| Title |
Letters from Richard Jones to William Whewell |
| Reference |
51 |
| Covering Dates |
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| Extent and Medium |
1 box |
|
| Index Terms |
| Jones, Richard (1790-1855) political economist |
| Trinity/Add.Ms.c/51 contains: |
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1
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been trying to find RJ all around the country: 'I had trusted to revive many old and acquire many new ideas: and more especially just now when I have cleared away the obstacles that stood between me and the speculations about wh. we used to talk I had anticipated much edifying discourse upon the past[,] the present and the future'. WW wanted to talk to RJ about 'the Review wh. Rose [Hugh James Rose] says is again labouring into existence' - WW does not think they 'have strength for it' yet.
1 doc. |
16 Oct 1817 |
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2
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is taking his students into Wales and 'graze them at the foot of Cader Idris'. He hopes to see RJ on Saturday the 27th so that he can witness him in the pulpit. WW is 'almost tired of this vile alternation of grinding in Cambridge and out of Cambridge but as yet there is not much else to be done. It has kept me still lamenting...on my ignorance and the small partibility of its being dissipated'. WW has begun to read Welsh.
1 doc. |
19 Jun 1818 |
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3
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's hopes of meeting up with RJ have not gone to plan. He is very impressed with the area surrounding Carnarvon. WW is cramming seven pupils: 'One advantage of having my hands so full of employment is that it allows one to dream of undertakings metaphysical, philological, mathematical and others which I would execute if I had time. In the mean while nothing prospers but mechanics'. WW has been approached by Monk [James H. Monk] for the College mathematical lectureship, and has accepted.
1 doc. |
21 Aug 1818 |
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4
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. All of WW's luggage is at the bottom of the Channel [WW and Richard Sheepshanks were embarking on a trip to France, when they ran against another vessel, and although they were both safely evacuated onto another ship there was no time to retreave their luggage]. Could RJ supply them with some spare clothing? .
1 doc. |
16 Sep 1819 |
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5
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW was surprised to find RJ in Paris: 'Sheepshanks [Richard Sheepshanks] and I are preparing to take wing but it will be nearly a fortnight before we reach Paris'. Due to the lack of time, they have had to abandon their philosphical plans of becoming aquainted with 'its state, moral, political, literary and culniary'. From Paris they go to Switzerland, then to Italy and then back via Paris. Their plan is not definite and they would add a week on if they new they would meet up with RJ: 'I wish we could persuade you to take one more extensive ramble - you would be the better for it in your life afterwards and you may take the length and breadth and height of the French constitution at some future time when the edifice has settled into a more permanent form'. .
1 doc. |
16 Jul 1820 |
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6
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is now re-established into College life. After RJ left both WW and Richard Sheepshanks in France [see WW to RJ, 16 July 1820], they 'were principally employed in seeing earth and stone and wood, either in their natural or artificial combinations and had not much opportunity for speculating, or collecting facts for speculators like you, about the animals who inhabit these localities'. WW got on adequately with his French but RS 'continued to talk the very worst jargon that ever man uttered - Notwithstanding this however he was very strenuous in his attempts to expound and give his ideas on all points, especially political, to all the people who came in our way'. WW did not use to believe RJ's 'conclusions as to the chance of a revolution in France but all that we saw after we parted had certainly a tendency to confirm them. An expectation of the same kind seemed to be entertained by most of those who would tell you their opinions and everybody appeared to have some modification or other of hostility to the Bourbons. And this is so much the worse because the powers of political and moral reasoning of the mass of the people are not such as to make it likely that they will make themselves any thing better than what they have. However if their house of cards stands a few years longer I hope to go and take a most accurate look at it. I am convinced that for a quarter of a year they would be delightful people to live amongst'. WW would recommend RJ to visit Switzerland: 'If you could stay there a little you might see the working of a set of minature constitutions consisting of all conceivable mixtures of aristicracy and democracy. So far as externals are concerned the aristcratical parts are much superior'. .
1 doc. |
05 Nov 1820 |
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7
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is thinking of visiting Cumberland and Westmorland - 'I have long intended to make the regular cockney tour of the lakes'. WW has never seen them: 'I shall climb to the top and measure its height by the barometer, knock off a piece of rock with a geological hammer to see what it is made of, and then evolve some quotation from Wordsworth into the still air above it'. WW recently went to Brighton and returned by Oxford: 'they are more violently geological there than we are here'. He is pleased that 'at least one science, and that a most important and interesting one and (whatever you may think) with indisputable claims to be called a science, has not only been rigorously cultivated in the universities[,] upon it had been prosecuted out of them for 100 years, which is in itself a new fact, but has owed and is likely to owe its substence and value in a great measure to academical professors'. This makes it a novlety since 'they are so slow in abandoning what is obsolete every where else and adopting what is established every where else but the fact is so or mainly so. Like very obstinate artillerymen they stand by their guns even after they are spiked. - However we hope to alter a good deal of this in time'.
1 doc. |
04 Aug 1821 |
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8
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. John Herschel was late in writing because he was hoping to meet WW and RJ in person. WW just caught him 'as he was going to see Davy [Humphry Davy] make some experiments on galvinism which are odd enough'. WW picked up a copy of Rickman [Thomas Rickman, 'An Attempt to Discriminate the Styles of Architecture in England from the Conquest to the Reformation', 1817] for RJ from Taylor's architectual library in Holborn: 'I think you will find it worth cramming - and for the furtherance of your future theory of the origin of pointed architecture I picked up some views of Peterborough which I found and which will show your favourite Basilica on a large scale'.
1 doc. |
1 Sep 1821 |
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9
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hoped to find RJ in London. If he is in Brighton WW will visit at the end of the week.
1 doc. |
16 Jan 1822 |
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10
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been here [the Athenaeum Club] about a week: 'My purpose for the last few days has been and is to appear in a visible for at Brasted on Saturday next when I shall be glad to find you rejoicing and to rejoice with you'.
1 doc. |
1 Jan 1824 |
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11
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW gives his and George Peacock's travel plans for this summer. The latter 'sometimes talks rather wildly of going to Norway'. WW is thinking of printing which will entail him spending much of the vacation in Cambridge. If RJ is not leaving Brighton both WW and Peacock will probably visit him. 'How goes on your political economy? - I hope we are to see and hear something of it before long'.
1 doc. |
21 May 1822 |
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12
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been waiting for RJ's catalogue of required books. He has made a few purchases including 'the book which I recollect right you were most impatient for. Its title is England's measure by foreign tradeetc..written by Thomas Mun of Lond. merchant. 1669-' Although the book might not be what RJ wants since WW recognises 'some of the sentences as what I have already seen in some of your pamphlets - particularly an enumeration of the qualities of a good merchant, and a hypothetical statement of exports...What I have made of it appears in a great measure very clever and sensible excepting the conclusions which he draws from his reasonings'. He has also another book entitled The unhappenings of England as to its trade by sea and land truly stated... by Charles Pooey, 1701. WW also has 'the prize essay in 1755, fellow to the one which you have got is A view of the manner in which trade and civil liberty support each other by Wm. Hazeland.' WW will send them to RJ. John Herschel has sent RJ the French periodical work which came from Edinburgh. The Cambridge fever has killed five Johnians.
1 doc. |
10 Jul 1822 |
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13
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. The Cambridge fever seems to have disappeared [see WW to RJ, 10 July 1822]: 'I am sorry to have made you uncomfortable by leading you to imagine that we were in danger but I could not find in my heart to take your advice and leave the place'. They 'have made Hare [Augustus Hare] classical lecturer on our side. He is a thoroughly good scholar and will be much more rational in acting than he is in talking'.
1 doc. |
19 Jul 1822 |
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14
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is surprised at RJ's 'indignation' of the word metaphysics: 'It is no doubt true that people apply it to the speculations of others when they want them to appear abtruse and unsubstantial and to their own when they would have them seem profound and philosophical'. If they did not use this word they would find another. If 'you will not allow metaphysical to have its application to the philosophy of mind you will find no precise use for it. In general it seems to mean either that which depends upon the examination of our intellectual powers and properties, or that kind of reasoning, depending upon the [byndomain] of abstract forms, which the origin of the term would attach to it'. By 'the metaphysics of mathematics I mean the examination of the laws and powers of the mind on which their evidence depends, the analysis of their principles into the most simple form and if you choose the history of their development. It is not easy to stick to the distinction between this and the logic of the science - but the latter examines the accuracy of your mode of deducing conclusions from your principles and the former your way of getting your principles. The metaphysics of language is equally intelligible for the mutual influence of mental operations and signs is to be called metaphysical and the word is to be called metaphysical if the word is to have any reputable signification'. WW agrees that there cannot be a metaphysics of political economy 'for there are no peculiar principles of observation or deduction employed in that science - they may as well talk of the metaphysics of chemistry. The thing which I suppose leads them into error is that some abstract terms are necessarily introduced in your science, and some even referring to the moral and intellectual qualities of man...But never mind if other people call you so - being well assured that you and Malthus belong not to the metaphysical but to the ethical school of Political Economy'.
1 doc. |
16 Aug 1822 |
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15
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW gives RJ a list of books from the public library which may be of interest - mainly concerned with banks, trade and coinage. WW's 'book is swelling out larger than I expected ['A Treatise on Dynamics', 1823]. He still meditates 'doing something about the history of the Metaphysics of Mechanics though as yet it is only intention. Something like Smith's [Adam Smith] History of Astronomy but with more historical facts - But if you can help me to get rid of that word of abomination metaphysical I shall be exceedingly obliged to you - I hope you have not enhaled your wrath and brought yourself into anything like charity with it for you may depend on it that no conviction or management will even make it permanently faithful to inductive philosophy'.
1 doc. |
23 Sep 1822 |
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16
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW will be voting for Scarlett in the forthcoming election: 'the least evil and as likely to be most frequently on the right side when there is one'. If RJ is 'not a whig I hope you are anti-Tory enough to join us. Woodhouse [Robert Woodhouse] has taken the lead a good deal in bringing Scarlett here'. WW is glad RJ's 'book goes on prosperously and I think you are right to hasten it as much as you can for it will be both more easy and most honourable to knock down Ricardo's errors while they are new'. WW does 'not fear so much discrepancy between our views of the philosophy of science as you anticipate - I shall I asure you be the most inductive of men; and if, instead of deriving some of my principles from the nature of things, I tell you that they are the results of definitions, and hope you will be pacified and it will answer my purpose as well'.
1 doc. |
03 Nov 1822 |
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17
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ should not keep 'a dignified neutrality' and should come and vote [see WW to RJ, 3 November 1822]: 'Herschel [John Herschel] comes to vote for Hervey because he thinks him the easiest to turn out next time'. WW will be voting for Scarlett, though he thinks the candiadate Grant [Robert Grant] 'most likely of any to do us credit'.
1 doc. |
20 Nov 1822 |
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18
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Is RJ aware of the plan of John Herschel, George Peacock and WW coming to visit him? WW is going to spend possibly six to eight weeks on the continent - Normandy, the Netherlands and then to the Rhine. WW is to have the tutorship with Brown for the next year, then Brown 'goes and leaves me absolute Lord of all his pupils'. WW hopes that he is right in thinking that RJ is near completing his work on political economy.
1 doc. |
18 May 1823 |
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19
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Why has he not seen or heard from RJ this summer? 'Sheepshanks [Richard Sheepshanks] has been down and has used my garden as an observatory with great industry. - He confines himself principally to the kind of astronomy which you despise so much and which consists in seeing that the stars pass the meridian at the proper time - I suppose you would not suspect him much more than a person who notices exactly the times of which the stage coach passes his door'. RJ will stay some time when he presents his university sermon. 'I must also always request to be remembered to your Polit. Econ. as a personage that I have a great affection for and hope to be better aquainted with shortly. - What is come of your projects of becoming a vicar?' .
1 doc. |
24 Sep 1823 |
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20
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Further to RJ's letter - 'I do not yet see, supposing Burges [Henry Burges] to go to another college, which will be best for him, but at any rate he will have to read mathematics to have much chance...His nervousness is one thing much against him, but even if he should get over that, I should doubt his success'. WW has sent RJ a few examination papers but cannot send the papers of the Classical Tripos: 'It was considered rather too hard an examination - the greater part, of course, was translation'. The Trinity papers are not all first year - the Homer is always a second or third year subject. RJ could look at Monk's [James H. Monk] published collection 'called Cambridge Classical Examinations where you may find more and have the satisfaction of abusing the author into the bargain'. .
1 doc. |
16 Sep 1824 |
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21
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW expects to be in London 'about the beginning of June to go down to Greenwich and eat white bait with the Royal Society'. For the rest of the vacation he will visit the Rhine, the Tyrol and Venice - could RJ accompany him along any of the journey? WW read RJ's pamphlet 'with great satisfaction and was much entertained with your distinction between money and other commodities ['Reasons Against the Repeal of the Usury Laws', 1825]. I am afraid that people hardly fright enough about the question to do you justice. I hope to find the demolition of the Ricardites very forward if I see you, for it is a proper adventure for you to set out to kill such a dragon as that system'. WW gives details of next years lectures which RJ's nephew [William W. Attree] can start preparing for. .
1 doc. |
24 May 1825 |
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22
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Henslow [John S. Henslow] has been appointed Botanical Professor of the King and has thus resigned his Mineralogical Chair at Cambridge. WW has been canvassing for the office - 'and so far I have met with all possible encouragement and with no rival. I conceive therefore that I have not much chance of failing to be elected'. WW intends to go to Freyberg and Berlin 'which seem to me the best mineralogical schools in Germany and especially given to crystallography'.
1 doc. |
25 Jun 1825 |
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23
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has just returned from his German trip [see WW to RJ, 25 June 1825]. He will keep an eye out for Attree [William W. Attree - RJ's nephew]. WW will make time to read RJ's political economy if he sends it to him. He has 'got hundreds of mineralogical maggots in my head which I found in Germany and which may crawl into daylight hereafter - but now mind this my injunction - Do not go and conspire with Peacock [George Peacock] or any body else to tell our friends that I am bedeviled with german philosophy, as you once raised an essay with the accusation of a priori metaphysics [see WW to RJ, 16 August 1822]. If you do so you may easily give people an impression which you will not be able to remove when I have convinced you, as I certainly shall at the first opportunity, that everything which I believe is most true, philosophical, and inductive. Another injunction I also would give you. Do not imagine I am doing all for the material sciences with my mineralogy. If I do not fail altogether, it will be seen that this is one of the very best occasions to rectify and apply our general principles of reasoning; and my science shall, without ceasing to be good and true mineralogy, be also a most profitable example of that higher philosophy of yours which legislates for sciences - Remember also that we have got to do something for that same philosophy one day'. The talk of Cambridge is the Greek professorship - 'Rose [Hugh Rose] and Hare [Augustus Hare] are considered the most likely candidates'.
1 doc. |
17 Oct 1825 |
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24
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has put Attree [William W. Attree - RJ's nephew] into rooms, and set him to read with Romilly [Joseph Romilly]: 'I am much pleased with your youth and have not yet found his vanity at all prominent'. Scholefield [James Scholefield] has been appointed Greek Professor - 'they missed an admirable professor by not appointing Hare' [Augustus Hare]. When is WW to hear anything of RJ's political economy? .
1 doc. |
08 Nov 1825 |
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25
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is surprised that he has not heard from RJ: 'I hope someday to have an opportunity of convincing you that I have ten times as much reason to be angry and weary and disatisfied with my life as you have '. WW gives an account of the progress of Atree [William W. Atree - RJ's nephew] at Trinity. WW is sorry that RJ has 'promised not to come and vote for Lord Palmerston. I shall think the worst of the University if he is turned out upon that eternal no Popery cry which I do not think impossible. I cannot however persuade myself to care very much about the matter and am almost sick of hearing of that or any other subject of politics. Principally I believe because I can find no general principles at all to my liking and therefore cannot have the pleasure of applying them. If I could get rid of my tiresome occupations here and find time for some glimpses into your world of moral speculations I should at least have the pleasure of theorizing'. .
1 doc. |
23 Dec 1825 |
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26
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW will be glad to propose RJ's queries to Sir John Malcolm. He wishes RJ would let WW give Lord Palmerston's Committee 'at least one of your works. I do not think it will be a disagreeable business for the university to turn him out upon that senseless obstinancy of feeling against the Catholics; and to turn him out for a man like Copley [John S. Copley - Lord Lyndhurst] whose talents are too much entangled with a character of doubtful honesty to make him a respectable member'.
1 doc. |
03 Jan 1826 |
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27
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW and his horse should be with RJ by Thursday - the hot weather 'makes me wish to rest a day here'. He hopes to find Herschel in town [John Herschel].
1 doc. |
15 Aug 1826 |
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28
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. The Cambridge Lucasian Chair of mathematics is expected to be shortly vacant, since Turton [Thomas Turton] who holds it, has taken a college living with which it is not tenable: 'Now I doubt whether to apply for it - (The heads are the electors) - but one main doubt is whether Herschel [John Herschel] would offer and would succeed'. WW thinks he would like it and fill the position well. Does RJ know how to locate him?: 'If I were certain that he would not be a candidate I should be tempted to propose myself for as I think I have told you I should like the professorhip much'. WW 'could make very grand lectures on the principles of induction in mixed matematics that I have talked to you about. This would be good - but better still would be Herschel for ever'.
1 doc. |
13 Oct 1826 |
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29
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has had confirmation that Hercshel [John Herschel] will not be coming forward for the vacant office of Lucasian Chair of Mathematics. 'Babbage [Charles Babbage] is making application and has written to people here on the subject. He has no chance whatever and it is mere extravagence, at least as appears to me, his taking up the thing. I do undoubtedly believe that he would be a good Professor now, but it is too much to expect that our heads should understand not only his merits, but the varying shape of them as time and circumstances may have modified it'. WW thinks Peacock [George Peacock] the most desirous candiadate: 'I suppose Airy [George Airy] will not think of offering him for though he would be a better professor, it would be ungracious in him to fight Peacock - and after all it makes no difference. For French if he be a candidate will undoubtedly be elected'.
