 The traditional versions of neutral monism of Mach, James, and Russell reflect the empiricist outlook of their authors. This leads them to turn to experience, when searching for their neutral entities. And this leads us to see their doctrines as tainted by mentalism. Perhaps the traditional neutral monists were wrong to forge this tight link between the neutral entities and experience. Perhaps we are too quick in dismissing their efforts to discover a neutral base in this area. The rising interest in the history of analytic philosophy, the gradual rediscovery of Russell as a metaphysician and epistemologist, and the existence of new work such as Erik Banks’s new study of traditional neutral monism (Banks 2014) hold out some hope for better understanding of traditional neutral monism.