On another blog I see that the following question has been raised: "Do you know what William James thought of Catholicism?"
The blogger gives his own reply, which you can read via this link if you like.
Personally, I think I do have a handle on what James thought of Catholicism, so I'll offer my own answer.
The short answer is this: he thought of it as too “legalistic and moralistic” to satisfy the deepest of spiritual needs. But he did admire the aesthetic creativity with which it has always been associated, and he regretted the anti-aesthetic, stained-windows-smashing, aspects of the Reformation.
(See? as always with James, even the short answer can’t be very short, because there is always on the one hand and on the other hand. It is what makes him adorable.)
As for the theology of it, James had little patience for the sort of doctrinal structure that generally comes with the RC faith. Here is a pertinent passage from Varieties:
“Take God’s aseity, for example; or his necessariness; his immateriality; his ‘simplicity’ or superiority to the kind of inner variety and succession which we find in finite beings, his indivisibility, and lack of the inner distinctions of being and activity, substance and accident, potentiality and actuality, and the rest … candidly speaking, how do such qualities as these make any definite connection with our life? … what vital difference can it possibly make to any man’s religion whether they be true or false?”
He is aiming directly at the Thomistic doctrinal baggage of the Church there.
Showing posts with label Varieties of Religious Experience. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Varieties of Religious Experience. Show all posts
11 March 2012
14 December 2008
Whitman about Carlyle
On a list serve that I run I was asked not long ago by a fellow who described himself as an archivist for Alcoholics Anonymous whether I knew of any passage in which William James referred to certain religious experiences as being of the "educational variety."
The AA fellow also mentioned that as he had heard the phrase (he had gotten it second hand) James meant specifically by these experiences of an "educational variety," those that aren't immediate stroke-of-lightning conversions, that represent a gradual turning about.
I couldn't give him a precise use of that phrase. I was reminded of this passage, though, which is a quote from Walt Whitman to which James devotes a footnote in VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. I like the passage and will reproduce it here. You folks can make of it what you will.
"There is apart from mere intellect, in the make-up of every superior human identity, a wondrous something that realizes without argument, frequently without what is called education (though I think it is the goal and apex of all education deserving the name) an intuition of the absolute balance, in time and space, of the whole of this multifariousness, this revel of fools, and incredible make-believe and general unsettledness we call the world; a soul-sight of that divine clue and unseen thread which holds the whole congeries of things, all history and time, and all events, however trivial, however momentous, like a leashed dog in the hands of the hunter. [Of] such soul-sight and root-centre for the mind mere optimism explains only the surface."
This is part of a critique of Carlyle for the simple reason that Whitman believes Carlyle has never acquired the vision he describes, and thus failed to become a "superior human identity." Carlyle is the "mere optimist" of the final thrust.
I think it may have been what the archivist wanted, because the word "education" is in there twice, and in precisely the sense that would have impressed the founders of AA. Whitman is contrasting "what is called education" with what is truly "worthy of the name."
Also, the archivist had in mind the "educational variety" of experience as a drawn-out process, that Whitman had in mind -- as James was passing along to his reaers -- the notion of a certain intuition as a "goal and apex" of such a process -- which doesn't sound like a one-off stroke of lightning!
The AA fellow also mentioned that as he had heard the phrase (he had gotten it second hand) James meant specifically by these experiences of an "educational variety," those that aren't immediate stroke-of-lightning conversions, that represent a gradual turning about.
I couldn't give him a precise use of that phrase. I was reminded of this passage, though, which is a quote from Walt Whitman to which James devotes a footnote in VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. I like the passage and will reproduce it here. You folks can make of it what you will.
"There is apart from mere intellect, in the make-up of every superior human identity, a wondrous something that realizes without argument, frequently without what is called education (though I think it is the goal and apex of all education deserving the name) an intuition of the absolute balance, in time and space, of the whole of this multifariousness, this revel of fools, and incredible make-believe and general unsettledness we call the world; a soul-sight of that divine clue and unseen thread which holds the whole congeries of things, all history and time, and all events, however trivial, however momentous, like a leashed dog in the hands of the hunter. [Of] such soul-sight and root-centre for the mind mere optimism explains only the surface."
