Josiah Royce and William James lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Irving Street, just two doors apart, while Charles Peirce grew up just a few blocks away. In nearby Vermont, John Dewey was born and educated. These four great thinkers shared more than just geographic space. They engaged in a series of formative discussions. By tracing the interactions of Royce (1855-1916) with James, Peirce, and Dewey, Oppenheim hopes to "re-imagine pragmatism" in a way that will highlight Royce's key insights. Josiah Royce emphasized that communities of all sizes-ranging from families to towns-needed "reverence for the relations of life" not only to thrive but to survive. This theme permeates the dialectic of Royce's interactions with Peirce, James, and Dewey. Oppenheim dicusses how these thinkers agreed or disagreed about method and content, skepticism and intelligibility, nominalism and intentionality, as he uncovers their varied stances toward transcendent Reality. Oppenheim counters R.B. Perry's view that James and Royce held almost completely conflicting doctrines, and he repudiates Perry's tactic of using Royce as a foil to display James positively.
Oppenheim offers a richer portrait of Royce by calling attention to Royce's "doctrine of two levels" and its effects on the distinction of human and super-human, by showing the contrast of Royce's "third attitude of will" against two primarily self-centered attitudes of will, and by examining the roles of Spirit, Community, and semiotic process in Royce's thought. Frank M. Oppenheim, who is widely regard as an expert on Josiah Royce, brings more than 40 years of study to bear on this magnum opus. Reverence for the Relations of Life will be essential reading for those interested in American philosophy and theology.