letters bid good-bye for the summer to two tried friends. Five\nmonths later it seemed as if James had been at more pains to make his\nadieus than he usually put himself to on account of a summer's absence.\nWhen Mrs. James returned to the Cambridge house in the autumn, after he\nhad died, and had occasion to open his desk copy of the Harvard\nCatalogue, she found these words jotted at the head of the Faculty List:\n\"A thousand regrets cover every beloved name.\" It grieved him that life\nwas too short and too full for him to see many of them as often as he\nwanted to. One day before he sailed, his eye had been caught by the\nfamiliar names and, as a throng of comradely intentions filled his\nheart, he had had a moment of foreboding, and he had let his hand trace\nthe words that cried this needless \"Forgive me!\" and recorded an\nincommunicable Farewell.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry L. Higginson._\n\n\nCambridge, _Mar. 28, 1910_.\n\nBELOVED HENRY,--I had most positive hopes of driving in to see you ere\nthe deep engulfs us, but the press is too great here, and it remains\nimpossible. This is just a word to say that you are not forgotten, or\never to be forgotten, and that (after what Mrs. Higginson said) I am\nhoping you may sail yourself pretty soon, and have a refreshing time,\nand cross our path. We go straight to Rye, expecting to be in Paris for\nthe beginning of April for a week, and then to Nauheim, whence Alice,\nafter seeing me safely settled, will probably return to Rye for the heft\nof the summer. It would pay you to turn up both there and at Nauheim and\nsee the mode of life.\n\nHoping you'll have a good [Club] dinner Friday night, and never need any\nsurgery again, I am ever thine,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Miss Frances R. Morse._\n\n\nCambridge, _March 29, 1910_.\n\nDEAREST FANNY,--Your beautiful roses and your card arrived duly--the\nroses were not deserved, not at least by W. J. I have about given up all\nvisits to Boston this winter, and the racket has been so incessant in\nthe house, owing to foreigners of late, that we haven't had the strength\nto send for you. I sail on the 29th in the Megantic, first to see Henry,\nwho has been ill, not dangerously, but very miserably. Our Harry is with\nhim now. I shall then go to Paris for a certain medical experiment, and\nafter that report at Nauheim, where they probably will keep me for some\nweeks. I hope that I may get home again next fall with my organism in\nbetter shape, and be able to see more of my friends.\n\nAfter Thursday, when the good Boutrouxs go, I shall try to arrange a\nmeeting with you, dear Fanny. At present we are \"contemporaries,\" that\nis all, and the one of us who becomes survivor will have regrets that we\nwere no more!\n\nWhat a lugubrious ending! With love to your mother, and love from Alice,\nbelieve me, dearest Fanny, most affectionately yours,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To T, S. Perry._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _May 22, 1910_.\n\nBELOVED THOS.,--I have two letters from you--one about ... Harris on\nShakespeare. _Re_ Harris, I did think you were a bit supercilious _a\npriori_, but I thought of your youth and excused you. Harris himself is\nhorrid, young and crude. Much of his talk seems to me absurd, but\nnevertheless _that's the way to write about Shakespeare_, and I am sure\nthat, if Shakespeare were a Piper-control, he would say that he\nrelished Harris far more than the pack of reverent commentators who\ntreat him as a classic moralist. He seems to me to have been a\nprofessional _amuser_, in the first instance, with a productivity like\nthat of a Dumas, or a Scribe; but possessing what no other amuser has\npossessed, a lyric splendor added to his rhetorical fluency, which has\nmade people take him for a more essentially serious human being than he\nwas. Neurotically and erotically, he was hyper\u00e6sthetic, with a playful\ngraciousness of character never surpassed. He could be profoundly\nmelancholy; but even then was controlled by the audience's needs. A cork\nin the rapids, with no ballast of his own, without religious or ethical\nideals, accepting uncritically every theatrical and social convention,\nhe was simply an \u00e6olian harp passively resounding to the stage's call.\nWas there ever an author of such emotional importance whose reaction\nagainst false conventions of life was such an absolute zero as his? I\nknow nothing of the other Elizabethans, but could they have been as\nsoulless in this respect?--But _halte-la_! or I shall become a Harris\nmyself!... With love to you all, believe me ever thine,\n\nW. J.\n\nRead Daniel Hal\u00e9vy's exquisitely discreet \"Vie de Nietzsche,\" if you\nhaven't already done so. Do you know G. Courtelines' \"Les Marionettes de\nla Vie\" (Flammarion)? It beats Labiche.\n\n\n\n\n_To Fran\u00e7ois Pillon._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _May 25, 1910_.\n\nMY DEAR PILLON,--I have been here a week, taking the baths for my\nunfortunate cardiac complications, and shall probably stay six weeks\nlonger. I passed through Paris, where I spent a week, partly with my\nfriend the philosopher Strong, partly at the Fondation Thiers with the\nBoutrouxs, who had been our guests in America when he lectured a few\nmonths ago at Harvard. Every day I said: \"I will get to the Pillons this\nafternoon\"; but every day I found it impossible to attempt your four\nflights of stairs, and finally had to run away from the Boutrouxs' to\nsave my life from the fatigue and pectoral pain which resulted from my\nseeing so many people. I have a dilatation of the aorta, which causes\nanginoid pain of a bad kind whenever I make any exertion, muscular,\nintellectual, or social, and I should not have thought at all of going\nthrough Paris were it not that I wished to consult a certain Dr. Moutier\nthere, who is strong on arteries, but who told me that he could do\nnothing for my case. I hope that these baths may arrest the disagreeable\ntendency to _pejoration_ from which I have suffered in the past year.\nThis is why I didn't come to see the dear Pillons; a loss for which I\nfelt, and shall always feel, deep regret.\n\nThe sight of the new \"Ann\u00e9e Philosophique\" at Boutroux's showed me how\nvaliant and solid you still are for literary work. I read a number of\nthe book reviews, but none of the articles, which seemed uncommonly\nvaried and interesting. Your short notice of Schinz's really _bouffon_\nbook showed me to my regret that even you have not yet caught the true\ninwardness of my notion of Truth. You speak as if I allowed no _valeur\nde connaissance proprement dite_, which is a quite false accusation.\nWhen an idea \"works\" successfully among _all the other ideas_ which\nrelate to the object of which it is our mental substitute, associating\nand comparing itself with them harmoniously, the workings are wholly\ninside of the intellectual world, and the idea's value purely\nintellectual, for the time, at least. This is my doctrine and\nSchiller's, but it seems very hard to express it so as to get it\nunderstood!\n\nI hope that, in spite of the devouring years, dear Madame Pillon's state\nof health may be less deplorable than it has been so long. In particular\nI wish that the neuritis may have ceased. I wish! I wish! but what's the\nuse of wishing, against the universal law that \"youth's a stuff will not\nendure,\" and that we must simply make the best of it? Boutroux gave some\nbeautiful lectures at Harvard, and is the gentlest and most lovable of\ncharacters. Believe me, dear Pillon, and dear Madame Pillon, your ever\naffectionate old friend,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _May 29, 1910_.\n\n...Paris was splendid, but fatiguing. Among other things I was\nintroduced to the Acad\u00e9mie des Sciences Morales, of which you may likely\nhave heard that I am now an _associ\u00e9 \u00e9tranger_(!!). Boutroux says that\nRenan, when he took his seat after being received at the Acad\u00e9mie\nFran\u00e7aise, said: \"Qu'on est bien dans ce fauteuil\" (it is nothing but a\ncushioned bench with no back!). \"Peut-\u00eatre n'y a-t-il que cela de vrai!\"\nDelicious Renanesque remark!...\n\nW. J.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe arrangement by which Mrs. James and Henry James were to have arrived\nat Nauheim had been upset. The two, who were to come from England\ntogether, were delayed by Henry's condition; and for a while James was\nat Nauheim alone.\n\n\n\n\n_To his Daughter._\n\n\n_Bad-Nauheim_, _May 29, 1910_.\n\nBELOVED P\u00c9GUY,--The very _fust_ thing I want you to do is to look in the\ndrawer marked \"Blood\" in my tall filing case in the library closet, and\nfind the _date_ of a number of the \"Journal of Speculative Philosophy\"\nthere that contains an article called \"Philosophic Reveries.\" Send this\n_date_ (not the article) to the Revd. Prof. L. P. Jacks, 28 Holywell,\nOxford, if you find it, _immediately_. He will understand what to do\nwith it. If you don't find the article, do nothing! Jacks is notified. I\nhave just corrected the proofs of an article on Blood for the \"Hibbert\nJournal,\" which, I think, will make people sit up and rub their eyes at\nthe apparition of a new great writer of English. I want Blood himself to\nget it as a surprise.\n\n_I_ got as a surprise your finely typed copy of the rest of my MS., the\nother day. I thank you for it; also for your delightful letters. The\ntype-writing seems to set free both your and Aleck's genius more than\nthe pen. (If you need a new ribbon it must be got from the agency in\nMilk St. just above Devonshire--but you'll find it hard work to get it\ninto its place.) You seem to be leading a very handsome and domestic\nlife, avoiding social excitements, and hearing of them only from the\nbrethren. It is good sometimes to face the naked ribs of reality as it\nreveals itself in homes. I face them _here_ with no one but the\nblackbirds and the trees for my companions, save some rather odd\nAmericans at the _Mittagstisch_ and _Abendessen_, and the good smiling\n_Dienstm\u00e4dchen_ who brings me my breakfast in the morning.... I went to\nmy bath at 6 o'clock this morning, and had the Park all to the\nblackbirds and myself. This was because I am expecting a certain Prof.\nGoldstein from Darmstadt to come to see me this morning, and I had to\nget the bath out of the way. He is a powerful young writer, and is\ntranslating my \"Pluralistic Universe.\" But the weather has grown so\nthreatening that I hope now that he won't come till next Sunday. It is a\nshame to converse here and not be in the open air. I would to Heaven\n_thou_ wert _mit_--I think thou wouldst enjoy it very much for a week\nor more. The German civilization is _good_! Only this place would give a\nvery false impression of our wicked earth to a Mars-_Bewohner_ who\nshould descend and leave and see nothing else. Not a dark spot (save\nwhat the patients' hearts individually conceal), no poverty, no vice,\nnothing but prettiness and simplicity of life. I snip out a\nconcert-program (the afternoon one unusually good) which I find lying on\nmy table. The like is given free in the open air every day. The baths\nweaken one so that I have little brain for reading, and must write\nletters to all kinds of people every day. A big quarrel is on in Paris\nbetween my would-be translators and publishers. I wish translators would\nlet my books alone--they are written for my own people exclusively! You\nwill have received Hewlett's delightful \"Halfway House,\" sent to our\nsteamer by Pauline Goldmark, I think. I have been reading a charmingly\ndiscreet life of Nietzsche by D. Hal\u00e9vy, and have invested in a couple\nmore of his (N.'s) books, but haven't yet begun to read them. I am half\nthrough \"Waffen-nieder!\" a _first-rate_ anti-war novel by Baroness von\nSuttner. It has been translated, and I recommend it as in many ways\ninstructive. How are Rebecca and Maggie [the cook and house-maid]? You\ndon't say how you enjoy ordering the bill of fare every day. You can't\nvary it properly unless you make a _list_ and keep it. A good sweet dish\nis _rothe Gr\u00fctze_, a form of fine sago consolidated by currant-jelly\njuice, and sauced with custard, or, I suppose, cream.\n\nWell! no more today! Give no end of love to the good boys, and to your\nGrandam, and believe me, ever thy affectionate,\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry P. Bowditch._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _June 4, 1910_.\n\nDEAREST HEINRICH,--The envelope in which this letter goes was addrest in\nCambridge, Mass., and expected to go towards you with a letter in it,\nlong before now. But better late than never, so here goes! I came over,\nas you may remember, for the double purpose of seeing my brother Henry,\nwho had been having a sort of nervous breakdown, and of getting my\nheart, if possible, tuned up by foreign experts. I stayed upwards of a\nmonth with Henry, and then came hither _\u00fcber_ Paris, where I stayed ten\ndays. I have been here two and a half weeks, taking the baths, and\nenjoying the feeling of the strong, calm, successful, new German\ncivilization all about me. Germany is _great_, and no mistake! But what\na contrast, in the well-set-up, well-groomed, smart-looking German man\nof today, and his rather clumsily drest, dingy, and unworldly-looking\nfather of forty years ago! But something of the old _Gem\u00fcthlichkeit_\nremains, the friendly manners, and the disposition to talk with you and\ntake you seriously and to respect the serious side of whatever comes\nalong. But I can write you more interestingly of physiology than I can\nof sociology.... The baths may or may not arrest for a while the\ndownward tendency which has been so marked in the past year--but at any\nrate it is a comfort to know that my sufferings have a respectable\norganic basis, and are not, as so many of my friends tell me, due to\npure \"nervousness.\" Dear Henry, you see that you are not the only pebble\non the beach, or toad in the puddle, of senile degeneration! I admit\nthat the form of your tragedy beats that of that of most of us; but\nyouth's a stuff that won't endure, in any one, and to have had it, as\nyou and I have had it, is a good deal gained anyhow, while to see the\ndaylight still under _any_ conditions is perhaps also better than\nnothing, and meanwhile the good months are sure to bring the final\nrelief after which, \"when you and I behind the veil are passed, Oh, but\nthe long, long time the world shall last!\" etc., etc. Rather gloomy\nmoralizing, this, to end an affectionate family letter with; but the\ncircumstances seem to justify it, and I know that you won't take it\namiss.\n\nAlice is staying with Henry, but they will both be here in a fortnight\nor less. I find it pretty lonely all by myself, and the German language\ndoesn't run as trippingly off the tongue as it did forty years ago.\nPassage back is taken for August 12th....\n\nWell, I must stop! Pray give my love to Selma, the faithful one. Also to\nFanny, Harold, and Friedel. With Harold's engagement you are more and\nmore of a patriarch. Heaven keep you, dear Henry.\n\nBelieve me, ever your affectionately sympathetic old friend,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Fran\u00e7ois Pillon._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _June 8, 1910_.\n\nMY DEAR PILLON,--I have your good letter of the 4th--which I finally had\nto take a magnifying-glass to read (!)--and remained full of admiration\nfor the nervous centres which, after 80 years of work, could still guide\nthe fingers to execute, without slipping or trembling, that masterpiece\nof microscopic calligraphy! Truly your nervous centres are \"well\npreserved\"--the optical ones also, in spite of the cataracts and loss of\naccommodation! How proud I should be if now, at the comparatively\nyouthful age of 68, I could flatter _myself_ with the hope of doing what\nyou have done, and living down victoriously twelve more devouring\nenemies of years! With a fresh volume produced, to mark each year by! I\ngive you leave, as a garland and reward, to misinterpret my doctrine of\ntruth _ad libitum_ and to your heart's content, in all your future\nwritings. I will never think the worse of you for it.\n\nWhat you say of dear Madame Pillon awakens in me very different\nfeelings. She has led, indeed, a life of suffering for many years, and\nit seems to me a real tragedy that she should now be confined to the\nhouse so absolutely. If only you might inhabit the country, where, on\nfine days, with no stairs to mount or descend, she could sit with\nflowers and trees around her! The city is not good when one is confined\nto one's apartment. Pray give Madame Pillon my sincerest love--I never\nthink of her without affection--I am almost ashamed to accept year after\nyear your \"Ann\u00e9e Philosophique,\" and to give you so little in return for\nit. I am expecting my wife and brother to arrive here from England this\nafternoon, and we shall _probably_ all return together through Paris, by\nthe middle of July. I will then come and see you, with the wife, so\nplease keep the \"Ann\u00e9e\" till then, and put it into my hands. I can read\nnothing serious here--the baths destroy one's strength so. Whether they\nwill do any good to my circulatory organs remains to be seen--there is\nno good effect perceptible so far. Believe me, dear old friend, with\nevery message of affection to you both, yours ever faithfully,\n\nWm. James.