A collection of essays in popular philosophy by William James, based on addresses to student clubs. It explores belief, truth, morality, determinism, and the role of will and feeling in philosophical questions, including the title essay. James writes in an accessible, conversational style for general listeners.
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Text source: gutenberg.org · The work is in the public domain.
Opening of the book
THE WILL TO BELIEVE AND OTHER ESSAYS IN POPULAR PHILOSOPHY BY WILLIAM JAMES NEW IMPRESSION LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. FOURTH AVENUE & 30TH STREET, NEW YORK LONDON, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA 1912 Copyright, 1896 BY WILLIAM JAMES First Edition. February, 1897,
Reprinted, May, 1897, September, 1897, March, 1898, August, 1899, June, 1902, January, 1903, May, 1904, June, 1905, March, 1907, April, 1908, September, 1909, December, 1910, November, 1911, November, 1912 To My Old Friend, CHARLES SANDERS PEIRCE, To whose philosophic comradeship in old times and to whose writings in more recent years I owe more incitement and help than I can express or repay. PREFACE. At most of our American Colleges there are Clubs formed by the students devoted to particular branches of learning; and these clubs have the laudable custom of inviting once or twice a year some maturer scholar to address them, the occasion often being made a public one. I have from time to time accepted such invitations, and afterwards had my discourse printed in one or other of the Reviews. It has seemed to me that these addresses might now be worthy of collection in a volume, as they shed explanatory light upon each other, and taken together express a tolerably definite philosophic attitude in a very untechnical way. Were I obliged to give a short name to the attitude in question, I should call it that of radical empiricism, in spite of the fact that such brief nicknames are nowhere more misleading than in philosophy. I say 'empiricism,'
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