1 doc. |
18 Oct 1826 |
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30
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. If WW gets a chance tonight he will send RJ the results of Airy's [George Airy] 'enquiries about wagesetc - you will see that they apply to a particular district'. It now seems that no tutor or lector is eligible - Airy who is no lector, though a lecturer, is a candidate. Of course he has no chance which is a pity as he would make the best professor of all of us'.
1 doc. |
22 Oct 1826 |
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31
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW gives the value and etymology of the Hectare. Sends RJ a pamphlet [by Brereton?] which he thinks gives 'lots of support to your speculations - or if you disdain this - of coincidence with your results - as to the increase of population having occurred in the non-agricultural classes, while the number of the cultivators have been stationary or in some instances declined - of the greater steadiness of labour produced by the new agriculture - of the bad effects of the poor laws upon the people and of the magistrates on the poor laws - of the sufficiency of the demand for labour and various other laudable lucubrations'. WW has purchased one or two other pamphlets - one being 'On the Price of Corn and Wages of Labour' by Edward West. WW likes the pamphlet he has sent RJ because 'all the facts naturally find their place in the theory as they rise'. He has sent RJ a map of the world which he wants him 'to paint in the most brilliant colours by which rent can be represented'. .
1 doc. |
1 Nov 1826 |
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32
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is preparing the sermons he is to give at St. Mary's in February. He is shortly departing with Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] on an expedition to Paris. He is behind in writing the sermons: 'with time enough I should not fear the greater part of the work - all the argument about the activity and omnipresence of the Deity, but when I come to the indications of benevolent design in the moral frame of society I have not such an habitual familiarity with the view of the subject in its details as merits with the confidence and vehemence which would be becoming. I have no doubt I should get on better if I had you at my elbow'. Babbage is in Cambridge canvassing for the Lucassian Chair - John Herschel is here to support him - 'but all in vain'. George Airy has been elected. WW thinks this a good choice - he 'will reside and give lectures - practical and painstaking ones - who is par eminence a mathematician - and whose reputation will all go to the account of the university'.
1 doc. |
10 Dec 1826 |
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33
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorry that he caused RJ any uneasiness in his last letter [see WW to RJ, 10 December 1826]: 'I never intended to publish, and I do not think that I shall preach any thing which will brush the most delicate bloom of novelty off your plums'. Moral considerations are only considered in WW's last sermon, the others are mainly concerned with the physical sciences. He will not 'in fact have any possible room for more than a very short attack on the principle of population'. WW is aware 'that I see all this far more clearly than I should otherwise have done, in consequence of our dicussions on such matters...The principal advantage I shall derive from knowing your views - and indeed it is one of the greatest possible - will be that I shall talk confidently of that which I do not prove and assent loudly that a good deal more may be known and will be so when any body comes with the right kind of wisdom to the task'.
1 doc. |
15 Dec 1826 |
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34
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has just preached his last sermon: 'I have got through them without getting quite up to the moral part of my subject...No population and in short nothing but one or two analogies from the natural world to illustrate the probability of our being very fairly ignorant of the non general law of the moral world [see WW to RJ, 15 December 1826]. The wish was an attempt to make science fall in with a contemplative devotion whch I don't think was difficult though people seem from the notion they had of scientific men to have thought it must be impossible'.
1 doc. |
26 Feb 1827 |
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35
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been waiting for the arrival of RJ's work on population. He would like to see his work on rent appear first 'because I think it will impress people most with the originality and tendency of the book' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831].
1 doc. |
02 Apr 1827 |
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36
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Lady Malcolm has been ill for some time now and will have to forget about going to India. WW hopes to get abroad. RJ should try and get a copy of John Herschel's address to the Astronomical Society - 'it is very eloqent and spirited - I understand he talks of going to Madeira'. .
1 doc. |
28 May 1827 |
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37
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Further to Herschel's intention of going to Madeira [see WW to RJ, 28 May 1827]: 'he has some half intention of going farther - probably to Teneriffe to add to his stock of volcanic observaions - I was told too that he did not wish these plans to be talked of, as his lady mother will most likely set her face against them'. WW needs to become more 'aquainted with mineralogy if I really am to be professor...To confess to you a secret, which I hardly confess to myself, I much doubt whether this professorship is a business I shall make anything of. It will take a long time to turn me into a good mineralogist and lead me into paths out of the way of my favourite pursuits'.
1 doc. |
01 Jun 1827 |
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38
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has sent RJ various travel books which he hopes will answer his ends. 'Lady M. [Lady Malcolm] is ill and unsettled but I think getting better and M.M is speculating in conjunction with the guessor at truth [Augustus Hare], who has been for some time with them and is almost domesticated in the family. I expect him here today or tomorrow as he is to spend the summer here in translating Niebahr's [Barthold Georg Niebahr] Roman history'.
1 doc. |
18 Jul 1827 |
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39
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW was to travel to the Rhine and on towards Switzerland with Lady Malcolm and Augustus Hare but 'this beautiful scheme is now I think likely to fall through'. WW will try to go towards Bonn.
1 doc. |
27 Jul 1827 |
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40
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has not gone abroad and after 'dawdling' in various places he finds himself back at Trinity. He went to London and applied for a passport but with no definite plans to go abroad. He met Lady Malcolm and followed her back to Hyde Hall. He hopes to go back there: 'They talk of quitting the house in a week or so not to return - and I cannot but wish to take a conscious farewell of a place where I have been so nearly happy. - It is no one or two causes only that make me delight so much in being there, for I believe if one had nothing to do but to look at Kate [Kate Malcolm] it would be sufficient to make it a grateful state of feeling'. He gives RJ a recipe for horse radish sauce. .
1 doc. |
02 Sep 1827 |
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41
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Does RJ not know that he has a 'great deal of work to do in the world of which the execution is yet to begin? That you have got to trouble the shortwitted, rotten, pseudo-political-economists; and to yoke history, and morals, and natural characteristics, and practical experience to that chariot of science which they have hitherto been driving tandem with one jack-ass before another. If you think of visiting far lands it must only be to bring back that evidence of Political Economy which they have condemned to the murky cavins of the nether world'.
1 doc. |
10 Sep 1827 |
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42
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Could RJ send WW back all the books he has borrowed from the University library. WW gives advice on dealing with the syndics of the Cambridge press: 'I shall try to impress several of them with the idea of the desirableness of your book coming forth from the university press'. He leaves for Hyde Hall in the morning.
1 doc. |
23 Sep 1827 |
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43
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Hyde Hall 'with all its pleasures and its dangers is really and actually broken up'. WW 'liked and loved all the persons there so much that I must not look to find any other place where I shall be so happy or indeed in the same sense happy at all'. WW gives advice on dealing with the syndics of the Uiversity press [see WW to RJ, 23 September 1827]. If RJ is asked why he wants it published by the Cambridge press (rather than through the London booksellers which is the usual route for works on political economy) - 'I should reply that it seems to me that your work will be one, both from the object and the execution of it, which will do credit to any portion of the University...and that I am solitious about it not on your account, so much as for the sake of gracing the university by associating its name with a book which must exercise so much influence and of so beneficial a kind on the science of Poltical Economy'. RJ should also stress that he is desirous - through his connection with the university - of 'connecting any success which your speculations may find, with your relation to her; and that your principles aspire to a scientific charcater which makes this connexion not inappropriate'. It would be good if RJ could get another person other than just WW to help sell it to the syndics - 'Jacob's [William Jacob] approbation would be good'. .
1 doc. |
20 Sep 1827 |
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44
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Atree [William Atree] tells WW that RJ has composed an epistle to the syndics of the Cambridge press. WW has not yet spoken to any of the members 'thinking it better not to do so till I could press the matter to the utmost by producing details or manuscript' [see WW to RJ, 20 September 1827]. WW will have to soon decide on the professorship: 'I do not intend to devote my life to mineralogy and should probably not keep the professorship many years'. Nevertheless he intends to become master of the subject and intriduce reforms. He would also 'like the kind of rank which it gives here'.
1 doc. |
11 Nov 1827 |
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45
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's comments on the priniting plans of RJ's book: 'I do not suppose that there will be any objection to the plan you mention of taking your impression printed by the university if it so seems good to them and making with it in your hand the best bargain you can with a London bookseller' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', London, 1831]. WW does not know what a London bookseller would think of such a plan. The Mineralogy professorship is still uncertain and indeed may be terminated. There is another professorship vacant on the death of Woodhouse [Robert Woodhouse] which Airy [George Airy] will probably get, 'and the vacant one will be the Lucassian for which Babbage [Charles Babbage] was a candidate. Some people here hope that Herschel [John Herschel] will take it which I much doubt. I should rejoice to have Babbage, but I am not so sure that he...would succeed and not at all certain that he would now offer himself'.
1 doc. |
06 Jan 1828 |
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46
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Further to WW's last letter concerning the printing of RJ's book: 'Rose [Hugh James Rose] I believe with his book of inscriptions did exactly what you suggested. The syndics paid the expenses of the book and then Rose sold it to Murray' [see WW to RJ, 6 January 1828]. WW and others wish John Herschel could be persuaded to take the Lucassian Chair. .
1 doc. |
10 Jan 1828 |
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47
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW spent a fortnight in London - 'Lady M. [Lady Malcolm] being established in Manchester square'. He likes the idea of RJ 'going into Cornwall about the time of our oscillations' [pendulumn experiments conducted with George Airy down a tin mine shaft to measure the earth's density, see 'Account of Experiments Made at Dalcoath Mine in Cornwall', 1828]. Further to the vacant Lucassian professorship: 'I am afraid we shall make nothing of Herschel's professorship. I do not think he will offer himself and I am afraid the electors will not offer the chair to him. He has got some crotchets about it; first as to what a professor ought to do, that he ought to be in correspondence and rivalry with all the mathematical professors in the world, and then as to himself that he is not so much a mathematician par excellence as he is other things'.
1 doc. |
08 Feb 1828 |
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48
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes RJ's political economy is soon to appear. What does RJ think of the 'heads having elected Babbage [Charles Babbage elected to the Lucassian Chair] and how do you suppose he will take it?' George Peacock, Higman and WW wrote letters to each of the electors - 'so I shall be vexed if he is not gratified and now that he has no wife he may perhaps better like to live here part of the year'.
1 doc. |
17 Mar 1828 |
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49
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. If an order is not made for the printing of RJ's book by the end of May it cannot be done till October or November: 'By the bye it has occured to me that your way of beginning by talking about the definition of wealth is both uninviting and unnecessary. Cannot you manage to introduce the definition their when you first want it, and make your start more characteristic of the views you are going to take?' Charles Babbage has heard in Rome that he is Lucassian Professor 'and is full of gratitude and delight at the honor...Nothing can be better or prettier than all he writes about it'. Rose [Hugh James Rose] says that RJ should read Simondi's [Simonde de Sismondi] work about Italy. WW hopes RJ has 'not split your head with Niebuhr [Barthold Georg Niebahr].
1 doc. |
02 Apr 1828 |
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50
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Further to the printing of RJ's book: 'I find that when Rose [Hugh James Rose] laid his book of inscriptions before the syndicate and asked their aid he drew up for them a prospectus of the nature of its claims to their patronage'. RJ should do something similar.
1 doc. |
28 Apr 1828 |
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51
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW 'cannot but be amused to imagine what an awful person I must be when you dare scarcely trust me with your fears and hesitation about your printing'. WW wants to get his mineralogical system printed: 'While you work for years in the elaboration of slowly growing ideas, I take the first buds of thought and...without trying what patience and labour might do in ripening and perfecting them'. Pryme [George Pryme] has been elected Professor of Political Economy today.
1 doc. |
21 May 1828 |
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52
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is frustrated that the manuscripts to RJ's book has not yet come: 'I do expect that I shall be in possesion of your material by that time [a meeting of the syndics in a fortnight]'. The members of the syndicate need the manuscript for two weeks 'to give their opinion of it'. The friends of Pryme [George Pryme] 'are going to propose that the university should make him Professor of the science [Political Economy]. I do not think it will do the science any good for he is, as a lecturer, dull and unpopular and will never be otherwise'. It has been settled that the Professorship ends with the holder. .
1 doc. |
18 May 1828 |
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53
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's work on mineralogy has been printed ['An Essay on Mineralogical Classification and Nomenclature', 1828]: 'I do not see anything to discourage any one in his hopes of reasonable fame from any science and most especially yours. Take care to be first right in your principles, then bold and persevering in your assertion of them and you cannot fail'. WW is more interested to know what mineralogists will think of his introduction than the rest of the book. .
1 doc. |
30 May 1828 |
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54
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has just returned from Cornwall after making a series of pendulum experiments down a tin mine with George Airy in an attempt to measure the density of the earth ['Account of Experiments Made at Dalcoath Mine in Cornwall', 1828]: 'To tell the truth I consider that we have failed in our object nearly or altogether. Mainly in consequence of a rascally piece of steel deviating 1/10,000th of an inch from a straight line, by the fault of Thomas Jones of Charing Cross who is as great and reputable as his illustrious namesake was'. However, 'Airy who opposes a face of adament to a fist of iron thinks he can still make something of their vagaries'. WW has been reading a pamphlet on rent by a Mr Thompson [Thomas Perronet Thompson] of Queen's College ['The True Theory of Rent, in Opposition to Mr. Ricardo and Others', 1826]: 'One inference to be made from this same pamphlet is how ripe the world is for your speculations...Here you have the fallacy of rent being the excess of richer soils, the case (no doubt most imperfectly) indicated of rent in countries where this does not apply...[in which] the influence of moral causes and national habits' are taken into consideration. If political economists 'will not understand common sense because their heads are full of extravegant theory they will be trampled down and passed over; and it will be the height of indolence and bad management if you allow other heads to take the feet of yours'. WW thinks that he recognizes 'several views which I learnt from you' in the above work of Thompson's.
1 doc. |
09 Sep 1828 |
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55
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. What is RJ hesitating about now? He should give WW some of his manuscripts and let him get hold of the press syndicate as soon as possible [RJ, 'An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831].
1 doc. |
12 Oct 1828 |
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56
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. When RJ sends WW the manuscripts to his book [RJ, 'An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831], could he point out 'one or two passages which I may shew to some of the people and which may be likely to make a favourable impression on them' [the press syndicate].
1 doc. |
19 Oct 1828 |
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57
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ once promised that if a proposition was ever made to admit Bachelors to the public library he would come to Cambridge and vote for it: 'Such a proposition comes before the senate on wednesday the 26th'. WW is puzzled that RJ will not send his manuscript ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]: 'Have you resolved not to ask the university to help you?'.
1 doc. |
18 Nov 1828 |
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58
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ has probably lost his chance this term 'but pray be forthcoming at the beginning of the next' [ concerning his book and possible assistance from the Cambridge press syndicate - 'An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. The proposition to admit Bachelors to the public library [see WW to RJ, 18 November 1828] was blocked by Geldart [James W. Geldart]: 'If the matter had come to a vote you might have been wanted, for there would have been a strong opposition to the measure and particularly, such is the growing liberality of the age, among the younger masters of arts - you may depend upon it that we lived exactly at the right time for catching all the better influences of the university and that there have been nobody half so wise and enlightened in the later generations. Ask Attree [William Attree - RJ's nephew] about a sermon of Hare's [Augustus Hare] at St. Mary's last sunday; it was very much after the manner of a guess [Julius and Augustus Hare, 'Guesses at Truth by Two Brothers', 1827] but fearfully long; and as there is a sort of Wordsworthian ferment among the boys at present and from other causes 210 of them have petitioned him to print it. Atree is in the list'. The 'animal Geldhart is as you know our Civil Law Professor and is a horid fellow in the way of all improvement'. Charles Babbage has returned and is ready for his professorship [Lucassian Chair of Mathematics].
1 doc. |
04 Dec 1828 |
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59
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has heard that RJ will be coming into this neighbourhood, and therefore wants to make sure he is around when RJ visits Cambridge. WW hopes RJ is getting his manuscript ready to show the University press syndicate ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. Can RJ give WW the reference to the book in which he saw 'a short list of the alteration in prices of corn pushed by the increase or diminution of the supply in certain propositions. It was in some book of the age of Petty's [William Petty] Political arithmetic'. WW is 'thinking of putting some propositions of Political Economy for instance those in Thompson's [Thomas Perronet Thompson, 'The True Theory of Rent, in Opposition to Mr. Ricardo and Others', 1826] works in a mathematical form. The more I think of it the more likely this appears to be convenient to mathematicians. I expect nothing new from this but some avoidance of confusion. As to Thompson's book you are no doubt right that it takes the case of money rents only, but it pretends not to take more; and it appears to me that with regard to them he has demonstratively shewn the Ricardists to be wrong so clearly that I am persuaded they will soon be compelled, (that is as soon as they have any writers who are not muddleheaded,) to abandon this part of their theory'. .
1 doc. |
09 Jan 1829 |
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60
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. How is RJ progressing with his manuscripts ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. Charles Babbage has arrived in his capacity as Lucasian Professor: 'I have really enjoyed his society much having seen him more closely than I had done before. But his anxiety about the success and fame of his machine is quite devouring and unhappy'. WW also relates this to RJ's anxiety about his book. .
1 doc. |
04 Feb 1829 |
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61
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Can RJ 'send or carry any body that you can to vote' for WW at the ballot at the University Club on Thursday next. It will be easier for WW to meet people like RJ in London if he is a member. .
1 doc. |
19 Feb 1829 |
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62
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW gives his positive opinion of John Herschel's recent bride [Margaret Herschel]. WW was safely elected to the University Club [see WW to RJ, 19 February 1829]. He has 'been putting on paper and reading at the Philosophical Society my mathematico-politico-economics, and I am really rather pleased with the look of my lucubrations. I shall privately have it finished (as one of our papers) and send it to the Economists whom I know by way of challenge. It does not much interfere with your speculations but I know very much that it will bear traces of what I have learnt from you, especially in the boldness with which I doubt the accuracy of the orthodox economists. It is in fact for the most part Thompson's [Thomas Perronet Thompson] book on Rent translated into formula' ['The True Theory of Rent, in Opposition to Mr. Ricardo and Others', 1826]. WW's 'object is to shew the mode of applying mathematics so as to separate difficulties of calculation from difficulties of moral reasoning - to keep apart the business of reasoning up to principles and down from them'. He wants some statements concerned with land, produce and rent: 'I have told you I do not want accuracy but definiteness'.
