James went to Shakespeare and read the
plays all over again to test the Harris theory. Maybe the poet
could be known by his works. The fact that the theory was
revolutionary did not alter the possibility that it might be
true.
So with religion. A scientist, living in an age when science is
dogmatically irreligious, he turned from its cocksure reasoning
to ask for the facts. He went to the lives of the saints! Not to
Herbert Spencer, you see. When he wanted to study the religious
experience he went to the people who had had it, to Santa Theresa
and Mrs. Eddy. They might know something the professors didn't
know.
And again: at the age of sixty-five, with the whole of New
England's individualism behind him, he asked about socialism.
When he met H. G. Wells, he listened to the socialist, and, as it
happens, was converted. So he said so. James was no more afraid
of a new political theory than he was of ghosts, and he was no
more afraid of proclaiming a new theory, or an old one, than he
was of being a ghost. I think he would have listened with an open
mind to the devil's account of heaven, and I'm sure he would have
heard him out on hell.
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