QUARTERLY NEWS MARY BAKER EDDY MUSEUM and Historic Sites

VOL. 17, NO. 2 PUBLISHED BY LONGYEAR HISTORICAL SOCIETY SUMMER 1980 INTELLECTUAL TRENDS IN 19TH CENTURY BOSTON

Following the end of the American Civil War in the mid-1860's, there came a burst of energy which trans­ formed American life. The list of so­ cial changes is staggering, including "the industrialization and urbaniza­ tion of American society; the spread­ ing and merging of railroad and other systems of transport and communica­ tion; the surge toward bigness in in­ dustry, business, capital, labor, and education; the management prob­ lems of large-scale organization; the drift toward specialization in all oc­ oupations; and the rise of ttn adminis· trative and managerial olass." 1 It is intere!lting to be aware of the many forges for ohange that were cen­ tered in Boston at that time. Two events of a atrictly intellectual nature can be examined as symbols of the Ooqrtosy of Harvard Univtrllly Arehivel Coqrteay of Harvard Unlvtrllty Archlvtt Asa Gray In 1876 shift in thought then taking place: the Louie Agassiz, ca. 1872 impact of Darwinism, and the rise of Pragmatism. Boston's Jubilee 350 celebration is Most people do not realize that meetings at which Agassiz or Gray or a marvelous opportunity to reflect Charles Darwin and his theory of both spoke on issues associated with upon some of the great changes in evolution received their fairest hear­ evolution. Two common forums were thought which arose in Boston dur­ ing in the United States, specifically The Boston Society of Natural His­ ing the last half of the nineteenth in the Boston area. Asa Gray, profes­ tory and The Cambridge Scientific century. Christian Scientists are fa · sor of botany at Harvard College and Club. 2 Religious figures sided with m111ar with events in the history of a personal friend of Darwin. knew Agassiz, and most scientific figures the Christian Sc1ence movement that of the coming publication of On with Gray. 1\vo of Agassiz's co· occurred in the Boston area during the Origin of Species by Means of defenders were John A. Lowell, a this period; Mary Baker Eddy's heal· Natural Selection (1859) and intro· wealthy, politically powerful Bosto­ ing from the effects of a fall on the ice duced Darwin's theory of evolution nian who was a member of the Har­ and her discovery of the rules of into the United States. His colleague vard Corporation board; and Francis spiritual healing as taught by Christ at Harvard, Louis Agassiz, professor Bowen, Alford Professor of Moral Jesus; the culmination of her years of of zoology and founder of Harvard's Philosophy at Harvard. Leading Bible study in the writing of Science Museum of Comparative Zoology, within the Gray camp was William and Health with Key to the Scrip· had an established international rep· Barton Rogers, American geologist, tures; her teaching, and tha steps utation as an expert on fossil fish and who was instrumental in the found­ leading to the founding of her church. was the first to claim and prove that ing of the Massachusetts Institute of This article focuaes on other changes there had been an ice age. Agassiz's Technology. in thought at that time. belief in special creation (the notion What was the controversy about? that species were created in their cur­ Superficially, the origin of species. 1uarterly News Summer 1980 rent form and distribution by God) Gray, taking Darwin's position, © LongyeDr Foundation 1960 Vol. 17 , No . 2 made him Gray's chief opponent on claimed that present species de­ Subscription, $6.00 Annually evolution. scended by means of biological (Includes Activities at Longyear) Sent without charge to Members of Longyear Between December 1858 and Oc­ mechanisms from preceeding species tober 1860 there were nineteen public which were different in character.