1 doc. |
05 Mar 1829 |
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63
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has sent his paper to the press ['Mathematical Exposition of Some Doctrines of Political Economy', 1829]: 'I have not much more expectation than you have that mathematics will for a long time to come be an important instrument in advancing political economy, but I think that even now it may prevent people from drawing wrong conclusions from the data they have got and may systemtize and illustrate some of the causes of reasoning which the Ricardists consider to be important though you do not. They certainly have gone wrong in some instances of bad calculation alone'. WW now wants 'the proportion of the whole capital employed (on the average) to the last dose that is to that which on the same quantity of land is driven into or out of employment by a change - and this I suppose it is impossible to learn - and probably it depends on various causes besides demand and supply - But you will observe that it is not I who want this element but the Ricardists who will construct their theories upon it'. WW hopes his work 'will prevent my friends the young mathematicians from looking with too profound and unquestioning an awe upon the crabbed dogmatizing of the millions'. .
1 doc. |
02 Apr 1829 |
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64
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW had already discovered the mistakes RJ pointed out concerning WW's paper ['Mathematical Exposition of Some Doctrines of Political Economy', 1829]: 'I never expected to do anything except describe the logical consequences of assumed principles, but it seemed not useless to do this - first because Ricardo had done it wrong. Secondly because the strict consequences cannot be obtained, viz the proportions of the tax on rent and without mathematics - and thirdly because it does not seem too much to expect that the data on which the details of the calculation depend may be obtained when it is known to what use they may be put'. RJ must send him without delay the manuscripts to his book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831], since the syndics of the Cambridge press meet on May 5th. .
1 doc. |
26 Apr 1829 |
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65
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes RJ is contented with the determination of the Cambridge press syndicate: 'they will print for you 500 copies' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. .
1 doc. |
20 May 1829 |
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66
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW had expected to be able to give RJ some specimen pages of his book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831], but he has become involved with a committee set up to canvass for Cavendish [William Cavendish].
1 doc. |
01 Jun 1829 |
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67
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is fairly certain he sails from London by the Ostend packet on Staurday, and hopes RJ can meet him there. Can RJ tell him where he can find some information about the history of Flanders. The civic architecture of Belgium has been much admired but WW knows of nobody who 'has attempted to characterize it in detail'. He has heard from Lubbock [John W. Lubbock] who will be glad to help RJ with any calculations. Lubbock has sent WW a table showing 'the difference of the increase of population upon the number of marriages and the number of births per marriage, and vice versa. Of course it shews also how any alteration in one portion of these elements of the law of population would affect the others' [the table is attached]: 'Tables should be accurate and extensive to justify their expressing so formal a shape and your general reasoning would be much more persuasive. The mathematics of population viz the construction of such tables as the above with regard to all the elements on which population depends should be gone through completely from one capable of doing it'. Malthus and others would have benefited from abbreviating and annotating their statistical details.
1 doc. |
28 Jun 1829 |
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68
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW was captivated by the churches of Cologne but disappointed with the buildings in the Netherlands. The churches have 'just resemblance enough with our churches of the 11th century to enable us to class them'. WW has seen 'some of the earliest and most gorgeous specimens of the completely formed gothic, as the cathedral at Cologne; so that the series though not clearly perfect, is very full and almost satisfactory'.
1 doc. |
31 Jul 1829 |
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69
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been 'rambling for some days among the sources of rivers' in Switzerland. He describes his experiences with the mountains, glaciers and people of the Alps.
1 doc. |
17 Aug 1829 |
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70
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes 'Miss Political Economy is by this time a well grown and promising young lady almost fit to appear in the world' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831].
1 doc. |
14 Oct 1829 |
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71
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW cannot believe RJ's casual attitude towards his book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]: 'There is now nothing doing at the press for you for the last fortnight and if you go on as you have done you will not be out by spring'.
1 doc. |
27 Oct 1829 |
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72
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorry RJ has been ill. However, he is annoyed that RJ did not send his manuscript and get on with the printing of his book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. RJ should think about coming to hear Adam Sedgwick's lectures - 'the first 3 days of each week at 1 o'clock'. .
1 doc. |
08 Nov 1829 |
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73
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is astounded at the 'monstrous inaction of your authorly functions...not a word has been composed since I returned to England and I am fully persuaded that you will very shortly loose all chance of bringing your book out during the coming season; a vile and detestable piece of procrastination' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831].
1 doc. |
20 Nov 1829 |
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74
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ's manuscript arrived at the press on friday ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. .
1 doc. |
25 Nov 1829 |
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75
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hasn't received any manuscripts recently from RJ: 'I hope you are well enough to go on and that you will do so soon'. WW has nearly got his architecture printed and asks RJ what he thinks is the the best way of publishing it ['Architectural Notes on German Churches, with Remarks on the Origin of Gothic Architecture', 1830]: 'To tell the truth the stuff itself is rather dry, but I shall have a few peaks, and a surface, and the popularity of the subject, which may together get it a little circulation'.
1 doc. |
15 Dec 1829 |
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76
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends his corrections to one of RJ's printed sheets ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. He has also scrutinized the manuscript and made some changes. WW is not convinced by RJ's 'argument to shew that a creation of rent arising from a rise in raw produce diminshes the share of the producers[,] it seems to me that you only shew that it diminishes the share of the consumers and that a link or two is wanting'. RJ should leave all the talk concerning the value of metals in different countries to Ricardo and Malthus. 'The rent is clear enough and I think will interest' - although WW thinks RJ should, wherever possible, relate the argument to the bearing it has on this or some other country: 'it is the most obvious way to attract and enliven and will prevent your being as dull as the corresponding parts of Ricardo which you cannot afford to be because your results are not so paradoxical as his - moreover you write diabolically - and have I really think got an impediment in your writing by way of compensation for the glibness of your tongue'.
1 doc. |
10 Jan 1830 |
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77
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW advises RJ that he should have a break and a new heading on one of his pages in the proofs to his book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. .
1 doc. |
15 Jan 1830 |
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78
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends more corrections to the printed proofs of RJ's book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW thinks he should publish his book on architecture without his name attached ['Architectural Notes on German Churches, with Remarks on the Origin of Gothic Architecture', 1830]. .
1 doc. |
30 Jan 1830 |
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79
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is annoyed that RJ has not sent more of his work: 'Still you promise and still nothing comes of it. Your tomorrow means a week' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW likes the sound of RJ's current speculations but is sceptical that he would ever get round to publishing them: 'If they turn into equations they will answer my purpose admirably after they have answered yours'.
1 doc. |
28 Jan 1830 |
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80
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW cannot imagine why RJ has not sent more work to the printers ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]: 'the university lose money, and will make us all lose patience by and bye'. Charles 'Babbage is come and gone wilder than ever'.
1 doc. |
04 Feb 1830 |
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81
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sending the copy of RJ's sheets by mail tonight ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831], and also the title page to his own work ['Architectural Notes on German Churches, with Remarks on the Origin of Gothic Architecture', 1830].
1 doc. |
14 Feb 1830 |
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82
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ should look over and send back the last sheet WW sent him, so he can give it to the printers ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. No more sheets of manuscript have come through. Once WW knows RJ's plans he will be glad to see if a house near the college can be found for him.
1 doc. |
17 Feb 1830 |
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83
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. The printers need more manuscript. WW is pleased RJ is satisfied with his arrangements with the bookpublisher, Murray, and 'glad too that Jacob [William Jacob] is getting a little lighter to your merits. I do not think you need be surprised at his criticism: it means apparently that he understands the latter part of your book much better than the former which according to my conception of his character is just what one should expect. Take care you do not set too much your heart upon immeadiate brilliant success.'.
1 doc. |
28 Feb 1830 |
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84
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ is feeling under pressure from the demands of his book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW had no idea it would be 'so painful' for RJ: 'Why should you not lay aside the cultivation of your task till all the goblins have disappeared...One obvious mode of proceeding, and one which offers some advantages is to finish and publish Rent and to have the rest for another season'. .
1 doc. |
21 May 1830 |
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85
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW thinks RJ has made the right decision in 'the matter of publishing' [limiting his first book to rent - see WW to RJ, 21 May 1830: 'An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]: 'It will save you and me the endless annoyances and impossibilities which we incur by trying to print a book which is still to write, as if it were already written'. WW is grateful for RJ pointing out Dupin's [Charles Dupin] speculations: 'Do you not see that they are all mere mathematical consequences of Gregory King's [probably King's 'Natural and Political Observations and conclusions Upon the State and Condition of England', 1696] talk of the dependence of price on quantity which I told you was necessary for all mathematical working? They appear to me very useless on the account you mention and on some others which I will explain to you some day. I have still a great hankering after my plan of driving the dogmatical school of political economy into their proper region of mathematics, and a growing conviction of the possibility of doing this with great profit'.
1 doc. |
04 Jul 1830 |
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86
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is angry with Lockhart [John G. Lockhart] for having published his review of John Herschel ['Modern Science: Inductive Philosophy', Quarterly Review 45, 1831] but suppressing his one of RJ ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and Sources of Taxation by the Revd Richard Jones', The British Critic, Quarterly Theological Review and Ecclesiastical Record, 10, 1831]: 'I cannot say that I much like the review of Herschel now that I look at it in cold blood, and I have a strong persuasion that all the philosophical part will repel most and puzzle the rest'. WW is amused by RJ's encounters with Whately [Richard Whately]: 'I am quite ready to fight and very confident of getting the better' - but to do so effectively they need more examples - 'in short if you would get your wages published. The feeling on which Whately gounds his opinions, that principles of action are known by consciousness and do not require detailed observation...is plainwith and generally assumed and it will take some trouble to eradicate. The analogy between physical and political or economical science is yet to be shewn. There is no want of abundant means of shewing the actual folly and essential baseness of their method, but if this be made the permissable nature of the dispute people will ask you to reckon your points: so vindicate as fast as you can'. .
1 doc. |
15 Jul 1831 |
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87
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW describes his movements in and around the vicinity of Bath, Devon, Cornwall, Bristol and Liverpool. WW still thinks RJ's best plan is to just get the section on rent published ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. .
1 doc. |
26 Aug 1830 |
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88
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is concerned that RJ has 'still got your fancy about somthing being the matter with your mind which prevents your writing'. RJ should send WW his preface ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831].
1 doc. |
20 Sep 1830 |
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89
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is not particularly surprised that he has not received RJ's preface ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]: 'But I shall be much vexed if you again get into the way of letting days and weeks slip away without doing anything'. WW hopes the deliberate fires have stopped in RJ's part of the country.
1 doc. |
21 Oct 1830 |
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90
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW thinks RJ's preface is excellent and has given it to the printers ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. As to the latter pages WW advises RJ to 'remodel the last two pages (no more) or omit them'. He thinks 'the account of your part of the country is as bad as it can be among people pretending to an established order of society...However never dispair - we will live through the storm and teach the world wise things when the winds have lulled again'.
1 doc. |
1 Nov 1830 |
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91
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW 'was delighted to hear of the temper in which you were working and of the prospect of getting on again with the printing' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW hopes John Herschel will 'be our next President [the Royal Society]: both for the reason you mention and because I do really care for the poor old society which I suppose you do not. It would be bad to desert the ancient lady because such bullies and parisites as South [James South] have been trying to hustle her out of the country'. WW does not think Peel [Robert Peel] will take notice of RJ's project, 'but in good truth I think something of the kind is needed - the proceedings in your part of the world are like a break up of society'.
1 doc. |
16 Nov 1830 |
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92
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW gives his criticisms of RJ's manuscript sheets ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]: 'one or two parts are possibly of too sustained a tone'.
1 doc. |
28 Nov 1830 |
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93
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is still very clear in his opinion that RJ 'must omit all mention of the hartlitarian doctrines in p.xviii. It is not done that generally speaking the judgement of common men on this subject was clenched by this step, and you must not touch the subject a second time because you must appear to have approached it once only from the absolute majority' ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW does not think his 'notion of the gradation of general principles is difficult to develop if it were worth while' and shows RJ how to do it. He then contrasts this process [the work of the inductive philosopher] with the modern economists, who 'on the other hand - jump - to last - from one or two trivial facts to the conclusion that every man will get as much money as he can - an axiom generalisation - and having got hold of this they reason downwards to the doctrine of rent and forty things besides'. The vicinity of Cambridge is presently 'in the hot stage of this fever in the social state which you I hope have got through - we have had two fires - one large one so near as to illuminate our great court'. The Trinity 'youths have armed themselves with sticks and anticipate a row with much glee'. .
1 doc. |
07 Dec 1830 |
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94
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends a few more corrections for RJ to make to his preface ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW agrees with RJ 'entirely as to the importance of the distinction between the mode of incidence of moral and physical will but I do not see why you should be dissatisfied with the way in which you have expressed it'. WW has been working at his inductive history of chemistry: 'I never spend half an hour on the subject without making out something new and pertinent'. He is 'disposed to be of your opinion with regard to the R.S. [John Herschel losing the election to become President of the Royal Society] and so far as I can make out all Herschel's friends are disposed to give the old lady over...What will come of this I do not exactly see nor much care'.
1 doc. |
26 Dec 1830 |
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95
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is delighted with the inductive character which RJ's appendix gives to the book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW has heard a great deal of 'indignation expressed' at Charles Babbage not printing his examinations by the young tutors and examiners.
1 doc. |
13 Jan 1831 |
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96
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. A brief description of the use of land by labourers, rent and poor rates around Cambridge. .
1 doc. |
18 Jan 1831 |
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98
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. 'You author you!' - RJ's book is being distributed tomorrow ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. WW would like to meet RJ at the Geological Society dinner: 'I will bring my review of Herschel ['Modern Science: Inductive Philosophy', Quarterly Review 45, 1831] and you shall look it over. I am pretty much pleased with what I have done' - but he thinks it might be too metaphysical.
1 doc. |
11 Feb 1831 |
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99
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Nassau Senior's notions about the nature of science will provide WW with specimens of what is to be avoided: 'I will refer to the passages and revil in their absurdity'. The world will soon see them as non-sensical. WW will be glad to see RJ's recent speculations about induction - 'for among other questions it is certainly an important one how the true faith can best be propagated. I have done what I could in my review of Herschel' ['Modern Science: Inductive Philosophy', Quarterly Review 45, 1831]. What would RJ make of a 'popular exposition of the matter applied mainly to moral political and other notional sciences is what I do not so well see'. The principles of induction can only be taught or learnt by numerous examples. Of induction applied to subjects outside of natural philosophy WW can only think of RJ's book, and 'a good deal of Malthus's population is a beginning of such a process excluding of course his anticipatory thesis, the only thing usually talked of'. There are various subjects which are well worth an examination for this purpose, such as language and antiquities - but in what RJ calls intellectual philosophy WW sees 'scarcely a possibility of exemplyfying induction. So if you can make anything of the matter I shall be very glad to see it'. Rather, WW thinks the pupil should first 'read Euclid and algebra and when he has done that, mechanics and Newton, and there then is some chance of his knowing in his third year what induction is'.
1 doc. |
25 Feb 1831 |
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100
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is resolved to get away from Cambridge and visit RJ - 'if there is no other way of having a series of talks with you - I will then judge as well as I can about the matters speculative and practical that we have to do with'. There is so much electioneering and politics currently in Cambridge that he cannot think.
1 doc. |
25 Mar 1831 |
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101
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ has not sent WW any of his 'cravets and speculations' on induction. WW has been 'working out the part about foreign trade which makes very nice equations and I think I see a little more light'. He will be 'hugely wrath' if Lockhart [John G. Lockhart] does not put his review of RJ in the same edition of the Quarterly Journal as his one on Herschel ['Modern Science: Inductive Philosophy', Quarterly Review 45, 1831].
1 doc. |
13 Apr 1831 |
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102
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends RJ 'the first vol. of Wilks's India'. Coddington [Henry Coddington] 'who is a great admirer of yours was lamenting to me today that you had not invented names of your own for your various classes of Rents instead of adopting names necessarily already laden with confusion and complexity'. WW thinks, however, that RJ should 'stick to historical names till it became inconvenient to keep them'. If RJ really wishes to begin printing immeadiately he will have to send WW some 'make-believe' manuscript of wages now: 'The Syndicate have got rules vey simple and reasonable and though they may not be of much real use it would be mere folly to incur spleen and perhaps rejection by asking them to violate their maxims for so assignable cause. The adoption of your second part will depend on the reputation of the first and not on what you send as a specimen'. WW is convinced that wages is more important than rent. His 'political economy paper is mighty swollen and I am rather pleased with it . In some parts Ricardo is wrong simply for want of a mathematical instrument of deduction'.
1 doc. |
13 Oct 1831 |
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103
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. When will RJ be coming to vote for Cavendish [William Cavendish], could he also bring any of his work on wages so they can concoct an application to the Cambridge press syndicate? WW has had another letter from Mrs Young which appears to authorize him to negotiate with Peacock [George Peacock to work on a biography of Thomas Young].
1 doc. |
26 Apr 1831 |
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104
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW 'was greatly indignant at the democrats pretending to make out that it was impendent for the ends of truth and national prosperity that their dogmas on the subject should be disseminated wide and thick, but if you will make haste and give them a second of the true doctrine it will no doubt be much better than any attempt to poke them down by detached arguments' [the intended sequel to RJ's work on rent was wages]. RJ will probably have WW's article in the Quarterly Review: 'I think I have given you a more scanty pitance than I needed to have done. But I was afraid that if I begun at all to talk in the strain which would have expressed my own views and feelings I should lose the confidence both of my editor and my reader, and be looked on as a mere personal friend'. WW likes RJ's 'aspirations after a reform or at any rate a trial in the way of reviewing for ourselves'. He has 'a strong conviction that taking such a line of moral philosophy, political economy, and science, as I suppose we should, we might partly find and partly form a school which would be considerable in influence of the best kind'. .
1 doc. |
24 Apr 1831 |
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105
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. If RJ is applying to the University press syndicate he should do so this term. There is a movement at large which wants to establish a professorship in political economy 'on nearly the same conditions as that at Oxford. It is to be established in honour of Huskisson [William Huskisson], by some friends of his - there are two difficulties one to fix the mode of election the other to get rid of Payne [George Payne].They wanted to put Malthus in as the first professor'. WW has sent another review of RJ's book to the British Critic ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and Sources of Taxation by the Revd Richard Jones', The British Critic, Quarterly Theological Review and Ecclesiastical Record, 10, 1831].
