INTRODUCTION 



were still with us, he would often modify such 

 references. 



DISTINCTIVE FEATURES OF FISKE S THOUGHT 

 AND METHOD IN THE " COSMIC PHILOSO- 

 PHY " AS FAR AS CHAPTER XXI, PART II. 



3. As we learn from our author's Preface, 

 the present book grew out of lectures delivered 

 at Harvard University. Just at the beginning 

 of President Eliot's administration, on June 29, 

 1869, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Mr. J. Elliot 

 Cabot, and John Fiske were appointed " to be 

 University Lecturers on Philosophy '' at Har- 

 vard, for the academic year 1869-70. On De- 

 cember 24, 1869, Fiske was reappointed for the 

 year 1870-71 "to be University Lecturer on 

 the Positive Philosophy." ^ In the Harvard 

 Annual Catalogue for 1869-70, no mention is 

 made of Fiske's course amongst the so-called 

 " University Lectures " announced for that 

 year. But under a separate title, " University 

 Courses of Instruction," ^ Fiske appears as one 

 of several officers (the others being Professors 



^ See the President's Report for 1869-70, pp. 6 and 7. 



^ The Catalogue in question, on p. loi, makes a sharp 



distinction between the " University Lectures " of the yeai 



XXIX 