261 Agassiz said that God created each native Switzerland by Harvard, and matism, then, can be viewed as an individual species as it is now found. was one of the most loved and revered effort to carry the scientific attitudes A point often ignored is that Agas­ men of the city, numbering Longfel­ embodied in Darwinism into philos­ siz and Gray were both skilled nat­ low, Whittier, Lowell and Emerson ophy, and was a reform of philosophy uralists who were acutely aware of among his literary friends. similar to the Darwinian reform of their facts. Seldom did they dispute a Why did the Darwinians win? biology. The Darwinian controversy question of fact. They agreed on all First, the age was becoming spe­ was the major intellectual event the fundamental biological, geo­ cialized and sophisticated in its within the lives of the early prag­ graphical and paleontological facts. thinking. Darwin's ideas were tied matists. Discussions centered on what these directly to observable phenomena, Pragmatism first appeared, accord­ facts meant, on matters of interpreta­ were narrow in scope, and were ing to its originator, Charles Peirce, tion. closely reasoned. They could easily when sometime around "the earliest be verified using the canons of scien­ [eighteen] seventies ... a knot of tific reasoning then being developed. us young men in Cambridge, call­ On the other hand, Agassiz's ideas ing ourselves half-ironically, half­ were cosmic; he freely philosophized defiantly, 'The Metaphysical Club,' about his biological discoveries. -for agnosticism was then riding its Second, the definition of what con­ high horse, ... used to meet, some­ stituted science was changing; the times in my study, sometimes in that philosophical or broad theoretical of William James."5 The Metaphysi­ discussions which characterized ear­ cal Club's exact membership is not lier ages were disappearing. In an age clear, but the list of those who at­ of increasing industrialization and tended meetings is quite impressive: The Boston Society of Natural History specialization, Agassiz's views were Charles Peirce, William James, Fran­ Because they were both concerned doomed. cis Ellingwood Abbot, Charles with the meaning of the data, their All the reasons which doomed Everett, Nicholas St. John Green, debates became philosophical, al­ Agassiz's views were the very rea­ Joseph Warner, Chauncy Wright, though most people thought they sons that caused the rise of prag­ Francis Bowen, Oliver Wendell were scientific. The debates were matism, the uniquely American con­ Holmes, Jr., John Fiske and Thomas about scientific theories and the tribution to the history of philoso­ Davidson. philosophical issues underlying phy. Pragmatism was an attempt to The first appearance of pragma­ those theories. Gray defended a view bring scientific rigor into philosophy tism in print, without benefit of of science which claimed that natural by demanding that concepts be tied name, was in 1877-78 in The Popular processes can only be explained in to experience. Instead of looking for a Science Monthly. (It was the same terms of natural processes. He argued perfect, eternal universe, they, like magazine that is on newsstands to­ that if one moves beyond concepts the Darwinians, looked at a chang­ day, but at the time it was more like grounded in natural phenomena, one ing, finite world. Instead of looking the present Scientific American.) A is outside science. Although he was a beyond a limited human experience rather important appearance of religious man and attempted to trans­ to speculative theories for answers, pragmatic ideas occurred in 1881 late evolution theories into God's way the pragmatists sought to look more when a professor of law at Harvard of creating, Gray sought to divorce carefully at what is found directly published a book entitled, The Com­ science and religion in an effort to within human experience. Prag- mon Law. On the first page he states, keep science pure. Agassiz, on the other hand, looked upon the study of nature as a way "to become ac­ quainted with the ideas of God him­ self. " 3 He thought that scientific thinking could only take place within a greater conceptual frame­ work, only within a religious view of life. The underlying issue, then, was philosophical and theological. The nature of science and the question of · what constitutes legitimate scientific reasoning were the focus, although many at the time did not see that. Not surprisingly, Gray and Darwinism won the battle. When Agassiz died in 1873, debate ceased and Agassiz's name has since almost been lost from the history books.4 However, at the time of these debates, Agassiz was one of the giants of Boston's intellec­ Left, Charles Peirce, ca. 1900; right, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., 1899, while Supreme Court Justice of tual life. He had been lured from his Massachusetts. (Courtesy of Harvard University Archives)