1 doc. |
09 May 1831 |
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106
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has not applied [to the Cambridge press syndicate] about RJ's book [Wages]: 'I have not been able to see or talk to anybody, your MS is scanty'. WW thinks they should leave it till the autumn. The British Critic has written to WW 'and is really surprised at the idea of having a fling at the Ricardos and McCullochs -I will, I think, send you my proof sheets when they come' ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and Sources of Taxation by the Revd Richard Jones', The British Critic, Quarterly Theological Review and Ecclesiastical Record, 10, 1831]. WW has started thinking about his theology and will begin writing very shortly ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]. .
1 doc. |
17 May 1831 |
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107
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW rejoices 'especially in Lord Lansdowne's mode of approbation' over RJ's book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. He has received his proof sheets from the British Critic ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and Sources of Taxation by the Revd Richard Jones', The British Critic, Quarterly Theological Review and Ecclesiastical Record, 10, 1831]: 'I think I will not send you them. I do not like them at all but shrink from the task of altering them so as to make them good'. William Buckland and his wife are coming to stay next week.
1 doc. |
1 Jun 1831 |
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108
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends his review article of RJ's book on rent ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and Sources of Taxation by the Revd Richard Jones', The British Critic, Quarterly Theological Review and Ecclesiastical Record, 10, 1831]: 'I do not like it as I told you but I hope you will not think much tinkering needful for it will be very troublesome and I do not feel half myself while that thief Lockhart has got my other altruism in his power'.
1 doc. |
1 Jul 1831 |
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109
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is afraid RJ thinks him 'very cus ever since my last letter'. He is coming down to London tomorrow and hopes RJ will send or come to the Athenaeum to see if they can do something better than procrustinate: 'I will overhaul if I can do anything and improve your chance of finishing before the next revolution; which is desirable because your principles are so well applicable to the existing state of things'.
1 doc. |
16 Jul 1830 |
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110
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has got hold of a new science (meteorology) which 'is altogether admirable both for my theology and for my induction...The people have been collecting facts for a very long time - (ever since Noah) and are now just beginning to get a notion of the general laws and proportions in to which the mass is to be resolved. I do not know any subject which is at present in so instructive a condition. Moreover those who pursue it talk excellent philosophia prima as is always the case among people so employed; the wisdom which people utter under the unconscious tutoring of practice is very noticeable in the business of the intellect, as well as of the hands and the heart'. WW is delighted with the progress he is making on his Bridgwater treatise - 'but I begin to have less trust in this feeling, having found that it may delude me; however you shall see what I have done and tell me how far I am right' ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]. Is RJ at peace or war with the logician?: 'If you will give me illustrations and examples of the ascending method applied to moral sciences we shall have no difficulty in fighting the downward mad people. I have got some additional views but no removal yet of any doubts as to the identity of the scientific method (that is the method of making a science) in physical and moral sciences'. .
1 doc. |
23 Jul 1831 |
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111
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW would like RJ 'to look over my recent lucubrations, if you have time to do it carefully' ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]. WW wants it criticised. .
1 doc. |
28 Jul 1831 |
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112
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes to be in Hertford by the 12th or 13th. How is RJ's work on wages progressing?: 'I hope you still keep your intention of being ready for another explosion in the course of the winter'. WW wants to know 'whether that Scotchman' [John Lockhart] will publish his review of RJ in the Quarterly Review.
1 doc. |
28 Aug 1831 |
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113
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends RJ 'some lucubrations on the subject of McCulloch's review...Do not be alarmed - I am not going to publish them in a hurry or probably at all'. WW does not 'care so much about abusing Peter [possibly William Peter or Karl L. Peter] as about setting the matter on its proper footing - they are suggested as much by talking with the Ricardites as by the Review'. WW finds 'that people have by no means made out clearly what is new and peculiar in your doctrines and they will be long in doing it except it is put somewhere in a short compass to begin with. My view was to write what might benefit the Political Economists at the athenaeum'. WW has only spoken to two or three people on political economy - 'for nobody talks of anything but reform'.
1 doc. |
09 Oct 1831 |
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114
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Will RJ look over WW's 'Physical Theology ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]...and say how far you think the selection of arguments and the mode of presenting them will answer the purpose'. WW hears that RJ is to be reviewed in the Edinburgh Review by McCulloch [J.R. McCulloch] - 'so prepare for a flogging'.
1 doc. |
30 Sep 1831 |
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115
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has 'a vehement zeal to illuminate McCulloch [J. R. McCulloch] and his tribe. I have got Smith [Cambridge University Press] to sort permission to have your second volume printed which was granted without hesitation'.
1 doc. |
20 Oct 1831 |
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116
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been writing his reply to Peter [possibly William Peter or Karl L. Peter. See WW to RJ, 9 October 1831], and is inclined 'to make a separate pamphlet of it by which means it can be more easily disseminated among those whom one would wish to see it'. WW does 'not much like the thought of having anything to do with Blackwood' [Blackwood Magagazine]. However, because his piece on John Herschel in the Quarterly Review 'is so little likely to attract or interest readers that I have little doubt Lockhart [John Lockhart] thinks himself well rid of me'. WW should do what Macaulay [Thomas B. Macaulay] 'does in reviews, who always takes care to put in as much thought as he can express clearly and illustrate well and not a bit more'.
1 doc. |
30 Oct 1831 |
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117
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. It looks like Lockhart [John Lockhart] at last intends to put WW's review of RJ in the Quarterly Review. The article will hopefully do more good than if WW had written it against Peter [possibly William Peter or Karl L. Peter]: 'Still I should have liked much to have a knock at him for his reasoning in the Edinburgh...We must judge as well as we can whether after this article appears it is needful to answer Peter's puzzles'. WW is inclined to do so since they are the puzzles of an array of people: 'The two main points seem to be the proof that Ricardo, the Ricardiansetc not merely mean Ricardian rents, which I suppose can be made out palpably enough: and the proof that McCulloch [J. R. McCulloch] himself has never had any but the most imperfect and incoherent glimpses of the effect of agricultural improvements; and that you have labour up that part in a way which shews the importance and having of it'. WW only talks of such projects for speculations sake. 'I do not know whether you are exactly aware how the young Ricardians will meet your proofs that the increase of rent is owing to improvement'. WW explains how he thinks they will counter RJ's claims.
1 doc. |
01 Nov 1831 |
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118
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. When WW last wrote he had not seen the article on RJ in the Quarterly Review: 'I think you have great good luck in escaping out of my hands for I had not ventured to say so broadly what I supposed your plan to be though I expected to leave nearly the same impression, and I certainly never dreamt of quoting you to the extent to which Lockhart's [John Lockhart] established reviewer has done...I am quite sure both from what he says to me and still more from the inscrutable manner in which the whole business of the Review is carried on that he is very far from absolute, and that there is some greater power behind his editorial throne'. WW thinks that RJ's success among the existing political economists, will depend greatly 'on its being explained to them what you are supposed to have different from their doctrine'. If RJ wants 'candid and thinking readers you must go to Germany'. The master of Trinity - Christopher Wordsworth - 'is delighted' with RJ's book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831] and impatient for the next volume on wages. WW gives his comments on the review of Whately [Richard Whately]. .
1 doc. |
08 Nov 1831 |
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119
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW thinks RJ is right in resolving to explain himself further: 'If you want to see how it may be needed read the enclosed letter of Pryme [George Pryme] which I have just got and which I treacherously communicate to you the object of his criticisms. You will perceive how deeply the notion is burnt into these peolple that Ricardo's theory is good because he analyses the circumstances . The young Londoners have got the same fancy - most of the rest of Pryme's critque is stupid enough'. WW is to be one of the council of the Royal Society: 'My main reason for not refusing this is my dislike to be coupled with the Babbagian sect of spewers or railers; for in truth I do not see much chance of good coming of it'. Concerning Ricardo's analysis of rent, 'cannot it be shewn that it impossible to discriminate between the payment for the original powers of the soil, and for improvements?' .
1 doc. |
18 Nov 1831 |
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120
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. The review of RJ in the Quarterly Review is not to be WW's after all [see WW to RJ, 1 November 1831]. John Lockhart writes to WW to say 'that the article is written without communication with him by a gentleman who had undersood that department of the Review to be in his handsetc and has thought it necessary to let this person's review stand rather than lose the benefit of his labours in future'. However, he also says that WW's labour shall not have been spent in vain. This may mean part of it used in the other man's article: 'I expect this will turn out a good thing for you for the man will of course praise your book as opposed to the McCullochites, and you may come to the honour of being the creed of the tories before your full time. At any rate you will see the impression your book makes on a man not disposed to judge it unfavourably and will get the notoriety of being reviewed in the two opposing reviews immeadiately'.
1 doc. |
02 Nov 1831 |
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121
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Due to lectures and other matters WW has been brought to a stand still on the subject of 'McCulloch and his absurdities'. He hopes RJ's views and arguments will get him going again. WW agrees with all RJ's points: 'but I foster a difficulty in stating what is the law according to which improvements in agriculture proceed. They are so discontinuous and anomalous that it is scarcely possible to assert anything about them in general terms, and at the same time all readers want positive assertion, and will look to me what you oppose to the dogma, of the other party'.
1 doc. |
05 Dec 1831 |
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122
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ has not yet told WW what he thinks of his 'Theophysics' ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]: 'it much concerns me to know what you think'. Because 'the dogmatical and deductive spirit of the present generation of economists it appears to me that it might be worth while to cut their meat for them and stuff it in their mouths that they might [machifah] it after their own fashion...your great business is to teach what is true, and will be so when Ricardists and McCulochites have become like Aristotelians and Canterians now are'.
1 doc. |
06 Dec 1831 |
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123
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ should come to Cambridge at the time he mentions. WW does not expect many difficulties in carrying out his duties on the council of the Royal Society.
1 doc. |
09 Dec 1831 |
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124
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ's library books are overdue and WW has already paid 24 shillngs on his behalf. RJ should bring 'all your sayings and clear arguments against Peter McCulloch' when he comes up to Cambridge: WW has 'disposed of his [McCulloch's] cousin John', and is 'quite desirous to economise a little'.
1 doc. |
22 Dec 1831 |
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125
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is smoking a cigar and reading 'The Rights of Industry'. Will RJ's work on wages 'include the solution of some of the problems which have been suggesting themselves under the pleasant influence of water and smoke. They are mainly about the proportion that the productiveness of labour is always increased by its frredom from restrictions. The industry men of course maintains this, and urges it as a general and certain truth...It is of course inevitable that writers and especially popular writers, should dogmatise on the subject and make the assertion anticipatively; but this which is natural and perhaps good in them will not do for us. Moreover I see reasons to doubt the proposition where they absolutely started. It is certainly not true in limited periods and particular circumstances, and therefore requires more than mere logic to make it true generally'. WW explains the necessary approach: 'nothing but an analysis, or rather a classification of circumstances and of the mode of operation in each case over the whole of a very wide field can possibly shew what kind of adjustment of the personal relation and civil condition of producers is in succesive stages of production most effective. To assert that most will be produced by giving to each an equal right in his own industry seems to me no more probable beforehand, than to assert that most will be gained from the law by giving to each man an equal right to the law which is certainly false'.
1 doc. |
02 Jan 1832 |
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126
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wants RJ to finish his work on wages: 'I have sometimes a notion that you imagine yourself to be less idle than you really are'. Charles Babbage returned to Cambridge with some intention of lecturing - 'but finding he was not likely to have an audience or to be considered as performing any act of extraordinary attention to usual rules and duties, he came back still an unlecturing professor'.
1 doc. |
03 Jan 1832 |
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127
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW met Senior [Nassau Senior] at the Athenaeum club, 'and asked him if he answered to his friend Whately's [Richard Whately] name of catallactician. He said that he did not mean to adopt it but that he thought it a proper account of the matter: and when I reminded him that more than half the wealth of the world is never exchanged, he declared very frankly, that in that case he had no business with it'. .
1 doc. |
25 Jan 1832 |
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128
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has sent RJ a parcel about the allotment in Lord Fitzwilliam's property. RJ has 'much excited my curiosity about the Saint Simonians'.
1 doc. |
03 Feb 1832 |
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129
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is concerned with RJ's health and lifestyle. When RJ has 'time [after writing his book on wages] you shall write your fill about the economical conditions of political institutions but pray do not set off on this cross road at present'. RJ should not start with just any principle: 'If any truth is to be got at pluck it when it has grown ripe, and do not like the deductive savages cut down the tree to get at it'. WW has been reading 'the St. Simonian - who is the man that writes the exposition? - he must be a fine fellow: I am entirely charmed with the hauty and coherence of great part of his theory...his theory of organic and critical periods is constructed and followed into its various developments with consumate perception of the period state and tendency of men's thought and the cravings of their nature. I do not think the doctrine of the perpetual diminution of anlaganism is quite so well made out; and the assumption of a complete difference in kind between the next organic period and all preceding ones is as appears to me quite forced and illogical'. WW agrees with RJ that there 'are as you say several right notions about the character of science - one in which they have hit on the same way which I have used for nearly the same thing. The conceptions which must exist in the mind in order to get by induction a law from a collection of facts: and the impossibility of inducting or even of collecting without this. ' Charles Babbage told WW that he had a project of publishing a book like John Herschel's ['A Preliminary Discourse on Natural Philosophy', 1830]. WW agrees with RJ's view of Charels Babbage's new book ['On the Economy of Manufactures', 1832]: 'But still there is a great deal of ingenuity in his speculations and the one you mention about skilled labour is I think the brightest of them. Moreover the book is of a kind which will receive its full need of praise in these days'.
1 doc. |
19 Feb 1832 |
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130
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has 'only just time to send you the accompanying essay'.
1 doc. |
27 Feb 1832 |
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131
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wants to know how RJ's 'curative system' goes on: 'as soon as you do get into trim for thinking and writing pray go right in with your wages and sink all the episodic theories which come in your way'.
1 doc. |
02 Mar 1832 |
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132
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW does not think the Chancellor 'very likely to do what must and ought to be considered by all his party as utterly absurd and childish, and such would be his offering me profferments'.
1 doc. |
12 Mar 1832 |
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133
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's views on the subject of RJ applying for the Professorship at King's College, London, in Political Economy. With regard to the view of the Archbishop: 'I should not think that your connexion with King's College, if properly represented to him, could or could produce any unfavourable affect upon your prospects; for the establishment itself is a child of the high church'. However, WW is in two minds on RJ taking the post.
1 doc. |
16 Mar 1832 |
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134
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Printed letter written by Joseph Romilly with the date for the election of a new University Registrary. Further to RJ possibly being offered the professorship in political economy at King's College [see WW to RJ, 16 March 1832]: 'It appears that some of the managers of the College were dissatisfied with some of Senior's [Nassau Senior] published opinions (I believe about Irish Bishopsetc) and this I suppose has led to his resignation. If they offer it you it will be because they think your opinions will be such as they will better like, and because they still wish to have the eclat of a good professor on the subject'.
1 doc. |
18 Mar 1832 |
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135
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Thirlwall [Connop Thirlwall] considers 'himself to be a very ill used and unlucky man in being inveighed into the chair after he had left the room for a couple of hours, and is penitent for his outbreak; so I hope you at least continue stout of heart, and strong of stomach'. WW is writing his report on mineralogy 'which is full of induction as anything in the world is if people will only look' ['Report on the Recent Progress and Present State of Mineralogy', Report of the First and Second Meetings of the BAAS, 1832].
1 doc. |
03 Apr 1832 |
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136
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW would like news on RJ and Mrs Jones's health. What has come of RJ's Professorship? (see WW to RJ, 18 March 1832). The Somervilles [Mary and Dr Somerville] are in Cambridge with a ' Dublin man of whom you may have heard as a stout mathematician (Hamilton [William Rowan Hamilton]) and who is moreover a strenuous metaphysician and an interminable talker about such high matters'.
1 doc. |
12 Apr 1832 |
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137
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Further to RJ's desire to be appointed the next Professor of Political Economy at King's College (see WW to RJ, 12 April 1832): 'I am rather vexed at the stupidity of the King's College people, and I am moreover rather vexed to find that you have set your heart upon the matter more than I thought'. RJ should just concentrate on getting his book on wages finished - 'you would soon reach a stage in which their whims would be of no consequence to you and your determinations would be something to them'.
1 doc. |
29 Apr 1832 |
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138
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorry RJ is ill: 'The only moral I can extract from such anticipations is the importance of getting our speculations in to such a form that no calamity or adversity shall have the power, by putting an end to us or to the command of our faculties, to destroy the chance of our beautiful theories coming upon the world, in our time or afterwards...You know as well as I do that those who theorise rightly are in the end the lords of the earth'. The BAAS meeting at Oxford went very well.
1 doc. |
01 Jul 1832 |
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139
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is waiting for Rickman [Thomas Rickman] and then embarking on an architectural tour of Normandy.
1 doc. |
30 Jul 1832 |
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140
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's principal acquaintance at Caen was 'M. Le Prevot, a man of very considerable station and of great intelligence. I could not induce him to give me or direct me to any estimate on the subject of your problem as to the time in which the number of proprietors is doubled by the law of equal partition; but he tod me that many estimates which had been given on this subject were to be received with caution, being made by persons who are hostile to this law'. WW gives his observations on the small and large proprietors in the area and his travelling encounters in general. .
1 doc. |
25 Aug 1832 |
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141
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW returned to Cambridge via John Herschel 'who is busy grinding specula for the southern hemisphere' [JH's trip to the Cape in South Africa]. WW has been working on his Bridgwater treatise ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]. How is RJ's work on wages going? WW also saw Malthus [Thomas Malthus] who 'is much pleased with some Political Economy' by 'a certain Harriet Martineau'.
1 doc. |
13 Sep 1832 |
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142
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is surprised that RJ, 'who has made social economy your study, can help writing and publishing now when all men's mind's are in such a ferment' [the 1832 Reform Bill]: 'I am resolved to possess my soul in place and to leave the people to pull down the social edifice for their amusement which at presemt they seem disposed to do'. WW thinks he detects an article by RJ in the British Magazine - 'which I think excellent - If the church conservatives have the sense to take hold of it there is good foundation there for a popular cry against the innovators - Here are the rascals who want to take the support of the clergy off the shoulders of the land lords and to throw it on those of the people'.
