Grandfather William

"Despite Emerson's rousing call to stick fast to his own work, James went on much as he always had, scattering his energy and attention this way and that. The scattershot variety of his undertaking was his own real work. He was a pluralist to the bone. It is the monist -- self confessed or not -- who can organize a life around one central project, saying no to all offers and openings that may distract from the singular objective. F. Scott Fitzgerald said life is, after all, more successfully looked at from a single window. It is a truth -- if it is a truth -- for which James might have had some sympathy but no lasting patience."