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe letters which follow concern Henry Adams's \"Letter to American\nTeachers,\" originally printed for private circulation, but recently\npublished, with a preface by Mr. Brooks Adams, under the title: \"The\nDegradation of Democratic Dogma.\"\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry Adams._\n\n\nBAD-NAUHEIM, _June 17, 1910_.\n\nDEAR HENRY ADAMS,--I have been so \"slim\" since seeing you, and the baths\nhere have so weakened my brain, that I have been unable to do any\nreading except trash, and have only just got round to finishing your\n\"letter,\" which I had but half-read when I was with you at Paris. To\ntell the truth, it doesn't impress me at all, save by its wit and\nerudition; and I ask you whether an old man soon about to meet his Maker\ncan hope to save himself from the consequences of his life by pointing\nto the wit and learning he has shown in treating a tragic subject. No,\nsir, you can't do it, can't impress God in that way. So far as our\nscientific conceptions go, it may be admitted that your Creator (and\nmine) started the universe with a certain amount of \"energy\" latent in\nit, and decreed that everything that should happen thereafter should be\na result of parts of that energy falling to lower levels; raising other\nparts higher, to be sure, in so doing, but never in equivalent amount,\nowing to the constant radiation of unrecoverable warmth incidental to\nthe process. It is customary for gentlemen to pretend to believe one\nanother, and until some one hits upon a newer revolutionary concept\n(which may be tomorrow) all physicists must play the game by holding\nreligiously to the above doctrine. It involves of course the ultimate\ncessation of all perceptible happening, and the end of human history.\nWith this general conception as _surrounding_ everything you say in your\n\"letter,\" no one can find any fault--in the present stage of scientific\nconventions and fashions. But I protest against your interpretation of\nsome of the specifications of the great statistical drift downwards of\nthe original high-level energy. If, instead of criticizing what you seem\nto me to say, I express my own interpretation dogmatically, and leave\nyou to make the comparison, it will doubtless conduce to brevity and\neconomize recrimination.\n\nTo begin with, the _amount_ of cosmic energy it costs to buy a certain\ndistribution of fact which humanly we regard as precious, seems to me to\nbe an altogether secondary matter as regards the question of history and\nprogress. Certain arrangements of matter _on the same energy-level_ are,\nfrom the point of view of man's appreciation, superior, while others are\ninferior. Physically a dinosaur's brain may show as much intensity of\nenergy-exchange as a man's, but it can do infinitely fewer things,\nbecause as a force of detent it can only unlock the dinosaur's muscles,\nwhile the man's brain, by unlocking far feebler muscles, indirectly can\nby their means issue proclamations, write books, describe Chartres\nCathedral, etc., and guide the energies of the shrinking sun into\nchannels which never would have been entered otherwise--in short, _make_\nhistory. Therefore the man's brain and muscles are, from the point of\nview of the historian, the more important place of energy-exchange,\nsmall as this may be when measured in absolute physical units.\n\nThe \"second law\" is wholly irrelevant to \"history\"--save that it sets a\nterminus--for history is the course of things before that terminus, and\nall that the second law says is that, whatever the history, it must\ninvest itself between that initial maximum and that terminal minimum of\ndifference in energy-level. As the great irrigation-reservoir empties\nitself, the whole question for us is that of the distribution of its\neffects, of _which_ rills to guide it into; and the size of the rills\nhas nothing to do with their significance. Human cerebration is the most\nimportant rill we know of, and both the \"capacity\" and the \"intensity\"\nfactor thereof may be treated as infinitesimal. Yet the filling of such\nrills would be cheaply bought by the waste of whole sums spent in\ngetting a little of the down-flowing torrent to enter them. Just so of\nhuman institutions--their value has in strict theory nothing whatever to\ndo with their energy-budget--being wholly a question of the form the\nenergy flows through. Though the _ultimate_ state of the universe may be\nits vital and psychical extinction, there is nothing in physics to\ninterfere with the hypothesis that the penultimate state might be the\nmillennium--in other words a state in which a minimum of difference of\nenergy-level might have its exchanges so skillfully _canalis\u00e9s_ that a\nmaximum of happy and virtuous consciousness would be the only result. In\nshort, the last expiring pulsation of the universe's life might be, \"I\nam so happy and perfect that I can stand it no longer.\" You don't\nbelieve this and I don't say I do. But I can find nothing in \"Energetik\"\nto conflict with its possibility. You seem to me not to discriminate,\nbut to treat quantity and distribution of energy as if they formed one\nquestion.\n\nThere! that's pretty good for a brain after 18 Nauheim baths--so I won't\nwrite another line, nor ask you to reply to me. In case you can't help\ndoing so, however, I will gratify you now by saying that I probably\nwon't jaw back.--It was pleasant at Paris to hear your identically\nunchanged and \"undegraded\" voice after so many years of loss of solar\nenergy. Yours ever truly,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n[Illustration: Facsimile of Post-card addressed to Henry Adams.]\n\n[Post-card]\n\nNAUHEIM, _June 19, 1910_.\n\nP. S. Another illustration of my meaning: The clock of the universe is\nrunning down, and by so doing makes the hands move. The energy absorbed\nby the hands and the _mechanical_ work they do is the same day after\nday, no matter how far the weights have descended from the position they\nwere originally wound up to. The _history_ which the hands perpetrate\nhas nothing to do with the _quantity_ of this work, but follows the\n_significance_ of the figures which they cover on the dial. If they move\nfrom O to XII, there is \"progress,\" if from XII to O, there is \"decay,\"\netc. etc.\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Henry Adams._\n\n\n[Post-card]\n\nCONSTANCE, _June 26, [1910]_.\n\nYours of the 20th, just arriving, pleases me by its docility of spirit\nand passive subjection to philosophic opinion. Never, never pretend to\nan opinion of your own! that way lies every annoyance and madness! You\ntempt me to offer you another illustration--that of the _hydraulic ram_\n(thrown back to me in an exam, as a \"hydraulic goat\" by an\ninsufficiently intelligent student). Let this arrangement of metal,\nplaced in the course of a brook, symbolize the machine of human life. It\nworks, clap, clap, clap, day and night, so long as the brook runs _at\nall_, and no matter how full the brook (which symbolizes the descending\ncosmic energy) may be, it works always to the same effect, of raising so\nmany kilogrammeters of water. What the _value_ of this work as history\nmay be, depends on the uses to which the water is put in the house which\nthe ram serves.\n\nW. J.\n\n\n\n\n_To Benjamin Paul Blood._\n\n\nCONSTANCE, _June 25, 1910_.\n\nMY DEAR BLOOD,--About the time you will receive this, you will also be\nsurprised by receiving the \"Hibbert Journal\" for July, with an article\nsigned by me, but written mainly by yourself.[88] Tired of waiting for\nyour final synthetic pronunciamento, and fearing I might be cut off ere\nit came, I took time by the forelock, and at the risk of making ducks\nand drakes of your thoughts, I resolved to save at any rate some of your\nrhetoric, and the result is what you see. Forgive! forgive! forgive! It\nwill at any rate have made you famous, for the circulation of the H. J.\nis choice, as well as large (12,000 or more, I'm told), and the print\nand paper the best ever yet, I seem to have lost the editor's letter, or\nI would send it to you. He wrote, in accepting the article in May, \"I\nhave already 40 articles accepted, and some of the writers threaten\nlawsuits for non-publication, yet such was the exquisite refreshment\nBlood's writing gave me, under the cataract of sawdust in which\neditorially I live, that I have this day sent the article to the\nprinter. Actions speak louder than words! Blood is simply _great_, and\nyou are to be thanked for having dug him out. L. P. JACKS.\" Of course\nI've used you for my own purposes, and probably misused you; but I'm\nsure you will feel more pleasure than pain, and perhaps write again in\nthe \"Hibbert\" to set yourself right. You're sure of being printed,\nwhatever you may send. How I wish that I too could write poetry, for\npluralism is in its _Sturm und Drang_ period, and verse is the only way\nto express certain things, I've just been taking the \"cure\" at Nauheim\nfor my unlucky heart--no results so far!\n\nSail for home again on August 12th. Address always Cambridge, Mass.;\nthings are forwarded. Warm regards, fellow pluralist. Yours ever,\n\nWm. James.\n\n\n\n\n_To Theodore Flournoy._\n\n\nGENEVA, _July 9, 1910_.\n\nDEAREST FLOURNOY,--Your two letters, of yesterday, and of July 4th sent\nto Nauheim, came this morning. I am sorry that the Nauheim one was not\nwritten earlier, since you had the trouble of writing it at all. I thank\nyou for all the considerateness you show--you understand entirely my\nsituation. My dyspnoea gets worse at an accelerated rate, and all I\ncare for now is to get home--doing _nothing_ on the way. It is partly a\nspasmodic phenomenon I am sure, for the aeration of my tissues, judging\nby the color of my lips, seems to be sufficient. I will leave Geneva now\nwithout seeing you again--better not come, unless just to shake hands\nwith my wife! Through all these years I have wished I might live nearer\nto you and see more of you and exchange more ideas, for we seem two men\nparticularly well _faits pour nous comprendre_. Particularly, now, as my\nown intellectual house-keeping has seemed on the point of working out\nsome good results, would it have been good to work out the less unworthy\nparts of it in your company. But that is impossible!--I doubt if I ever\ndo any more writing of a serious sort; and as I am able to look upon my\nlife rather lightly, I can truly say that \"I don't care\"--don't care in\nthe least pathetically or tragically, at any rate.--I hope that Ragacz\nwill be a success, or at any rate a wholesome way of passing the month,\nand that little by little you will reach your new equilibrium. Those\ndear daughters, at any rate, are something to live for--to show them\nItaly should be rejuvenating. I can write no more, my very dear old\nfriend, but only ask you to think of me as ever lovingly yours,\n\nW. J.\n\nAfter leaving Geneva James rested at Lamb House for a few days before\ngoing to Liverpool to embark. Walking, talking and writing had all\nbecome impossible or painful. The short northern route to Quebec was\nchosen for the home voyage. When he and Mrs. James and his brother Henry\nlanded there, they went straight to Chocorua. The afternoon light was\nfading from the familiar hills on August 19th, when the motor brought\nthem to the little house, and James sank into a chair beside the fire,\nand sobbed, \"It's so good to get home!\"\n\nA change for the worse occurred within forty-eight hours and the true\nsituation became apparent. The effort by which he had kept up a certain\ninterest in what was going on about him during the last weeks of his\njourney, and a certain semblance of strength, had spent itself. He had\nbeen clinging to life only in order to get home.\n\nDeath occurred without pain in the early afternoon of August 26th.\n\nHis body was taken to Cambridge, where there was a funeral service in\nthe College Chapel. After cremation, his ashes were placed beside the\ngraves of his parents in the Cambridge Cemetery.\n\n THE END\n\n\n\n\nAPPENDIXES\n\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX I\n\nTHREE CRITICISMS FOR STUDENTS\n\n\nIn his smaller classes, made up of advanced students, James found it\npossible to comment in detail on the work of individuals. Three letters\nhave come into the hands of the editor, from which extracts may be taken\nto illustrate such comments. They were written for persons with whom he\ncould communicate only by letter, and are extended enough to suggest the\n_viva voce_ comments which many a student recalls, but of which there is\nno record. The first is from a letter to a former pupil and refers to\nwork of Bertrand Russell and others which the pupil was studying at the\ntime. The second and third comment on manuscripts that had been prepared\nas \"theses\" and had been submitted to James for unofficial criticism.\nThey exhibit him, characteristically, as encouraging the student to\nformulate something more positive.\n\n\n_Jan. 26, 1908._\n\nThose propositions or supposals which [Russell, Moore and Meinong] make\nthe exclusive vehicles of truth are mongrel curs that have no real place\nbetween realities on the one hand and beliefs on the other. The\nnegative, disjunctive and hypothetic truths which they so conveniently\nexpress can all, perfectly well (so far as I see), be translated into\nrelations between beliefs and positive realities. \"Propositions\" are\nexpressly devised for quibbling between realities and beliefs. They seem\nto have the objectivity of the one and the subjectivity of the other,\nand he who uses them can straddle as he likes, owing to the ambiguity of\nthe word _that_, which is essential to them. \"_That_ C\u00e6sar existed\" is\n\"true,\" sometimes means the _fact that_ be existed is real, sometimes\nthe _belief that_ he existed is true. You can get no honest discussion\nout of such terms....\n\n\n_Aug. 15, 1908._\n\nDear K----, ...[I have] read your thesis once through. I only finished\nit yesterday. It is a big effort, hard to grasp at a single reading,\nand I'm too lazy to go over it a second time in its present physically\ninconvenient shape. It is obvious that parts of it have been written\nrapidly and not boiled down; and my impression is that you have left\nover in it too much of the complication of form in which our ideas, our\ncritical ideas especially, first come to us, and which has, with much\nrewriting, to be straightened out. You were dealing with dialecticians\nand logic-choppers, and you have met them on their own ground with a\nlogic-chopping even more diseased than theirs. So far as I can see, you\n_have_ met them, though your own expressions are often far from lucid\n(--result of haste?); but in some cases I doubt whether they themselves\nwould think that they were met at all. I fear a little that both Bradley\nand Royce will think that your _reductiones ad absurdum_ are too fine\nspun and ingenious to have real force. Too complicated, too complicated!\nis the verdict of my horse-like mind on much of this thesis. Your\ndefense will be, of course, that it is a thesis, and as such, expected\nto be barbaric. But then I point to the careless, hasty writing of much\nof it. You _must_ simplify yourself, if you hope to have any influence\nin print.\n\nThe writing becomes more careful and the style clearer, the moment you\ntackle Russell in the 6th part. And when you come to your own dogmatic\nstatement of your vision of things in the last 30 pages or so, I think\nthe thesis splendid, prophetic in tone and _very_ felicitous, often, in\nexpression. This is indeed the _philosophie de l'avenir_, and a dogmatic\nexpression of it will be far more effective than critical demolition of\nits alternatives. It will render that unnecessary if able enough. One\nwill simply _feel_ them to be diseased. My total impression is that the\ncritter K---- has a _really magnificent vision_ of the lay of the land\nin philosophy,--of the land of bondage, as well as of that of\npromise,--but that he has a tremendous lot of work to do yet in the way\nof getting himself into straight and effective literary shape. He has\n_elements_ of extraordinary literary power, but they are buried in much\nsand and shingle....