The Letters of William James, Vol. 2. William James

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10

James always did a reasonable share of college committee work, especially for the committee of his own department. But although he had exercised a determining influence in the selection of every member of the Philosophical Department who contributed to its fame in his time (except Professor Palmer, who was his senior in service), he never consented to be chairman of the Department. He attended the weekly meetings of the whole Faculty for any business in which he was concerned; otherwise irregularly. He spoke seldom in Faculty. Occasionally he served on special committees. He usually formed an opinion of his own quite quickly, but his habitual tolerance in matters of judgment showed itself in good-natured patience with discussion—this despite the fact that he often chafed at the amount of time consumed. "Now although I happen accidentally to have been on all the committees which have had to do with the proposed reform, and have listened to the interminable Faculty debates last winter, I disclaim all powers or right to speak in the name of the majority. Members of our dear Faculty have a way of discovering reasons fitted exclusively for their idiosyncratic use, and though voting with their neighbors, will often do so on incommunicable grounds. This is doubtless the effect of much learning upon originally ingenious minds; and the result is that the abundance of different points and aspects which a simple question ends by presenting, after a long Faculty discussion, beggars both calculation beforehand and enumeration after the fact."—"The Proposed Shortening of the College Course." Harvard Monthly, Jan., 1891.

11

"I loved Child more than any man I know." Sept. 12, '96.

12

Eight lectures on "Abnormal Mental States" were delivered at the Lowell Institute in Boston, but were never published. Their several titles were "Dreams and Hypnotism," "Hysteria," "Automatisms," "Multiple Personality," "Demoniacal Possession," "Witchcraft," "Degeneration," "Genius." In a letter to Professor Howison (Apr. 5, 1897) James said, "In these lectures I did not go into psychical research so-called, and although the subjects were decidedly morbid, I tried to shape them towards optimistic and hygienic conclusions, and the audience regarded them as decidedly anti-morbid in their tone."

13

Demon Possession and Allied Themes, by John C. Nevius.

14

The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy had just appeared.

15

The Address has been reprinted in Memories and Studies.

16

For a short while MacMonnies's Bacchante stood in the court of the Boston Public Library.

17

These words were not employed in public, but were once applied to a well-known professor in a private letter.

18

A full report of the speech made at the Legislative hearing was printed in the Banner of Light, Mar. 12, 1898. The letter to the Boston Transcript in 1894 appeared in the issue of Mar. 24.

19

James J. Putnam to William James

Boston, Mar. 9, 1898.

Dear William,—We have thought and talked a good deal about the subject of your speech in the course of the last week. I prepared with infinite labor a letter intended for the Transcript of last Saturday, but it was not a weighty contribution and I am rather glad it was too late to get in. I think it is generally felt among the best doctors that your position was the liberal one, and that it would be a mistake to try to exact an examination of the mind-healers and Christian Scientists. On the other hand, I am afraid most of the doctors, even including myself, do not have any great feeling of fondness for them, and we are more in the way of seeing the fanatical spirit in which they proceed and the harm that they sometimes do than you are. Of course they do also good things which would remain otherwise not done, and that is the important point, and sincere fanatics are almost always, and in this case I think certainly, of real value.

20

That is, there was here no path to follow, only "blazes" on the trees.

21

The housekeeper at the Putnam-Bowditch "shanty."

22

Photograph of a boy and girl standing on a rock which hangs dizzily over a great precipice above the Yosemite Valley.

23

G. E. Woodberry: The Heart of Man; 1899.