1 doc. |
11 Oct 1832 |
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143
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW would like to hear as soon as possible how RJ has got on with his efforts to become the next Professor of Political Economy at King's College. He will be sending RJ his new book: 'I go on urging the difference between induction and deduction, without at all disturbing myself about the chance of nobody minding what I say. This you will see in the preface and the whole construction of the book is founded upon the same notion - Each chapter (except one) consists of a historical inductive and a mathematical deductive portion, and I am persuaded that this is the way in which scientific books of instruction ought to be written' ['The First Principles of Mechanics : With Historical and Practical Illustrations', 1832 ??]. Deductive people 'go on following, illustrating, expanding, a given notion which of the nature of it must be defined and [?] and so restricted to the range of our primitive knowledge. But the minds that feel a conviction of principles of unity as yet undetected, that believe in the existence of truths wider than they can limit by phrases habitually current, and that assert to the possibility of a connexion among laws that seem far asunder, while they acknowledge their ignorance what the connexion is; these are minds which have the best chance of discovering new principles and new generalisations and such habits of thought lead naturally to the persuasion of a supreme principle of unity and connexion'. If RJ finds 'in the course of your reading any good phrases, thought, or story, illustrating the narrowmindedness of mathematicians, and their ineptitude for judging well about real and practical matters, I think I could make some use of it'. .
1 doc. |
31 Oct 1832 |
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144
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW had hoped to hear from RJ about the King's College Professorship in Political Economy. WW hardly knows 'what to say about the man with the long name Carn- in Rose's magazine so far as you rest merely on the unpopularity and inconvenience of the tithe system, in a discussion which is itself to affect popularity, I do not see how you are to make out a very truimphant case, because the mere fact of referring to popularity as a principle seems to me to knock up all settled economic relations'. The weak part of the letter is at the bottom of the first page: 'after seeming to profess to discuss the commission and allowing that objections on this score must be admitted, he flies off to exclaim against the monstrosity of doing away with a thing a thousand years old at the eleventh houretcetc'. However, WW does not think it really worth RJ answering such letters: 'If your plan make any way it will not be from such objections that it will find any serious obstacles'.
1 doc. |
13 Nov 1832 |
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145
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been to London and has heard that the business of RJ's possible Professorship at King's College has not yet been settled. He met the Bishop of London: 'I asked him if the office was filled. He told me there was a difference of opinion whether it should be continued but that he wished it to go on, because you were to be Professor. I thought him extremely sensible and was very glad to find he had got such a notion'. WW would like to meet RJ to discuss his book ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]: 'I am coming now to the speculations about the effect of the study of science upon the mind'. There is going to be an election for the University: 'you will hear that Peel [Robert Peel] has retired - I think this must puzzle the Tories hugely for they had got up a strong declaration here in favour of the sitting members and will now have to look out for a new man'. WW will vote for Lubbock [John W. Lubbock] 'as my particular friend and as the mathematician of London. But I meddle not with Whig or Tory'.
1 doc. |
02 Dec 1832 |
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146
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. The University election takes place on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. RJ should come and stay as long as he wants. WW will be voting for John W. Lubbock: 'I suppose he has no chance this time'. WW hardly knows 'whether to wish the University success, for with such idiots as Lord John Russell and others among them they are not to be depended on for a week together. If they would make themselves the conservative party indeed it would be another aff[air?'.
1 doc. |
07 Dec 1832 |
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147
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorry RJ ever got involved with the Professorship in Political Economy at King's College: 'it is now very clear that it will either never come at all, or will come in such a way as to be no great advantage or comfort to you'.WW is more concerned at 'the danger of your publication of your next volume being retarded by it'. WW does not see a chance 'of any one doing what you would do for the science, soon, or I could almost say, ever. To bring the facts of the historical and economical condition of nations under general laws, when once done will never be forgotten, and the effects of such a view will be forthwith and forever operative...It is the only way too, to bring common practice and common symapthy within sight of sound theory'. If he does not continue he will be remembered as a young author extingusihed by J. R. McCulloch. As for 'Whatley [Richard Whatley] and his logic you may neglect him or kick hm as you like. You will of course soon be as completely out of his reach as a man who walks forwards is of a man who stands still and prances'. WW has finished his Bridgwater treatise ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833] and sent it to the Bishop of London and the President of the Royal Society to examine.
1 doc. |
21 Dec 1832 |
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148
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW will come to vist RJ on the same day as Connop Thirwall. After London, WW will return back to Lord Braybrook's and to Cambridge again. WW hopes RJ will begin work on his book now that the fiasco over the King's College Professorship is over: 'If you are resolved to maintain your first whim to be a failure I will not fight against you now: but at the same time...it is no bad success for a book not deductive like Ricardo's, but inductive, and in its induction, as you must allow, far from complete, to obtain so much notice as yours has done: and I dare say that half the impression is a great deal more than the Wealth of Nations or Malthus's Population or any book of similar novelty and importance sold in the same time'. McCulloch's review of RJ's book 'gave you or your friends an opportunity of urging your opinions in a polemical form: - that opportunity was lost by your procrastination: - I think the loss was an advantage; and shall think so the more if it urges you on to publish what remains'. RJ once spoke of writing an article for the Philological Museum. He should think of doing it now as Connop Thirlwall 'is rather in want of grist for his mill'.
1 doc. |
26 Dec 1832 |
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149
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW offering a better word for catallactics [see WW to RJ, 25 January 1832]. He hopes RJ goes 'on prosperously with your exhortation to his grace ['A Few Remarks on the Proposed Commutation of Tithe, with Suggestions of Some Additional Facilities', 1833??]. I thought you seemed to be in a good vein in most of your criticism: the main danger which I saw, and which might be an imagination of my own, was that you might get into a wrangle about logic and induction' ['A Review of Richard Whatley'??]. WW will give him Cesalpinus's 'say about definitions it is good and remarkable but mixed up with a cordinate reference to induction which though very important for the subject will I think take too much developing for your review. The first question of his first book is - How we are to understand that we must proceed from universals to particulars (as Aristotle directs) seeing that parts alone are better known - and his answer is that we know the whole completely before we know the parts - we learn universals from particulars by induction - there are these shifts of our progress Induction, Division, Definition'. WW has found, among some of his papers, a packet from Edward Bromhead 'containing among other matters a sheet of observations on my First Principles of Mechanics, and another of notes on Political Economy, in which he expresses himself much disturbed at my having said in a previous letter that Definitions must come last - you see how hard a battle you or we have to fight'. .
1 doc. |
20 Jan 1833 |
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150
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW finds RJ's word admirable [another word - I think - for Richard Whatley's term 'catallactics', see WW to RJ, 20 January 1833]: 'Except you could make more of the ridicule of Whatley turn upon the ugliness of the word Calallactics' ['Review of Whatley'?]. RJ should reduce his 3 glasses of wine to 2. WW has enclosed an unpublished sonnet by 'Hamilton [William Rowan Hamilton] the Dublin astronomer about which I want your advice. It takes my fancy extremely...I should like to print it at the beginning of my Bridgwater book ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]...In doing so I should say in the preface that the statements in one of my chapters concerning the tendency of mathematics to lead men's minds from religious views must be held to apply to some cause only, as was clear by such an example as the author of these lines, one of the first analysts of the age. This would be no more than justice, for he is a superb analyst and a noble fellow'. What does RJ think?.
1 doc. |
02 Feb 1833 |
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151
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is 'somewhat amused at seeing you relapsing into the human frailty of definitions after having just finished a most eloquent and convincing sermon against them; but I am also some what alarmed at seeing you in so dangerous a path'. WW is surprised that RJ should need 'a formal definition, expresed in studied terms, not afterwards to be modified. If you use wealth or any other term of which the signification is too lax or too wide in common language to convey your meaning properly by all means give a description of what you intend it to include, and refer to and recall this description', but do not look for an 'English word and conspiring with another man to make it mean some part only or modification of its usual meaning'. WW will fight against it and tells RJ what Thomas Malthus ought to say to such a move: 'After receiving this long lecture from your economical pastor and master, you would I suppose strike out all the formalities of your definition and content yourself with saying that when wealth is spoken of in the following reasonings it is not intended to include any but material possesionsetcetc'.
1 doc. |
10 Feb 1833 |
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152
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ is lacking in pluck and is putting himself 'into an immense fidget about whether you are to have half a dozen more or fewer auditors which is a purely unessential circumstance'. WW does not understand what RJ means by the failure of his lecture ['An Introductory Lecture on Political Economy to which is Added a Syllabus of Lectures on the Wages of Labour', 1833]: 'What amount of success will satisfy you? If you expect that the whole lecture room should rush from their seats and lift you in their arms declaring you the emperor of economists, the thing will not be done. People will even retain many of their prejudices. Time and Right, past friends but slow travellers, must work for you before you can have justice'.
1 doc. |
24 Feb 1833 |
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153
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has no fears for RJ in his introductory lecture [New Professor of Political Economy at King's College, London]. He should print his lecture ['An Introductory Lecture on Political Economy to which is Added a Syllabus of Lectures on the Wages of Labour', 1833].
1 doc. |
14 Feb 1833 |
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154
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has not written as he was expecting RJ's finished lecture ['An Introductory Lecture on Political Economy to which is Added a Syllabus of Lectures on the Wages of Labour', 1833]. WW thinks his bridgwater treatise is looking 'very pretty' ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 1833]. WW wants to know what impression is made of the part in his book where he contrasts induction and deduction. RJ's lectures should 'be a clear exposition of principles with interesting views of realities illustrating them'. .
1 doc. |
24 Mar 1833 |
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155
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW would be curious to know how RJ has 'found it convenient to deliver your doctrines for the benefit of a king's college audience and also what kind of audience such a one'.
1 doc. |
17 Apr 1833 |
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156
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW encouraging RJ to send his work on wages to the press.
1 doc. |
02 Aug 1833 |
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157
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has heard nothing from RJ on the progress of his work on wages: 'If you will come to Cambridge I think we shall launch your second volume into the sea of printers ink in the most satisfactory way, but if you can't do this send me the ms. forthwith'.
1 doc. |
16 Sep 1833 |
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158
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW met John and Margaret Herschel in London - 'a great pleasure to me, as it always is; and the unhappiness of parting with him is almost done away with by looking at the views and feelings with which he goes and the temper in which she accompanies him' [their departure to the Cape of Good Hope]. WW would like to talk to RJ about his 'project of resigning the tuition of which I have spoken to you before. My wish to do so grows upon me - the business remains as tiresome as ever'.
1 doc. |
21 Oct 1833 |
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159
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has made arrangements to substantially lighten his load as head tutor [see WW to RJ, 21 October 1833]: 'This is excellent good in itself, but better still is this that it makes it a very easy and short affair to give up the tuition altogether if I find that my remaining official employments are burthersome'. He can now return 'forthwith and in eanest to my beloved induction. I have been employed all the term hitherto upon a thumping paper on the tides which I intend to be a step of some consequence in the theory. I wish I could explain to you how useful my philosophy is in shewing me how to set about a matter like this, and how good a subject this one of the tides is to exemplify it'.
1 doc. |
13 Nov 1833 |
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160
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes RJ gets well quickly. He does not think he will be able to visit RJ soon, as he has begun to write his book ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837] and has various pupils to deal with. .
1 doc. |
10 Dec 1833 |
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161
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wanted to talk to RJ about his statistical section in the BAAS: 'I want to see setting to work in a reasonable and promising manner. I do not think the best mode to proceed is by advertisemnet '. A copy of the sections resolutions should be sent to all persons who seemed likely to be worth the trouble. After this they may 'develop and systematize' each of their 5 subject areas: 'I am myself much disposed to thumb my fingers into your economical statistics, but I have so much else to do I will avoid it if I can'. .
1 doc. |
20 Dec 1833 |
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162
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. On the possibility of having a cast made of John Herschel from the mask taken from his face, and assisted by Pickersgill's [Henry Hall Pickersgill] portrait: 'I promised my aid [to James Stewart, JH's brother-in-law] and have got several names, but the project is not very warmly received by Herschel's friends'. WW would like Stewart to consider an engraving from Pickersgill's picture.
1 doc. |
20 Jan 1834 |
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163
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW refutes a story concerning Thorp [Thomas Thorp, senior dean and tutor] and WW's 'asserted resignation of the tuition'. The story was now old and had been promoted by 'some of the silliest scandal-mongers we have here, and that my theory of it was that it was one of the usual invention's of the second-year men to make the freshmen stare'. WW has had no time to get statistical recruits [RJ's statistical section at the BAAS]: 'I think I could do so better if I had some printed project, such for instance as your scheme of distribution of subjects which appears to me admirable'.
1 doc. |
20 Feb 1834 |
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164
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is pleased RJ's Statistical Society has started well: 'I should have been sorry if you had not taken it for granted that I wished to be one of you'. WW would be pleased to be on the council if it is clear other people as well as RJ wish it. WW is against the University whig reformers who want to see unrestricted admission and graduation for Dissenters: 'Their petition appeared to me very wild, except as a mere ministerial move. As to the substance of the petition, it throws down before the Dissenters the College fellowships, which they did not ask for, but which being thus offered to them they will of course claim. I think the fellowships a necessary support to the established church; and I think the church a necessary part of our social system'. WW is disillusioned with the views of Musgrave [Thomas Musgrave?], Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] and Peacock [George Peacock]. WW encourages RJ to get on with his work on wages: 'your book is of more consequence than a cart load of such petitions'.
1 doc. |
24 Mar 1834 |
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165
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hears from Stewart [James Stewart] that RJ has been occupied with his new Statistical Society: 'He adds moreover that you are somewhat disturbed at some of the vagaries which it appears likely to take'. When is WW to recieve RJ's work on wages? He would like to come to London and catch one of RJ's lectures. WW has had a very pleasant letter from John Herschel. .
1 doc. |
22 Apr 1834 |
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166
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Things 'are all going wrong here and I dare say shall soon be in a condition quite insolvable. Thirlwall [Connop Thirlwall] has published a pamphlet on the Dissenters question' ['A Letter to the Rev. Thomas Turton, on the Admission of Dissenters to Academical Degrees', 1834]. Subsequently, the Master [Christopher Wordsworth] has asked him to resign which he duly did: 'The whigs are a bitter set, and not very scrupulous, and I dare say will do somthing to shew their wrath'.
1 doc. |
28 May 1834 |
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167
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wants to get down to London' to look after a scheme of tide observations which the Admiralty have promised to execute at about 500 points from June 7 to 23'.
1 doc. |
03 Jun 1834 |
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168
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW will be coming to London via the coasts of Suffolk and Essex so that he can 'look after my tides'. .
1 doc. |
06 Jun 1834 |
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169
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW never actually got to London: 'I set off for the coast on Friday intending to see how the coast guard took up the orders of the Admiralty which were issued at my suggestion and finding that everything furnished well along the shore of Suffolk I thought I could not do better than come back and write philosophy'. WW expects he will 'have a postscript to my pamphlet ['Remarks on some parts of Mr. Thirlwall's letter on the Admission of Dissenters to Academical Degrees', 1834. See WW to RJ, 28 May 1834] to write for I find that Thirlwall is charging another pistol which he will let off in a day or two ['A Letter to the Rev. Thomas Turton, on the Admission of Dissenters to Academical Degrees', 2nd edn., to which is added a 2nd letter containing a vindication of some passages in the first letter', 1834]. I expect that I shall find it necessary to let off something in return. I was very glad that you liked the tone of my last and I shall probably keep the same ground in my reply' ['Additional Remarks on Mr Thirlwall's Letter...of Academical Degrees', 1834]. .
1 doc. |
12 Jun 1834 |
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170
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has had a letter from Benson [see Christopher Benson to WW, 1 June 1834]: 'I suppose a stout high churchman asking me how far I would go in concession to the Dissenters. I answered that I would give them degrees keeping them in their present footing in the colleges, so that they must conform to general rules and claim no exemptions'.
1 doc. |
6 Jun 1834 |
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171
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Perhaps WW should have suppressed his pamphlet altogether, 'but there was something which looked like a challenge in a part of Thirlwall's [Connop Thirlwall] which drew me on' [see WW to RJ, 12 June 1834, for background and references]. WW thinks RJ's suggestion that WW's pamphlet could be seen as a defense of the Master's dismissal of Thirlwall as absurd. On the contrary, WW thought Thirlwall's opinions on chapel going could have been overcome: 'This I told his friends (Sedgwick, Musgrave, Romillyetc) from the first'. WW is clear about his own view: 'The case is the same as that of an officer in any other body publishing an attack upon the system which he has to carry into affect: or a cabinet minister declaring himself against a cabinet measure: the tutors and assistant tutors were understood by most of us to be engaged to further the observance of all college rules by the undergraduates'. This does not mean a tutor cannot hold Thirlwall's opinions about dissenters, as is clear from the case of George Peacock. RJ will find that Augustus Hare 'considers that the Master could not do otherwise than he did, and Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] acknowledged that Thirlwall's declarations were inconsistent with his position'. .
1 doc. |
23 Jun 1834 |
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172
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is at Lord Braybrooke's [Richard Neville Braybrooke] to meet the Bishop of London. Does RJ think it a 'proper thing' to print a cheap new edition of his Bridgwater book? ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 2nd edn., 1834]. This would enable the book to circulate more widely and do more of the work the Bridgwater treatises are supposed to do: 'I think I shall write to Pickering and propose the scheme to him'.
1 doc. |
19 Jul 1834 |
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173
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorry RJ is tormented with his 'commissionship that is to be' [Tithe Commission?]. RJ's book [probably his work on wages], whether he intends it or not, 'will be taken as an exposition of reasons and arguments as well as maxims of action, and therefore it can hardly help being in some measure polemical - moreover it must contain your case in such a shape as to enable your adherents in town and country to see the arguments on your side and to defend you with somthing like consistency. Beyond this I suppose you need not be pugnacious; and therefore you have nothing to do with arguments drawn from theory...you need not attack bad theories; nor infact any but very obvious objections'. WW is getting 'deeper and deeper' into his history and philosophy of the inductive sciences. WW wants to show RJ the latter: B.2 [Book 2] Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences - 'it must contain most of the metaphysical discussion's which have been attended to of late, but it must also contain all my analysis of the nature of induction and the Rules of its exercise including Bacon's suggestions. B.3 [Book 3] Prospects of Inductive Science - The question of the possibility and method of applying inductive processes, as illustrated in the philosophy of B. 2 [Book 2] to other than material sciences; as philology, and, politics and morals'.