\n\n\n_May. 26, 1900._\n\nDear Miss S----, I am a caitiff! I have left your essay on my poor self\nunanswered.... It is a great compliment to me to be taken so\nphilologically and importantly; and I must say that from the technical\npoint of view you may be proud of your production. I like greatly the\nobjective and dispassionate key in which you keep everything, and the\nnumber of subdivisions and articulations which you make gives me\nvertiginous admiration. Nevertheless, the tragic fact remains that I\ndon't feel wounded at all by all that output of ability, and for reasons\nwhich I think I can set down briefly enough. It all comes, in my eyes,\nfrom too much philological method--as a Ph.D. thesis your essay is\nsupreme, but why don't you go farther? You take utterances of mine\nwritten at different dates, for different audiences belonging to\ndifferent universes of discourse, and string them together as the\nabstract elements of a total philosophy which you then show to be\ninwardly incoherent. This is splendid philology, but is it live\ncriticism of anyone's _Weltanschauung_? Your use of the method only\nstrengthens the impression I have got from reading criticisms of my\n\"pragmatic\" account of \"truth,\" that the whole Ph.D. industry of\nbuilding up an author's meaning out of separate texts leads nowhere,\nunless you have first grasped his centre of vision, by an act of\nimagination. That, it seems to me, you lack in my case.\n\nFor instance: [Seven examples are next dealt with in two and a half\npages of type-writing. These pages are omitted.]\n\n...I have been unpardonably long; and if you were a man, I should\nassuredly not expect to influence you a jot by what I write. Being a\nwoman, there may be yet a gleam of hope!--which may serve as the excuse\nfor my prolixity. (It is not for the likes of _you_, however, to hurl\naccusations of prolixity!) Now if I may presume to give a word of advice\nto one so much more accomplished than myself in dialectic technique, may\nI urge, since you have shown what a superb mistress you are in that\ndifficult art of discriminating abstractions and opposing them to each\nother one by one, since in short there is no university extant that\nwouldn't give you its _summa cum laude_,--I should certainly so reward\nyour thesis at Harvard,--may I urge, I say, that you should now turn\nyour back upon that academic sort of artificiality altogether, and\ndevote your great talents to the study of reality in its concreteness?\nIn other words, do some _positive_ work at the problem of what truth\nsignifies, substitute a definitive alternative for the humanism which I\npresent, as the latter's substitute. Not by proving their inward\nincoherence does one refute philosophies--every human being is\nincoherent--but only by superseding them by other philosophies more\nsatisfactory. Your wonderful technical skill ought to serve you in good\nstead if you would exchange the philological kind of criticism for\nconstructive work. I fear however that you won't--the iron may have\nbitten too deeply into your soul!!\n\nHave you seen Knox's paper on pragmatism in the \"Quarterly Review\" for\nApril--perhaps the deepest-cutting thing yet written on the pragmatist\nside? On the other side read Bertrand Russell's paper in the \"Edinburgh\nReview\" just out. A thing after your own heart, but ruined in my eyes by\nthe same kind of vicious abstractionism which your thesis shows. It is\namusing to see the critics of the will to believe furnish such exquisite\ninstances of it in their own persons. _E.g._, Russell's own splendid\natheistic-titanic confession of faith in that volume of essays on\n\"Ideals of Science and of Faith\" edited by one Hand. X----, whom you\nquote, has recently worked himself up to the pass of being ordained in\nthe Episcopal church.... I justify them both; for only by such\nexperiments on the part of individuals will social man gain the evidence\nrequired. They meanwhile seem to think that the only \"true\" position to\nhold is that everything not imposed upon a will-less and non-co\u00f6perant\nintellect must count as false--a preposterous principle which no human\nbeing follows in real life.\n\nWell! There! that is all! But, dear Madam, I should like to know where\nyou come from, who you are, what your present \"situation\" is, etc.,\netc.--It is natural to have some personal curiosity about a lady who has\ntaken such an extraordinary amount of pains for me!\n\nBelieve me, dear Miss S----, with renewed apologies for the extreme\ntardiness of this acknowledgment, yours with mingled admiration and\nabhorrence,\n\nWM. JAMES.\n\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX II\n\nBOOKS BY WILLIAM JAMES\n\n\nThe following chronological list includes books only, but it gives the\nessays and chapters contained in each.\n\nProfessor R. B. Perry's \"Bibliography\" (see below) lists a great number\nof contributions to periodicals, which have never been reprinted, and\nincludes notes indicative of the matter of each.\n\n(No attempt has been made to compile a list of references to literature\nabout William James, but the following may be mentioned as easily\nobtainable: _William James_, by \u00c9MILE BOUTROUX. Paris, 1911.\nTranslation: Longmans, Green & Co., New York and London, 1912. _La\nPhilosophie de William James_, by THEODORE FLOURNOY. St. Blaise, 1911.\nTranslation: _The Philosophy of William James._ Henry Holt & Co., New\nYork, 1917.)\n\n\n _Literary Remains of Henry James, Sr._, with an Introduction by\n WILLIAM JAMES. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1884.\n\n _The Principles of Psychology._ New York: Henry Holt & Co.; London:\n Macmillan & Co., 1890.\n\n _Volume I._ Scope of Psychology--Functions of the Brain--Conditions\n of Brain Activity--Habit--The Automaton Theory--The Mind-Stuff\n Theory--Methods and Snares of Psychology--Relations of Minds to\n Other Things--The Stream of Thought--The Consciousness of\n Self--Attention--Conception--Discrimination and\n Comparison--Association--The Perception of Time--Memory.\n\n _Volume II._ Sensation--Imagination--Perception of Things--The\n Perception of Space--The Perception of Reality--Reasoning--The\n Production of Movement--Instinct--The\n Emotions--Will--Hypnotism--Necessary Truth and the Effects of\n Experience.\n\n _A Text-Book of Psychology._ Briefer Course. New York: Henry Holt &\n Co.; London: Macmillan & Co., 1892.\n\n Introductory--Sensation--Sight--Hearing--Touch--Sensations of\n Motion--Structure of the Brain--Functions of the Brain--Some\n General Conditions of Neural Activity--Habit--Stream of\n Consciousness--The\n Self--Attention--Conception--Discrimination--Association--Sense of\n Time--Memory--Imagination--Perception--The Perception of\n Space--Reasoning--Consciousness and\n Movement--Emotion--Instinct--Will--Psychology and Philosophy.\n\n _The Will to Believe, and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy._ New\n York and London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1897.\n\n The Will to Believe--Is Life Worth Living?--The Sentiment of\n Rationality--Reflex Action and Theism--The Dilemma of\n Determinism--The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life--Great Men\n and their Environment--The Importance of Individuals--On Some\n Hegelisms--What Psychical Research has Accomplished.\n\n _Human Immortality, Two Supposed Objections to the Doctrine._\n London: Constable & Co., also Dent & Sons; Boston: Houghton,\n Mifflin & Co., 1898.\n\n _The Same._ A New Edition with Preface in Reply to His Critics.\n Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1899.\n\n _Talks to Teachers on Psychology, and to Students on Some of Life's\n Ideals._ New York: Henry Holt & Co.; London: Longmans, Green & Co.,\n 1899.\n\n Psychology and the Teaching Art--The Stream of Consciousness--The\n Child as a Behaving Organism--Education and Behavior--The Necessity\n of Reactions--Native and Acquired Reactions--What the Native\n Reactions Are--The Laws of Habit--Association of\n Ideas--Interest--Attention--Memory--Acquisition of\n Ideas--Apperception--The Will.\n\n Talks to Students: The Gospel of Relaxation--On a Certain Blindness\n in Human Beings--What Makes Life Significant?\n\n _The Varieties of Religious Experience._ A Study in Human Nature.\n The Gifford Lectures on Natural Religion, Edinburgh, 1901-1902. New\n York and London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1902.\n\n Religion and Neurology--Circumscription of the Topic--The Reality\n of the Unseen--The Religion of Healthy-Mindedness--The Sick\n Soul--The Divided Self, and the Process of its\n Unification--Conversion--Saintliness--The Value of\n Saintliness--Mysticism--Philosophy--Other\n Characteristics--Conclusions--Postscript.\n\n _Pragmatism._ A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking. New York\n and London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1907.\n\n The Present Dilemma in Philosophy--What Pragmatism Means--Some\n Metaphysical Problems Pragmatically Considered--The One and the\n Many--Pragmatism and Common Sense--Pragmatism's Conception of\n Truth--Pragmatism and Humanism--Pragmatism and Religion.\n\n _A Pluralistic Universe._ Hibbert Lectures at Manchester College.\n New York and London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1909.\n\n The Types of Philosophic Thinking--Monistic Idealism--Hegel and his\n Method--Concerning Fechner--Compounding of Consciousness--Bergson\n and his Critique of Intellectualism--The Continuity of\n Experience--Conclusions---- Appendixes: _A._ The Thing and its\n Relations. _B._ The Experience of Activity. _C._ On the Notion of\n Reality as Changing.\n\n _The Meaning of Truth._ A Sequel to _Pragmatism_. New York and\n London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1909.\n\n The Function of Cognition--The Tigers in India--Humanism and\n Truth--The Relation between Knower and Known--The Essence of\n Humanism--A Word More about Truth--Professor Pratt on Truth--The\n Pragmatist Account of Truth and its Misunderstanders--The Meaning\n of the Word Truth--The Existence of Julius C\u00e6sar--The Absolute and\n the Strenuous Life--H\u00e9bert on Pragmatism--Abstractionism and\n \"Relativismus\"--Two English Critics--A Dialogue.\n\n _Some Problems of Philosophy._ A Beginning of an Introduction to\n Philosophy. New York and London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1911.\n\n Philosophy and its Critics--The Problems of Metaphysics--The\n Problem of Being--Percept and Concept--The One and the Many--The\n Problem of Novelty--Novelty and the Infinite--Novelty and\n Causation---- Appendix: Faith and the Right to Believe.\n\n _Memories and Studies._ New York and London: Longmans, Green & Co.,\n 1911.\n\n Louis Agassiz--Address at the Emerson Centenary in Concord--Robert\n Gould Shaw--Francis Boott--Thomas Davidson--Herbert Spencer's\n Autobiography--Frederick Myers's Services to Psychology--Final\n Impressions of a Psychical Researcher--On Some Mental Effects of\n the Earthquake--The Energies of Men--The Moral Equivalent of\n War--Remarks at the Peace Banquet--The Social Value of the\n College-bred--The Ph.D. Octopus--The True Harvard--Stanford's Ideal\n Destiny--A Pluralistic Mystic (B. P. Blood).\n\n _Essays in Radical Empiricism._ Edited by RALPH BARTON PERRY. New\n York and London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1912.\n\n Introduction--Does Consciousness Exist?--A World of Pure\n Experience--The Thing and its Relations--How Two Minds can Know One\n Thing--The Place of Affectional Facts in a World of Pure\n Experience--The Experience of Activity--The Essence of\n Humanism--_La Notion de Conscience_--Is Radical Empiricism\n Solipsistic?--Mr. Pitkin's Refutation of Radical\n Empiricism--Humanism and Truth Once More--Absolutism and\n Empiricism.\n\n _Collected Essays and Reviews._ Edited by _Ralph Barton Perry_. New\n York and London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1920.\n\n Review of E. Sargent's _Planchette_ (1869)--Review of G. H. Lewes's\n _Problems of Life and Mind_ (1875)--Review entitled \"German\n Pessimism\" (1875)--Chauncey Wright (1875)--Review of \"Bain and\n Renouvier\" (1876)--Review of Renan's _Dialogues_ (1876)--Review of\n G. H. Lewes's _Physical Basis of Mind_ (1877)--Remarks on Spencer's\n Definition of Mind as Correspondence (1878)--Quelques\n Consid\u00e9rations sur la M\u00e9thode Subjective (1878)--The Sentiment of\n Rationality (1879)--Review (unsigned) of W. K. Clifford's _Lectures\n and Essays_ (1879)--Review of Herbert Spencer's _Data of Ethics_\n (1879)--The Feeling of Effort (1880)--The Sense of Dizziness in\n Deaf Mutes (1882)--What is an Emotion? (1884)--Review of Royce's\n _The Religious Aspect of Philosophy_ (1885)--The Consciousness of\n Lost Limbs (1887)--R\u00e9ponse de W. James aux Remarques de M.\n Renouvier sur sa th\u00e9orie de la volont\u00e9 (1888)--The Psychological\n Theory of Extension (1889)--A Plea for Psychology as a Natural\n Science (1892)--The Original Datum of Space Consciousness\n (1893)--Mr. Bradley on Immediate Resemblance (1893)--Immediate\n Resemblance--Review of G. T. Ladd's _Psychology_ (1894)--The\n Physical Basis of Emotion (1894)--The Knowing of Things Together\n (1895)--Review of W. Hirsch's _Genie und Entartung_\n (1895)--Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results\n (1898)--Review of R. Hodgson's _A Further Record of Observations of\n Certain Phenomena of Trance_ (1898)--Review of Sturt's _Personal\n Idealism_ (1903)--The Chicago School (1904)--Review of F. C. S.\n Schiller's _Humanism_ (1904)--Laura Bridgman (1904)--G. Papini and\n the Pragmatist Movement in Italy (1906)--The Mad Absolute\n (1906)--Controversy about Truth with John E. Russell (1907)--Report\n on Mrs. Piper's Hodgson Control; Conclusion (1909)--Bradley or\n Bergson? (1910)--A Suggestion about Mysticism (1910).\n\n\n _A List of the Published Writings of William James_, with notes,\n and an index; by RALPH BARTON PERRY. New York and London: Longmans,\n Green & Co., 1920.\n\n\n\n\nINDEX\n\nTHROUGHOUT the index the initial =J.= stands for William James. In the\nlist of references to his own writings, arranged alphabetically at the\nend of the entries under his name, the titles of separate papers are set\nin roman and quoted, those of volumes in italics.\n\nThe words \"See Contents\" under a name indicate that letters addressed to\nthe person in question are to be sought in the Table of Contents, where\nall letters are listed.\n\n\nAbauzit, F., =1=, 145, =2=, 185.\n\nAbbot, F. E., _Scientific Theism_, =1=, 247.\n\nAbsolute, Philosophy of the, =1=, 238.\n\nAbsolute Unity, =1=, 231.\n\nAcad\u00e9mie Fran\u00e7aise, =2=, 338.\n\nAcad\u00e9mie des Sciences Morales, et Politiques, =J.= a corresponding\n member of, =2=, 75;\n =J.= an _associ\u00e9 \u00e9tranger_ of, 328, 319, 338.\n\nAdams, Brooks, =2=, 343.\n\nAdams, Henry, _Letter to American Teachers_, =2=, 343 _ff._;\n mentioned, 10. _See Contents._\n\nAdirondack range, =1=, 194, 195.\n\nAdirondacks. _See_ Keene Valley.\n\nAdler, Waldo, =2=, 75, 76, 163.\n\n\u00c6sthetics, Study of, and Art, =2=, 87.\n\nAgassiz, Alexander, =1=, 31.\n\nAgassiz, Louis, =J.= joins his Brazilian expedition, =1=, 54 _ff._,\n =J.= quoted on, 55;\n quoted, on =J.=, 56;\n on the Brazilian expedition, 56, 57, 59, 61, 67, 68, 69;\n described by =J.=, 65, 66;\n centenary of, =2=, 287, 288;\n mentioned, =1=, 34, 35, 37, 4=2=, 47, 48, 72, =2=, 2.\n\nAgassiz, Mrs. Louis, her 80th birthday, =2=, 180 and _n._, 181;\n mentioned, =1=, 60, 65, 67. _See Contents_.\n\nAguinaldo, Emilio, =2=, 148.\n\nAlcott, A. Bronson, =1=, 18 _n._\n\nAllen, John A., =1=, 74.\n\nAmalfi, Sorrento to, =2=, 22=1=, 222.\n\nAmazon, the, Agassiz's expedition to. _See_ Brazil.\n\nAmerica, general aspect of the country, =1=, 346, 347 and _n._\n And _see_ United States.\n\nAmerican Philosophical Association, =2=, 163, 164, 300.\n\nAmericans, in Germany, =1=, 87.\n\nAngell, James R., =1=, 345, =2=, 14.\n\nAnglican Church, =2=, 305.\n\nAnglicanism and Romanism, =2=, 305.\n\nAnglophobia in U. S. revealed by Venezuela incident, =2=, 27, 31, 32.\n\nAnnunzio, Gabriele d', =2=, 63.\n\n\"Anti-pragmatisme,\" =2=, 319.\n\nAristotle, =1=, 283.\n\n_Aristotelian Society Proceedings_, =2=, 207.\n\nArnim, Gisela von. _See_ Grimm, Mrs. Herman.\n\nAshburner, Anne, =1=, 179, 181, 315.\n\nAshburner, Grace, =1=, 181, 315. _See Contents_.\n\nAshfield, annual dinner at, =2=, 199.\n\nAthens, =2=, 224, 225. And _see_ Parthenon, the.\n\nAtkinson, Charles, =1=, 35.\n\nAusable Lakes, =1=, 194.\n\nAustria, political conditions in (1867), =1=, 95.\n\nAvenarius, =2=, 301.\n\n\nBaginsky, Dr., =1=, 214.\n\nBain, Alexander, =1=, 143, 164.\n\nBakewell, Charles M., =2=, 14, 81, 85, 120, 248.\n\nBaldwin, James M., =2=, 20.\n\nBaldwin, William, =1=, 337.\n\nBalfour, A. J., _Foundations of Belief_, =2=, 20.\n\nBalzac, Honor\u00e9 de, =1=, 106, =2=, 265.\n\nBancroft, George, =1=, 107, 109.\n\nBancroft, Mrs. George, =1=, 135.\n\nBancroft, John C., =1=, 70.\n\nBaring Bros., =1=, 73.