Royce, Josiah, 1855–1916, American philosopher, b. California, grad. Univ. of California, 1873. After studying in Germany and at Johns Hopkins, he returned to California to teach (1878–82). From 1882 until his death he was at Harvard, becoming a professor in 1892. Among his works are The Spirit of Modern Philosophy (1892), The World and the Individual (1900–1901), The Philosophy of Loyalty (1908), and Lectures on Modern Idealism (1919). Royce, thoroughly grounded in history and cognizant of scientific thought, was the foremost American idealist. He held that reality is the life of an absolute mind. We know truth beyond ourselves because we are a part of the logos, or world-mind. Science successfully depends on description, but appreciation must precede description and consequently ideals must be deeper than the mechanism of science. The natural order of the world must be also a moral order. Our ethical obligation is to the moral order and takes the form of loyalty to the great community of all individuals.

Bibliography

See biography by B. Kuklick (1972, repr. 1985); studies by G. Marcel (tr. 1965), P. L. Fuss (1965), T. F. Powell (1967), B. B. Singh (1973), F. M. Oppenheim (1980), and J. Clendenning (1985).

Royce, Josiah

(born Nov. 20, 1855, Grass Valley, Calif., U.S.—died Sept. 14, 1916, Cambridge, Mass.) U.S. philosopher. He studied under William James and Charles Sanders Peirce at Johns Hopkins University. After teaching English at the University of California for four years, he accepted a position at Harvard University (1882), where he remained until his death. An absolute idealist in the Hegelian tradition, he stressed the unity of human thought with the external world. His idealism also extended to religion, the basis of which he conceived to be human loyalty. In his words, the highest good would be achieved by “the willing and practical and thoroughgoing devotion of a person to a cause.” A diverse thinker, he also made contributions to psychology, social ethics, literary criticism, history, and metaphysics. His many books include The Religious Aspect of Philosophy (1885), The Spirit of Modern Philosophy (1892), Studies of Good and Evil (1898), The World and the Individual (1900–01), and The Philosophy of Loyalty (1908). His emphasis on individuality and will over intellect strongly influenced 20th-century American philosophy.

Royce, Josiah (1855–1916) philosopher: born in Grass Valley, Calif. The son of poor parents who had journeyed to California in the 1849 gold rush, he graduated from the University of California (1875), then studied in Germany, where he was influenced by post-Kantian idealism, and at Johns Hopkins University. In 1878, at William James's invitation, he joined the Harvard faculty, becoming one of its most celebrated teachers. In such works as Religious Aspects of Philosophy (1885) and The World and the Individual (1900–01), he developed a religiously oriented brand of absolute idealism. In later years he devoted increased attention both to technical problems of logic and mathematics and to moral and religious issues of broad interest.