Author: David Spiech Page 205 of 283

To John Hall Wheelock
C/o Brown Shipley & Co
123, Pall Mall, London, S.W.1
Cortina, Italy. July 1, 1935

It is inevitable that there should be different circumstances in business in different countries, and even a different spirit, and I wish to leave the matter of royalties, in the case of The Last Puritan as in that of all my other books, entirely to your judgement. I note that you think it might be possible to increase the royalty to 15% after the sale of 7,500 copies, if it should ever come to that, which I don’t expect. Meantime the important point is that you should feel able to offer the book at $2.50, which seems a very moderate price nowadays for so long a work, and I hope that this price, and the appearance of being a novel, will lead a good many people to buy and to read it, who haven’t meddled yet with my philosophy. They will get the pill here gilded by cheapness and some jokes. . . . .

I also note with pleasure that you suggest publishing Obiter Scripta in the autumn of 1936. That is not a long delay, and little more than would be needed to put the book through the press. I think Mr. Buchler and Mr Schwartz, as well as I, have every reason to be satisfied with that prospect. You may make your arrangements entirely with them, as I have done all that concerns me in the matter.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Five, 1933-1936.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Libraries, Princeton NJ

To John W. Yolton
6, Via di Santo Stefano Rotondo
Rome. June 30, 1951

The organising and directive force in living bodies is biological, not mental: I call it the psyche, in the sense given to this word in Aristotle’s De Anima.  When such a psyche reaches its full development, it generates a hypostatic light, sensation, emotion, or images, and the whole drift of passions and thoughts. To say that I separate mind from matter is therefore exquisitely contrary to the fact. Nor is it in any definite sense “happiness” that crowns this development: there is a sort of happiness in the fulfilment of any natural function; but usually there is much else at work as well in the psyche, and much sacrifice and renunciation is involved in any real moral peace. It may be society in general that is given up for a particular love, or vice versa; or it may be a general submission of everything definite in the routine of a busy life. I do not deny that for some psyches that last may be the least of evils; but I see no reason for thinking it the compulsory duty of everybody. And the desire to do good and improve the world is the active side of the natural tendency to establish an equilibrium between oneself and the world: it may serve you; you may serve it; perhaps both things can be realised at once, and then tutti contenti.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Eight, 1948-1952.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2008.
Location of manuscript: Unknown

To Charles Augustus Strong
22 Beaumont St.
Oxford. June 29, 1917

What has chiefly occupied me of late (besides the inevitable obsession of the war) has been the French translation of Egotism, which I have had to revise, and in some passages actually to retranslate for the good Lerolle, who got lost in the intricacies of my style and of German philosophy. It is all over now, and in the press: it may come out in July, or may be postponed for business reasons for two or three months. The great event, however, is that Boutroux is decorating it with a preface, in which he calls me sage antique and a great many other pretty names; and he swallows my view of German philosophy, hardly making a wry face at all. The preface has appeared as an article in the Journal des Débats, and I would send you a copy, except that the tiresome censor doesn’t allow clippings to be sent to neutral countries. You shall get the book from Paris when it appears.

I am feeling well, and although I walk much less than formerly (I don’t know why) I am thinner. Perhaps it is the diet of no bread and no sweets! However, I have the most delicious combinations of rice-with-everything, and I believe that is supposed to be just as fattening.

I was in London for a week in May, but did and saw nothing to speak of. Lovely weather, sunshine uninterruptedly for weeks—now rain at last again—

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Two, 1910-1920.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001.
Location of manuscript: Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow NY

To John Hall Wheelock
C/o Brown Shipley & Co
123, Pall Mall, London, S.W.1
Paris. June 28, 1936

I see you have agreed on the name Avila for the limited edition, so that my suggestion of Triton falls to the ground. My friends here also think Avila excellent: but I am afraid people will call it Avilla or Aveéla, which will sound just as well, no doubt, to their ears; but the place is called Ah´vila, Latin Abula, with the adjective, even in modern Spanish, Abulense;  and it would shock a native ear to hear it accented otherwise.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Five, 1933-1936.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Libraries, Princeton NJ

To Guy Murchie
Chateau Frontenac
Quebec, Canada. June 27, 1896

I can’t resist the impulse to write you a line from here, because I am thinking of you, wishing you were here, and wondering where in the world you are. If your father sold the mine in Newfoundland and you bought a farm in New Brunswick, why are you in Newfoundland and not chez toi, if, as they tell me now, you are in Newfoundland? I give it up: but of course it doesn’t matter if in some way you are finding what will ultimately satisfy you. Let me know soon what is up, for now when I pass the sad shores of Newfoundland I shall never know whether to gaze upon them with moist eyes and wave a metaphorical handkerchief in that direction, or whether the Mecca lies rather behind my back. You see, in spite of this then pursuit of vain knowledge, even the faithful need a little geography. We sail from here tomorrow, Sunday, morning. I like the place. The people are people. These are the long-sought peasants of America. I think it might be pleasant to live here: it would be like Europe, in the country.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book One, [1868]-1909.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001.
Location of manuscript: Collection of Guy Murchie, Jr.