1 doc. |
27 Jul 1834 |
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174
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is 'sorry to hear of the result of the poor law speculation and grieved to think of the annoyance' it will cause RJ: 'What an insatiable monster the Chancellor is!'. WW has written out some of the general views of his Philsophy of Induction: 'You will see that a main feature is the assertion of ideas and facts as equally and conjointly necessary to science - also the opposition between the indistinct knowledge which is implied in the use of common language, and the distinct knowledge for which induction inquires; - also the attempt to shew that guessing (and therefore often guessing wrong) is a necesary part of the progress of induction'.
1 doc. |
05 Aug 1834 |
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175
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW describes his encounters with the mountains and lakes of Scotland. Travelling alone helps him speculate. In his history of the inductive sciences ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837] he will 'give a history of some of the principal sceinces, making the epochs when the great steps were made, the preludes, and the sequels of these epochs, the way in which each was essential to the next and so on'. WW hopes this will be followed by showing 'that in all great inductive steps the type of the process has been the same. And I have in the Second Book ['The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, Founded upon their History', 2 vols., 1840] to explain what facts this process consists of, what conditions it requires, what faculties it calls into play. I expect to show clearly that in order to arrive at knowledge or science we must have, besides impressions of sense, certain mental bonds of connexion, ideal relations, combinatory modes of conception, sciential conditions, or whatever else you can help me call them: they are what I call ideas in my former letter' [see WW to RJ, 5 August 1834]. Thus space is the ideal relation on which the science of geometry depends; time, cause, likeness, substance, life, are ideal relations on which other sciences depend. Now when I have shown distinctly how these ideal relations are the conditions of physical sciences which have already made a general acknowledged progress, I shall have to try to discover the nature of the analogy which exists between these sciences, and our knowledge respecting morals, taste, politics, language, and generally all hyperphysical knowledge'. WW's philosophy also points out 'the nature of each of the inductive steps of which the progress of physical science has consisted, under what conditions it could be and was made, and especially how it rendered the next step possible by its influence on current ideas and on language. Now I shall want to do the same thing with regard to some of the hyperphysical sciences, and thus shall have to give a criticism of their past history fashioned upon a general type'. .
1 doc. |
21 Aug 1834 |
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176
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is at work 'with great activity' upon his history and philosophy of the inductive sciences: 'The history of mechanics and astronomy is so important and instructive that I must be liberally full'. He expects 'that by means of it I shall be able to shut the mouths of all gain sayers of my philosophy'. WW still holds that his philosophy contains 'the most valuable parts of my speculations'. If in the course of writing his book on the history ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837], he finds himself 'becoming metaphysical and transcendental, I open book two ['The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, Founded upon their History', 2 vols., 1840], in which all these things fall into their places, and will in the end make the most beautiful system that can be imagined'. .
1 doc. |
06 Oct 1834 |
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177
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Townsend [Charles Townsend] has told WW 'some absurd story of youre having a fancy for publishing sermons'. WW wants to know the exact state of RJ's labours. Regarding his own work he is keen 'to have done with astronomy, which is of course my pattern science, and must have its story told with some detail and completeness'. The Coleridgians want to establish a Coleridge prize essay in a metaphysical subject as a memorial of him.
1 doc. |
19 Dec 1834 |
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178
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been longer in writing up his years work than he expected: however I have at last finished my astronomy, brought up its history to last saturday'. WW wants to see RJ and find out how his book is going: 'I will bring you some portion of my opus ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837], but it is grown so big that I can only convey a small specimen of it - a brick of the building'. .
1 doc. |
31 Dec 1834 |
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179
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wants to settle arrangements for when RJ and Mrs Jones come to stay in Cambridge. He wants to know what RJ thinks of politics: 'I suppose we may look on the constitution as [changed] from this time; for all power must centre in the house of commons, and they will be thoroughly democratic. I cannot understand how the whigs had the heart to take the ship; seeing the consequence as a great number of them did. I thought they had at least some love of the country but I see now that they loved nothing but their own revenge and gain. It is a thing that rather weighs on one's spirits to know that we are living in a country running rapidly to disorganisation and comparative barbarism'. .
1 doc. |
20 Feb 1835 |
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180
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW assumes that RJ has 'not yet migrated to your college [RJ has been appointed Thomas Malthus's successor as Professor of Political Economy at the East India College]; when you are I shall rejoice much to think you are so near'. The conservatives have been halted again, while the whigs carry 'on a little further by the Radicals before they can pull up. Do you think that Stanley's decided break-off from the whig Radicals is as great a gain to the conservative side as the ejection of their speaker is a loss?' Although the conservatives have 'the sense of the country with them it does not point out very clearly how they are to get the votes. I suppose Stanley's putting himself forward is to beunderstood as declaring himself the nucleus of a conservative whig party which will not shake hands with O'Connel. The danger in which we are at present seems to me to be one which is most degrading and disgusting'. WW is worried that 'a pride of Irish Barbarians' will conquer England: 'It seems absurd to speak seriously of such a danger; but where is the impossibility that the Irish members by being the majority, may carry measures which will brutalize England to the condition of Ireland and worse? Pray what is come of your church reform and tithe commutation consultations?'.
1 doc. |
12 Apr 1835 |
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181
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW 'cannot get on very well without lecturing in Butler's [Joseph Butler] sermons which is carrying me into the whole business of moral principle with reference to Hobbes [Thomas Hobbes], Mackintosh [James Mackintosh] and all the squad of speculators on such matters. This will rather interfere with my prescribed course of writing about induction, but still I hope to manage in such a way as not to lose by it. I shall expect to manage so that what I do will come into its place at some time or other: for the beauty of my induction is that it is like the Devonshire man's pie, into which he puts every thing which he catches'. WW is pleased Mrs Jones saw enough of Cambridge to like it.
1 doc. |
02 May 1835 |
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182
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has seen the London Review of Adam Sedgwick ['A Discourse on the Studies of the University of Cambridge', 3rd ed., 1834]: 'I am somewhat puzzled not being able to make out whether the reviewer is a scoundral who by bringing together peoples passions...or whether he is a real bona fide example of that silliness which belongs to Benthamites and the like, and which can see nothing but moral horrors in all persons of opposite opinions'. WW has 'got a glimpse, which I have long been wishing and struggling for, of the inductive history of ethics. Mackintosh's [James Mackintosh] Dissertation is my main guide'. WW has also been working on a scheme 'of wriing a short essay on mathematics as a part of a liberal education, to appear as the preface to a new edition of one of my many mechanical books which is wanted' ['Thoughts on the Study of Mathematics as Part of a Liberal Education', 1835]. WW gives a few speculations on Gothic architecture.
1 doc. |
09 May 1835 |
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183
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ's examination papers appear to WW excellent: 'I see many reasons for thinking that your system of examinations by the lecturers themselves has several advantages over ours. It is also I think in some degree the Oxford system. I am still scheming and speculating for the improvement of our system here'. WW has written to the editors of the Encyclopaedia Britanica offering to edit James Mackintosh's 'History of Moral Philosophy in a separate and convenient form for our men, to write a preface, or analysis or some other kind of appendage to recommend it to our students as the best text book on the subject'. He also wants to write a pamphlet about mathematics as part of a liberal education, 'which will all be founded on the principles of the true philosophy without my telling people more of them than is requisite to be told for the purpose. I want you to come and talk about this for I daresay we shall disagree hugely'. WW reflects upon the current political state: 'One cannot but feel that the present state of the country breaks up all those circles of early friendship which at a former period one hoped would apply a great deal of the quiet pleasures of maturer age'.
1 doc. |
26 May 1835 |
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184
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is still at Suffolk Street to finish his preface to James Mackintosh's Disseration [see WW to RJ, 26 May 1835]. Good as RJ's project of Indian lectures is, 'do not let it interfere with your book' [on wages]. WW is 'now going to look after my tides at the Admiralty, my Trinity House Sermon, and my wind measurer'. He is then off to Dublin .
1 doc. |
20 Jul 1835 |
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185
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW seeks advice from RJ on his preface and the structural presentation of James Mackintosh's views.
1 doc. |
22 Jul 1835 |
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186
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is dissapointed that RJ has not written to him in Dublin regarding his preface to James Mackintosh's Dissertation [see WW to RJ, 22 July 1835]: 'I suppose I shall be able to find some one who will do me the friend's office of reading it over and giving me his opinion'. The first meeting of the BAAS got off to a good start.
1 doc. |
10 Aug 1835 |
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187
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Thanks RJ for the criticism to his preface to James Mackintosh's Dissertation [see WW to RJ, 10 August 1835]: 'But I am rather puzzled with what you say. There is nothing in the Dissertation or in my preface which appears to me to be an attempt to establish a parallel between the moral sense and our physical senses. That our moral judgements belong to a peculiar faculty indeed, and cannot be resolved into judgements, concerning mere pleasure and pain is Mackintosh's [James Mackintosh] opinion and mine, but is far from new. The arguments which I have given in favour of this opinion are put in my own way rather than his and were intended to be the main nature of the essay'. WW is 'far from considering Mackintosh's [James Mackintosh] as allowing the whole truth; but that is to be remedied only by writing a new treatise. The great merit of the book in my eyes is that it connects some prevalent errors; and I certainly hoped that the arguments against the utilitarian view were likely to produce some effect'. WW is upset at the intended abolition of the East India College where RJ is Professor of Political Economy.
1 doc. |
21 Aug 1835 |
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188
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is travelling over countryside he once traversed with RJ: 'I thought I could spare a day to retorch my recollections of the places we visited together'. WW has found two passages in his preface to James Mackintosh's Dissertation, which might have induced RJ to 'make out a parallel between the moral sense, as it has been called, and the physical senses'. He then explains why there is not a problem even in these two cases.
1 doc. |
01 Sep 1835 |
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189
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Could RJ send WW back his preface to James Mackintosh's Dissertation immeadiately.
1 doc. |
06 Sep 1835 |
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190
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is annoyed with RJ over his remarks concerning his preface to James Mackintosh's Dissertation: 'You must know, I think, as well as I, that such general criticisms as you have sent me can be of no use'. RJ does not refer to any passages to which his remarks apply. In his last letter WW referred to two passages which he though RJ might be refering to [see WW to RJ, 1 September 1835]: 'I begged to know whether, in what you said, you meant those passages; and of this request you take no notice'. WW is vexed: 'because; for my own part, I consider this mutual criticism one of the important offices of friendship between people who happen to publish. I have always given my best thoughts and care to it'. RJ should not be so worried about being made redundant at the East India College if it is closed. WW wishes he 'could hear something of your book. I shall soon begin to believe that you have no clear idea of the importance of your own discoveries'.
1 doc. |
09 Sep 1835 |
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191
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Does RJ still want WW to send him the volume with the material on Egypt?: 'I hope you do as that will be evidence that the Political Economy of Nations is going on'. WW has been writing a pamphlet on mathematics, 'which is a sort of overflowing of my inductive philosophy and may serve as a trial whether I can make metaphysics of my kind intelligible to general readers'. .
1 doc. |
05 Oct 1835 |
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192
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is 'somewhat overwhelmed with tutor work and I have besides a great tide-paper on the stocks, which is to be a considerable advance on all that we have yet done. All this smothers the induction and I have not been able to do a stitch at it all the term'.
1 doc. |
11 Nov 1835 |
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193
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Can WW spend the night at RJ's on the 27th? Has RJ read James Mackintosh's life: 'It has interested me extremely; and I think both you and I may profit somewhat by it''. A Mr Joseph R.A is in Cambridge and WW has agreed to give him a sitting: 'He does not seem to me a good arist, but I do not much care what he makes of me'.
1 doc. |
20 Nov 1835 |
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194
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW went to see Adam Sedgwick in Norwich: 'Sedgwick is going on in the same truimphant way in which he does in most places; making people stare and start, but making them like and admire him with a sort of enthusiasm'. AS is giving weekly lectures in geology to about 400 people. WW sends RJ a pamphlet [John Barrow] article in the Quarterly Review ['Newton and Flamsteed: Remarks on an Article in Number 109 in the Quarterly Review', 1836] he wrote after reading Barrow's: 'You know all Trinity men must care for Newton'.
1 doc. |
31 Dec 1835 |
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195
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is contemplating a visit to see RJ: 'your reappointment cannot be looked upon in any other way than as a very bad symptom of the prospect of your college'. In particular the 'refusal to reappoint for a year'. WW has been working hard at his book ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837]: 'I draw to an end and still think that the plan is solid and consistent and the execution of every part respectable. I cannot but think the scheme both of the whole and of the separate divisions is novel and striking'. .
1 doc. |
28 Feb 1836 |
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196
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW will see RJ on Thursday night. He does not want to preach at Haileybury on Sunday.
1 doc. |
01 Mar 1836 |
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197
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends RJ a package from John Herschel: 'You will be pleased to see his unfailing affection for the Inductive Philosophy, and I hope it will put you in mind that you, as well as he and I, are bound by our early principles to go on working in our respected ways at our departments of sound speculative science'. RJ should not waste all his time on legislation and politics - 'So get your little Pamphlet finished as fast as you can and then take to general views again' ['Remarks on the Government Bill for the Commutation of Tithe', 1836].
1 doc. |
09 Apr 1836 |
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198
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW notes that the Tithe Bill is got through the Commons and is now in the Lords [see WW to RJ, 9 April 1836]: 'I hope you have now a fair prospect of success both in your public and private project'. WW has taken the opportunity in the new edition of his book to say a word about the controversy between him and the Edinburgh Reviewer ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 3rd edn., 1836]. Adam Sedgwick's Bevesleiad is reprinted: 'I am afraid that from it and Lord Lyndhurst's [John Singleton Copley] speech people will suppose that at Trinity we practice ourselves in calling names. They ought to make Sedgwick a bishop and put him against Copley'. .
1 doc. |
30 Jun 1836 |
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199
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has a few copies of the preface to his new volume of Dynamics which is to be published next October: 'In this I have said a little about the arguments concerning my view of the nature of the laws of motion'. He hopes this will answer some of the objections which are likely to be brought towards him by Drinkwater [John E. Drinkwater Bethune?] and Ellis [William Ellis?].
1 doc. |
04 Jul 1836 |
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200
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes RJ is securely sworn in as Commissioner [Commission on Tithes]. WW has been asked to recommend one candidate to RJ's notice for a place as one of the assistant Commissioners: 'The candidate is W. Wordsworth junior son of the poet. I know nothing of him personally, but he is of a good stock and it would give me great pleasure to forward any wish of his father'. The application comes via Rose [Hugh James Rose] 'who has scuples (but not angry ones) about applying to you himself' [Rose wanted the post RJ was appointed to].
1 doc. |
12 Aug 1836 |
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201
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW rejoices again at RJ's appointment as Commissioner [see WW to RJ, 12 August 1836]. WW was encouraged by the account RJ gave of Rose's [Hugh James Rose] 'probable promotion; and indignant to find, at the end of your letter, that it was likely to be defeated by that insatiable Lonsdale. I have heard nothing more, so I am still hoping Rose will be the man. I do not doubt that if he were confortably seated in the office he would mollify his prejudices and dislikes and work it well. I hope he is tranquil again about your appointment. I wrote to him, explaining in as justly a manner as I could, how invinsible your claims were, and how much the clergy ought to rejoice at them as well'. The BAAS meeting has gone on well: 'Charles Dupin was with us and spoke repeatedly. Buckland [William Buckland] talked such philosophy that the ladies wanted to toss him in a blanket; and your statistitcan Stanley of Alderly next made such a speech as almost to make me despair of the fortunes of the next meeting of which he is to be vice-president'.
1 doc. |
31 Aug 1836 |
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202
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been applied to by a Mr Rodwell to introduce him to RJ as a candidate for the job of assistant Tithe Commissioner. WW is 'never tired of admiring the skill with which I have arranged and subdivided my book, of which I daresay nobody else will even see beauty' ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837]. .
1 doc. |
29 Sep 1836 |
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203
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW trying to mobolise support for his attempt to become the new Lowndean Professor at Cambridge: 'I certainly should very much like the professorship - very much on public grounds for Tidology and the Reform of University Education would then be my business' [George Peacock was appointed].
1 doc. |
06 Nov 1836 |
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204
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW had a letter from Spring Rice saying he would support George Peacock for the Lowndean professorship out of personal firendship. WW complained to Lord Fitzwilliam claiming he would have preferred minister's made their decision based on merit rather than personal friendship. Lord Lansdowne also informed WW that he would be voting for Peacock. WW has has a letter from a formr pupil of his who 'is just publishing a work On the Distribution of Wealth suggested by living in France and seeing the economical, moral, and political effects of the division of property there. I think I shall write to him to read your book'. .
1 doc. |
18 Nov 1836 |
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205
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW thinks he has left some books in RJ's drawing room which he would like back. Connop Thirlwall will not be a candidate for the Greek Professorship.
1 doc. |
09 Jan 1837 |
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206
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is pleased RJ has defeated his internal foes and is sure he will do the same with his external adversaries [RJ is in charge of the Tithe Commission]. WW would very much like to see a fair review of his book ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837] in the Edinburgh Review - 'if it were only for the sake of the ancient times when it used to contain the judgements of Playfair [John Playfair], Mackintosh [James Mackintosh] and such people. And though I have little respect for its philosophy or philosophers at present, I now no other periodical in which sound philosophy would appear with a better grace'. WW hears 'nothing but what convinces me it [his book] will make its way among those who shape the opinions of future generations'. WW would like RJ to review it in the Edinburgh. He thinks the British Critic will treat his book with fairness. WW is writing a little book on University education ['On the Principles of English University Education', 1837]: 'I think it is much more likely to have a popular currency than either of the other books; and of course it is founded, actually and professedly, upon the history, as all good books in future should be'. .