262 "The life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience.... The law embodies the story of a nation's development. ... The substance of the law at any given time pretty nearly corresponds, so far as it goes, with what is then understood to be convenient. " 6 These few sentences encapsulate the philosophy of law which their author, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., held throughout all his years on the Massachusetts and the United States Supreme Courts. The term "pragmatism" was first used, with the idea being attributed to Charles Peirce, on August 26,1898 when William James, then Professor of Philosophy at Harvard, delivered a talk at the Philosophical Union of the University of California on "Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results." William James carried the prag­ matic gospel to all of North America and Europe. He was loved by one and Courtesy ol Harvard University Archives all, and his writings were read William James (left) and Josiah Royce, ca. 1908 widely, even by people not terribly interested in philosophy. Unfortu­ One change, for example, corre­ were possible. With the pragmatists nately, he wrote in what for lated with the sciences rising to be­ we see a shift from thinking about the philosophers is a racy style, speak­ come the describers of reality. Phi­ universe as something fixed which ing, for example, of the "cash-value" losophers, prior to the pragmatists, can be understood, to seeing the uni­ of the consequences of an idea. Ber­ were trained in seminaries, and were, verse as something undergoing con­ trand Russell, the noted British on the whole, religious thinkers. stant change, whose nature we can philosopher, after reading American With pragmatism, philosophers be­ only guess at. philosophy, said, "I find love of truth came more influenced by devel­ All of the changes brought about in America obscured by commer­ opments in the sciences than in reli­ by pragmatism resulted in a rejection cialism of which pragmatism is the gion. In the early nineteenth century, of the eternal. Viewed pragmatically, philosophical expression."7 Yet, as intellectual questions were taken to from the standpoint of natural sci­ already noted, pragmatism was clergymen; now the news media con­ ence, the eternal is considered be­ philosophical; it imbibed the spirit of sult with scientists on the chief intel­ yond the ken of all known proce­ the sciences, required the careful lectual issues. What clergy have to dures, - beyond all human reason­ analysis of concepts, and took se­ say does not seem so important any ing. riously human experience. It was more. Probably the biggest change evi­ more than a mere attitude; it em­ Another change relates to the de­ dent in Boston from the birth of bodied some major changes in our velopment of psychology. With the pragmatism was the change in the collective intellectual life. acceptance of Darwin's theory of philosophy curriculum at Harvard. The general effect of pragmatism evolution, man ceased being a spe­ William James in his lively way was not to change the outward facets cial creation, a special creature. A forced his students and colleagues to of life, but to alter the way in which subsequent development with many consider this way of approaching they were understood. Greater em­ parallels to evolution was the intellectual questions. The most phasis was put on the scientific view naturalization of mind, which famous sight in the Boston area of life. Methods became more im­ brought with it the rise of psychol­ associated with pragmatism was a se­ portant than results; the process of ogy. Once man became, in the eyes of ries of neighborly debates between achieving a goal became as signifi­ scientists, a natural creature, the next William James and Josiah Royce. cant or more significant than the goal logical step was to view his mind as Royce was America's greatest expo­ itself. Constant change along with just another evolutionary, natural nent of idealism, who James had the here-and-now became accepted phenomenon. Thus, we see a slow, brought to Harvard as a genuine men­ as the focus of thought. Fixed ideas, but consistent, shift from talking tal giant, and who added much to the absolutes, transcendentals, all began about mind to examinations of faculty. They were neighbors, and to pass from thought. Great shifts in brain.8 were regularly seen speaking over the thinking were appearing in the intel­ Another change in thought which back fence. On what? The greatest lectual scene of the late nineteenth was introduced with pragmatism and deepest issues in philosophy and century. The results of these changes was the idea of uncertainty. Because religion. The result was that Royce are just beginning to become appar­ pragmatism so fully embraced became more pragmatic, and James ent. change, no fixed ideas or conclusions became more transcendental.