\n\nBarber, Catherine, marries William James I, =1=, 4;\n her ancestry, 4 and _n._\n And _see_ James, Mrs. Catherine (Barber).\n\nBarber, Francis, =1=, 5.\n\nBarber, Jannet, =1=, 4 _n._\n\nBarber, John, =J.='s great-grandfather, in the Revolutionary army,\n =1=, 4 and _n._;\n H. James, Senior, on, 5.\n\nBarber, Mrs. John, =1=, 5.\n\nBarber, Patrick, =1=, 4 _n._\n\nBarber family, the, =1=, 4, 5.\n\nBashkirtseff, Marie, Diary of, =1=, 307, =2=, 148.\n\nBastien-Lepage, Jules, =1=, 210 and _n._\n\n\"Bay.\" _See_ Emmet, Ellen.\n\nBayard, Thomas F., =2=, 27 _n._\n\nBeers, Clifford W., _A Mind that Found Itself_, =2=, 273, 274 and _n._\n _See Contents_.\n\nBeethoven, Ludwig von, _Fidelio_, =1=, 112.\n\nBelgium, philosophers in, =1=, 216.\n\nBenn, A. W., =1=, 333, 334.\n\nBerenson, Bernhard, =2=, 138.\n\nBergson, Henri, _Mati\u00e8re et M\u00e9moire_, =2=, 178, 179;\n his system, 179;\n =J.='s enthusiasm for, 179, 180 _n._;\n _L'Evolution Cr\u00e9atrice_, 290 _ff._;\n _Le Rire_, 329;\n mentioned, 17=2=, 226, 257, 314, 315.\n _See Contents._\n\nBerkeley, Sir W., _Principles_, =2=, 179.\n\nBerlin, =1=, 100, 105, 106, 11=2=, 122.\n\nBerlin, University of, =1=, 118, 120, 121.\n\nBernard, Claude, =1=, 72, 156.\n\nBhagavat-Gita, the, =2=, 238.\n\nBible, the, and orthodox theology, =2=, 196.\n\nBielshowski, A., _Life of Goethe_, =2=, 262.\n\nBigelow, Henry J., =1=, 72.\n\nBigelow, W., Sturgis, =2=, 10.\n\nBirukoff, _Life of Tolstoy_, =2=, 262.\n\nBlack, W., _Strange Adventures of a Phaeton_, =1=, 173.\n\nBlood, Benjamin Paul, _The Flaw in Supremacy_, =2=, 39;\n J.'s article on, in _Hibbert Journal_, 39 _n._, 347, 348;\n his _An\u00e6sthetic Revolution_ reviewed by =J.=, 40 and _n._;\n his strictures on =J.='s English, 59;\n mentioned, 22, 338, 339.\n _See Contents._\n\nB\u00f4cher, Ferdinand, =1=, 337.\n\nBoer War, the, =2=, 118, 140.\n\nBonn-am-Rhein, =1=, 20.\n\nBoott, Elizabeth (Mrs. Frank Duveneck), =1=, 153, 155.\n\nBoott, Francis, J.'s commemorative address on, =1=, 153;\n mentioned, 155, 341 _n._, =2=, 191.\n _See Contents._\n\nBornemann, Fra\u00fclein, =1=, 116, 135.\n\nBosanquet, B., quoted, =2=, 126.\n\nBoston _Journal_, =2=, 329.\n\nBoston _Transcript_, J.'s letter to, on Medical License bill, =2=, 68-70;\n 72 and _n._, 124, 125.\n\nBoulogne, Coll\u00e8ge de, =1=, 20.\n\nBourget, Paul, _Idylle Tragique_, =2=, 37;\n and Tolstoy, 37, 38;\n mentioned, =1=, 348.\n\nBourget, Mme. Paul, =1=, 348.\n\nBourkhardt, James, =1=, 64, 70.\n\nBourne, Ansel, =1=, 294.\n\nBoutroux, \u00c9mile, =2=, 314, 33=2=, 335, 337, 338.\n\nBowditch, Henry I., =1=, 124.\n\nBowditch, Henry P., =1=, 7=1=, 10=2=, 138, 139, 149, 167, 169, 195.\n _See Contents._\n\nBowen, Francis, =1=, 53.\n\nBoyd, Harriet A. (Mrs. C. H. Hawes), =2=, 223, 224.\n\nBradley, Francis H., _Logic_, =1=, 258;\n mentioned, =2=, 142, 208, 216, 271, 272, 281, 282.\n\nBrazil, Agassiz's expedition to, =1=, 54 _ff._;\n letters written by =J.=, 56-70;\n recalled, on Mrs. Agassiz's 80th birthday, =2=, 181.\n\nBrazilians, the, =1=, 59, 66.\n\nBrighton (England) Aquarium, =1=, 287.\n\nBritish Guiana, =2=, 26.\n\nBritish intellectuality, =1=, 270.\n\nBrown-S\u00e9quard, Charles E., =1=, 71.\n\nBrowning, Robert, \"A Grammarian's Funeral,\" =1=, 129, 130;\n mentioned, =2=, 123.\n\nBruno, Giordano, inscription on statue of, =2=, 139,\n\nBryce, James, =1=, 303, 345, =2=, 65, 298, 299.\n\nBryce, Mrs. James, =2=, 298, 299.\n\nBryn Mawr College, =2=, 120, 121.\n\nBull, Mrs. Ole, =2=, 144.\n\nBunch, a dog, =1=, 183.\n\nBurkhardt, Jacob, _Renaissance in Italy_, =1=, 176.\n\nBusse, _Leib und Seele, Geist and K\u00f6rper_, =2=, 237 and _n._\n\nButler, Joseph, _Analogy_, =1=, 189.\n\nButler, Samuel, =1=, 283.\n\n\nCabot, J. Elliot, =1=, 204.\n\nCaird, Edward, =1=, 205, 305.\n\nCalifornia, impressions of, =2=, 82.\n\nCalifornia, Northern, =2=, 80.\n\nCalifornia, University of, =2=, 5.\n\nCalifornia Champagne, Gift of, =1=, 291.\n\nCanadian Pacific Ry., =2=, 80.\n\nCarlyle, \"Jenny,\" =2=, 192.\n\nCarlyle, Thomas, and H. James, Senior, compared, =1=, 241;\n mentioned, 220.\n\nCarnegie, Andrew, =2=, 18.\n\nCarpenter, William B., =1=, 143.\n\nCarqueiranne, Ch\u00e2teau de, =2=, 114.\n\nCarrington, Hereward, =2=, 327.\n\nCams, Karl G., =1=, 96.\n\nCasey, Silas, =1=, 155.\n\nCastle Malwood, =2=, 160.\n\nCatholic Church, =J.='s attitude toward, =1=, 296, 297.\n\nCatholics, \"concrete,\" differentiated from their church, =1=, 297.\n\nCattell, J. M., quoted, =1=, 300;\n mentioned, =2=, 32.\n\nCensus of Hallucinations in America, conducted by =J.=, =1=, 228,\n 229, =2=, 50.\n\nChamberlain, Joseph, =1=, 303.\n\nChambers, Dr., _Clinical Lectures_, =1=, 150.\n\nChanzy, Antoine E. A., =1=, 160.\n\nChapman, John J., _Practical Agitation_, =2=, 124;\n _Political Nursery_, 128;\n mentioned, 125, 329.\n _See Contents._\n\nChapman, Mrs. John J., =2=, 256.\n\nCharmes, Francis, =2=, 320.\n\nChatrian, L. G. C. A. _See_ Erckmann-Chatrian.\n\nChautauqua, =J.='s lectures at, and impressions of, =2=, 40 _ff._\n\nChesterton, Gilbert K., _Heretics_, =2=, 241, 260;\n mentioned, 257 and =n.=, 330.\n\nChicago, anarchist riot in, and English newspapers, =1=, 252.\n\nChicago University, School of Thought, =2=, 201, 202.\n\nChild, Francis J., death of, =2=, 52;\n mentioned, =1=, 51, 169, 195, 291, 315 and _n._, 317.\n _See Contents._\n\nChild, Mrs. F. J., =1=, 51, 197, =2=, 52.\n\nChocorua, =J.='s summer home at, =1=, 267, 268;\n life at, 271, 272;\n =J.='s life ends at, =2=, 350;\n =1=, 261, 323.\n\nChristian Scientists, and the Medical License bill, =2=, 68, 69.\n\nChristian Theology, position with reference to, =2=, 213, 214.\n\nClairvoyance. _See_ Psychic phenomena.\n\nClapar\u00e8de, Edward, =2=, 226, 227, 323.\n\nClark University, =2=, 327.\n\nClarke, Joseph Thatcher, =2=, 130.\n\nClemens, Samuel L. _See_ Twain, Mark.\n\nCleveland, Grover, his Venezuela Message, and its reaction on\n =J.=, =2=, 26 _ff._, 31, 32, 33, =2=, 285.\n\nClifford, W. K., =2=, 218.\n\nClub, the, =2=, 9, 10.\n\nColby, F. M., =2=, 264.\n\nCollier, Robert J. F., =2=, 264.\n\nColorado Springs, summer school at, =2=, 24.\n\nColumbia Faculty Club, =J.='s talks at, =2=, 265 and _n._\n\nColumbia University, =2=, 332.\n\nColumbus, Christopher, and Dr. Bowditch, =1=, 124.\n\nCommon sense, =2=, 198.\n\nConcord, Mass., Emerson centenary at, =2=, 194.\n\nConcord Summer School of Philosophy, =1=, 230, 255.\n\nCongress of the U. S., and the Spanish War, =2=, 73, 74.\n\nConiston, Ruskin Museum at, =2=, 306.\n\nContinent, the, and England, contrasts between, =2=, 152, 305.\n\nConversion, =2=, 57.\n\nCorreggio, Antonio de, his Shepherds' Adoration, =1=, 90;\n and Rafael, 90.\n\nCorruption, in Europe and America, =2=, 101.\n\nCourtelines, G., _Les Marionettes de la Vie_, =2=, 336.\n\nCourtier, M., =2=, 327.\n\nCousin, Victor, =1=, 117.\n\nCrafts, James W., =2=, 10.\n\nCranch, Christopher P., =1=, 131.\n\n_Critique Philosophique_, =1=, 188, 207.\n\nCrothers, Samuel M., =2=, 262.\n\nCuba, and the Spanish War, =2=, 73, 74.\n\n\nDanriac, Lionel, =2=, 45, 203.\n\nDante Alighieri, =1=, 331.\n\nDarwin, Charles R., =1=, 225.\n\nDarwin, Mrs. W. E. (Sara Sedgwick), =1=, 76, 179, =2=, 152.\n\nDarwin, William E., =2=, 152.\n\nDarwin, William Leonard, =2=, 276.\n\nDaudet, Alphonse, =2=, 168.\n\nDavidson. Thomas, =J.='s essay on, =2=, 107 _n._;\n =J.= lectures at his summer school, 197, 199;\n mentioned, =1=, 192, 202, 204, 249, 255, =2=, 156.\n _See Contents._\n\nDavis, Jefferson, =1=, 66, 67.\n\nDeath, reflections concerning, =2=, 154.\n\nDelboeuf, J., =1=, 216, 217.\n\nDemoniacal possession, =2=, 56, 57.\n\nDerby, Richard, =1=, 122.\n\nDescartes, Ren\u00e9 C., =1=, 188, =2=, 13.\n\nDeterminism, =1=, 245, 246.\n\nDewey, John, _Beliefs and Realities_, =2=, 245, 246;\n mentioned, 202, 257.\n _See Contents._\n\nDexter, Newton, =1=, 68, 73.\n\nDibblee, Anita, =2=, 82, 84.\n\nDibblee, B. H., =2=, 82.\n\nDibblee, Mrs., =2=, 82, 84.\n\nDickinson, G. Lowes, _Justice and Liberty_, =2=, 317, 318.\n\nDiderot, Denis, _OEuvres Choisis_, =1=, 106, 107;\n mentioned, 142.\n\nDilthey, W., =1=, 109, 110, 111.\n\nDivonne, =1=, 137, 138.\n\nDixwell, Epes S., =1=, 124.\n\nDixwell, Fanny, =1=, 76 and _n._\n And _see_ Holmes, Mrs. Fanny Dixwell.\n\nDooley, Mr. _See_ Dunne, Finley P.\n\nDorr, George B., =2=, 255.\n\nDorrs, the, =2=, 63.\n\nDresden, =1=, 86, 9=2=, 93, 104.\n\nDresden Gallery, =1=, 90.\n\nDreyfus Case, the, =2=, 89, 97 _ff._, 102.\n\nDriesch, Hans, _Gifford Lectures_, =2=, 323.\n\nDriver, Dr., =2=, 118.\n\nDu Bois, W. E. B., _The Souls of Black Folk_, =2=, 196 and _n._\n\nDu Bois-Raymond, Emil, =1=, 121.\n\nDudevant, Mme. Aurore. _See_ Sand, George.\n\nDu Maurier, George, _Peter Ibbetson_, =1=, 318.\n\nDunne, Finley P., =2=, 94, 264.\n\nDurham, =2=, 306, 307.\n\nDuveneck, Frank, =1=, 153, 337 and _n._, 341.\n\nDuveneck, Mrs. Frank. _See_ Boott, Elizabeth.\n\nDwight, Thomas, =1=, 97, 98, 122, 124, 165, 166, 170.\n\n\nEdinburgh, praise of, =2=, 146, 147, 150;\n social amenities in, 147, 148.\n\nEducation, importance of, =1=, 119.\n\nEliot, Charles W., quoted, on =J.= in Scientific School, =1=, 31, 32 and _n._;\n on J. Wyman, 47, 48;\n on courses given by =J.=, =2=, 4 _n._;\n mentioned, =1=, 35, 165, 166, 202, 262, =2=, 3, 15, 86, 137, 266.\n\nEliot, George, _Daniel Deronda_, =1=, 185.\n\nElliot, Gertrude, =2=, 263.\n\nElliot, John W., =2=, 129.\n\nElliot, Mrs. John W. (Mary Morse), =1=, 197, 199, =2=, 129.\n\nEllis, Rufus, =1=, 192.\n\nEmerson, Edward W., on H. James, Senior, =1=, 17, 18 and _n._;\n mentioned, 33.\n\nEmerson, Mary Moody, and H. James, Senior, =1=, 18 _n._\n\nEmerson, Ralph Waldo, letters of H. James, Senior, to, quoted, =1=, 11;\n centenary of, =2=, 187, 190, 193, 194 (=J.='s address at);\n \"the divine,\" 190, 191;\n his devotion to truth, 190;\n _Representative Men_, 192, 193;\n and Santayana, 234, 235;\n mentioned, =1=, 9, 18 _n._, 125, =2=, 23, 196, 197.\n\nEmmet, Ellen, =1=, 316, =2=, 61, 82, 83, 84.\n _See Contents._\n\nEmmet, Mrs. Temple (Ellen Temple), =2=, 64.\n\nEmmet, Rosina H., =2=, 38, 61, 62, 64.\n _See Contents._\n\nEmmet, Temple, =2=, 61.\n\nEmpiricism, =1=, 152. And _see_ Radical Empiricism.\n\nEngland, in 1871, =1=, 161;\n gardens in, 288;\n impressions of, in 1901, =2=, 152;\n contrasted with Continental countries, 152, 305;\n and the U. S., 304, 305;\n changes in, 307;\n high state of civilization in, 307, 308.\n\nEnglish, in Germany, =1=, 87.\n\nEnglish language, the teaching of the, =1=, 341.\n\nEnglish newspapers, and the anarchist riot in Chicago, =1=, 252;\n attitude of, on Venezuela Message, =2=, 33;\n mentioned, 125, 126.\n\nEnglish people, one aspect of the greatness of, =1=, 288.\n\nEnglish social and political system, =1=, 232, 233.\n\nErb, Dr., =2=, 128.\n\nErckmann (\u00c9mile)-Chatrian (L. G. C. A.), _L'Ami Fritz_, =1=, 101;\n _Les Confessions d'un Joueur de Clarinette_, 101;\n _Histoire d'un Sous-Ma\u00eetre_, 162;\n mentioned, 106, 136.\n\nErdmann, Johann E., =1=, 345.\n\nErie Canal, the, =1=, 3.\n\n_Essays Philosophical and Philological in Honor of William\n James_, =2=, 309, 310.\n\nEsterhazy M. (Dreyfus case), =2=, 98, 100.\n\nEvans, Mrs. Glendower. _See Contents._\n\nEvans, Mary Anne. _See_ Eliot, George.\n\nEverett, Charles Carroll, =1=, 202, =2=, 156.\n\nEverett, William, =1=, 51.\n\nExperience, The philosophy of, =2=, 184, 185, 187.\n\n\nFaidherbe, Louis L. C., =1=, 160.\n\nFairchild, Sally, =2=, 205.\n\nFaith-curers, and the Medical License bill, =2=, 68, 69, 70, 71.\n\nFarlow, William G., =1=, 71.\n\nFechner, Gustav T., _Zend-Avesta_, =2=, 300, 309;\n mentioned, =1=, 160, =2=, 269, 318.\n\nFichte, Johann G., =1=, 141, =2=, 293.\n\nField, Kate, _Washington_, =1=, 308.\n\n_Figaro_, =2=, 97, 99.\n\nFischer, Kuno, Essay on Lessing's _Nathan der Weise_, =1=, 94;\n _Hegel's Leben, Werke und Lehre_, =2=, 134, 135, 138.\n\nFiske, John, death of, =2=, 156, 157;\n _Cosmic Philosophy_, =2=, 233;\n mentioned, =1=, 347, =2=, 10.\n\nFitz, Reginald H., =1=, 162.\n\nFlaubert, Gustave, _Madame Bovary_, =2=, 291;\n mentioned, =1=, 182.\n\nFletcher, Horace, =2=, 254.\n\nFlint, Austin, =1=, 167.\n\nFlorence, Boboli Garden, =1=, 177; 180, 181, 328 _ff._, 340, 342.\n\nFlournoy, Theodore, _William James_, =1=, 145 and _n._;\n beginnings of =J.='s friendship with, 320;\n _M\u00e9taphysique et Psychologie_, =2=, 25;\n on religious psychology, 185;\n reviews Myers's _Human Personality_, 185;\n lectures on pragmatism, 267;\n mentioned, 129, 172, 180 _n._, 227, 228, 315.\n His children referred to:\n Alice, =2=, 129, 241, 242;\n Ariane-Doroth\u00e9e, 129;\n Henri, 186, 187;\n Marguerite, 129.\n _See Contents._\n\nFlournoy, Mme. Theodore, =1=, 325, 326, =2=, 23, 25, 46,\n 48, 53, 55, 129, 187, 310, 313.\n\nFoote, Henry W., =1=, 111, 112, 113, 153.\n\nForbes, W. Cameron, =2=, 297. _See Contents._\n\nForbes-Robertson, J., =2=, 263.\n\nFouill\u00e9e, Alfred, Renouvier's articles on, =1=, 231;\n mentioned, 324.\n\nFrance, and Prussia (1867), =1=, 95;\n religious and revolutionary parties in, 161, 162;\n influence of Catholic education in, 162;\n and the Dreyfus case, =2=, 89;\n decadence of, 105, 106.\n\nFrance, Anatole, =2=, 63.\n\nFrancis of Assisi, St., =2=, 142.\n\nFrancis Joseph, Emperor, =1=, 88.\n\nFranco-Prussian War, =J.='s views on, =1=, 159, 160, 161.\n\nFrazer, J. G., =2=, 139.\n\nFree will, influence on =J.= of Renouvier's writings on, =1=, 147, 164,\n 165, 169;\n and determinism, 186;\n S. H, Hodgson's paper on, 244, 245.\n\nFrench language, =1=, 341.\n\nFreud, Sigmund, =2=, 327, 328.\n\n\nGalileo, =2=, 1 =n.=\n\nGalileo anniversary at Padua, =1=, 333.\n\nGardiner, H. N., =2=, 163. _See Contents._\n\nGardner, Mrs. John L., =2=, 205.\n\nGaribaldi, statue of, =2=, 139.\n\nGautier, Th\u00e9ophile, =1=, 106.\n\nGeneva, \"Academy\" of, =1=, 20, =2=, 187;\n Museum at, 21.\n\nGerman art, =1=, 105.\n\nGerman character, =1=, 126.\n\nGerman education, =1=, 121.\n\nGerman essayists, discussed, =1=, 94, 95.\n\nGerman genius, its massiveness, =2=, 176.\n\nGerman language, =J.='s progress in learning, =1=, 87, 101, 108, 116, 121;\n mentioned, 87, 88, 89, 92, 341.\n\nGerman motto, the, =1=, 213.\n\nGerman universities, and Harvard, =1=, 217, 218 and _n._\n\nGermans, =J.='s opinion of, =1=, 100, 101, 121, 122, =2=, 104.\n\nGermany, =J.='s impressions of, =1=, 86, 105;\n peasant-women in, 211;\n philosophers in, 216, 217;\n in 1910, =2=, 341.\n\nGibbens, Alice H., early life, =1=, 192;\n marries =J.=, 192. And _see_ James, Mrs. William.\n\nGibbens, Mrs. E. P., =1=, 192, 222, 247, 248, 260, 339,\n =2=, 118. _See Contents._\n\nGibbens, Margaret, =1=, 248, 260, 279, 28=1=, 318. And\n _see_ Gregor, Mrs. Leigh R.\n _See Contents._\n\nGibbens, Mary, marries W. M. Salter, =1=, 248.\n\nGifford Lectures. _See_ this title under James, William, Works of.\n\nGilman, Daniel Coit, =1=, 202, 203.\n\nGizycki, Herr von, =1=, 214, 248.\n\nGladstone, William E., =2=, 31.\n\nGlenmore, Davidson's summer school of philosophy at, =2=, 197 _n._, 199.\n\nGod, conceptions of, =2=, 211, 213, 269, 270.\n\nGoddard, George A., =1=, 274.\n\nGodkin, E. L., Life of, quoted, =1=, 17, 115 _n._;\n =J.='s opinion of, 284, 285;\n _Comments and Reflections_, =2=, 30;\n illness of, 160, 161;\n his death, 181;\n proposed memorial to, 18=1=, 182;\n his home life and his \"life against the world,\" 182;\n mentioned, =1=, 118, 239, =2=, 167.\n _See Contents._\n\nGodkin, Mrs. E. L., =1=, 240, 241, =2=, 30, 167.\n\nGodkin, Lawrence, =2=, 30.\n\nGoethe, Johann W. von, quoted, =1=, 54;\n _Italienische Reise_, 91;\n Vischer on Faust, 94;\n _Gedichte_, =2=, 176;\n mentioned, =1=, 104, 107.\n\nGoldmark, Charles, =2=, 75, 77.\n\nGoldmark, Josephine, =2=, 215.\n\nGoldmark, Pauline, =2=, 75, 76, 94. _See Contents._\n\nGoldmarks, the, =2=, 275.\n\nGoldstein, Julius, =2=, 339.\n\nGoodwin, William W., =1=, 51.\n\nGordon, George A., =1=, 277.\n\nGrand Canyon of Arizona, =2=, 238, 239.\n\nGrandfather Mountain, =1=, 316, 317.\n\nGrant, Sir Ludovic, =2=, 144.\n\nGrant, Percy, =2=, 262.\n\nGrant, Ulysses S., =1=, 155.\n\nGray, John C., Jr., =1=, 102, 127, 154, 155, 168, 169, =2=, 9, 10, 288.\n _See Contents._\n\nGray, Roland, =2=, 109.\n\nGreat Britain, and Venezuela, =2=, 26, 27;\n and the Boer War, 140, 141.\n And _see_ England.\n\nGreeks, the, =2=, 225.\n\nGreen, St. John, =2=, 233.\n\nGreene, T. H., =2=, 237.\n\nGregor, Mrs. Leigh R. (Margaret Gibbens), =1=, 338, =2=, 106.\n And _see_ Gibbens, Margaret.\n\nGregor, Rosamund, =2=, 275 and _n._\n\nGrimm, Herman, his _Un\u00fcberwindliche M\u00e4chte_, reviewed by\n =J.=, =1=, 103, 104 and _n._;\n his arrant moralism, 104;\n \"suckled by Goethe,\" 104;\n J. dines with, 109 _ff._;\n his costume, 110;\n on Homer, 111;\n mentioned, 107, 108, 125.\n\nGrimm, Mrs. Herman (Gisela von Arnim), =1=, 111, 116.\n\nGrimm Brothers, =1=, 107, 110.\n\nGrinnell, Charles E., =2=, 10.\n\nGryon, Switzerland, =1=, 321, 322.\n\nGurney, Edmund, _Phantasms of the Living_, =1=, 267;\n his death, 279;\n =J.='s regard for, 280 and _n._;\n mentioned, 222, 229 _n._, 242, 25=1=, 255, =2=, 30.\n\nGurney, Mrs. Edmund, =1=, 279, 287.