1 doc. |
13 May 1837 |
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207
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorry RJ is so disturbed in spirit: 'Pray give up your intended Review of my book (for I suppose it is that which torments you) and think no more about it' [see WW to RJ, 13 May 1837]. WW does not think the Quarterly Review will 'take it in'. WW is a little angered that RJ has not answered any of his letters of late, which he boils down to his work on the Tithe Commission. WW disposed of David Brewster's review ['On the History of the Inductive Sciences', Edinburgh Review 66, 1837] 'exactly as I intended'. WW has preached his sermons on the Foundations of Morals, which he will soon print' ['On the Foundation of Morals: Four Sermons Preached before the University of Cambridge', 1837]. He has also almost printed his book on the use of mathematics in education ['Mechanical Euclid', 1837].
1 doc. |
20 Jun 1837 |
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208
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Does RJ feel like joining WW on the continent in the beginning of August? WW thinks the ingenuity of the Parisians has declined during the last fifteen years. WW wanted to know how successful Cousin's [Victor Cousin] attempt to introduce a sort of Scoto-German philosophy into Frnace had been: 'The result of his efforts appears to be a complete failure; for he has had no successors in his own peculiar path. The German element of his metaphysics seems to have flown away like the smoke of a tobacco pipe and the only residue I find is a little Scotch metaphysics among those who profess to be metaphysicians who are however, very few and little attended to. I expect that you will hold this up to me as a warning, to show the folly of engaging in a similar undertaking in our own country...But in truth it only shows, what I always supposed to be the case, that it is hardly possible to introduce foreign metaphysics in the lump, and that we must read German writers for some other purpose than that of substituting German metaphysics for English. I shall try to profit by this piece of wisdom when the time comes'.
1 doc. |
12 Jul 1837 |
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209
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Does RJ still persuade himself that he is to write a review of WW's history? ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837]. If RJ looks at the last Quarterly Review he will see 'that Lockhart and Murray appear resolved to have none but shallow articles...so I apprehend your chance there is small'. Has RJ seen Macaulay's [Thomas B. Macaulay] article on Bacon in the Edinburgh Review?: 'I rejoice to see how little people yet see the philosophy of induction for Macaulay is no bad example of the general thinker; and yet how scanty and superficial are his views - happily expressed and well illustrated of course'. Sir Charles Bell has complained to WW that he has been located 'with slight and injustice in page 425 of my third volume' ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837]. Has RJ put 'down on paper, as clearly and strongly as you can, the reasons which you can find for the opinion you held a little while ago; - namely - that the simplest mechanical truths depend upon experience in a manner in which the simplest geometrical truths do not; - that the axioms of geometry may be self-evident, and known apriori; but that there are not axioms of mechanics so known and so evident. I am very desirous of getting this opinion in its best and most definite shape, because the rejection of it is a very leading point of my philosophy...The whole act of induction depends upon it'.
1 doc. |
06 Sep 1837 |
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210
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been moving from one part of the country to another since the BAAS meeting at Newcastle. He met RJ's friend, Sir James Graham, who speaks very well of RJ: 'he tells me that he has proposed this as a prize question for the new agricultural assosiation What are the causes of the difference in prosperity of Belgium and Ireland, since you have in both the same small properties and individual labour, and the same religion'. There was a dispute at Newcastle: 'Babbage [Charles Babbage] has behaved with great bitterness to Murchison [Roderick Murchison] and tried to get him drummed out of the association in which he failed'. WW refused to support 'Babbage's dogma that men of science in England are a dogmatical race'. .
1 doc. |
10 Sep 1838 |
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211
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Has RJ read David Brewster's review of WW's history? ['On the History of the Inductive Sciences', Edinburgh Review, 66, 1837]. Does he think there is anything he needs to answer? Brewster 'has made the article for the most part an angry remonstance in favour of his own rights unjustly withheld'. For example, WW does not quote from Brewster's 'Life of Newton' or his Edinburgh Journal of Science. That he does not give more credit to Brewster's arrangement of crystals or support his demands for more public rewards to men of science. And by referring to Brewster's controversies with French discoverers: 'I am disposed to stand upon my character and hold my tongue, till I can write my philosophy, and then I can get all to right that is really wrong'. The real injustice is in his history of phsiology and neglect of Charles Bell [see WW to RJ, 6 September 1837]: 'If I could find any mode and channel of modifying this I would do it'. Brewster has also taken 'special care to overlook all that I have said of his rival Forbe's [James Forbes] discoveries'. .
1 doc. |
31 Oct 1837 |
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212
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW believes it is as well that he did not consult RJ on his plans to go to Munich: 'your strong conviction of the grievous harm which inevitably arises from meddling with German metaphysicians might have shaken my purpose. I believe I go among them pretty well secured by a previous resolution not to adopt any of their fancies'. When he has time he will stop to work at his book ['The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, Founded upon their History', 2 vols., 1840]: 'The part that I am now revising alarms me severely by its abstract and almost mathematical aspect; and what is worse I can neither do without this part nor make it more popular...in truth it puts me out of heart about the reception of the book'. WW wishes RJ would write something on the education question: 'for Republic opinion is very strong, which their case, as it is usually stated, is not; and if you can find this in a very good and striking form for them', it will earn RJ the 'gratitude from good churchmen and good conservatives'. WW expects to be back for the Birmingham meeting of the BAAS in August.
1 doc. |
14 Jul 1839 |
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213
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ's letter arrived like a 'thunder clap': WW and George Peacock will set off instantly on the course RJ recommends to London. They will go to either Lord Monteagles's at 37 Lower Brook Streeet, or to 42 Upper Grosvernor Street. WW is delighted with the warm friendship of Peacock's letter: 'The knowledge of such feelings on his part is a great good gained whatever comes of the result'. .
1 doc. |
16 Oct 1841 |
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214
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Can RJ still keep his eyes open for a good cook - 'we are in as great need as ever'.
1 doc. |
01 Dec 1841 |
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215
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes RJ 'has got over your worry about the effect of the new corn law upon your clients the tithe owners. WW does not believe that the new averages will materially effect the value of tithe, but the tithe owner will now be exposed to an inequality of burden with the poor rate. The contract involved in the commutation 'is really ripped up by the new averages'. The persons who act for the church ought to say that they do not accept the change. .
1 doc. |
10 Apr 1842 |
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216
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Could RJ send him an account of how Mrs Jones is. Worsley [Thomas Worsley] has asked WW to be the minister at his wedding, just as RJ had been at his.
1 doc. |
22 May 1842 |
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217
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Trinity Lodge has no windows, walls or roof [due to the restoration to the lodge of the oriel and mullioned windows]. So far Christopher Wordsworth (junior) and Mill [William Hodge Mill] are candidates for Thomas Turton's vacated office of Regius Professor of Divinity.
1 doc. |
09 Sep 1842 |
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218
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wants advice over the candidates for Thomas Turton's vacated chair (Regius Professor of Divinity): 'which is as you know one of our best University appointments, being about 800 pounds a year, and one of great influence'. The candidates are Mill [William Hodge Mill], Christopher Wordsworth (junior), Dr Lee [Samuel Lee?] - the Hebrew Professor and WW thinks Graham [John Graham?]. Mill is 'somewhat too near the Tractarians in his opinions'. Wordsworth is well aquainted with the Fathers 'and draws from them consequences very different from the Oxford men'. There is an expectation that WW should be a candidate [Alfred Ollivant was elected]: 'It would give me a power of trying to introduce improvements into the University, but I think it would not fall in with my schemes of building up moral philosophy. My philosophy grows under my hand, and grows into a form in which I think the world will not reject it. I must add that I believe I should be elected if I were to offer myself'.
1 doc. |
09 Oct 1842 |
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219
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW recollects RJ agreeing with WW 'that Rickman [Thomas Rickman] was the man of genius among the modern writers on architecture'. Will RJ subscribe to a monument in his honour.
1 doc. |
20 Nov 1842 |
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220
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW does not think it wise to communicate to RJ's Welsh friend anything concerning the University petition [supporting the Welsh Bishoprichs]. WW has received several letters which show how strong the cae is, including an admirable one from Connop Thirlwall. WW is working away as Vice Chancellor: 'it is not hard work, and has a good deal to enjoy in it. I have got a Syndicate appointment, mainly at Peacock's [George Peacock] instance, to revise our examination and lecture system; but I am not sure of getting anything out of it except an exposition of good principles. I think I shall manage that'.
1 doc. |
27 Nov 1842 |
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221
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Some of WW's colleagues think that the time is not quite ripe for the University to move in the matter of the Welsh Bishoprichs. WW wants RJ to tell him when the issue will be brought before parliament and by whom: 'I by no means despair of being able to lend a hand in preventing this third assault upon sacred persons and things'.
1 doc. |
02 Dec 1842 |
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222
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorry that RJ's close colleague at the East India College has died. RJ has mentioned to WW 'the late existence of serfdom in Scotland. It may serve to make your pupils remember it to see it noted in one of Scott's [Walter Scott] Novels (Riogauntlet, vol. 2).
1 doc. |
15 Dec 1842 |
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223
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Alfred Olivant has become a candidate for Thomas Turton's vacated chair (Regius Professor of Divinity): 'Tell me what you know of him in Wales or elsewhere. His coming forwards was a move of some of the electors who suspected C. Wordsworth [Christopher Wordsworth, junior], as well as Mill [William Hoodge Mill], of tractarian propensities, and did not like the other candidates for various reasons [see WW to RJ, 9 October 1842]. It is a curious proof how strong the Cambridge antipathy to that school is. I am only sorry for it in so far as if it dispel C. Wordsworth it will much grieve my benefactor his father'.
1 doc. |
10 Jan 1843 |
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224
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Alfred Ollivant has been elected the new Regius Professor of Divinity - 'rather of the evangelical cast'. WW voted for William Hodge Mill [see WW to RJ, 10 January 1843] .
1 doc. |
01 Feb 1843 |
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225
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW thinks RJ will get some good suggestions from Willis [Robert Willis] if he puts his case to him. This is what occurs to WW: 'In every machine or rather in every mechanical work you have three things to consider - moving power, train of mechanism connecting the power with the work - work done'. RJ's 'question seems to be how much the value of the work done exceeds the value of the moving power. I reply, it exceeds it by the value of the mechanism, at least, otherwise people would not acquire the mechanism'. WW gives more details giving Willis's example of a knife grinder. WW's axiom is 'the value of the work done must be the value of the moving power + the value of the machinery'. The 'productive power of nations must be compared by comparing the moving forces + the whole quantity of working mechanism; for the latter would not exist if it did not add its own value to that of the moving frame'. Willis and WW 'agreed to call the measure of moving power Labouring Force - an expression which has considerable advantages - the French term is Travail'. The University has petitioned for the Welsh Bishoprichs [see WW to RJ, 2 December 1842].
1 doc. |
14 Feb 1843 |
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226
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ has not told WW 'whether my views respecting the value of tools and machinery as an element of national wealth fill in with your questions and with your principles' [see WW to RJ, 14 February 1843]. WW - as Vice-Chancellor - 'wanted to give something of system to our mathematical course, and tried: but the Johnians have beaten me hitherto'. .
1 doc. |
06 Apr 1843 |
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227
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW would like to know what RJ has to say about John Mill's book ['A System of Logic Ratiocinative and Inductive: Being a Connected View of the Principles of Evidence and the Methods of Scientific Investigation', 1843]: 'he appears to me to write like a man whose knowledge is new (indeed he confesses that he had much of it from Herschel [John Herschel, 'A Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy', 1830] and me ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837]) - and not very well appreciated'. He relies far too much on the new work of Liebig [Justus von Liebig] and Herschel's version of Wells's book on Dew: 'Tell Herschel he has something to answer for in persuading people that they could so completely understand the process of discovery from a single example'. With regard to 'the part of Mill's book of which you speak I agree with you that the logic is fairly logical; - also, that it is already dull. The Whateleian logicians are to me far more offensive than the Aristotelians'. Mill's conceit is offensive and he is 'quite subjugated by one whom I think a very bad philosopher, Comte [Auguste Comte], of whom he constantly talks with a veneration which I could easily show you is a most gross indolutary. I had written an article for my philosophy about Comte, but suppressed it wishing to avoid unnecessary controversy' ['The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, Founded upon their History', 2 vols., 1840].
1 doc. |
07 Apr 1843 |
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228
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Could RJ ascertain from Empson [William Empson] his 'intended notions and his disposition to help me with his criticism'. WW wants Empson to check that WW has not made any blunders in his Roman or English Law ['The Elements of Morality, Including Polity', 2 vols., 1845]. .
1 doc. |
18 Jun 1843 |
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229
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW and Cordelia Whewell would like to see RJ and Charlotte Jones anytime between now and mid-October. 'Pray what have your Taffies got into thier heads that makes them so troublesome. It is plain that the old war of Saxons against Celts is only patched up into a hollow truce'.
1 doc. |
24 Sep 1843 |
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230
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been working on the historical part of his Morality ['The Elements of Morality, Including Polity', 2 vols., 1845]. This has led him to re-read Hallam's [Henry Hallam] books: 'I am glad to find that they have risen much in my estimation on closer inspection; for I like the man. They are, especially the English Constitution ['Constitutional History of England from Henry VII's Accession to the Death of George II', 1827] a series of condensed, able, lawyer like, or rather judge like discussions of all the principal constitutional questions which are history offers, He is an old whig and at times rather a stern one; but then he is an old whig not a new whig; and I see scarcely any points on which we the constitutional conservatives are called upon to differ with him'. WW compares his 'judicial gravity and fairness' with the 'sophistical advocacy of Macaulay!' [Thomas Babbington Macaulay]. WW can appreciate RJ's disgust at 'The Times' and its treatment of the tithe commutation. WW thinks 'something of the same kind should be done for Ireland with regard to the advantages of the union'. .
1 doc. |
06 Oct 1843 |
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231
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Lonsdale [John Lonsdale?] vacates King's College and Le Bas [Charles Webb Le Bas?] is also going to resign. WW wants to know who the candidates will be and what their prospects are. Blakesley [Joseph Blakesley?] would like the London appointment and Coddington has made a start for Haileybury: 'What are your intentions and wishes? They will have great weight with me'. WW has not seen much more of RJ's Welsh Tithe changes'. .
1 doc. |
13 Nov 1843 |
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232
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's broken rib caused by falling over the imperial of Hope [Beresford Hope] - did not much impede his proceedings and he is now almost better.
1 doc. |
26 Nov 1843 |
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233
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Is RJ pleased with the appointment of their new Principal at Hayleybury? Who is the new Principal at King's College? Would RJ give the benefit of some of his Tithe Commission knowledge. Is there a table used to determine the Rent change as it varies with the price of grain: 'I want such knowledge to advise both the College and the University'.
1 doc. |
09 Dec 1843 |
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234
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ has had time now to decide whether he likes the new Principal at Haileybury: 'I hope your impression of him is as favourable as mine was'. WW is giving his fifth series of lectures on morals: 'I am almost surprised that my class is so large as it is'.
1 doc. |
15 Feb 1844 |
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235
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has sent RJ a paper he has 'published in our Cambridge Transactions which contains an answer to J. Mill's main argument against me' ['On the Fundamental Antithesis of Philosophy', Transactions of the Cambridge Philosophical Society, 1844]. He has also printed a short answer to the metaphysics of Herschel's Review of me' ['Letter to Sir John Herschel', 1844]. WW has heard that RJ and Miss Edgworth [Maria Edgworth] are to spend an Easter holiday with John Herschel: 'You could not fail to enjoy the time'.
1 doc. |
18 Apr 1844 |
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236
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW sends RJ a sheet of his Morality ['The Elements of Morality, Including Polity', 2 vols., 1845], so he can see the shape it is taking. 'Empson's [William Empson] assistance has been of invaluable service' [see WW to RJ, 18 June 1843].
1 doc. |
07 Mar 1845 |
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237
|
William Whewell to Richard Jones. Thanks RJ for his comments [see WW to RJ, 7 March 1845]: 'When you see all that I have said about the moral character of nations, I think you will find that I have not talked hopelessly or vaguely on that subject'. WW is upset that John Herscel has been 'so much disturbed by that busybody South [James South]. I have not seen the letter which South published; I think I asked from you that Herschel also has written to the Times, and I will look for his letter'.
1 doc. |
24 Apr 1845 |
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238
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW and Cordelia Whewell are going north to look after CW's sick father (John Marshall). WW's Morality is out ['The Elements of Morality, Including Polity', 2 vols., 1845] and he would be thankful for any comments RJ may have.
1 doc. |
16 May 1845 |
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239
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. With 'the passing of the Corn Bill I suppose the existence of our Conservative Ministry must be drawing rapidly to a close, and I suppose with that the days of the present Parliament and this I suppose will set you at liberty'. RJ should therfore come and visit them in Lowestoft. Robert Peel's popularity is such that not one newspaper (accept perhaps the Globe) supports him: 'I suppose we shall have the election soon'.
1 doc. |
27 Jun 1845 |
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240
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW returns [Bannister's?] Pamphlet. Murchison [Roderick Murchison] 'intended to refer to it publicly: but I do not know whether he did so. He was not disposed to go the length of engaging in the Cabol Society'. John Herschel informs WW that he 'thinks you have sent your pictures to press'. .
1 doc. |
01 Jul 1845 |
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241
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is pleased to hear that RJ's book is being printed ['Lectures on the Political Economy of Nations', 1845?]. WW will look over his sheets with great interest. WW's interest 'does not depend so much upon any hope I have of detecting errors for you, as from my desire to see your views in their systematic shape'. WW is sure it will make its way to general acceptance: 'I believe that the promulgation of long pondered truths ought to be prepared to wait a while for the gratitude of the world, for they cannot mix themselves with popular and periodical literature or with London coteries in such a way as to find a set of ready made admirers when they publish. But this is not to be regretted, for truths of any broad philosophical kind do not admit of transmission through admirers so made. - I have been much amused, in this point of view with the success of the Vestiges of Creation. No really philosophical book could have had such success and the very unphilosophical character of the thing made it excessively hard for a philosophical man to answer it, and still more, to get a hearing [as] he did. How do you like Sedgwick's [Adam Sedgwick] in the Edinb.? To me, the material appears excellent but the workmanship bad, and I doubt if it will do its work'.
