The Metaphysical Club, 1
Reading: Louis Menand, The Metaphysical Club, preface-Ch. 2 and 351-58.
In his preface, Menand reveals that the “story of ideas in America” (of the subtitle) that he’s going to tell has to do with a new mode of thinking that developed gradually in post-Civil War America. The Civil War, he tells us, “swept away . . . almost the whole intellectual culture of the North” (x). (This claim seems somewhat hyperbolic, given the importance of Darwinism, but Menand later makes a good case for the impact of the war on two of his main characters, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and William James.) Menand credits Holmes and James, along with Charles Peirce and John Dewey, with developing the modern mode of American thought. He proposes that these men shared “an idea about ideas”–”that ideas are not ‘out there’ waiting to be discovered, but are tools — like forks and knives and microchips — that people devise to cope with the world in which they find themselves” (xi). This “idea about ideas” — the notion that ideas are simply tools rather than universal truths — is the core premise of the new philosophy of pragmatism that Menand argues that Holmes, James, Peirce, and Dewey invented during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Oddly, Menand does not use the word pragmatism in his preface!
Given that this is a book about pragmatism, it seems worthwhile to skip ahead to the section where Menand takes another stab at defining what pragmatism means. He does so on pages 351-58. Because you have to skip over 300 pages to get to this section, it’s not going to be completely clear at first glance, but it’s still useful to look ahead.
Menand starts here by giving pragmatic description of the human decision-making process. He concludes near the top of page 353 that “so often, we know we’re right before we know why we’re right,” because “there is no noncircular set of criteria for knowing whether a particular belief is true.” This idea is too complex to be swallowed easily. If we bear with Menand for a few more pages, though, he explains that William James believed that “no belief . . . is justified by its correspondence to reality, because mirroring reality is not the purpose of having minds” (356). This (negative) analogy does help. Minds are not mirrors. It sure would be nice here to have a positive analogy to explain what a mind is or does, wouldn’t it? Menand doesn’t quite give us that, but he does give us, in these pages, a few formulations of James’s idea that “the true is the name of whatever proves itself to be good in the way of belief” (355). We could probably rephrase this to say that “the truth is what works.” Our minds don’t mirror reality, then, but they do provide us with tools for coping with reality. We cannot possibly say if our ideas match up to reality–all that we can know is whether or not our ideas have what James called “cash value.” Having said all of this, don’t get too bent out of shape if this section still seems obscure. Menand is going to tell many personal stories about his main characters in order to help us understand pragmatism.
Back to the beginning of the book. The focus of part one is Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., a Harvard graduate and Civil War veteran who eventually served on the Supreme Court. In these early chapters, Menand introduces a multitude of characters, most of whom don’t come up again. In doing so, though, he paints a brilliant picture of the context from which Holmes emerged — namely, the context of pre-Civil War Boston and Harvard. As we read, then, we need to pay attention to how Menand connects that context to Holmes. Menand’s main point for this whole section of the book involves the impact of the Civil War on Holmes. Menand argues that the war made the assumptions of pre-war Boston “obsolete” and that the war made Holmes “lose his beliefs in beliefs” (4). Oh dear.
As we forge ahead, the main thing to keep an eye on is how the young Holmes was influenced by our old friend Ralph Waldo Emerson (who was a friend of his father) and was subsequently drawn into the movement to abolish slavery and the Civil War itself. By the end of the second chapter, we can see that Holmes was becoming somewhat disillusioned by the war effort.
In addition to the questions on your reading guide, by my lights there two main questions to ask about these first two chapters: 1) How and why did Holmes get drawn into abolitionism and military service, and 2) Why did he begin to lose faith in the war?
October 31st, 2007 at 2:53 pm
Response to Question 1:Reading Guide
In the beginning of Menards book, “The Metaphysical Club”, he otlines what the civil war meant economically, intellectually, and politically. He stresses first the political impact of the Civil War. Politics were now to be dominated by the Republican party who endorsed a strong central government and industrialization. In essence, the point being made is that the Republican party, promoting industrialization, definately shaped Early America during this time period. Menard notes, “For more than thirty years, a strong central government protected and promoted the ascendence of industrial capitalism and the way of life associated with it-the way of life we call “modern.”
Another point he makes is that the Civil War had a profound impact on beliefs. He comes to the conclusion that the Civil War changed the entire intellectual movement of the North. As he stated, “The Civil War swept away the slave civilization of the South, but it swept away almost the whole intellectual culture of the North along with it.”
The fact of the matter is that each of the thinkers illustrated in this book were deeply effected by the Civil War. For they had lost their belief in ideas. Seeing the devestation wrought by the Civil War, they began to lose their faith in “ideas”. Essentially, they believed ideas were a “provisional response to particular and unreproducible circumstances that thier survival depends not on their imutability but on their adaptability.” I believe he is asserting that the economic, social, and political culture of the time influenced these thinkers by making them “adapt” their thoughts. Not only did the conditions of the time influence their thoughts, but it also allowed their thoughts to flourish. As Lois Menard states “they helped put Americans into a better relation with the conditions of modern life.”
