William James

“ This book would never have been written had I not been honored with an appointment as Gifford Lecturer on Natural Religion at the University of Edinburgh. In casting about me for subjects of the two courses of ten lectures each for which I thus became responsible, it seemed to me that the first course might well be a descriptive one on "Man's Religious Appetites," and the second a metaphysical one on "Their Satisfaction through Philosophy." ”

“ He produces real effects in nature.
POSTSCRIPT Philosophic position of the present work defined as piecemeal supernaturalism-- Criticism of universalistic supernaturalism-- Different principles must occasion differences in fact-- What differences in fact can God's existence occasion?-- The question of immortality-- Question of God's uniqueness and infinity: religious experience does not settle this question in the affirmative-- The pluralistic hypothesis is more conformed to common sense. ”

“ Nevertheless, they break down the exclusive authority of rationalistic states-- They strengthen monistic and optimistic hypotheses.
LECTURE XVIII PHILOSOPHY Primacy of feeling in religion, philosophy being a secondary function-- Intellectualism professes to escape objective standards in her theological constructions-- "Dogmatic theology"-- Criticism of its account of God's attributes-- "Pragmatism" as a test of the value of conceptions-- God's metaphysical attributes have no practical significance-- His moral attributes are proved by bad arguments ”