This is part of a critique of Carlyle for the simple reason that Whitman believes Carlyle has never acquired the vision he describes, and thus failed to become a "superior human identity." Carlyle is the "mere optimist" of the final thrust.
I think it may have been what the archivist wanted, because the word "education" is in there twice, and in precisely the sense that would have impressed the founders of AA. Whitman is contrasting "what is called education" with what is truly "worthy of the name."
Also, the archivist had in mind the "educational variety" of experience as a drawn-out process, that Whitman had in mind -- as James was passing along to his reaers -- the notion of a certain intuition as a "goal and apex" of such a process -- which doesn't sound like a one-off stroke of lightning!
16 September 2007
God and the Moral Philosopher
Some comments today, in accord of course with the name and originating purpose of this blog, about the philosopher William James, especially his essay "The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life."
Toward the end of that essay he asks himself the question (I'm paraphrasing) whether a secular humanist ethics is enough, or whether a coherent sense of good and evil requires a belief in God.
The answer? A secular ethic can be logically coherent but would not ordinarily be psychologically self-sufficient, because an understanding of ethical philosophy leads naturally beyond this world, to an understanding of the divine source of the energies that make for goodness.
The secular ethic can be logically self-sufficient because, as James strove to show, goodness is an inter-subjective fact. All anyone has to acknowledge in order to get a basic grasp on the issues of right and wrong is that there are a variety of different minds in the world, and that they conflict. The goal of reconciliation will naturally suggest itself. Furthermore, in James' view at least, there is a pattern of moral progress in history, a movement toward "our civilizd society" and away from "the older savage ways." An atheist can observe that pattern in the documents as well as a theist. He can draw conclusions from it an act accordingly.
Even, James writes, in a "merely human world without a God" life can be "a genuinely ethical symphony," although in such a world the range of its octaves is narrow.
Why are they narrow? To understand that, we ought to back up and define the essence of James' moral vision. It has both a conservative and a rebellious side -- the conservative respects and defends the social equilibrium that has developed, against the savage or the fraudulent and the threats each presents. But the rebellious
says that no equilibrium is final, and puishes forward toward something more inclusive, more tolerant...higher.
A thoroughly secular view can grasp both halves of this vision, as a logical matter. But depth in contemplation of the human predicament, James says, will lead an ethical philosopher to wonder what motivates and what sustains the rebels who challenge the existing order and upon whose efforts the pattern of moral progress depends. In one passage in MPML James said that every one of "hundreds of ideals has its special champion already provided in the shape of some genius
expressly born to feel it, and to fight to death in its behalf".
Expressly born? A champion already provided? Provided by whom? The most natural hypothesis is that champions -- saints, we may call them, to recall the lectures on sainthood and its uses in VARIETIES -- they come to us and are sustained by what James near the end of "The Moral Philosopher" calls "a divine thinker with all-enveloping demands."
Toward the end of that essay he asks himself the question (I'm paraphrasing) whether a secular humanist ethics is enough, or whether a coherent sense of good and evil requires a belief in God.
The answer? A secular ethic can be logically coherent but would not ordinarily be psychologically self-sufficient, because an understanding of ethical philosophy leads naturally beyond this world, to an understanding of the divine source of the energies that make for goodness.
The secular ethic can be logically self-sufficient because, as James strove to show, goodness is an inter-subjective fact. All anyone has to acknowledge in order to get a basic grasp on the issues of right and wrong is that there are a variety of different minds in the world, and that they conflict. The goal of reconciliation will naturally suggest itself. Furthermore, in James' view at least, there is a pattern of moral progress in history, a movement toward "our civilizd society" and away from "the older savage ways." An atheist can observe that pattern in the documents as well as a theist. He can draw conclusions from it an act accordingly.
