turity, quite as circuitous and unpredictable as were his father's
ideas on the training of his children. That Swedenborgian theologian
foresaw neither the career of novelist for his son Henry, nor that of
pragmatist philosopher for the older William. The father's migrations
between New York, Europe and Newport meant that William's education had
variety if it did not have fixed direction. From 13 to 18 he studied
in Europe and returned to Newport, Rhode Island, to study painting
under the guidance of John La Farge. After a year, he gave up art for
science and entered Harvard University, where his most influential
teachers were Louis Agassiz and Charles W. Eliot. In 1863, William
James began the study of medicine, and in 1865 he joined an expedition
to the Amazon. Before long, he wrote: "If there is anything I hate, it
is collecting." His studies constantly interrupted by ill health, James
returned to Germany and began hearing lectures and reading voluminously
in philosophy. He won his medical degree at Harvard in 1870. For four
years he was an invalid in Cambridge, but finally, in 1873, he passed
his gravest physical and spiritual crises and began the career by which
he was to influence so profoundly generations of American students.
From 1880 to 1907 he was successively assistant professor of
philosophy, professor of psychology and professor of philosophy at
Harvard. In 1890, the publication of his Principles of Psycholog
brought him the acknowledged leadership in the field of functional
psychology. The selection of William James to deliver the Gifford
lectures in Edinburgh was at once a tribute to him and a reward for the
university that sponsored the undertaking. These lectures, collected
in this volume, have since become famous as the standard scientific
work on the psychology of the religious impulse. Death ended his
career on August 27th, 1910.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Varieties of Religious Experience, by
William James

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