Because ideas are simply provisional responses to unpredictable circumstances it is vital, they would argue, that “Ideas should never become ideologies.” The Civil war was fought on the notion of certain ideologies which only served to bring on death and destruction. Lois Menard goes on to note, “Those beliefs had not prevented the country from going to war…they seemed absurdly obsolete in the new, postwar world.” Perhaps a new understanding would be in order. It was this new type of understanding which would become the school of Pragmatism.
October 31st, 2007 at 9:07 pm
I have done a lot of research on the Civil War and was not at all surprised that Holmes became disillusioned with it — almost everyone who fought in the war did. Since he lost his belief in beliefs and saw many of his compatriots die, it is surprising that Holmes could have become such known intellectual after the war. But the country needed intellectuals after the war because, as Menand states: “it [the war] swept away the the whole intellectual culture of the North along with it.”
Holmes was only a part of a whole generation of veterans who lost their belief in beliefs, and Holmes was a outspoken figure. The entire country seemed to become pragmatists after the war.
October 31st, 2007 at 10:15 pm
One of the items that struck me about the first part was the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson on the young Oliver Wendell Holmes. Emerson’s teachings about the rejection of institutionalized religion seemed to lead Holmes to realize that he did not need a religious faith to lead his life in a satisfactory manner. Ultimately though, it was the life experiences of Holmes put together, Emerson included, that led him to repudiate religion as a necessary component of a good life, or that killing is justified if the cause being fought for is worthy enough.
To address the point of why Holmes lost faith in the war more specifically, it is fair to say the his faith was lost because the ideas in which he may have used to validate belief in its justification in the first place were not nearly strong enough to hold up to the realities of war, and the reality of what is might actually take to live up to certain ideals.
November 1st, 2007 at 10:33 am
Holmes wrote, “I think before long the majority will say that we are vainly working to effect what never happens - the subugation of a great civilized nation” which seems to point toward Emerson’s influence of antiinstitution and the exploitation of dissilusionment of reform through violence(war). The horrors that Holmes experienced certainly validated his view that “our reasons for needing reasons are always changing” and with just cause cannot be synonyous with “just because”. The preservation of union and the abolitionists’ tendency toward rightoeousness may have been no match fot Holmes when it came to the bloodiness of battle and waste of lives.
November 1st, 2007 at 11:37 am
When Holmes dropped out of college to join the unionists, he was an idealist who believed that he would help put an end to slavery. Like many people who fight in wars, he ended up experiencing disillusionment toward the effort. The war taught him that killing one another for a cause could never be justified. According to Holmes: “Organized violence, at bottom, is just another form of oppression.”
November 1st, 2007 at 12:05 pm
The reason why Holmes was drawn to abolitionism was from Emerson in his freshman year at college. Emerson struck a chord in Holmes because he believed that we take things into account for ourselves, but rather we look down on others. The political war over slavery was developing and Holmes was angered over Harvard faculty penalizing him. Holmes left college and looked at the war as a heroic event. Holmes believed he was doing the right thing to prove his ideas on abolition.
November 1st, 2007 at 12:07 pm
Attending Harvard in the years leading up the Civil War, Holmes undoubtedly noticed an immense hipocrisy defining many of the people around him: His fellow students, his father, and friends of his father. Unionist and Abolitionist both agreed and disagreed on the state of affairs. Holmes, who joined the union saw more confusion and disillusion when he went to war. At Ball’s Bluff he was shot just above the heart, and at Antietam, in the neck, then in the foot. Clearly Holmes was considerably lucky while certainly, many of his comrades were not. Also, Holmes believed in the war effort, while many of his comrades did not. Surviving the Civil War seemed to be no more than mere chance, and I am sure Holmes recognized that. I would argue that surviving that war, or any other war, makes many individuals adopt a skeptical perspective for at least some amount of time in their lives.
November 1st, 2007 at 12:26 pm
War is never what you think it is. Even back then people looked at war as something clamorous, until you experience it for your self. People wanted slavery to end, and had been willing to go to war for their believes. Everyone had good intention just like Holmes, until he experience the horror of war first hand. This would have a great impact on anybody who experienced war, and would make him look at life differently.
November 1st, 2007 at 12:28 pm
I would also like to argue although I have never been in a War of any type. It changes there lives. Most of my uncles have a military background, and most have been deployed at some point in there lives. Its changes you, it makes you appreciate life that you have now more. Such as the life of my Uncle he at the age of 48 was called over too Iraq for a year, when he returned too the US it took him a period to adjust to life here. These people have seen thing’s they wish there children will never have to witness therefore, there writing’s are going to be scewed as such.