Even, James writes, in a "merely human world without a God" life can be "a genuinely ethical symphony," although in such a world the range of its octaves is narrow.
Why are they narrow? To understand that, we ought to back up and define the essence of James' moral vision. It has both a conservative and a rebellious side -- the conservative respects and defends the social equilibrium that has developed, against the savage or the fraudulent and the threats each presents. But the rebellious
says that no equilibrium is final, and puishes forward toward something more inclusive, more tolerant...higher.
A thoroughly secular view can grasp both halves of this vision, as a logical matter. But depth in contemplation of the human predicament, James says, will lead an ethical philosopher to wonder what motivates and what sustains the rebels who challenge the existing order and upon whose efforts the pattern of moral progress depends. In one passage in MPML James said that every one of "hundreds of ideals has its special champion already provided in the shape of some genius
expressly born to feel it, and to fight to death in its behalf".
Expressly born? A champion already provided? Provided by whom? The most natural hypothesis is that champions -- saints, we may call them, to recall the lectures on sainthood and its uses in VARIETIES -- they come to us and are sustained by what James near the end of "The Moral Philosopher" calls "a divine thinker with all-enveloping demands."
12 August 2007
Stephen Bradley
Stephen Bradley was an evangelical who wrote a memoir of his spiritual life in 1830.
His name survives today because William James quoted him in his "Varieties of Religious Experience." I'll reproduce part of one of those quotes, regarding Bradley's conversion experience, not because I recommend Bradley's sort of faith, but simply as a token of a type.
"At first, I began to feel my heart beat very quick all on a sudden, which made me at first think that perhaps something is going to ail me, though I was not alarmed, for I felt no pain. My heart increased in its beating, which soon convinced me that it was the Holy Spirit from the effect it had on me. I began to feel exceedingly happy and humble, and such a sense of unworthiness as I never felt before. I could not very well help speaking out, which I did, and said Lord, I do not deserve this happiness, or words to that effect, while there was a stream (resembling air in feeling) came into my mouth and heart in a more sensible manner than that of drinking anything, which continued, as near as I could judge, five minutes or more, which appeared to be the cause of such a palpitation of my heart."
There's a lot that fascinates me about this quote, for example the scrupulous fashion in which Bradley, having quoted what he remembers himself as saying in prayer at the time, adds, "or words to that effect," to account for the imperfection of human memory.
James notes that the effect of this conversion experience upon Bradley in later life is something "of which we gain no information." Bradley dates the experience to Novemver 1829, when he was 24 years old, and the memoir was published in 1830.
If by their fruits we shall judge them, as pragmatists always hold, then it would be of interest to learn of Bradley's later life.
His name survives today because William James quoted him in his "Varieties of Religious Experience." I'll reproduce part of one of those quotes, regarding Bradley's conversion experience, not because I recommend Bradley's sort of faith, but simply as a token of a type.
"At first, I began to feel my heart beat very quick all on a sudden, which made me at first think that perhaps something is going to ail me, though I was not alarmed, for I felt no pain. My heart increased in its beating, which soon convinced me that it was the Holy Spirit from the effect it had on me. I began to feel exceedingly happy and humble, and such a sense of unworthiness as I never felt before. I could not very well help speaking out, which I did, and said Lord, I do not deserve this happiness, or words to that effect, while there was a stream (resembling air in feeling) came into my mouth and heart in a more sensible manner than that of drinking anything, which continued, as near as I could judge, five minutes or more, which appeared to be the cause of such a palpitation of my heart."
There's a lot that fascinates me about this quote, for example the scrupulous fashion in which Bradley, having quoted what he remembers himself as saying in prayer at the time, adds, "or words to that effect," to account for the imperfection of human memory.
James notes that the effect of this conversion experience upon Bradley in later life is something "of which we gain no information." Bradley dates the experience to Novemver 1829, when he was 24 years old, and the memoir was published in 1830.
If by their fruits we shall judge them, as pragmatists always hold, then it would be of interest to learn of Bradley's later life.
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