July 14, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



35 



James's latest utterances lie indeed ex- 

 pressed, with eharacteristic energy, a cer- 

 tain abhorrence of what he called classical 

 tendencies in philosophical thought. But 

 I must repeat the word: Fortune not un- 

 justly replies, and will reply to James's 

 vigorous protest against every form of 

 classicism, by making him a classic. 



Thus, then, from the point of view of 

 the competent foreign students of our 

 philosophy, the representative American 

 philosophers are now three and only three 

 — Edwards, Emerson, James. 



And of these three there can be little 

 question that, at the present time, the most 

 widely known abroad is James. Emerson 

 has indeed found a secure place in the 

 minds of the English-speaking lovers of 

 his type of thought everywhere; and has 

 had an important part in the growth of 

 some modern German tendencies. But 

 James has already won, in the minds of 

 French, of German, of Italian, and of still 

 other groups of foreign readers, a position 

 which gives him a much more extended 

 range of present influence than Emerson 

 has ever possessed. 



It is my purpose, upon the present occa- 

 sion, to make a few comments upon the 

 significance of William James's philos- 

 ophy. This is no place for the discussion 

 of technical matters. Least of all have I 

 any wish to undertake to decide, upon this 

 occasion, any controversial issues. My in- 

 tentions as I address you are determined 

 by very simple and obvious considerations. 

 William James was my friend from my 

 youth to the end of his beneficent life. I 

 was once for a brief time his pupil. I long 

 loved to think of myself as his disciple; 

 although perhaps I was always a very bad 

 disciple. But now he has just left us. 

 And as I address you I remember that he 

 was your friend also. Since the last an- 

 nual meeting of this assembly he has been 



lost to us all. It is fitting that we should 

 recall his memory to-day. Of personal 

 reminiscences, of biographical sketches, 

 and of discussions relating to many details 

 of his philosophy, the literature that has 

 gathered about his name during the few 

 months since we lost him, has been very 

 full. But just as this is no occasion for 

 technical discussion of his philosophy so 

 too I think this is no place to add new 

 items to the literature of purely personal 

 reminiscence and estimate of James. What 

 I shall try to do is this: I have said that 

 James is an American philosopher of 

 classic rank, because he stands for a stage 

 in our national self-consciousness — for a 

 stage with which historians of our national 

 mind must always reckon. This statement, 

 if you will permit, shall be my text. I 

 shall devote myself to expounding this text 

 as well as I can in my brief time, and to 

 estimating the significance of the stage in 

 question, and of James's thought in so far 

 as it seems to me to express the ideas and 

 the ideals characteristic of this phase of 

 our national life. 



In defining the historical position which 

 William James, as a thinker, occupies, we 

 have of course to take account, not only of 

 national tendencies, but also of the general 

 interests of the world's thought in his time. 

 William James began his work as a philos- 

 opher, during the seventies of the last cen- 

 tury, in years which were, for our present 

 purpose, characterized by two notable 

 movements of world-wide significance. 

 These two movements were at once scien- 

 tific in the more special sense of that term, 

 and philosophical in the broad meaning of 

 that word. The first of the movements was 

 concerned with the elaboration — the widen- 

 ing and the deepening of the newer doc- 

 trines about evolution. This movement 



