by Benjamin Paul Blood
Reprinted Date: October, 2009.
This reprint is of one of the first non-dual treatises written by an American: Benjamin Paul Blood. Published in 1860, on the eve of one of the darkest periods in American history, Optimism is a stirring practical guide to faith in, and acceptance toward, whatever life delivers. Impassioned by his own mystical experiences, Blood’s distinctly American voice had a profound effect on William James, whose last published essay was a tribute to his mystical mentor. As pessimism again darkens America, Optimism shines a dazzling guiding light on wholeness: “We easily conceive ourselves invested in bodies or spheres of palpitating, ethereal lightness, which may fly, at will, around the pendant world; yet the sense in which we were independent of God’s consciousness in our own world would be as mysterious as now. However we exist, doubtless we shall feed only upon his bounty, and shall never inspire ourselves.”
About Benjamin Paul Blood:
“I have always held the opinion that one of the first duties of a good reader is to summon other readers to the enjoyment of any unknown author of rare quality. . . my own taste, literary as well as philosophic, has been exquisitely titillated by . . . Benjamin Paul Blood.” —William James
William James’ “The Varieties [of Religious Experience] is itself best understood as a moment in the ... progression that, at its crest, points directly to the work of Benjamin Paul Blood.”
—Christopher Nelson in Streams of William James
Jonathan Bricklin, editor
Publication Date: November, 2007.
-- Featuring an expanded version of the groundbreaking essay "Sciousness and Con-sciousness: William James and the Prime Reality of Non-Dual Experience," first published in the Journal of Transpersonal Psychology
“The last couple of years have seen a resurgence of interest in William James, one of modern psychology’s most widely respected pioneers. ...But nothing has quite highlighted the depth of his thought like Jonathan Bricklin’s Sciousness. —What is Enlightenment?
"This collection is delightful. It brings together important texts from the later life of Wiliiam James, some of which are not very known, even in academic circles. Jonathan Bricklin's discussion of James is insightful, erudite and illuminating." --Benny Shanon, Professor, Department of Psychology of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, holder of the Mandel Chair in Cognition, and author of The Antipodes of the Mind)
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Exploring Reawakenings to Wholeness