263 Courtesy of Harvard University Archives William James in 1901 The State House in Boston

William James was, of course, century. What is particularly signifi­ 1. Max H. Fisch, Classic American Philos­ aware of the growth of the Christian cant is that although Mrs. Eddy chose ophers, Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc., 1951, p. 9. Science movement during his time, Boston - at that time the cultural 2. David E. Pfeifer, "Louis Agassiz and the and was interested in it from an intel­ and intellectual Athens of America Origin of Species," St!ldie~ in Philosophy lectual and philosophical stand­ - as the headqu[lrters for her world­ and in the Hi~tory of Sc;i!lnce, edit!ld py point, Although he did not undere reaching movement, she did not take Righard Thr~m11n, Cgron!ldo Pr!l~§. 1970, stand Christhm Science, - and part in the major intellectual events pp. 10g-1Q3 , 3. Loui§ Aga~§i~ 11nd A,A, Oould, Pringiplfl§ pragmatism certainly had no connec­ mentioned above. She states in No gf Zoo191W· 11:171i, p, 131} , tion with the religion discovered and and Yes. "Christian Science is no 4 , It Ia intQrllatina tg notll that M11ry B!!k!lr founded by Mary Baker Eddy = his 'Boston craze;' it is the sober second Eddy IIl!mtion§ Dorwin 11nd A!!!IMSiz BllV­ public defense of Christian Science thought of advancing humanity.''lo erol timeB in h11r writill!lB, !l3PilQi!llly in the ohopt!lr on G!lnllsis in Soience and Health in the 1690's helped defeat a bill de· Though no doubt aware of the intel­ with K!ly to thfl Sc;ripture~. Sl!!l olso Mary signed to restrict mental healers. lectual current of her day, which in­ Baker Eddy MentJonfld Them. pp. 9·10, Early in 1894 the medical profession cluded the Darwinian controversy 66-67. introduced into the Massachusetts and pragmatism, from the vantage of 5. Chinlea S. Peirce, Collected Papers. edited Legislature a bill to require all per­ history we can see she placed herself by Charlea Hortahorne and Paul Weias. Harvard Univeraity Pres~, 1935, p. '1. sons practicing mental therapy to on what many historians would 6. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Th!l Common pass a medical examination and be today call the "right side" of the is­ Law. Harvard UnlverBity Preas, 1967 licensed. On March 24, 1894 the Bos­ sues, and she did it not with human (reprint of 11:11}1 edition), p. 5. ton Evening 'Il'anscript published a reasoning, but on the basis of 7. Quoted from the Freeman in John Dewey, "Pragmatic Americ::a,'' Pragmatism and letter on the subject from James, spiritual insight and revelation. American Culture, edited by Gail Kan· which read in part: "I assuredly hold nedy, D.C. Heath & Co., 1950, p. fl7, no brief for any of these healers, and David E. Pfeifer 1:1. It waa William JomeB who introduc!ld phyBiolo!!lcal psyoholoi!Y into the United must confess that my intellect has [Dr. David E. Pfeifer, Associate been unable to assimilate their States. Professor of Philosophy at Principia 9. Gay Wilson Allen, WJ!Jiam Jamea : A Biag· theories, so far as I have heard them College, Elsah, Illinois, received his raphy, Vildn!! Pr!lss,196'1, p. 372. See also given. But their facts are patent and Ph.D. from the University of Illinois Robert Peal, Christian Science = Its En· startling; and anything that inter· and specialized in the history of counter with American Culture, and feres with the multiplication of such Robert Peel. Mary Baker Eddy~ The YaarB American philosophy and philoso­ of Authority. facts, and with our freest opportunity phy of religion.] 10. M11ry B11ker Eddy, No and Yes. p. 19:7. of observing and studying them, will, I believe, be a public calamity. " 9 The bill was tabled, and revived in 1698. This time James appeared before a committee as well as writing a letter LONG YEAR FOUNDATION: Board of 'frustees; Marian H. Holbrook, Frederick to the 'D'anscript. D. Herberich, Robert C. Dale, June A. Austin, John E. Auchmoody. Pre11ident: Richard C. Molloy. QUARTERLY NEWS ill published four times annually, in the Viewed historically,· the begin­ Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, at the headquarters of Long year Histori­ nings of the Christian Science cal Society, 120 Seaver Street, Brookline, Ma11sachusetts 02146. Inquiries about movement coincided with the mo­ memberships, subscriptions, and services are welcome. mentous changes of the nineteenth

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