1 doc. |
18 Jul 1845 |
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242
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wants to know whar RJ thought of his notes on his lectures [see WW to RJ, 18 July 1845: RJ, 'Lectures on the Political Economy of Nations', 1845?]. WW's Morality ['The Elements of Morality, Including Polity', 2 vols., 1845] has been adversely reviewed in the Athenaeum and the Spectator: 'I was not quite prepared for the amount of unfairness, and the evidence that neither critic had read the book so as to justify of it in any connected manner'. WW and Cordelia Whewell hoped to see the Herschels [John Herschel and family] but they have scarlett fever in the house.
1 doc. |
15 Aug 1845 |
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243
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has read RJ's sheets with great interest and gives his suggestions on how to improve its structure and detail ['Lectures on the Political Economy of Nations', 1845?]. RJ should give an example of capital: 'This is important, because the conception of auxiliary capital is one of the most characteristic and decisive parts of your speculations'. WW sees 'no objection to your using the term motive force and power as you do, except that I think you ought to say mechanical power, as otherwise you will incur ambiguity in many cases'. Estimating travail does not depend on the mode of working: 'I have called travail, laboring force, which is your power. What you call the motive force of steam is rather the motive force of fire. The sources of labouring forces as I enumerate them, are water, wind, fire, muscular force of man and animals'. .
1 doc. |
05 Aug 1845 |
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244
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is pleased RJ like his analyis of his book [see WW to RJ, 5 August 1845: RJ, 'Lectures on the Political Economy of Nations', 1845?]. WW is writing a reply to Lyell's Travels [Charles Lyell, 'Travels in North America', 2 vols., 1845] in which he attacks 'me for my defence of our college system: the fact being, that his head is turned by his success in lecturing in America. One might have supposed that his recollections of his experience in King's College would have shown him that lecturing may go with very little teaching, even in the best hands; but this he appears to have quite forgotten'. Could RJ look at WW's reply and say whether he thinks it too fierce ['Of a Liberal Education in General, and with Particular Reference to the Leading Studies of the University of Cambirdge', 1845]. .
1 doc. |
16 Sep 1845 |
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245
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW semds RJ what he has said about Charles Lyell (p. 116) [see WW to RJ, 16 September 1845]: 'I want you to tell me if it is said in a proper manner'. WW has read 'Baufield's book which is much more remarkable and striking than I had expected from his task. It appears to me however that he attaches far too much value to one or two abstract expressions of some of his foreign authorities'. .
1 doc. |
24 Sep 1845 |
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246
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is very dissatisfied with the sheet he sent him this morning that he has decided to re-write it [see WW to RJ, 24 September 1845].
1 doc. |
24 Sep 1845 |
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247
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Thanks RJ for his suggestions and sends him the revised sheet [see WW to RJ, 28 September 1845]. WW does not intend to write much on his dispute with Charles Lyell [see WW to RJ, 16 September 1845]: 'for my book is intended mainly as a treatise on local questions, now under discussion in the University' ['Of a Liberal Education in General, and with Particular Reference to the Leading Studies of the University of Cambirdge', 1845]. WW wrote his book because 'people were going on in a very thoughtless manner with regard to changes in our examinations which I hope I shall stop'.
1 doc. |
28 Sep 1845 |
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248
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. What does RJ think of the 'sudden move of Peel's [Robert Peel]. It seems to me like the sinking of the Royal George [;] It was not in the battle'. WW would like RJ to help him find some account of the ecclesiastical constitution (the relation of Church and State) in all the kingdoms of Europe. I must modify that part of my Morality ['The Elements of Morality, Including Polity', 2 vols., 1845]'. WW thinks it likely that some of his suggestions from his book will be carried into effect soon ['Of a Liberal Education in General, and with Particular Reference to the Leading Studies of the University of Cambirdge', 1845].
1 doc. |
13 Dec 1845 |
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249
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW agrees with RJ's gloomy analysis of Robert Peel: 'I think now, the sooner Peel is out the better. He has neither political wisdom nor good faith. A man who placed at the head of party combined for preserving the greatest objects of human and national action, civil and religious institutions, turns round upon them and says I have done that which I know will destroy you, can have no power, nor any feeling of the value of the objects'. Peel 'shews a previously settled determination to which the fear of famine is only a pretext I have little doubt that he has an equally settled determination to destroy the Irish church...I cannot think he can stay in long; and then I suppose we shall have the Whigs. For though he had not broken up the Conservative party enough for this when he resigned before he has done so now. - I am glad you are going to write about the effect of commuted Tithes on prices of corn; for Stanley's views appear to me very mischievous, and likely to work much harm to the clergy; especially if we come to times of scrambling for spoil which seems likely enough. - Dr Arnold's judgement of Peel, that he cared about nothing really but finance, is obviously quite correct'.
1 doc. |
18 Feb 1846 |
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250
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW and Cordelia Whewell are settled in their new house [Cliff Cottage]. WW is now printing a second edition of his History ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vls., 1837]. He has 'come to the conviction that to alter a book very much in the second edition, spoils it. You may avoid some error, but you lose the vitality and meaning of the work'. Who is going to put out the fire Robert Peel started in the House of Commons?.
1 doc. |
11 Jun 1846 |
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251
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW hopes RJ and Mrs Jones enjoy their holiday. He is 'glad to hear of your History of the Common Law, and shall be curious to see it. Of course you will not forget the influence which the Roman Law exercised through the education of the Lawyers. Have you looked at Palgrave's books? Of course you have' [Francis Palgrave - deputy-keeper of her majesty's records 1838-61: 'The Rise and Progress of the English Commonwealth', 1832].
1 doc. |
24 Aug 1846 |
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252
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. John Lefevre is coming to stay on thursday as the college auditor, and WW wonders whether RJ could come and stay then. WW is on the verge of printing his new edition of his History ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vls., 1837]. .
1 doc. |
01 Dec 1846 |
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253
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has been reading Twiss's Lectures on the History of Political Economy [Travers Twiss, 'View of the Progress of Political Economy in Europe Since the Sixteenth Century', 1847] and hoping RJ would write a review of it for Empson [William Empson, editor of the Edinburgh Review]: 'You might find in that way, an easy opportunity of giving your opinion on the leading points of the subject...he has, so far as I can judge, taken hold of the main points of the history very well; - though I think in some cases he has let the points slip too easily. For instance, he appears to me to have muddled away Adam Smith's great distinction of productive and unproductive labour, and to have given his assent too easily to some of Say's extreme opinions'. WW gives his opinion on the difficulties of deciding what mans desires are.
1 doc. |
12 Aug 1847 |
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254
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. RJ will of course soon look at Mill's book on Political Economy ['The Principles of Political Economy']: 'It is full of interesting discussions of all the great social and economical questions of the day, and there are arguments and views extremely well put throughout. Nor have I found anything which I quarrel with...except the injustice towards you of which I think he is guilty'. WW thinks Mill has down-played RJ's work and failed to recognise that the peculiar and distinctive character of RJ's book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and on the Sources of Taxation', 1831]: 'I do not see how Mill can be either ignorant of the novelty or the value of your classification of cultivation for he makes it the basis of his own speculations', although he 'spoils the classification' by lumping together Cottiers and Ryots. Mill 'must have known that the idea of making such a classifcation, and, what is a great deal more, the making it the basis of principles which regulate the distribution of wealth and the progress of society, is entirely yours'. WW thinks Mill has RJ in mind 'where he holds that the international produce of land marginaly decreases with the expansion of agriculture'. WW wants to know how we can say 'that the produce of land increases universally in a dimishing ratio, when we have to allow that there is a principle which we call the progress of civilisation'. .
1 doc. |
20 Oct 1848 |
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255
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW wants RJ to reinvest his capital in guaranteed shares that are the best to be had at present.
1 doc. |
22 Nov 1848 |
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256
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's views on the Duke of Richmond's report concerning church property. WW has had an Irishman staying at Trinity who objected to RJ's chapter on Cottier Rents ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and on the Sources of Taxation', 1831]: 'the Cottiers morally pay their rents in labour, so that they are really serfs'. WW wishes 'somebody would do justice in these matters. People will not mind me when I write political economy, except indeed, I join to it mathematics, and make nonsense of it'.
1 doc. |
29 Oct 1849 |
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257
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW and Cordelia Whewell have 10 000 pounds of their marriage trust money payable on August 16 from the Lancaster and [?] Railway. The company want to know if they would reinvest for another three or five years at four percent. What does RJ think? WW has heard nothing more from the Cambridge University Commission: 'I should suppose we may meet it in such a way as to incur no needless danger; but I confess I have a strong persuasion that Lord John [John Russell] will not be satisfied till his move has ended in something being done as to the distribution of funds, and I do not see how anything of that kind can be done without a more perilous infraction of our corporate rights'. WW forgets whether he directed to RJ a copy of his paper in the Cambridge Philosophical Transactions on certain algebraical ways to treat political economy ['Mathematical Exposition of Some Doctrines of Political Economy: Third Memoir', Camb. Phil. Trans., 1850]: 'the paper really does contain a refutation of certain vaunted theorems of John S. Mill on international trade; shown them to be true, even on their mathematical assumptions, within very narrow limits'. WW gives his solution to the cause and measure of the different value of money in different countres: 'The main point of my solution comes to this, that the value of money is high in a country which has the (money) balance of trade shading in its favour, and of course, low where the balance is against the cuntry'. .
1 doc. |
05 Jul 1850 |
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258
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Nothing has yet been done about reinvesting WW and Cordelia Whewell's marriage trust of 10, 000 pounds [see WW to RJ, 5 July 1850]. The four percent offer to reinvest the sum in the Lancaster and [?] Railway does not seem very attractive: 'If you can suggest anything better I shall be glad'. John Brown has died: 'he was the last of his generation; the first lecturer in whose room I sat, one of the rulers of the college ever since I have been in the college'. .
1 doc. |
21 Aug 1850 |
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259
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is sorting out the financial reinvestment of his marriage trust [see WW to RJ, 21 August 1850].
1 doc. |
26 Aug 1850 |
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260
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has not received a summons from RJ to come to London regarding his and Cordelia Whewell's marriage trust securities [see WW to RJ, 26 August 1850]. He hopes RJ's health continues to improve. Has RJ any notion of what the 'ministers intend to do about winding up the no-popery uproar which they have set going? I cannot imagine anything which they can do which will not be utterly at variance with all their previous policy'.
1 doc. |
17 Dec 1850 |
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261
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Could RJ get in contact with Dr Fuller [Frederick J. Fuller] to complete the financial arrangements concerning WW and Cordelia Whewell's marriage trust [see WW to RJ, 17 December 1850]. WW is looking forward to his new Triposes and his lectures.
1 doc. |
01 Jan 1851 |
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262
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has just been to the funeral of his friend and brother-in-law Frederick Myers. He thinks RJ should be given a pension from the state like the other two Tithe Commissioners, rather than relying on the church for compensation [the work of the Tithe Commission has finished]: 'It is treating the Commission as if it were a lawsuit between the nation and the church, and so at the end each party were left to pay its own agents'. .
1 doc. |
05 Aug 1851 |
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263
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has bought a house in Lowestoft [Cliff Cottage] and grounds for 2100 pounds: 'a very good bargain, I think'. Their is a plot of land nearby that he would also like to purchase, it is owned by the government: 'Perhaps you may be able to learn for me ...to whom it would be best to make an application for this purpose'. .
1 doc. |
13 Aug 1851 |
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264
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is busy examining for fellowships. He wants to know how RJ's recovery is going. RJ will have been as shocked as WW was to hear of the death of Drinkwater [John E. Drinkwater Bethune]: 'I had heard not a word of his being out of health. That fatal India!'.
1 doc. |
04 Oct 1851 |
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265
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is 'afraid that the hope from St. Paul's is extinguished. I see in the newspaper that a Mr Champneys is appointed'. However WW hopes that all the applications made from so many quarters on RJ's behalf to Lord John Russell will produce an affect upon him which will show itself. WW hopes RJ would get a pension on account of his health. He has been reading RJ's lectures: 'I hope you will now have health and time to weave them and your other speculations on the like subjects into a connected scheme. Such a scientific exposition of the subject may be of use when men become sane on such subjects'.
1 doc. |
21 Oct 1851 |
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266
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Since WW will have no chance of seeing RJ for some time, he wants to hear something of him. Who is to be the next Law Professor at Haileybury?: 'You will not easily get one who suits you so much as your Empson [William Empson] did'.
1 doc. |
20 Jan 1852 |
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267
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has sent RJ 'a little book about the things which are great to us little men here at Cambridge ['Of a Liberal Education in General...3. The Revised Statutes 1851-1852']. The 'revision of the fundamental statutes of a historical body like the University is at all times a grave matter. But this is made more so by the radical party trying to use the occasion so as to subvert the whole constitution of the University'. A reward for RJ's work on the Tithe Commission must be a question for parliament. WW will send RJ a copy of his examination papers.
1 doc. |
21 Feb 1852 |
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268
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW gives his comments on the structure and division of RJ's lectures.
1 doc. |
28 Mar 1852 |
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269
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW thought he should write first to RJ before he made any further application to the Bishop of London [probably about a pension for RJ].
1 doc. |
25 May 1852 |
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270
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has just arrived at the Athenaeum Club from the Continent. He has heard nothing from Monteagle [Thomas Spring-Rice] or anyone else concerning RJ's affairs.
1 doc. |
16 Sep 1852 |
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271
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW would rejoice to see RJ here whenever he can come, but WW must leave on Thursday to give a charity sermon in the north. He has got RJ's lectures and will look over them. WW has finished his translation of Grotius.
1 doc. |
19 Sep 1852 |
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272
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has returned from his northern excursion [see WW to RJ, 19 september 1852] and will be at Cambridge till Christmas. He will be glad to see RJ whenever he can come up.
1 doc. |
30 Sep 1852 |
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273
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW has read RJ's lectures and is ready to discuss them with him: 'They appear to me to be full of the most valuable matters, delivered in most places with great force. But I think they may and ought to be made a little more symmetrical and methodical'. RJ should draw up an analytical table like the one WW suggested for the first five lectures [see WW to RJ, 28 March 1852]. There is a Review of WW's lectures on Mortality in the Westminster Review ['Lectures on the History of Moral Philosophy in England', 1852, and 'Elements of Morality, including Polity', 1845, Westminster Review, October 1852]: 'It is plainly John Mill and I am rather amused to hear what is the amount of what can now be said of the best of Bentham's [Jeremy Bentham] school in favour of their master'. Mill wants to put the result of their controversy on the following issue: 'Whether the pleasures of animals - pigs, geese, lions for instance - are of the same moral value as those of man. He says yes, I say no. As to other matters he accuses me, as I accuse Bentham of reasoning in a circle'.
1 doc. |
10 Oct 1852 |
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274
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Guest [Edwin Guest] has been elected Master of RJ's old Cambridge College [Caius]: 'I know him principally as a zealous and laborious philologist'. WW wants to know whether RJ has been offered Buller's place on the new Commission: 'I thought that as the occasion occured so soon after Lord Derby saying that though he could not give you a retiring pension, he thought you had a claim to be appointed to an active office'.
1 doc. |
04 Nov 1852 |
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275
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is glad RJ has taken the Secretaryship [Secretary to the Capitular Commission]: 'though I am afraid the salary is not so good as that of the Commissioners. The problem to solve as to what the chapters are to do is a ticklish one, especially if they are to be seminaries of clergymen. I should think any plan of the kind must be taken in connection with the recommendations of our Cambridge University Commissioners who advise that several new theological Proffesorships should be established here'.
1 doc. |
15 Nov 1852 |
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276
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW got RJ's letter from the Cathedral Commission. He is concerned at the possible resignation of the Cambridge Greek Professor: 'a vacancy occuring now might embarass us much'.
1 doc. |
15 Dec 1852 |
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277
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. The doctor is convinced that Cordelia Whewell is making progress in her health. WW's translation of Grotius is at the press. What is to come of RJ at Haileybury? Maria Herschel was here with Cordelia for three months. .
1 doc. |
17 Jun 1853 |
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278
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is 'disposed to believe that my book [probably his 'Of the Plurality of Worlds: An Essay', 1853] is well written, because I wrote it with pleasure and facility. When you come to the hard chapters I expect you would be staggered: - the more ought you to admire me for my self denial in cutting them out after they were written - indeed after they were printed'. .
1 doc. |
30 Dec 1853 |
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279
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW reminisces over one of the trips he once made with RJ and Charlotte Jones. He will be departing shortly for a trip to the north. WW will grieve over the fate of Haileybury 'and think it a folly' [the closing of the East India College].
1 doc. |
06 Sep 1854 |
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280
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is glad that RJ's retiring pension has been settled: 'I suppose you will now carry into effect your plan of taking a house somewhere nearer London. WW will require the cooperation of RJ over the transfer of a portion of his marriage trust property. He has to consider reinvesting 15,000 pounds in a northern Railway for 3 years at 4.5 %: 'I should be willing too if the time were longer, but it is tiresome to have to be finding new investment constants. The Eastern Counties offer, I believe 5 per cent for 5 years'.
1 doc. |
12 Dec 1854 |
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281
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW's 'lectures are in full cry and he has got to look after Optics, Botany, Academic Education, and such branches of knowledge besides all my own business'.
1 doc. |
17 Apr 1833 |
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282
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is finding it harder to hear anything from RJ now than when he was living in Kent.
1 doc. |
26 Apr 1833 |
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283
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW is pleased RJ and Charlotte Jones are thinking of coming to visit them in June. He is also glad to hear so good an account of RJ's syllabus at Haileybury. 'Talking of you political economists, are you not edified by the importance which people are giving to Michael Sadler'.
1 doc. |
27 May 1842 |
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284
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. Edward Ryan has promised to come to Cambridge and meet RJ. WW will also try to persuade John E. Drinkwater Bethune to do the same. .
1 doc. |
26 Dec 1842 |
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285
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William Whewell to Richard Jones. WW had hoped to see RJ before he left this morning: 'I wanted to have some further instructions about the Refrigirator. Will you send me or tell the workmen to send me the dimensions of yours, and the details - viz. The mode of keeping out the air, and the mode of placing the trays'.
1 doc. |
13 June 1842 |
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