od to be wholly abominable when worked by
concepts alone, and partly because the essay casts some positive light
on the pluralist-empiricist point of view.

{xiv}

The paper on Psychical Research is added to the volume for convenience
and utility. Attracted to this study some years ago by my love of
sportsmanlike fair play in science, I have seen enough to convince me
of its great importance, and I wish to gain for it what interest I can.
The American Branch of the Society is in need of more support, and if
my article draws some new associates thereto, it will have served its
turn.

Apology is also needed for the repetition of the same passage in two
essays (pp. 59-61 and 96-7, 100-1). My excuse is that one cannot
always express the same thought in two ways that seem equally forcible,
so one has to copy one's former words.

The Crillon-quotation on page 62 is due to Mr. W. M. Salter (who
employed it in a similar manner in the 'Index' for August 24, 1882),
and the dream-metaphor on p. 174 is a reminiscence from some novel of
George Sand's--I forget which--read by me thirty years ago.

Finally, the revision of the essays has consisted almost entirely in
excisions. Probably less than a page and a half in all of new matter
has been added.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY,
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS,
December, 1896.

[1] B. P. Blood: The Flaw in Supremacy: Published by the Author,
Amsterdam, N. Y., 1893.

{x}

CONTENTS.

PAGE

THE WILL TO BELIEVE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Hypotheses and options, 1. Pascal's wager, 5. Clifford's
veto, 8. Psychological causes of belief, 9. Thesis of the
Essay, 11. Empiricism and absolutism, 12. Objective certitude
and its unattainability, 13. Two different sorts of risks in
believing, 17. Some risk unavoidable, 19. Faith may bring
forth its own verification, 22. Logical conditions of religious
belief, 25.

IS LIFE WORTH LIVING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Temperamental Optimism and Pessimism, 33. How reconcile
with life one bent on suicide? 38. Religious melancholy and its
cure, 39. Decay of Natural Theology, 43. Instinctive antidotes
to pessimism, 46. Religion involves belief in an unseen
extension of the world, 51. Scientific positivism, 52. Doubt
actuates conduct as much as belief does, 54. To deny certain