WILLIAM JAMES ON PSYCHICAL RESEARCH

An interesting introduction and postlude by Gardner Murphy (whose own book in this field will appear in a few months) defines and reaffirms William James' importance as an empirical investigator in psychical research for over thirty years who brought to it his ""disciplined, unfearing, ever inquiring, nervously revolving and reconsidering mind"". Always aware of the fitful and fragmentary nature of the evidence obtainable, of the possible ""fraud, conscious or unconscious"" which seems ubiquitous, of the ""non possumus"" of the strictly scientific approach, still James was eager to pursue every phenomenon and explore the subtle relationship of mental healing, psychical research and a broader religious and spiritual existence. Here everything from letters, shorter reviews, essays, to longer extracts from his major works have been gathered together and establish his search for demonstrated truths- whether in telepathy, hypnotism, mediumship (particularly his extensive documentation of sittings with Mrs. Piper), clairvoyance, and assorted phantasms and phenomena. And from the particulars observed and recorded- one is able to reach with James the broader conclusions to which a body of material such as this leads---the existence of a ""subliminal"" self and the possibility of its survival after death. It will be valuable to have the main suppositions and conclusions of his investigative and speculative writings in one volume here substantiating the fact that ""James always knew there was more"".