\n\nGurney, Ephraim W., =1=, 76 _n._, 151.\n\nGurney, Mrs. Ephraim W. (Ellen Hooper), =1=, 76 _n._\n\n\nHabit, Chapter on, in the _Psychology_, =1=, 297.\n\nHal\u00e9vy, Daniel, _Vie de Nietzsche_, =2=, 336, 340.\n\nHall, G. Stanley, quoted, =1=, 188, 189, 307;\n his new Journal, =2=, 210, 217;\n mentioned, =1=, 255, 269, =2=, 327.\n\nHallucinations, Census of. _See_ Census.\n\nHamilton, Alexander, =1=, 5.\n\nHamilton, Sir W., =1=, 189.\n\nHampton Court, =1=, 287.\n\nHapgood, Norman, =2=, 264.\n\nHarris, Frank, _The Man Shakespeare_, =2=, 330, 335, 336.\n\nHarris, William T., =1=, 201, 202, 204.\n\nHartmann, Karl R. E. von, =1=, 19=1=, =2=, 293.\n\nHarvard Medical School, in the sixties, =1=, 71 _ff._;\n and the Medical License Bill, =2=, 67.\n\nHarvard Psychological Laboratory, beginning of, =1=, 179 _n._;\n M\u00fcnsterberg in charge of, 301, 302.\n\nHarvard Summer School, =2=, 4.\n\nHarvard University, beginning of =J.='s service in, =1=, 165;\n courses in philosophy offered by, 191;\n Hegelism at, 208;\n contrasted with German universities, 217, 218 and _n._;\n Department of Philosophy, =J.= on the future of, 317, 318;\n =J.='s new courses at, =2=, 3, 4;\n routine business of professors, 45 and _n._;\n a possible genuine philosophic universe at, 122;\n confers LL.D. on =J.=, 173 and _n._;\n =J.= resigns professorship at, 220, 266 and _n._;\n Roosevelt as possible President of, 232 and _n._\n\nHavens, Kate, =1=, 85 _n._\n\nHawthorne Julian, _Bressant_, =1=, 167.\n\nHay, John, =1=, 251.\n\nHegel, Georg W. F., _Aesthetik_, =1=, 87;\n mentioned, 202, 205, 208, 305.\n\nHegelianism (Hegelism), at Harvard, =1=, 208;\n in the _Psychology_, 304 and _n._, 305;\n mentioned, =2=, 237.\n\nHegelians, =1=, 205.\n\nHeidelberg, =1=, 137.\n\nHelmholtz, H. L. F. von, _Optics_, =1=, 266;\n mentioned, 72, 119, 123, 137, 224, 225, 347.\n\nHelmholtz, Frau von, =1=, 347.\n\nHenderson, Gerard C., =2=, 275.\n\nHenry, Joseph, =1=, 7.\n\nHenry, Colonel (Dreyfus case), =2=, 98.\n\nHerder, Johann G. von, =1=, 141.\n\nHering, Ewald, =1=, 212.\n\nHewlett, Maurice, _Halfway House_, =2=, 340.\n\nHeymans, G., _Einf\u00fchrung in die Metaphysik_, =2=, 237 and _n._\n\nHibbert Foundation lectures (Manchester College), =2=, 283, 284.\n\n_Hibbert Journal_, =2=, 313, 348,\n\nHigginson, Henry L., takes charge of =J.='s patrimony, =1=, 233;\n and the Harvard Union, =2=, 108 and _n._;\n mentioned, 9, 10, 18=1=, 19=1=, 26=1=, 287, 329.\n _See Contents._\n\nHigginson, James J., =1=, 102, 127.\n\nHigginson, Storrow, =1=, 35.\n\nHigginson, T. W., =2=, 191.\n\nHildreth, J. L., =1=, 275, 277.\n\nHildreth, Mrs. J. L., =1=, 276.\n\nHoar, George F., =2=, 191.\n\nHobhouse, L. T., and \"The Will to Believe,\" =2=, 207, 209;\n mentioned, 282. _See Contents._\n\nHodder, Alfred, =2=, 14.\n\nHodges, George, =2=, 276,\n\nHodgson, Richard, death of, =2=, 242, 258;\n his work and character, 242;\n and Mrs. Piper, 242;\n =J.= investigates Mrs. Piper's claim to give communications\n from his spirit, 286, 287;\n =J.='s report thereon, 317, 319, 324;\n mentioned, =1=, 228, 229 _n._, 254, 281.\n\nHodgson, Shadworth H., \"Time and Space,\" =1=, 188;\n \"Theory of Practice,\" 188;\n \"Philosophy and Experience,\" and \"Dialogue on the Will,\" 243-245;\n mentioned, 143, 191, 202, 203, 204, 205, 208, 222.\n _See Contents._\n\nH\u00f6ffding, Harold, =2=, 216.\n\nHolland, Mrs. _See_ Mediums.\n\nHolmes, O. W., =1=, 71.\n\nHolmes, O. W., Jr., =1=, 60, 73, 76, 80, 154, 155, =2=, 10, 51.\n _See Contents._\n\nHolmes, Mrs. O. W., Jr. (Fanny Dixwell), her \"panel\" and its\n inscription, =2=, 156 and _n._, 157.\n\nHolt, Edwin B., =2=, 234.\n\nHolt, Henry, =2=, 18. _See Contents._\n\nHolt, Henry, & Co., J. contracts to write volume on Psychology for, =1=, 194.\n\nHomer, =1=, 111.\n\nHooper, Edward W., =2=, 156.\n\nHooper, Ellen, =1=, 76 and _n._\n\nHooper, Ellen (Mrs. John Potter), =2=, 275.\n\nHooper, Louisa, =2=, 275.\n\nHopkins, Woolsey R., describes accident to H. James, Senior, =1=, 7, 8.\n\nHorace Mann Auditorium, =2=, 17.\n\nHorse-swapping, =1=, 271.\n\nHouse of Commons, =1=, 345, 346.\n\nHowells, W. D., _Indian Summer_, =1=, 253;\n _Shadow of a Dream_, 298;\n _Hazard of New Fortunes_, 298, 299;\n _Rise of Silas Lapham_, 307;\n _Minister's Charge_, 307, 308;\n _Lemuel Barker_, 308;\n _Criticism and Fiction_, 308;\n mentioned, =1=, 158, =2=, 10.\n _See Contents._\n\nHowells, Mrs. W. D., =1=, 253, 298, 299.\n\nHowison, George H., =1=, 239 _n._, 304, =2=, 78.\n _See Contents._\n\nHugo, Victor, _Les Mis\u00e9rables_, =1=, 263;\n _La L\u00e9gende des Si\u00e8cles_, =2=, 63;\n mentioned, =1=, 90, =2=, 51.\n\nHuidekoper, Rosamund, =2=, 275.\n\nHumanism, =2=, 245, 282.\n\nHumboldt, H. A. von, _Travels_, =1=, 62.\n\nHumboldt, W., letters of, =1=, 141.\n\nHume, David, =1=, 187, =2=, 18, 123, 165.\n\nHunnewell, Walter, =1=, 68.\n\nHunt, William M., =1=, 24.\n\nHunter, Ellen (Temple), =2=, 258, 262.\n\nHuxley, Thomas H., =J.= quoted on, =1=, 226 _n._;\n his _Life and Letters_, 226 _n._, =2=, 248;\n mentioned, =2=, 218.\n\nHyatt, Alpheus, =1=, 31.\n\nHyslop, James H., =2=, 242, 287.\n\n\nIdeal, the, =1=, 238.\n\nIdealism, Absolute, Royce's argument for, =1=, 242.\n\nImmortality, =1=, 310, =2=, 214, 287.\n\nImperialism, =2=, 74.\n\nIndians, in Brazil, =1=, 66, 67, 70.\n\nIndifferentism, =1=, 238.\n\nInsane, proposed national society to improve condition of, =2=, 273, 274.\n\nIntellectualism, =2=, 291, 292.\n\nItalian language, =1=, 341, =2=, 222.\n\nItaly, =1=, 175, 180, 181.\n\n\nJacks, L. P., =2=, 339, 348.\n\nJackson Henry, =1=, 274, 275.\n\nJacobi, Friedrich H., =1=, 141.\n\nJames, Alexander R. (=J.='s son), =2=, 37, 43, 92. _See Contents._\n\nJames, Alice (=J.='s sister), her diary quoted, =1=, 16;\n in England with H. James, Jr., from 1885 on, 258;\n her illness, 258, 259, 284;\n her diary quoted, 259 _n._;\n quoted, on =J.='s European trip in 1889, 289, 290;\n her death, 319;\n mentioned, 18, 47, 60, 69, 91, 103, 142, 172, 183, 217,\n 220, 281, 285, 286, =2=, 127.\n _See Contents._\n\nJames, Mrs. Catherine (Barber), third wife of W. James I, (=J.='s paternal\n grandmother), \"a dear gentle lady,\" =1=, 6;\n her house in Albany, 105;\n mentioned, 4, 5 _n._, 7.\n\nJames, Garth Wilkinson (=J.='s brother), wounded at Fort Wagner,\n =1=, 43, 44, 49;\n mentioned, =1=, 17, 33, 35, 36, 40, 41, 42, 51, 52, 60,\n 69, 70, 88, 135 _n._, 136, 192.\n\nJames, Henry, Senior (=J.='s father), quoted, on his father, =1=, 4,\n his grandfather, 5,\n and his mother, 5 and _n._;\n his habit of thought expressed in his description of his mother, 5 _n._;\n sketch of his life and character, 7-19;\n maimed for life by accident, 7, 8;\n his discontent with orthodox dispensation, 8;\n marries Mary Walsh, 8;\n =J.='s striking resemblance to, 10;\n relations with his children, 10, 18, 19;\n =J.='s introduction\n to his _Literary Remains_, 10, 13;\n letters of, to Emerson, 11;\n effect of Swedenborg's works on, 12;\n the only business of his later life, 1=2=, 13;\n =J.='s\nestimate of, 13;\n Henry James quoted on, 14;\n letter of, to editor of _New Jerusalem Messenger_, 14-16;\n his directions regarding his funeral service, 16;\n Godkin quoted on, 17;\n E. W. Emerson quoted on, 17, 18 and _n._;\n and Miss Emerson, 18 _n._;\n influence of his \"full and homely idiom\" on the conversation of\n his sons, 18;\n his philosophy, discussed by =J.=, 96, 97;\n his essay on Swedenborg, 117;\n letter of, to Henry James, 169;\n dangerously ill, 218;\n =J.='s last letter to, 218-220;\n his _Secret of Swedenborg_, 220;\n his death, 221;\n =J.='s memories of, 221, 222;\n his mentality described, 241, 242;\n compared with Carlyle, 241;\n mentioned, =2=, 6, 7, 27, 36, 53, 68, 80, 92, 103, 104, 115 and\n _n._, 118, 135 _n._, 153, 157, 158 and _n._, 175,\n 217, 260, 289, 290, 316, =2=, 39, 278.\n _See Contents._\n\n_Literary Remains_ of, edited by =J.=, =1=, 4 and _n._, 5 _n._, 10,\n 13, 236, 239, 240, 241.\n\nJames, Mrs. Henry, Senior (Mary Walsh), (=J.='s mother), her character,\n =1=, 9;\n her death, 218;\n mentioned, 8, 69, 80, 103, 117, 156, 175, 183, 219, 220. _See Contents._\n\nJames, Henry, Jr. (=J.='s brother), impressions of an elder generation\n reflected in _The Wings of the Dove_, =1=, 7;\n and his mother, 9; his birth, 9;\n quoted, on his father, 14;\n influence of his father's \"idiom\" on his speech, 18;\n at the Coll\u00e8ge de Boulogne, 20;\n early secret passion for authorship, 21;\n his \"meteorological blunder,\" 21; quoted, on =J.=, as\n \"he sits drawing,\" 22, 23;\n letter of his father to, 169;\n his feeling for Europe, 209;\n its reaction on him and on =J.=, contrasted, 209, 210;\n described by =J.=, 288;\n his \"third manner\" of writing criticized by =J.=, =2=, 240, 277-279;\n his paper on Boston, 252;\n mentioned, =1=, 17, 25, 33, 36, 40, 41, 45, 51, 53, 68,\n 70, 76, 80, 90, 94, 95, 99, 100, 115, 117, 118, 136, 138,\n 141, 148 _n._, 174, 175, 177, 178, 180, 218, 219, 240, 258,\n 260, 262, 269, 283, 284, 286, 287, 289, 290, 319, =2=, 10,\n 35, 61, 62, 84, 105, 106, 110, 161, 167, 168, 169, 170, 192,\n 193, 215, 224, 250, 280, 315, 333, 335, 338, 341, 350.\n _See Contents._\n\n Works of: _The American_, =1=, 185;\n _The American Scene_, =2=, 264, 277, 299;\n _The Bostonians_, =1=, 250, 25=1=, 25=2=, 253;\n _The Golden Bowl_, =2=, 240;\n Notes _of a Son and Brother_, =1=, 10, 11 _n._, 24, 32, 36, 135 _n._;\n _Partial Portraits_, 280;\n _The Portrait of a Lady_, 36;\n _Princess Cassamassima_, 251;\n _The Reverberator_, 280;\n _Roderick Hudson_, 184;\n _W. W. Story, Life of_, 27 _n._;\n _The Tragic Muse_, 299;\n _A Small Boy and Others_, 4 _n._, 8 _n._, 9, 10, 14, 20, 21, 22, 23;\n _The Wings of the Dove_, 7, 36, =2=, 240.\n\nJames, Henry, 3d (=J.='s son), =1=, 275, 278, 279, 282, 329, 330,\n 336, 343, =2=,\n 30, 31, 84, 129, 143, 145, 147, 159, 324.\n _See Contents._\n\nJames, Hermann (J.'s son), birth of, =1=, 234, 235; death of, 247.\n\nJames, Margaret M. (=J.='s daughter), birth of, =1=, 267;\n mentioned, 275, 276, 279, 281, 322, 332, 336, =2=, 43, 54,\n 98, 102, 110, 130, 191.\n _See Contents._\n\nJames, Robertson (=J.='s brother), in Union army, =1=, 43, 44;\n mentioned, 17, 33, 41, 43, 52, 60, 69, 70, 81, 136.\n\nJames, William, =J.='s grandfather, his career, from penury to\n great wealth, =1=, 2, 3;\n a leading citizen of Albany, 3;\n personal appearance, 3;\n anecdotes of, 3, 4;\n H. James, Senior, quoted on, 4;\n his stiff Presbyterianism and its results, 4;\n his will disallowed by court, 4, 6;\n marries Catherine Barber, 4.\n\nJames, William, (=J.='s uncle), =1=, 6.\n\nJAMES, WILLIAM.\n His ancestors in America, =1=, 1;\n recurrence of his father's habit of thought in, 5 _n._;\n and his mother, 9;\n resemblance of, to his father, 10;\n quoted, on his father, 13;\n influence of his father's \"idiom,\" 18 and _n._;\n frequent changes of schools and tutors, 19;\n in Europe, 1855 to 1858, 19;\n at the Coll\u00e8ge de Boulogne, and the \"Academy\" of Geneva, 20;\n quoted, on his education, 20;\n interest in exact knowledge, 20;\n begins study of anatomy at Geneva, 21;\n his cosmopolitanism of consciousness, 22;\n widely read in three languages, 22;\n effect of his early training, 22;\n takes up painting, 22-24;\n portrait of Katharine Temple, 24;\n physique, personal appearance and dress, 24, 25;\n temperament and conversation, 26;\n \"smiting\" quality of his best talk, 27;\n keen about new things, 28;\n disadvantage\nof being too encouraging to \"little geniuses,\" 28, 29;\n freer criticism of those who had arrived, 29;\n influence as a teacher at Harvard, 29, 30;\n in Lawrence Scientific School, 31 and _n._;\n physical condition keeps him out of army in Civil War, 47;\n transfers from Chemistry to Comparative Anatomy, 47;\n and Jeffries Wyman, 48, 49;\n begins course at Medical School, 53;\n philosophy begins to beckon, 53;\n joins Agassiz's expedition to the Amazon, 54;\n his nine months with Agassiz not wasted, 55, 56;\n has small-pox at Rio, 60, 61, 63 and _n._;\n interne at Mass. General Hospital, 71;\n again in Medical School, 71-84.\n\n Impaired health causes his visit to Germany, 84, 85;\n in Dresden, Berlin and Teplitz, 85, 86;\n describes his condition in letter to his father, 95, 96;\n returns to U. S., 139;\n takes degree of M.D. (1869), 140;\n eye-weakness, 140, 141;\n scope of his reading, 141, 142 and _n._, 143;\n his note-books, 143, 144;\n relation between earlier and later writings, 144 and _n._;\n morbid depression, 145;\n chapter on the \"sick soul\" the story of his own case, 145-147;\n return of resolution and self-confidence, 147, 148;\n Instructor in Physiology, 165;\n his real subject, physiological psychology, 165, 166;\n his deepest inclination always toward philosophy, 166;\n H. James, Senior's, letter on the change in =J.='s mental tone\n and outlook, 169, 170;\n decides to devote himself to biology, 171;\n Europe again, 171;\n end of the period of morbid depression, 171;\n gives course in Psychology and organizes Psychological Laboratory,\n 179 and _n_,;\n contributions to periodicals, 180;\n on teaching of philosophy in American colleges, 189 _ff._\n\n Marries Alice H. Gibbens, 192;\n effect of his new domesticity, 193;\n importance of his wife's companionship and understanding, 193;\n contracts to write a volume on Psychology, 194;\n vacations in Keene Valley, 195;\n his mode of life there, 195;\n a bit of self-analysis, 199, 200;\n first work on _Psychology_, 203, 223;\n declines invitation to teach at Johns Hopkins, 203;\n in Europe, 1880-83, 208 _ff._;\n and Henry James, 209, 210;\n \"reaction\" on Europe, 209, 210;\n death of his mother, 218, and of his father, 221;\n his memories of them, 221, 222;\n corresponding member of English Society for Psychical Research, 227;\n an organizer and officer of the American Society, 227;\n investigates psychic phenomena, 227 _ff._;\n conducts American Census of Hallucinations, 228, 229;\n edits his father's _Literary Remains_, 236, 239 _ff._;\n his life at Chocorua, 271, 272, 273.\n\n Abroad in 1889, 286 _ff._;\n at International Congress of Physiological Psychology, 288, 289, 290;\n his new house in Cambridge, 290, 291;\n his inclination toward the under-dog, 292, 293, =2=, 178;\n completion of the _Psychology_, =1=, 293 _ff._;\n effect of its publication on his reputation, 300;\n prepares an abridgment (_Briefer Course_), 300, 301;\n turns his attention more fully toward philosophy, 301;\n raises money for Harvard Laboratory, 301, and recommends M\u00fcnsterberg\n as its head, 301;\n his sabbatical year abroad, 302, 320 _ff._;\n beginning of his friendship with Flournoy, 320;\n receives honorary degree at Padua, 333.\n\n How his mind was moving during the nineties, =2=, 2 _ff._;\n his opinion of psychology, 2;\n new courses at Harvard, 3, 4;\n outside lecturing, 4;\n would devote his thought and work to metaphysical and religious\n questions, 5;\n frustrations, 5, 6;\n personal appearance, 6, 7;\n his daily round, 7-9;\n the Club, 9, 10;\n nervous break-down, 10;\n D. S. Miller quoted on, 11-17;\n attitude toward spelling reform, 18, 19;\n and Cleveland's Venezuela Message, 26 _ff._;\n experiments with mescal, 35, 37;\n Chautauqua lectures, 40 _ff._;\n work on college committees, 45 _n._,\n at Faculty meetings, 45 _n._,\n lectures at Lowell Institute, 54 and _n._, 55;\n invited to deliver Gifford Lectures at Edinburgh, 55;\n Blood's strictures on his English, 59;\n on a proposed Medical License bill, 66 _ff._;\n on the Spanish War, 73, 74;\n corresponding member of Acad\u00e9mie des Sciences Morales et Politiques, 75;\n a memorable night in the Adirondacks, 75-77.\n\n Effect on his health of misadventures in the Adirondack, 78, 79, 90, 91;\n two years of exile and illness, 92 _ff._;\n an individualist and a liberal, 93;\n opposed to Philippine policy of McKinley administration, 93, 94;\n his teaching limited to a half-course a year, 171;\n lectures and contributions to philosophic journals, 171;\n strain on his strength, 171;\n the spirit in which he did his work, 172, 173;\n receives LL.D. from Harvard, 173 and _n._;\n replies to Prof. Pratt's _Questionnaire_, 212-215;\n at Philosophical Congress at Rome, 219, 220, 225 _ff._;\n lectures at Stanford University, 220, 235, 240, 244 and _n._;\n and the San Francisco earthquake, 220, 246 _ff._;\n _Pragmatism_, 220;\n resigns his professorship, 220, 266 and _n._;\n the last meeting of his class, 220, 221, 262.\n\n Declining health, 283, 333;\n lectures on Hibbert Foundation at Oxford, 283, 284;\n uncompleted projects, 284;\n his attitude toward war, 284, 285, and universal arbitration, 285;\n tolerance fundamental in his scheme of belief, 286;\n his report on \"Mrs. Piper's Hodgson control,\" 286, 287;\n last months in Europe, 333 _ff._;\n farewell to Harvard Faculty, 334;\n returns to Chocorua, 350;\n the end, 350.\n\n Letters containing moral counsel, or touching upon problems of _Belief_,\n =2=, 57, 65, 76, 77, 149, 150, 196, 197, 210, 211, 212-215, 269, 326,\n 344-346;\n _Conduct_, =1=, 77-79, 100, 128 _ff._, 148, 199, 200, =2=, 131, 132;\n _Life and Death_, =1=, 218-220, 309-311, =2=, 130, 154.