Reading Notes: August 28th, 2024

“Why don’t you have a special “Neo-Hegelian Department” in “Mind,” like the “Children’s Department” or the “Agricultural Department” in our newspapers—which educated readers skip?” (William James, Letter to G. Croom Robertson (Editor of “Mind”), Aug. 13, 1886)

“The most promising man we have in this country is, in my opinion, the above-mentioned Royce, a young Californian of thirty, who is really bult for a metaphysician, and who is, besides that, a very complete human being, alive at every point….He has just been in here, interrupting this letter, and I have told him he must send a copy of his book, the “Religious Aspect of Philosophy,” to you, promising to urge you to read it when you have the time….The second half [of the book] is a new argument for monistic idealism, an argument based on the possibility of truth and error in knowledge, subtle in itself, and rather lengthily expounded, but seeming to be to be one of the few big original suggestions of recent philosophical writing. I have vainly tried to escape from it. I still suspect it of inconclusiveness, but I frankly confess that I am unable to overthrow it. Since you too are an anti-idealist, I wish very much you would try your critical teeth upon it. I can assure you that, if you come to close quarters with it, you will say its author belongs to the genuine philosophic breed.” (William James, Letter to Carl Stumpf, Feb. 6th, 1887)