The American Evasion of Philosophy: A Genealogy of Pragmatism

1. The Emersonian Prehistory of American Pragmatism

1 The Emersonian Prehistory of American Pragmatism Mr. Emerson's authority to the imagination consists, not in his culture, not in his science, but all simply in himself, in the form of his natural personality. There are scores of men of more advanced ideas than Mr. Emerson, of subtler apprehension, of broader knowledge, of deeper culture ... Mr. Emerson was never the least of a pedagogue, addressing your scientific intelligence, but an every way unconscious prophet, appealing exclusively to the regenerate heart of mankind, and announcing the speedy fulfillment of the hope with which it had always been pregnant. He was an American John the Baptist, proclaiming tidings of great joy to the American Israel; but, like John the Baptist, he could so little foretell the form in which the predicted good was to appear, that when you went to him he was always uncertain whether you were he who should come, or another. -Henry James, Sr. The long shadow cast by Ralph Waldo Emerson over American pragmatism has been often overlooked and rarely examined. Yet Emerson not only prefigures the dominant themes of American pragmatism but, more important, enacts an intellectual style of cultural criticism that permits and encourages American pragmatists to swerve from mainstream European philosophy.l Like Friedrich Nietzsche-and deeply adored by him- Emerson is a singular and unique figure on the North Atlantic intellectual landscape who defies disciplinary classification. 9 10 The Emersonian Prehistory of American Pragmatism Emerson lacks the patience and persistence to be a great poet. He does not have the deep sense of alienation and marginality to be a profound prophet. And he does not possess the talent for logical precision and sustained argumentation to be a rigorous philosopher.2 Yet Emerson is more than a mediocre man of letters or a meteoric man of lectures. Rather he is a cultural critic who devised and deployed a vast array of rhetorical strategies in order to exert intellectual and moral leadership over a significant segment of the educated classes of his day. The rhetorical strategies, principally aimed at explaining America to itself,3 weave novel notions of power, provocation, and personality into a potent and emerging American ideology of voluntaristic invulnerability and utopian possibility. Like his contemporary (and major twentieth-century competitor) Karl Marx, Emerson is a dyed-in-the-wool romantic thinker who takes seriously the embodiment of ideals within the real, the actualization of principles in the practical-in short, some kind of inseparable link between thought and action, theory and practice.4 Similar to Marx, Emerson focuses on the pressing concerns unleashed by the American, French, and Industrial revolutions: the scope of human powers and the contingency of human societies. These concerns are addressed by highlighting the willful self (or selves) up against and overcoming antecedent circumstances, or to put it in the language of social science, the relation between purposeful subjects and prevailing structures, conscious human agents and social constraints. What distinguishes Marx and Emerson from most of their contemporaries is ~heir stress on the dynamic character of selves and structures, the malleability of tradition and the transformative potential in human history} And what separates Marx from Emerson is that the former's stress on dynamism leads toward a projection of fundamental social transformation through unavoidable class conflict, whereas Emerson's dynamic perspective results in a'prescription for courageous self-reliance by means of nonconformity and inconsistency. For Marx, the major foes are class exploitation and people's lack of control of their lives; for Emerson, the principal enemies are personal stagnation and the absence of creative innovation in people's lives. Both Marx and Emerson herald self-realization and promote democracy (different versions thereof). Yet Marx's preoccupation with power, class, and social freedom leaves a tradition of historical materialist analyses, socialist ideologies, and communist parties, whereas Emerson's fascination with power, provocation, and personality bequeaths a legacy of cultural critiques, pragmatic ideologies, and reform efforts. Just as actually existing communist civilization has traduced Marx's dream of human freedom, so has present-day American civilization vulgarized Emerson 's hope for personal emancipation. Yet just as Marx would be most proud of the revolutionary socialist tradition (e.g., Rosa Luxemburg, Antonio Gramsci) that sits on the margins of communist civilization, so Emerson would be most appreciative of the American pragmatist tradition Emerson on Power (and Tradition) 11 (e.g., William James, John Dewey) that rests nearer to...