\n\n WORKS OF:--\n \"Address of the President before the Society for Psychical Research,\"\n =2=, 30 and _n._\n \"Bain and Renouvier,\" 1, 186.\n _Briefer Course_ (abridgment of the _Principles of Psychology_), =1=,\n 300, 301, 304, 314.\n \"Brute and Human Intellect,\" =1=, 180.\n \"Certain Blindness in Human Beings, A,\" =2=, 5.\n _Collected Essays and Reviews_, =1=, 225 _n._, =2=, 20 _n._, 287, 295 _n_.\n \"Confidences of a Psychical Researcher,\" =2=, 327 and _n._\n \"Dilemma of Determinism, The,\" =1=, 237 and _n._, 238.\n \"Does Consciousness Exist?\" _See_ \"Notion de Conscience, La.\"\n \"Energies of Men, The,\" =2=, 252, 284.\n \"Feeling of Effort, The,\" =1=, 207.\n \"Frederick Myers's Service to Psychology,\" =2=, 151 and _n._\n \"German-American Novel, A.\" =1=, 104 _n._\n Gifford Lectures on Natural Religion, =J.= invited to deliver, =2=, 55;\n preparing for, 85, 92, 93;\n delivered, 144 _ff._;\n success of, 147, 149, 150, 151;\n outline of, 150;\n published as _Varieties of Religious Experience_, 169;\n mentioned, 75, 96, 97, 105, 108, 111, 115, 127, 134, =2=, 162, 164, 165.\n And _see_ _Varieties of Religious Experience_, _infra_.\n \"How Two Minds can Know One Thing,\" =2=, 217 and _n._\n _Human Immortality_, =2=, 180 and _n._\n \"Introspective Psychology, On Some Omissions of,\" =1=, 230.\n \"Knight-Errant of the Intellectual Life, A,\" =2=, 107 _n._\n Lowell Institute Lectures, =2=, 54 and _n._, 55.\n _Meaning of Truth, The_, =2=, 20 _n._, 327.\n _Memories and Studies_, =1=, 153, 226 _n._, 229 _n._, =2=, 39\n _n._, 59 _n._, 107 _n._, 151 _n._,\n 193, 247, 285 _n._, 287, 327 _n._\n \"Moral Equivalent of War, The,\" =2=, 284.\n \"Notion de Conscience, La,\" =2=, 226 and _n._, 267 and _n._\n \"Perception of Space, The,\" =1=, 266 _n._\n \"Perception of Time, The,\" =1=, 266.\n \"Philosophic Reveries,\" =2=, 339.\n \"Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results,\" =2=, 5.\n _Philosophy, Some Problems of_, =1=, 144 _n._, 186.\n _Pluralistic Mystic, A._ (lectures on Hibbert Foundation), =2=, 39 _n._,\n 300, 311, 313, 322, 324, 325, 326, 339.\n _Pragmatism_, =2=, 17, 276, 279, 292, 294, 295, 300;\n translated by W. Jerusalem, 297.\n \"Pragmatism's Conception of Truth,\" =2=, 271 and _n._\n \"Proposed Shortening of the College Course,\" =2=, 45 _n._\n _Psychology, Principles of_, =1=, 194, 203, 223, 224, 249,\n 268, 269, 283, 293 _ff._, 296, 297, 300, 301, 304 and _n._, 305,\n 307, 320, =2=, 12, 13.\n \"Quelques Consid\u00e9rations sur la M\u00e9thode Subjective,\" =1=, 180.\n _Radical Empiricism, Essays in_, =2=, 267 _n._\n \"Radical Empiricism, Is it Solipsistic?\" =2=, 218.\n \"Radical Empiricism as a Philosophy,\" =2=, 197 _n._\n _Selected Essays and Reviews_, =2=, 271.\n \"Sentiment of Rationality, The,\" =1=, 203 and _n._\n \"Shaw Monument, Oration on Unveiling of,\" =2=, 59, 60.\n \"Spatial Quale, The,\" =1=, 205 and _n._\n \"Spencer's Definition of Mind as Correspondence,\" =1=, 180.\n _Talks to Teachers and Students on Some of Life's Problems_, =2=,\n 4, 5, 40, 79, 286.\n \"Tigers in India, The,\" =2=, 20 _n._\n _Varieties of Religious Experience._ (Gifford Lectures), =1=, 145-147,\n 293, =2=, 169, 170, 209, 210, 268.\n \"What Psychical Research has Accomplished,\" =1=, 229 and _n._, 306.\n \"_Will to Believe, The_,\" =2=, 44, 48, 85, 87, 88, 207, 208, 209, 282.\n _Will to Believe, The, and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy_, =1=, 229\n _n._, 237 _n._, 280 _n._, =2=, 4, 5, 34, 58 _n._, 64.\n \"Word More about Truth, A,\" =2=, 295.\n _See_ also list of Dates at the beginning of Volume I, and the partial\n bibliography (Appendix II, _infra_).\n\nJames, Mrs. William (Alice Gibbens), =1=, 192, 193, 195, 196, 217, 218, 232,\n 237, 247, 269, 276, 277, 278, 279, 281, 286, 288, 294, 297, 298, 316, 319,\n 321, 325, 328, 337, 338, 339, 340, 341, 346, =2=, 5, 7, 8, 9, 20, 24, 34,\n 35, 36, 37, 38, 52, 59, 60, 63, 92, 93, 96, 97, 110, 111, 112, 113, 129,\n 134, 145, 147, 158, 159, 161, 165, 175, 176, 182, 187, 188, 193, 215, 223,\n 233, 247, 250, 256, 258, 259, 275, 312, 313, 333, 334, 338, 350.\n _See Contents._\n\nJames, William (=J.='s son), birth of, =1=, 234;\n mentioned, 237, 260, 275, 276, 277, 282, 329, 330, 336, 346, =2=,\n 92, 98, 129, 159, 174, 175, 185, 186, 187, 250, 258, 259, 274, 275, 276.\n _See Contents._\n\nJameson Raid, =2=, 27.\n\nJanet, Pierre, =2=, 216, 217, 226, 254.\n\nJanet, Mme. Pierre, =2=, 216.\n\nJap, a dog, =1=, 275, 276, 277, 278, 279.\n\nJefferies, Richard, _The Life of the Fields_, =2=, 258, 259.\n\nJeffries, B. Joy, =1=, 163.\n\nJerome, W. T., =2=, 264.\n\nJerusalem, W. _See Contents._\n\nJevons, F. B., =2=, 306.\n\n\"Jimmy,\" students' name for the _Briefer Course_, =1=, 301.\n\nJohns Hopkins University, =J.= declines invitation to teach at, =1=, 203.\n\nJohnson, Alice, =2=, 311.\n\n_Journal of Speculative Philosophy_, =1=, 266, =2=, 339.\n\nJung-Stilling, Johann K., _Autobiography_, =1=, 155.\n\n\nKallen, Horace M., =2=, 271.\n\nKant, Immanuel, _Kritik der reinen Vernunft_, =1=, 138, =2=, 179;\n =J.= lectures on, 45, 47, 51, 54;\n mentioned, =1=, 117, 141, 191, 202, 205, =2=, 3.\n\nKaulbach, W. von, =1=, 90.\n\nKeane, Bishop, =1=, 294.\n\nKeene Valley, Adirondacks, =J.='s summer holidays in, =1=, 194, 195, 196;\n an eventful 24 hours, and its effect, =2=, 75-79, 95;\n his further misadventure, 90, 91;\n mentioned, =1=, 232, =2=, 51, 259, 261, 296, 297.\n\nKipling, Rudyard, _The Light that Failed_, =1=, 307;\n mentioned, =2=, 21, 22, 231.\n\nKitchin, George W., =2=, 306.\n\nKnox, H. V., =2=, 313, 314.\n\nKruger, Paul, =2=, 27.\n\nKolliker, R. A. von, =1=, 123.\n\nKosmos, the startling discoveries concerning, =1=, 101.\n\nK\u00fchnemann, Eugen, =2=, 263.\n\n\nLa Farge, Bancel, =2=, 275.\n\nLa Farge, John, =1=, 24, 91, =2=, 173.\n\nLamar, Lucuis Q. C., =1=, 251.\n\nLamb, Charles, =2=, 239.\n\nLamb House, Rye, Henry James's English home, =2=, 107, 111.\n\nLawrence Scientific School, Chemical laboratory in, =1=, 31;\n C. W. Eliot quoted on =J.='s course in, 31, 32 and _n._\n\nLeibnitz, Baron G. W. von, =2=, 13.\n\nLema\u00eetre, Jules, =2=, 63.\n\n_Leonardo_, =2=, 227, 228, 245.\n\nLeopardi, Giacomo, \"To Sylvia,\" =1=, 246 and _n._\n\nLesley, Susan I., _Recollections of my Mother_, =2=, 135 and _n._\n\nLessing, Gotthold E., _Emilia Galotti_, =1=, 91;\n Fischer's Essay on _Nathan der Weise_, 94.\n\nLeuba, James H., =2=, 210, 211, 218.\n _See Contents._\n\nLincoln, Abraham, effect of his death, =1=, 66, 67;\n characterized by =J.=, 67.\n\nLinville, N. C., =1=, 316, 317.\n\nLister, Sir Joseph, =1=, 72.\n\nLloyd, Henry D., =2=, 166.\n\nLocke, John, =1=, 191, =2=, 165, 257.\n\nLodge, Henry Cabot, =2=, 30.\n\nLodge, Sir Oliver, =1=, 229 _n._\n\nLoeser, Charles A., =1=, 337, 339.\n\nLombroso, Cesar, =2=, 15.\n\nLondon, =1=, 175, =2=, 307.\n\nLondon, _Times_, =2=, 43, 65, 118.\n\nLong, George, =1=, 78.\n\nLoring, Katharine P., =1=, 259, 262, 311, 316.\n\nLotze, Rudolf H., =1=, 206, 208.\n\nLoubet, \u00c9mile, President of France, =2=, 89, 98.\n\nLowell, A. Lawrence, =2=, 326.\n\nLowell, James Russell, death of, =1=, 314, 315 _n._;\n =J.='s memory of, 315;\n mentioned, 195.\n\nLucerne, =2=, 133.\n\nLudwig, Karl F. W., =1=, 72, 160, 215.\n\nLutoslawski, W., =2=, 103, 171.\n _See Contents._\n\n\nMcDougall, William, =2=, 313, 314, 315.\n\nMcKinley, William, and the Spanish War, =2=, 74;\n Philippine Policy of his administration disapproved by =J.=, 93, 94, 289;\n and Roosevelt, =J.='s description of, 94;\n mentioned, 50, 101, 102, 109.\n\nMacMonnies, F. W., Bacchante, =2=, 62 and _n._, 63.\n\nMacaulay, Thomas B., Lord, =1=, 225.\n\nMach, Ernst, =1=, 211, 212.\n\nMaine, U. S. S., explosion of, =2=, 73.\n\nManchester College. _See_ Hibbert Foundation.\n\nMarcus Aurelius, =1=, 78, 79.\n\nMarshall, Henry Rutgers, _Instinct and Reason_, =1=, 87.\n _See Contents_.\n\nMartin, L. J., =2=, 246, 249.\n\nMartineau, James, =1=, 283.\n\nMascagni, Pietro, _I Rantzau_, =1=, 334, 335.\n\nMassachusetts General Hospital, =1=, 71, 72.\n\nMaterialism, =1=, 82, 83.\n\nMaudsley, Henry, =1=, 143.\n\nMaupassant, Guy de, =1=, 282.\n\nMedical License bill (proposed), in Mass., =2=, 66 _ff._\n\nMediums, =1=, 228, =2=, 287, 311.\n And _see_ Paladino, Eusapia, and Piper, Mrs.\n\nMental Hygiene, Connecticut Society for, =2=, 273;\n National Committee for, 273.\n\nMerriman, Daniel. _See Contents._\n\nMerriman, Mrs. Daniel, =2=, 118.\n\nMerriman, R. B., =2=, 63, 66, 132, 175.\n\nMescal, =J.='s experiment with, =2=, 35, 37.\n\nMetaphysical problems, =J.='s mind haunted by, =2=, 2.\n\nMetaphysics, outline of course offered by =J.= in, =2=, 3, 4;\n =J.='s proposed system of, 179, 180.\n\nMeysenbug, Malwida von, _Memoiren einer Idealistin_, =2=, 135 and _n._\n\nMezes, Sidney E., =2=, 14.\n\nMill, John Stuart, =1=, 164, =2=, 267.\n\nMiller, Dickinson S., quoted, on =J.= as a teacher and lecturer, =2=, 11-17;\n \"Truth and Error,\" 18;\n quoted, on =J.='s talks with Columbia Faculty Club, 265 _n._;\n his \"study\" of =J.=, 331, 332;\n mentioned, 87, 88, 137, 163, 232 _n._, 282.\n _See Contents._\n\n_Mind_, =1=, 254, 255.\n\nMind-curers. _See_ Faith-curers.\n\nMiracles, =2=, 57, 58.\n\nMitchell, S. Weir, =2=, 37.\n\nMonism, =1=, 238, 244, 245.\n\nMontgomery, Edmund, =1=, 254, 255.\n\nMorgan, C. Lloyd, =2=, 216.\n\nMoritz, C. P., =1=, 141.\n\nMorley, John, _Voltaire_, =1=, 144 _n._\n\nMorse, Frances R., =1=, 197, =2=, 106, 113, 232.\n _See Contents._\n\nMorse, Mary. _See_ Elliot, Mrs. John W.\n\nMorse, John T., =2=, 10.\n\nMotterone, Monte, =1=, 324.\n\nM\u00fcller, G. E., =1=, 312, 313.\n\nMunich Congress, =2=, 46, 50.\n\nMunk, H., =1=, 213, 114.\n\nM\u00fcnsterberg, Hugo, recommended by =J.= as head\n of Harvard Psychological Laboratory, =1=, 301, 302;\n \"the Rudyard Kipling of philosophy,\" 318;\n \"an immense success,\" 332;\n criticizes =J.=, =2=, 267, 268;\n mentioned, =1=, 312, =2=, 2, 18, 121, 229, 270, 293, 320.\n _See Contents._\n\nMurray, Gilbert, =2=, 271.\n\nMusset, Alfred de, =2=, 63.\n\nMyers, F. W. H., _Human Personality_, =1=, 229 _n._, =2=, 151, 185 and _n._;\n death of, 141;\n =J.='s tribute to, 141, 151, 157;\n mentioned, =1=, 287, 290, =2=, 57, 114, 118, 156, 157, 161.\n _See Contents._\n\nMyers, Mrs. F. W. H., =1=, 290, 345, =2=, 151, 157.\n\n\nNaples, =2=, 222.\n\n_Nation, The_, review of _Literary Remains of Henry James_ in, =1=, 240, 241;\n =J.='s comments on, 284;\n and Cleveland's Venezuela Message, =2=, 28;\n mentioned, =1=, 70, 92, 104 and _n._, 117, 118, 161,\n 186, 188, 189, =2=, 42, 182, 332.\n\nNauheim (Bad), =2=, 92, 93, 95, 104, 107, 134, 135, 157, 158, 160, 333, 338.\n\nNeilson, Adelaide, =1=, 168.\n\nNevins, John C., _Demon Possession and Allied Themes_, =2=, 56 and _n._\n\nNew Forest, The, =2=, 160, 161.\n\n_New Jerusalem Messenger_, H. James, Senior's, letter to\n editor of, =1=, 14-16.\n\n_New World, The_, =1=, 334, =2=, 44.\n\nNew York City, =2=, 264, 265.\n\nNewcomb, Simon, =1=, 250.\n\nNewport, R. I., =2=, 202, 203.\n\nNewton, Sir Isaac, =2=, 1 _n._\n\nNichols, Herbert, =1=, 335, =2=, 14.\n\nNietzsche, Friedrich W., =2=, 233.\n\nNivedita, Sister, =2=, 144.\n\nNonentity, Idea of, =2=, 293.\n\nNordau, Max S., _Entartung_, =2=, 19;\n mentioned, 17.\n\nNorton, Charles Eliot, Ruskin's letters to, =2=, 206;\n mentioned, =1=, 181, 291, 331, 338, 347, =2=, 191, 199.\n _See Contents._\n\nNorton, Grace, =1=, 284, =2=, 191.\n _See Contents._\n\nNorton, Mrs. Charles E. (Susan Sedgwick), =1=, 181.\n\nNorton Woods, the, =2=, 201.\n\n\nOlney, Richard, and the Venezuela Message, =2=, 27, 29.\n\nOptimism, =1=, 83, 238.\n\nOregon, forest fires in, =2=, 80.\n\nOstensacken, Baron, =1=, 337, 339.\n\nOstwald, W., =2=, 229.\n\nOxford, =2=, 307.\n\n\nPadua, Galileo anniversary at, =1=, 333 and _n._;\n University of, confers degree on =J.=, 333.\n\nP\u00e6dagogy, =2=, 47.\n\nPaladino, Eusapia, =2=, 186 and _n._, 311, 320, 327.\n\nPaley, William, =1=, 283.\n\nPallanza, Italy, =1=, 329.\n\nPalmer, George H., a Hegelian, =1=, 205, 208;\n investigates psychic phenomena with =J.=, 227;\n mentioned, 202, 292, 335, =2=, 2, 18.\n _See Contents._\n\nPalmer, Mrs. Alice Freeman, =2=, 124.\n\nPapini, Giovanni, _Crepuscolo dei Filosofi_, =2=, 245, 246;\n mentioned, 172, 227, 228, 229, 257, 267.\n\nParis, =1=, 174, 175, 217.\n\nParis Commune (1871), =1=, 161.\n\nParkman, Francis, =2=, 10.\n\nParkman, Mrs. Henry, =2=, 205.\n\nParthenon, the, =2=, 224, 225.\n\nParty spirit, the only permanent force of corruption in the U. S., =2=, 100.\n\nPasteur, Louis, =1=, 72, 225.\n\nPaty du Clam, Colonel du, =2=, 98.\n\nPaulsen, Friederich, _Einleitung_, =1=, 346, =2=, 244.\n\nPeabody, Elizabeth, =1=, 112.\n\nPeabody, Frances G., =2=, 229.\n\nPeace Congress, =2=, 277.\n\nPeillaube, M., =2=, 228, 229.\n\nPeirce, Benjamin, =1=, 32.\n\nPeirce, Charles S., =1=, 33, 34, 80, 149, 169, =2=, 191, 233, 294, 328.\n\nPeirce, James M., =2=, 258.\n\nPerry, Ralph Barton, his _List of Published Writings_\n of =J.=, =1=, 144, 223, 224;\n mentioned, =2=, 121, 163, 234, 295.\n\nPerry, Thomas S., with =J.= in Berlin, =1=, 107, 109, 111, 113, 114, 117, 124;\n mentioned, 40 _n._, 60, 91, 94, 102, 106, 134, 151, 157, 169, =2=, 10.\n _See Contents._\n\nPertz, Mrs. Emma (Wilkinson), =1=, 135 and _n._\n\nPessimism, =1=, 238.\n\nPeterson, Ellis, =1=, 166.\n\nPfl\u00fcger, Dr., =1=, 156.\n\nPhelps, Edward J., =2=, 27 _n._\n\nPhilippine question, the, =2=, 167, 168.\n\nPhilippines, policy of McKinley administration concerning, =2=, 93, 94;\n duty of U. S. with regard to, 289.\n\nPhilosophical Club, University of California, =J.='s lectures to, =2=, 79.\n\n_Philosophical Review_, =2=, 228.\n\nPhilosophical Society, =J.= refuses to join, =2=, 164.\n\nPhilosophy, =J.= begins to feel the pull of, =1=, 53, 54;\n difficulties attending teaching of, in American colleges, 188, 189, 190.\n\nPhysiological Psychology, =1=, 165, 166, 179.\n\nPhysiological Psychology, International Congress of, =1=, 288, 289, 290.\n\nPhysiology, =J.= attends lectures on, in Berlin, =1=, 118, 120, 121;\n =J.='s first teaching subject, 165.\n\nPicquart, M. G. (Dreyfus case), =2=, 67, 98.\n\nPiddington, J. G., =2=, 311.\n\nPierce, George W., =2=, 14.\n\nPillon, Fran\u00e7ois, =1=, 208, 229, 233, 343, =2=, 45, 79.\n _See Contents._\n\nPillon, Mme. Fran\u00e7ois, =2=, 73, 204, 338, 343.\n\nPinkham, Lydia E., \"the Venus of Medicine,\" =1=, 261 and _n._\n\nPiper, Mrs. William, =J.= quoted on, =1=, 227, 228;\n mentioned, =2=, 242, 311, 319, 320.\n And _see_ Hodgson, R.\n\nPlato, =1=, 283.\n\nPluralism, =1=, 186, =2=, 155.\n\nPluralistic idealism, =2=, 22.\n\nPollock, Sir Frederick, =1=, 222, =2=, 199.\n\nPomfret, Conn., =1=, 153, 154.\n\n_Popular Science Monthly_, =1=, 190.\n\nPorter, Noah, =1=, 231, 232.\n\nPorter, Samuel, =1=, 214.\n\nPorto Rico, =2=, 74.\n\nPotter, Horatio, =1=, 59.\n\nPowderly, Terence V., =1=, 284.\n\nPragmatism, and radical empiricism, distinction between, =2=, 267;\n disadvantages of the word as a title, 271, 295, 298.\n\nPrague, =1=, 211, 212, 213.\n\nPratt, James B., =J.='s replies to his questionnaire on\n religious belief, =2=, 212-215.\n\nPratt, M., =2=, 204.\n\nPrince, William H., =1=, 37, 39, 42, 44.\n\nPrince, Mrs. William H. (Katharine James), =1=, 42.\n _See Contents._\n\nPrinceton Theological Seminary, H. James, Senior, at, =1=, 8.\n\nPringle-Pattison, A. S., =2=, 325, 326.\n And _see_ Seth, Andrew.\n\nProfession, choice of, =1=, 75, 79, 123.\n\nPrussia, political conditions in (1867), =1=, 95;\n and France, 95.\n\nPrussians, =1=, 122.\n\nPsychic phenomena, investigated by =J.= and Palmer, =1=, 225 _ff._;\n mentioned, 248, 250, 305, 306, =2=, 56, 287, 320.\n\nPsychical Research, American Society for, =J.= active in organizing, =1=, 227;\n amalgamated with English Society, 227;\n =J.= on its function, 249, 250, =2=, 242, 286, 306.\n\nPsychical Research, English Society for, founded, =1=, 227;\n =J.= a corresponding member, vice-president, and president\n of, 227, 229 _n._, 248.\n\nPsychologists, American Association of, =2=, 20.\n\nPsychology, =J.= begins to read on, =1=, 118, 119;\n =J.= gives course in, 179;\n =J.= helps to make it a modern science, 224, 225;\n \"a nasty little subject,\" =2=, 2.\n\nPsychology, Experimental, in U. S., History of, =1=, 179 _n._\n\nPsychology, Physiological. _See_ Physiological Psychology.\n\nPutnam, Charles P., =1=, 71, 195, 196, 327, =2=, 296.\n\nPutnam, Frederick W., =1=, 31.\n\nPutnam, George, =2=, 224, 225.\n\nPutnam, James J., letter to =J.= on Medical License bill, =2=, 72 _n._;\n mentioned, =1=, 71, 168, 195, 196, =2=, 112, 128, 147, 249.\n _See Contents._\n\nPutnam, Marian (Mrs. James J.), =2=, 249.\n\n\nQuincy, Henry P., =1=, 77, 122.\n\n\nRadcliffe College, =2=, 4, 24, 180 _n._, 181.\n\nRadcliffe College, =J.='s class at. _See Contents._\n\nRadical Empiricism and pragmatism, distinction between, =2=, 267;\n mentioned, 203, 204.\n\nRafael Sanzio, the Sistine Madonna, =1=, 90.\n\nRaffaello, Florentine cook, =1=, 339, 341.\n\nRankin, Henry W., =2=, 55.\n _See Contents._\n\nReed, Thomas B., =2=, 50.\n\nReid, Carveth, =1=, 205, 222.\n\nReligion, =J.='s views on, =2=, 64, 65, 127, 149, 150, 211 _ff._, 269.\n\nRenan, Ernest, death of, =1=, 326;\n mentioned, 110, =2=, 123, 338.\n\nRenouvier, Charles, the _Ann\u00e9e 1867 Philosophique_, =1=, 138, 186;\n influence on =J.= of his writings on free will, 147, 169;\n =J.='s first acquaintance with his work, 186;\n =J.='s correspondence with, 186;\n translates some of =J.='s papers, 186;\n his articles on Fouill\u00e9e, 231;\n _Principes de la Nature_, 334;\n his _Philosophy of History_, =2=, 44, 47;\n his death, 204;\n _Monadologie_ and _Personalisme_, 204;\n mentioned, =1=, 138, 205.\n _See Contents._\n\nRepublican Party, the, in 1899, =2=, 94.\n\nReverdin, M., =2=, 267.\n\nRhea, Jannet, =1=, 4 _n._\n\nRhea, Matthew, =1=, 4 _n._\n\nRhodes, James F., _History of the U. S._, =2=, 27 _n._;\n mentioned, 10.\n\nRichet, Charles, =1=, 229 _n._, =2=, 114, 225.\n\nRichter, Jean Paul, =1=, 141.\n\nRindge, Frederick H., =1=, 330, =2=, 39.\n\nRio de Janeiro, =1=, 58 _ff._\n\nRisks, choice of, =2=, 49, 50.\n\nRitter, Charles, =1=, 23, =2=, 25, 55.\n\nRobertson, Alexander, =1=, 8, 9.\n\nRobertson, G. Croom, editor of _Mind_, =1=, 222, 254.\n _See Contents._\n\nRobeson, Andrew R., =1=, 33.\n\nRomanism and Anglicanism, =2=, 305.\n\nRomanticism, =1=, 256.\n\nRome, Philosophical Congress at, =2=, 225 _ff._, 228;\n mentioned, =1=, 178, 180, =2=, 138, 139, 269.\n\nRoosevelt, Theodore, as possible President of Harvard, =2=, 232 and _n._;\n mentioned, 94, 266.\n\nRopes, John C., death of, =2=, 108, 109;\n mentioned, =1=, 35, =2=, 10, 156.\n\nRosmini-Serbati, Antonio, =1=, 295.\n\nRousseau, Jean-Jacques, =1=, 142.\n\nRoyce, Josiah, early life, =1=, 200, 201;\n quoted, on his first acquaintance with =J.=, 200, 201;\n brought to Harvard through =J.='s influence, 201;\n his _Religious Aspect of Philosophy_, 239, 242, 265;\n \"a perfect little Socrates,\" 249;\n made professor, 332;\n and =J.=, as teachers, compared by Miller, =2=, 16;\n \"the Rubens of philosophy,\" 86;\n _The World and the Individual_, 113 and _n._, 114, 116, 121 and _n._;\n his system, 114;\n a sketcher in philosophy, 114, 116;\n mentioned, =1=, 238, 239, 255, 262, 280, 291, 318, 347,\n =2=, 18, 122, 143, 216, 234, 321, 322.\n _See Contents._\n\nRuskin, John, his letters to C. E. Norton, =2=, 206, 207;\n characterized by =J.=, 206;\n _Modern Painters_, 206;\n mentioned, =1=, 220, =2=, 306.\n\nRye (England), =2=, 104.\n And _see_ Lamb House.\n\n\nSabatier, Paul, =2=, 142.\n\nSt. Gaudens, Augustus, his monument to R. G. Shaw unveiled, =2=, 59-61.\n\nSt. Louis, hurricane at, =2=, 35, 36.\n\nSt. Louis Exposition (1904), =2=, 216.\n\nSainte-Beuve, C. A., =1=, 142.\n\nSalisbury, Robert Cecil, Marquis of, =2=, 27.\n\nSalter, C. C., =1=, 51.\n\nSalter, W. M., =1=, 248, 346, =2=, 97.\n _See Contents._\n\nSalter, Mrs. W. M. (Mary Gibbens), =1=, 248.\n\nSan Francisco, earthquake at, =2=, 246 _ff._, 251, 256;\n mentioned, 80, 81.\n\nSanctis, Professor di, =2=, 225.\n\nSand, George, and A. de Musset, =2=, 63;\n mentioned, =1=, 106, 182, 183.\n\nSantayana, George, _Interpretations of Poetry and Religion_, =2=, 122-124;\n _Life of Reason_, 234, 235;\n mentioned, =1=, 335, =2=, 14, 121, 225.\n _See Contents._\n\nSardou, Victorien, _Agnes_, =1=, 168.\n\nSargent, Epes, _Planchette_, reviewed by =J.=, =1=, 225 _n._\n\nSargent, John S., =1=, 303.\n\n_Saturday Club, Early Years of the_. _See_ Emerson, Edward W.\n\nSaxons, the, =1=, 86.\n\nScenery, part played by, in =J.='s spiritual experience, =2=, 174, 175.\n\nSchelling, Friedrich W. J. von, =1=, 14.\n\nSchiller, F. C. S., his article on =J.= in _Mind_, =2=, 65, 66;\n _Studies in Humanism_, 270;\n mentioned, 172, 186 _n._, 208, 230, 257, 267, 296, 300, 311, 313, 314, 337.\n _See Contents._\n\nSchiller, J. C. Friedrich von, =1=, 91, 141, 202.\n\nSchinz, Herr, =2=, 337.\n\nSchlegel, August W. von, =1=, 141.\n\nSchlegel, Karl W. F. von, =1=, 141.\n\nSchmidt, Heinrich J., _History of German Literature_, =1=, 141.\n\nSchopenhauer, Arthur, =1=, 191, =2=, 293.\n\nSchott, Dr. (Nauheim), =2=, 124, 128, 134, 157.\n\nSchurman, Jacob G., =1=, 334, =2=, 166.\n\nScotland, =J.= strongly attracted by, =1=, 286.\n\nScott, Sir Walter, his _Journal_, =1=, 309.\n\nScripture, Edward W., =1=, 334.\n\nScudder, Samuel H., =1=, 31.\n\nSea, =J.='s views of traveling by, =1=, 58.\n\nSeals, trained, =1=, 278.\n\nS\u00e9cretan, Charles, =1=, 324.\n\nSedgwick, Arthur G., =1=, 320 and _n._, =2=, 10.\n\nSedgwick, Lucy (Mrs. Arthur G.), =1=, 320 and _n._\n\nSedgwick, Sara, =1=, 76 and _n._\n And _see_ Darwin, Mrs. W. E.\n\nSedgwick, Theodora, =1=, 181, 291, 315, 317, 328, 331,\n =2=, 151, 152, 191, 200, 207, 308.\n _See Contents._\n\nSelberg, \"a swell young Jew,\" =1=, 112, 114, 115.\n\nSemler, Dr., =1=, 87.\n\nSeth, Andrew, =2=, 96, 116, 144.\n And _see_ Pringle-Pattison, A. S.\n\nSeth, James, =2=, 144.\n\nShakespeare:\n H. Grimm on _Hamlet_, =1=, 111;\n _As You Like It_, 144 _n._, 190;\n at Stratford, =2=, 166;\n mentioned, 330, 335, 336.\n\nShaler, Nathaniel S., quoted, on J. Wyman, =1=, 48;\n _The Individual_, =2=, 153 and _n._, 154;\n _Autobiography_, 325;\n mentioned, =1=, 31, =2=, 258, 288.\n _See Contents._\n\nShaw, G. Bernard, _C\u00e6sar and Cleopatra_, =2=, 263;\n mentioned, 330.\n\nShaw, Robert G., unveiling of St. Gaudens's monument to, =2=, 59-61;\n mentioned, =1=, 43.\n\nSherman, William T., =1=, 56, 57.\n\nSidgwick, Henry, \"Lecture against Lecturing,\" =2=, 12;\n death of, 141;\n mentioned, =1=, 229 _n._, 287, 290, 345, =2=, 50, 156.\n\nSlattery, Charles L. _See Contents._\n\nSmith, Adam, =1=, 283.\n\nSmith, Norman K. _See Contents._\n\nSmith, Paulina C., =2=, 106.\n\nSmith, Pearsall, =1=, 287.\n\nSnow, William F., quoted, on =J.= and the San Francisco\n earthquake, =2=, 247 _n._\n\nSnow, Mrs. W. F., =2=, 246.\n\nSociety for Psychical Research. _See_ Psychical Research, Society for.\n\nSolomons, Leon M., death of, =2=, 119;\n his character and work, 119, 120.\n\nSorbonne, the, =J.= declines appointment as exchange\n professor at, =2=, 236 and _n._\n\nSorrento, to Amalfi, =2=, 221, 222.\n\nSpain, misrule of, in Cuba, =2=, 73.\n\nSpanish War, the, =2=, 73, 74.\n\nSpannenberg, Frau, =1=, 85.\n\n_Spectator, The_, =2=, 126.\n\nSpelling reform, =J.='s attitude toward, =2=, 18, 19.\n\nSpencer, Herbert, _Psychology_, =1=, 188;\n _Data of Ethics_, 264;\n mentioned, 143, 164, 191, 254.\n\nSpinoza, Baruch, =1=, 283, =2=, 13.\n\nSpirit-theory, the. _See_ Psychic phenomena.\n\nSpiritualism. _See_ Psychic phenomena.\n\nSpiritualists, and the Medical License bill, =2=, 68.\n\nSpringfield _Republican_, =2=, 125.\n\nStanford, Leland, =2=, 242, 244.\n\nStanford, Mrs. Leland, =1=, 242, 244.\n\nStanford, Leland, Jr.,=1=, 243.\n\nStanford University, =J.='s lectures at, =2=, 235, 240, 244 and _n._;\n a miracle, 241;\n its history, 242, 243;\n what it might be made, 243, 244.\n\nStanley, Sir Henry M., =1=, 303.\n\nStanley, Lady, =1=, 303.\n\nStarbuck, E. D., _Psychology of Religion_, =2=, 217.\n _See Contents._\n\nStead, W. T., =2=, 276, 277.\n\nSteffens, Heinrich, =1=, 141.\n\nStephen. Sir James Fitz-James, \"Essay on Spirit-Rapping,\" =1=, 34 _n._\n\nStephen, Sir Leslie, _Utilitarians_, =2=, 152;\n his letters, 176.\n\nSteuben, Baron von, =1=, 5.\n\nStorey, Moorfield, =1=, 109, =2=, 10.\n _See Contents._\n\nStout, G. F., =2=, 47, 65.\n\nStrasburg, =1=, 86, 87.\n\nStratford-on-Avon, and the Baconian theory, =2=, 166.\n\nStrong, Charles A., =2=, 198, 225, 229, 230,\n 282, 295, 301, 309, 310, 315, 337.\n _See Contents._\n\nStumpf, Carl, _Tonpsychologie_, =1=, 266, 267;\n mentioned, 211, 212, 213, 216, 289.\n _See Contents._\n\nSturgis, James, =1=, 184.\n\nStyle in philosophic writing, =2=, 217, 228, 229, 237,\n 244, 245, 257, 272, 281, 300.\n\nSubjectivism, tendency to, =1=, 249.\n\nSubliminal, Problem of the, =2=, 141, 149, 150, 212.\n\nSuccess, worship of, =2=, 260.\n\nSully, James, =2=, 1 _n._, 225, 226, 218.\n _See Contents._\n\n\"Supernatural\" matters. _See_ Psychic phenomena.\n\nSuttner, Baroness von, _Waffennieder_, =2=, 340.\n\nSwedenborg, Emmanuel, influence of his works on H. James,\n Senior, =1=, 12, 13, 14;\n _Society of the Redeemed Form of Man_, quoted, 12 and _n._;\n H. James, Senior's, essay on, 117;\n mentioned, =2=, 40.\n\nSwitzerland, =1=, 322, 323, 327, 328, 336.\n\nSylvain, Mlle., =2=, 224.\n\nSylvain, M., =2=, 224.\n\n\nTappan, Mary, =2=, 200.\n _See Contents._\n\nTappan, Mrs., =1=, 118.\n\nTaylor, A. E., =2=, 208, 216, 281, 282.\n\nTemple, Ellen, =1=, 38, 39, 51, =2=, 61, 81.\n And _see_ Emmet, Mrs. Temple.\n\nTemple, Henrietta, =1=, 39.\n\nTemple, Katharine, =J.='s portrait of, =1=, 24;\n mentioned, 36, 51, 74, 75.\n _See Contents._\n\nTemple, \"Minny,\" the original of two of Henry James's heroines, =1=, 36;\n =J.= quoted on, 36, 37;\n her \"madness,\" 38;\n mentioned, 43, 51, 74, 75, 98.\n\nTemple, Mrs. Robert (=J.='s aunt), =1=, 36.\n\nTennyson, Alfred, Lord, =2=, 276.\n\nTeplitz, =1=, 133, 134, 137.\n\nThames, the, =1=, 287.\n\nThatness. _See_ Whatness.\n\nThaw, Henry, trial of, =2=, 264.\n\nThayer, Abbott, =2=, 276.\n\nThayer, Gerald, =2=, 275, 276.\n\nThayer, Joseph Henry, =1=, 323.\n\nThayer, Miriam, =1=, 323.\n\nThayer Expedition. _See_ Brazil, Agassiz's expedition to.\n\nThies, Louis, =1=, 107, 112, 157.\n\nThies, Miss, =1=, 116.\n\nThompson, Daniel G., =1=, 295.\n\nTieck, Ludwig, =1=, 141.\n\nTolstoy, Leo, _War and Peace_, =2=, 37, 40, 48;\n and P. Bourget, 37, 38;\n _Anna Karenina_, 41, 48;\n and H. G. Wells, 316;\n mentioned, 44, 45, 51, 52, 63.\n\nTorquay, =2=, 167.\n\nTownsend, Henry E., =1=, 122.\n\nTruth, the, obscured by American philosophers, =2=, 237, 272, 337.\n\nTuck, Henry, =1=, 122, 124.\n\nTuckerman, Emily, =2=, 168.\n\nTurgenieff, Ivan, =1=, 177, 182, 185.\n\nTwain, Mark, =1=, 333, 341, 342, =2=, 264.\n\nTweedie, Mrs. Edmund, =1=, 36.\n\nTweedies, the, =1=, 117, 184.\n\nTychism, =2=, 204, 292.\n\nTychistic and pluralistic philosophy of pure experience, =2=, 187.\n\n\nUnion College, H. James, Senior, graduates at, =1=, 8.\n\n_Unitarian Review_, Davidson's article in, =1=, 236.\n\nUnitarianism (Boston), the \"bloodless pallor\" of, =1=, 236.\n\nUnited States, =J.='s remarks on, =1=, 216, 217;\n and the Philippines, =2=, 140, 141;\n rushing to wallow in the mire of empire, 141;\n manner of eating boiled eggs in, 188;\n vocalization of people of, 189;\n and England, 304, 305.\n\nUpham, Miss, =1=, 34, 50.\n\nUphues, =1=, 345, 346.\n\n\nVan Buren, \"Elly,\" =1=, 70, 74, 75.\n\nVan Rensselaer, Stephen, =1=, 3.\n\nVenezuela Message, Cleveland's, =2=, 26 _ff._\n\nVenus de Milo, =1=, 113.\n\nVerne, Jules, _Tour of the World in Eighty Days_, =1=, 173.\n\nVeronese, Paul, =1=, 90.\n\nVerrall, Mrs. A. W. _See_ Mediums.\n\nVers-chez-les-Blanc, =1=, 320, 345, =2=, 48.\n\nVictor Emmanuel III, King of Italy, =2=, 227.\n\nVictoria, Queen, her Jubilee, =1=, 270.\n\nVienna, exhibition of French paintings at, =1=, 210.\n\nVillari, Pasquale, =1=, 338, 339, 342.\n\nVillari, Mrs., =1=, 338, 339, 342.\n\nVincent, George E., =2=, 41, 42.\n\nVirchow, Rudolf, =1=, 72.\n\nVischer, F. T., Essays, =1=, 94;\n _Aesthetik_, 94.\n\nViti, Signor da, =2=, 227.\n\nVivekananda, =2=, 144.\n\nVoltaire, =1=, 144 _n._\n\nVulpian, A., =1=, 156.\n\n\nWalcott, Henry P., =1=, 347, =2=, 10.\n\nWaldstein, Charles, =1=, 274, =2=, 224.\n _See Contents._\n\nWalsh, Catherine (=J.='s 'Aunt Kate'), =1=, 41,\n 51, 60, 61, 70, 80, 81, 114, 118, 183, 218,\n 259, 280, 282, 285.\n\nWalsh, Hugh, =1=, 8.\n\nWalsh, Rev. Hugh, =1=, 8 _n._\n\nWalsh, James (=J.='s maternal grandfather), =1=, 8.\n\nWalsh, Mary, marries H. James, Senior, =1=, 8;\n her ancestry, 8, 9.\n And _see_ James, Mrs. William.\n\nWalsh, Mrs. Mary (Robertson), =1=, 8.\n\nWalston, Sir Charles. _See_ Waldstein, Charles.\n\nWambaugh, Eugene, =2=, 132.\n\nWard, James, =2=, 312, 313, 314, 315.\n\nWard, Samuel, =1=, 73.\n\nWard, Thomas W., on the Brazilian expedition, =1=, 59, 60, 65;\n mentioned, 33.\n _See Contents._\n\nWard, Dorothy, =2=, 166.\n\nWare, William R., =1=, 124, 153.\n\nWaring, Daisy, =2=, 202.\n\nWaring, George E., quoted, on Henry James, =1=, 184, 185.\n\nWarner, Joseph B., =2=, 160, 233.\n\nWarren, W. R., =2=, 233.\n\nWashington, Booker T., _Up from Slavery_, =2=, 148;\n mentioned, 60, 61.\n\nWashington, Mrs. Booker T., at Ashfield, =2=, 199.\n\nWashington, George, =1=, 5, 277.\n\nWashington, State of, forest fires in, =2=, 80.\n\nWells, H. G., _Utopia_, =2=, 230, 231;\n _Anticipations_, 231;\n _Mankind in the Making_, 231;\n =J.='s appreciation of, 231;\n _Kipps_, 241;\n \"Two Studies in Disappointment,\" 259, 260;\n _First and Last Things_, 316;\n the Tolstoy of the English World, 316;\n mentioned, 246, 257, 318.\n _See Contents._\n\nWerner, G., =2=, 242.\n\nWhatness and thatness, =1=, 244, 245.\n\n\"White man's burden,\" cant about the, =2=, 88.\n\nWhitman, Henry, death of, =2=, 156;\n mentioned, =1=, 298, 302.\n\nWhitman, Sarah (Mrs. Henry), her character and\n accomplishments, =1=, 302, =2=, 205, 206;\n last illness and death, 204, 205, 207;\n mentioned, =1=, 309 _n._, 348, =2=, 156, 256.\n _See Contents._\n\nWhitman, Walt, =2=, 123.\n\nWhole, Idolatry of the, =1=, 246, 247.\n\nWilkinson, Emma. _See_ Pertz, Mrs. Emma.\n\nWilkinson, J. J. Garth, =1=, 135 _n._\n\nWilliam II of Germany, his message to Kruger, =2=, 27, 28.\n\nWilmarth, Mrs., =2=, 50.\n\nWitmer, Lightner, =2=, 320.\n\nWolff, Christian, =1=, 264.\n\nWoodberry, George E., _The Heart of Man._ =2=, 89, 90.\n\nWoodbridge, F. J. E., _Journal_, =2=, 244.\n _See Contents._\n\nWorcester, Elwood, _The Living World_, =2=, 318.\n\nWordsworth, W., _The Excursion_, =1=, 168, 169.\n\nWright, Chauncy, and =J.=, =1=, 152 _n._;\n mentioned, =2=, 233.\n\nWundt, Wilhelm M., as a type of the German professor, =1=, 263;\n his _System_, 333;\n mentioned, 119, 215, 216, 224, 264, 295, =2=, 321.\n\nWyman, Jeffries, influence as a teacher, =1=, 47;\n C. W. Eliot and N. S. Shaler quoted on, 47, 48;\n =J.= quoted on, 48, 49;\n mentioned, 35, 37, 50, 71, 72, 150, 155, 160, 163, 170.\n\n\nYale University, =1=, 231.\n\nYankees, a German lady's idea of, =1=, 89, 90.\n\nYoga practices, =2=, 252 _ff._\n\nYosemite Valley, =2=, 81.\n\n\nZennig's restaurant (Berlin), =1=, 112, 113.\n\n_Zion's Herald_, Emerson number of, =2=, 197.\n\nZola, \u00c9mile, _Germinal_, =1=, 287;\n mentioned, =2=, 67, 73.\n\n\nMCGRATH-SHERRILL PRESS\nGRAPHIC ARTS BLDG.\nBOSTON\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe following typographical errors have been corrected by the etext\ntranscriber:\n\nmutally encouraging=>mutually encouraging\n\nMalvida von Meysenbug, Stuttgart, 1877=>Malwida von Meysenbug,\nStuttgart, 1877\n\nMeysenbug, Malvida von, _Memoiren einer Idealistin_=>Meysenbug, Malwida\nvon, _Memoiren einer Idealistin_\n\nRome eems to beat=>Rome seems to beat\n\nQu'on est bien dans \u00e7e fauteuil=>Qu'on est bien dans ce fauteuil\n\n\n * * * * *\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[1] \"It seems to me that psychology is like physics before Galileo's\ntime--not a single elementary law yet caught a glimpse of. A great\nchance for some future psychologue to make a greater name than Newton's;\nbut who then will read the books of this generation? Not many, I trow.\nMeanwhile they must be written.\" To James Sully, July 8, 1890.\n\n[2] President Eliot, in a memorandum already referred to (vol. 1, p. 32,\nnote), calls attention to these courses and remarks: \"These frequent\nchanges were highly characteristic of James's whole career as a teacher.\nHe changed topics, textbooks and methods frequently, thus utilizing his\nown wide range of reading and interest and his own progress in\nphilosophy, and experimenting from year to year on the mutual contacts\nand relations with his students.\" James continued to be titular\nProfessor of Psychology until 1897, just as he had been nominally\nAssistant Professor of Physiology for several years during which the\noriginal and important part of his teaching was psychological. His title\nnever indicated exactly what he was teaching.\n\n[3] At this meeting he delivered a presidential address \"On the Knowing\nof Things Together,\" a part of which is reprinted in _The Meaning of\nTruth_, p. 43, under the title, \"The Tigers in India.\" _Vide_, also,\n_Collected Essays and Reviews_.\n\n[4] In a brief letter to the _Harvard Crimson_ (Jan. 9, 1896), James\nurged the right and duty of individuals to stand up for their opinions\npublicly during such crises, even though in opposition to the\nadministration. Mr. Rhodes, in his _History of the United States,\n1877-1896_, makes the following observation: \"Cleveland, in his chapter\non the 'Venezuelan Boundary Controversy,' rates the un-Americans who\nlauded 'the extreme forbearance and kindness of England.' ... The\nreference ... need trouble no one who allows himself to be guided by two\nof Cleveland's trusted servants and friends. Thomas F. Bayard, Secretary\nof State during the first administration, and actual ambassador to Great\nBritain, wrote in a private letter on May 25, 1895, 'There is no\nquestion now open between the United States and Great Britain that needs\nany but frank, amicable and just treatment.' Edward J. Phelps, his first\nminister to England, in a public address on March 30, 1896, condemned\nemphatically the President's Venezuela policy.\" See Rhodes, _History_,\nvol. VIII, p. 454; also p. 443 _et seq._\n\n[5] \"The Evolution of the Summer Resort.\"\n\n[6] \"Address of the President before the Society for Psychical\nResearch.\" Proc. of the (Eng.) Soc. for Psych. Res. 1896, vol. XII, pp.\n2-10; also in _Science_, 1896, N. S., vol. IV, pp. 881-888.\n\n[7] From the last paragraph of Cleveland's Venezuela message.\n\n[8] In 1910--during his final illness, in fact--James fulfilled this\npromise. See \"A Pluralistic Mystic,\" included in Memories and Studies;\nalso letter of June 25, 1910, p. 348 _infra_.\n\n[9] Cf. William James's unsigned review of Blood's _An\u00e6sthetic\nRevelation_ in the _Atlantic Monthly_, 1874, vol. XXXIV, p. 627.\n\n[10] James always did a reasonable share of college committee work,\nespecially for the committee of his own department. But although he had\nexercised a determining influence in the selection of every member of\nthe Philosophical Department who contributed to its fame in his time\n(except Professor Palmer, who was his senior in service), he never\nconsented to be chairman of the Department. He attended the weekly\nmeetings of the whole Faculty for any business in which he was\nconcerned; otherwise irregularly. He spoke seldom in Faculty.\nOccasionally he served on special committees. He usually formed an\nopinion of his own quite quickly, but his habitual tolerance in matters\nof judgment showed itself in good-natured patience with discussion--this\ndespite the fact that he often chafed at the amount of time consumed.\n\"Now although I happen accidentally to have been on all the committees\nwhich have had to do with the proposed reform, and have listened to the\ninterminable Faculty debates last winter, I disclaim all powers or right\nto speak in the _name_ of the majority. Members of our dear Faculty have\na way of discovering reasons fitted exclusively for their idiosyncratic\nuse, and though voting with their neighbors, will often do so on\nincommunicable grounds. This is doubtless the effect of much learning\nupon originally ingenious minds; and the result is that the abundance of\ndifferent points and aspects which a simple question ends by presenting,\nafter a long Faculty discussion, beggars both calculation beforehand and\nenumeration after the fact.\"--\"The Proposed Shortening of the College\nCourse.\" _Harvard Monthly_, Jan., 1891.\n\n[1] \"I _loved_ Child more than any man I know.\" Sept. 12, '96.\n\n[11] Eight lectures on \"Abnormal Mental States\" were delivered at the\nLowell Institute in Boston, but were never published. Their several\ntitles were \"Dreams and Hypnotism,\" \"Hysteria,\" \"Automatisms,\" \"Multiple\nPersonality,\" \"Demoniacal Possession,\" \"Witchcraft,\" \"Degeneration,\"\n\"Genius.\" In a letter to Professor Howison (Apr. 5, 1897) James said,\n\"In these lectures I did not go into psychical research so-called, and\nalthough the subjects were decidedly morbid, I tried to shape them\ntowards optimistic and hygienic conclusions, and the audience regarded\nthem as decidedly anti-morbid in their tone.\"\n\n[12] _Demon Possession and Allied Themes_, by John C. Nevius.\n\n[13] _The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy_ had\njust appeared.\n\n[14] The Address has been reprinted in _Memories and Studies_.\n\n[15] For a short while MacMonnies's Bacchante stood in the court of the\nBoston Public Library.\n\n[16] These words were not employed in public, but were once applied to a\nwell-known professor in a private letter.\n\n[17] A full report of the speech made at the Legislative hearing was\nprinted in the _Banner of Light_, Mar. 12, 1898. The letter to the\nBoston _Transcript_ in 1894 appeared in the issue of Mar. 24.\n\n[18] _James J. Putnam to William James_\n\nBOSTON, _Mar. 9, 1898_.\n\nDEAR WILLIAM,--We have thought and talked a good deal about the subject\nof your speech in the course of the last week. I prepared with infinite\nlabor a letter intended for the _Transcript_ of last Saturday, but it\nwas not a weighty contribution and I am rather glad it was too late to\nget in. I think it is generally felt among the best doctors that your\nposition was the liberal one, and that it would be a mistake to try to\nexact an examination of the mind-healers and Christian Scientists. On\nthe other hand, I am afraid most of the doctors, even including myself,\ndo not have any great feeling of fondness for them, and we are more in\nthe way of seeing the fanatical spirit in which they proceed and the\nharm that they sometimes do than you are. Of course they do also good\nthings which would remain otherwise not done, and that is the important\npoint, and sincere fanatics are almost always, and in this case I think\ncertainly, of real value.\n\nAlways affectionately,\nJAMES J. P.\n\n\n[19] That is, there was here no path to follow, only \"blazes\" on the\ntrees.\n\n[20] The housekeeper at the Putnam-Bowditch \"shanty.\"\n\n[21] Photograph of a boy and girl standing on a rock which hangs dizzily\nover a great precipice above the Yosemite Valley.\n\n[22] G. E. Woodberry: _The Heart of Man_; 1899.\n\n[23] James's house was number 95, his mother-in-law's number 107.\n\n[24] Augusta was the house-maid; Dinah, a bull-terrier.\n\n[25] It will be recalled that Davidson had a summer School of Philosophy\nat his place called Glenmore on East Hill, and that East Hill is at one\nend of Keene Valley. See also James's essay on Thomas Davidson, \"A\nKnight Errant of the Intellectual Life,\" in _Memories and Studies_.\n\n[26] A gift which provided for building the \"Harvard Union.\"\n\n[27] \"You have never spent a night under our roof, or eaten a meal in\nour house!\" This fictitious charge had become the recognized theme of\nfrequent elaborations.\n\n[28] _The World and the Individual_, vol. I. Mrs. Evans was inclined to\ncontend for Royce's philosophy.\n\n[29] The name of an American claret which his correspondent had\n\"discovered\" and in which it also pleased James to find merit.\n\n[30] The second volume of _The World and the Individual_. (Gifford\nLectures at the University of Aberdeen.)\n\n[31] _Interpretations of Poetry and Religion._ New York, 1900.\n\n[32] _Memoiren einer Idealistin_, by Malwida von Meysenbug, Stuttgart,\n1877.\n\n[33] _Recollections of My Mother_ [Anne Jean Lyman], by Susan I. Lesley,\nBoston, 1886.\n\n[34] Sister Nivedita.\n\n[35] Booker T. Washington's _Up from Slavery_.\n\n[36] \"Frederick Myers's Services to Psychology.\" Reprinted in _Memories\nand Studies_.\n\n[37] _The Individual, A Study of Life and Death_. New York, 1900. This\nletter is reproduced from the _Autobiography_ of N. S. Shaler, where it\nhas already been published.\n\n[38] Mrs. O. W. Holmes had used the following translation of an epitaph\nin the Greek Anthology:--\n\n A shipwrecked sailor buried on this coast\n Bids thee take sail.\n Full many a gallant ship, when we were lost,\n Weathered the gale.\n\n\n[39] \"And base things of the world and things which are despised hath\nGod chosen, yes, and things which are not, to bring to naught things\nthat are.\"\n\n[40] Kitchen.\n\n[41] Although James had received the usual hint that Harvard intended to\nconfer an honorary degree upon him, he had absented himself from both\nthe honors and fatigues of Commencement time. The next year he was\npresent, and the LL.D. was conferred.\n\n[42] \"I have been re-reading Bergson's books, and nothing that I have\nread in years has so excited and stimulated my thought. Four years ago I\ncouldn't understand him at all, though I felt his power. I am sure that\nthat philosophy has a great future. It breaks through old _cadres_ and\nbrings things into a solution from which new crystals can be got.\" (From\na letter to Flournoy, Jan. 27, 1902.)\n\n[43] The Ingersoll Lecture on Human Immortality.\n\n[44] There had been a celebration of Mrs. Agassiz's eightieth birthday\nat Radcliffe College, of which she was President.\n\n[45] On the Amazon in 1865-66.\n\n[46] An 8-page _Syllabus_ printed for the use of his students in the\ncourse on the \"Philosophy of Nature\" which James was giving during the\nfirst half of the college year.\n\n[47] _Human Personality and its Survival of Bodily Death_, by F. W. H.\nMyers.\n\n[48] \"The piles driven into the quicksand are too few for such a\nstructure. But it is essential as a preliminary attempt at methodizing,\nand will doubtless keep a very honorable place in history.\" To F. C. S.\nSchiller, April 8, 1903.\n\n[49] Eusapia Paladino, the Italian \"medium.\" The physical manifestations\nwhich occurred during her trance had excited much discussion.\n\n[50] The name of a student-society.\n\n[51] The horse.\n\n[52] W. E. B. Du Bois: _The Souls of Black Folk_.\n\n[53] These five lectures were delivered at the summer school at\n\"Glenmore,\" which Thomas Davidson had founded. Their subject was\n\"Radical Empiricism as a Philosophy\"; but they were neither written out\nnor reported.\n\n[54] _Aristotelian Society Proceedings_, vol. IV, pp. 87-110.\n\n[55] James's answers are printed in italics.\n\n[56] \"How Two Minds Can Know One Thing,\" _Journal of Philosophy,\nPsychology, and Scientific Methods_, 1905, vol. II, p. 176.\n\n[57] \"Is Radical Empiricism Solipsistic?\" _Journal of Philosophy,\nPsychology, and Scientific Methods_, 1905, vol. II, p. 235.\n\n[58] This address, \"La Notion de Conscience,\" was printed first in the\n_Archives de Psychologie_, 1905, vol. V, p. 1. It will also be found in\nthe _Essays in Radical Empiricism_.\n\n[59] \"My own desire to see Roosevelt president here for a limited term\nof years was quenched by a speech he made at the Harvard Union a couple\nof years ago.\" (To D. S. Miller, Jan. 2, 1908.)\n\n[60] _The Life of Reason._ New York, 1905.\n\n[61] He had been \"sounded\" regarding an appointment as Harvard Exchange\nLecturer at the Sorbonne, and had at first been inclined to accept.\n\n[62] Busse, _Leib und Seele, Geist und K\u00f6rper_; Heymans, _Einf\u00fchrung in\ndie Metaphysik_.\n\n[63] _Vide Letters of Henry James_, vol. II, p. 43.\n\n[64] \"Also outside 'addresses,' impossible to refuse. Damn them! Four in\nthis Hotel [in San Francisco] where I was one of four orators who spoke\nfor two hours on 'Reason and Faith,' before a Unitarian Association of\nPacific Coasters. Consequence: _gout_ on waking this morning! _Unitarian\ngout_--was such a thing ever heard of?\" (To T. S. Perry, Feb. 6, 1906.)\n\n[65] Dr. Snow kindly wrote an account of the afternoon that he spent in\nJames's company in the city and it may here be given in part.\n\n\"When I met Professor James in San Francisco early in the afternoon of\nthe day of the earthquake, he was full of questions about my personal\nfeelings and reactions and my observations concerning the conduct and\nevidences of self-control and fear or other emotions of individuals with\nwhom I had been closely thrown, not only in the medical work which I\ndid, but in the experiences I had on the fire-lines in dragging hose and\nclearing buildings in advance of the dynamiting squads.\n\n\"I described to him an incident concerning a great crowd of people who\ndesired to make a short cut to the open space of a park at a time when\nthere was danger of all of them not getting across before certain\nbuildings were dynamited. Several of the city's police had stretched a\nrope across this street and were volubly and vigorously combating the\nonrush of the crowd, using their clubs rather freely. Some one cut the\nrope. At that instant, a lieutenant of the regular army with three\nprivates appeared to take up guard duty. The lieutenant placed his guard\nand passed on. The three soldiers immediately began their beat, dividing\nthe width of the street among themselves. The crowd waited, breathless,\nto see what the leaders of the charge upon the police would now do. One\nman started to run across the street and was knocked down cleverly by\nthe sentry, with the butt of his gun. This sentry coolly continued his\npatrol and the man sat up, apparently thinking himself wounded, then\nscuttled back into the crowd, drawing from every one a laugh which was\nevidently with the soldiers. Immediately, the crowd began to melt away\nand proceed up a side street in the direction laid out for them.\n\n\"In connection with this story Professor James casually mentioned that\nnot long before, where there were no soldiers or police, he had run on\nto a crowd stringing a man to a lamp-post because of his endeavor to rob\nthe body of a woman of some rings. At the time, I did not learn other\ndetails of this particular incident, us Professor James was so full of\nthe many scenes he had witnessed and was particularly intent on\ngathering from me impressions of what I had seen. I suppose he had\nsimilarly been gathering observations from others whom he met,\n\n\"An incident which struck me as humorous at the time was that he should\nhave gathered up a box of \"Zu-zu gingersnaps,\" and, as I recall it, some\nsmall pieces of cheese. I do not now recall his comment on where he had\nobtained these, but there was some humorous incident connected with the\ntransaction, and he was quite happy and of opinion that he was enjoying\na nourishing meal.\n\n\"Professor James told me vividly and in a few words the circumstances of\nthe damage done by the earthquake at Stanford University, and I left him\nto make arrangements for going down to the University that night to\nprovide for my family. As it turned out, Professor James returned to the\ncampus before I did, and true to his promise thoughtfully hunted up Mrs.\nSnow and told her that he had seen me and that I was alive and well.\"\n\n[66] James had not used a type-writer since the time when his eyes\ntroubled him in the seventies. The machine now had the fascination of a\nstrange toy again.\n\n[67] He did mistake, as Mr. Chesterton's subsequent utterances showed.\n\n[68] As to \"Jimmy,\" _vide_ vol. I, p. 301 _supra_.\n\n[69] _Cf._ pp. 16, 17, and 220 _supra_.\n\n[70] Dr. Miller writes: \"These four evenings at the Faculty Club were\nsingularly interesting occasions. One was a meeting of the Philosophical\nClub of New York, whose members, about a dozen in number, were of\ndifferent institutions. The others were impromptu meetings arranged\neither by members of the Department of Philosophy at Columbia or a wider\ngroup. At one of them Mr. James sat in a literal circle of chairs, with\nprofessors of Biology, Mathematics, etc., as well as Philosophy, and\nanswered in a particularly friendly and charming way the frank\nobjections of a group that were by no means all opponents. At the close,\nwhen he was thanked for his patience, he remarked in his humorously\ndisclaiming manner that he was not accustomed to be taken so seriously.\nPrivately he remarked how pleasantly such an unaffected, easy meeting\ncontrasted with a certain formal and august dinner club, the exaggerated\namusement of the diners at each other's jokes, etc.\"\n\n[71] His resignation did not take effect until the end of the Academic\nyear, although his last meeting with the class to which he was giving a\n\"half-course,\" occurred at the mid-year.\n\n[72] \"La Notion de Conscience,\" _Archives de Psychologie_, vol. V, No.\n17, June, 1905. Later included in _Essays in Radical Empiricism_.\n\n[73] \"Pragmatism's Conception of Truth.\" Included in _Selected Essays\nand Reviews_.\n\n[74] The story of the Committee for Mental Hygiene is interestingly told\nin Part V of the 4th Edition of C. W. Beers's _A Mind that Found\nItself_. Several letters from James are incorporated in the story.\n_Vide_ pp. 339 and 340; also pp. 320, 352.\n\n[75] Mrs. James's niece, Rosamund Gregor, age 6.\n\n[76] _Memories and Studies_, pp. 286 _et seq._\n\n[77] The reader need hardly be reminded that new meanings and\nassociations have attached themselves to this word in particular.\n\n[78] _Talks to Teachers_, p. 265.\n\n[79] Proceedings of (English) S.P.R., vol. XXIII, pp. 1-121. Also, Proc.\nAmerican S.P.R., vol. III, p. 470.\n\n[80] _L'\u00c9volution Cr\u00e9atrice._\n\n[81] \"A Word More about Truth,\" reprinted in _Collected Essays and\nReviews_.\n\n[82] Learned public.\n\n[83] Superficial stuff.\n\n[84] The lectures were published as _A Pluralistic Universe_.\n\n[85] New York: Longmans, Green & Co., 1908.\n\n[86] \"The Confidences of a Psychical Researcher,\" reprinted in _Memories\nand Studies_ under the title \"Final Impressions of a Psychical\nResearcher.\"\n\n[87] By Frank Harris; New York: 1909.\n\n[88] See the footnote on p. 39 _supra_.","title":"The Letters of William James, Vol. 2","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":121273}