Author: David Spiech Page 34 of 283

To Charles Augustus Strong
Glion-sur-Territet, Switzerland. August 29, 1929

The other day we had a casual discussion about “knowledge” and the immediate, and he became surprisingly intense, saying he had a sort of religious conviction that “knowledge” could only be of immediate data. This, in a supposed disciple of mine, was a bit disconcerting: but he said afterwards that it was only a question of words, that he preferred to call “knowledge” with Russell, what I call intuition: because what I call knowledge, being admittedly only “faith mediated by symbols”, was only belief; and belief is not knowledge. You see he is after certitude: and I tell you about it because possibly you may get into trouble together and misunderstand one another on this crucial point, if you are not forewarned of this thirst for certitude in the young mind. I don’t think his divergence from me is a matter of words only: it rests on the axiom that “experience” is of fact, and that its objects are existent states. This, of course, is in part your own contention, so that you may find him, on this point, in agreement with you against me: but I am afraid that in another aspect of the question, he will be recalcitrant to your doctrine, because while you say that the existence of the object is given immediately, you admit, I believe, that its given characters are for the most part only essences imputed to it by the psyche in view of her own reactions. This, if granted, would destroy the axiom of immediate certitude of fact: and I can’t see why the existence of the object is not imputed to it by the psyche as much as its essence.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Four, 1928–1932.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow NY

To Nancy Saunders Toy
Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy. August 28, 1938

Dear Mrs. Toy,

I am sending your note about Miller to Strong, who is at Valmont, his nursing home above the Lake of Geneva; and very likely he will act on your suggestion. However, he has not had much spare cash of late, most of his securities having stopped paying dividends, and it might be easier for me to help Miller (it would not be the first time!) quite unbeknown to my actual pocket, by asking George Sturgis to send him a cheque. . . .

Your extreme delicacy, vicariously attributed to Miller, amuses me a little. He has been dependent on Strong for long periods, and once, out of a clear sky, he wrote to me asking for a largish sum, (a “loan”) several hundred dollars, to fit himself out in clerical garments suitable for his visits to the Bishop of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury. He then hoped to get a living in England, so that the investment, though speculative, was a “business proposition” on his part. He was then said to be living on raw spinach—“not exclusively”, he admitted—and being “behind the veil”, whether from inanition or mystic rapture, is also nothing new to him. The trouble is that he is a little unbalanced and difficult to deal with, because he makes his health an excuse for not sticking to anything. Do you remember the quarrel he had with Münsterberg, when the latter wrote to him saying that he (Münsterberg) was a doctor of medicine as well as of philosophy, and that he detected in Miller every sign of incipient paranoia? Poor Miller knew only too well that he lived on the verge of nervous collapse; but such a diagnosis was not only cruel but, as the event has shown, mistaken. Miller’s conversion, which came much later, may have canalized his supersensitiveness a little: but he seems not quite settled even in his religious life. It is a sad career.

Yours sincerely,
G Santayana

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Six, 1937-1940.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2004.
Location of manuscript: The Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge MA

To George Washburne Howgate
Versailles, France. August 27, 1932

Dear Mr. Howgate,

Did you have, in your list of my articles, “Revolutions in Science,” and “Fifty Years of British Idealism”? They came out in “The New Adelphi”, three or four years ago. The second is about Bradley, and might put my view of German philosophy in a fresh light.

I also forgot, in the haste of your departure, to tell you what I chiefly had to say, which was that the antinomy MacStout-Van Tender has always had a clear solution—a Spinozistic solution—in my own mind. All my oscillations are within legitimate bounds. For the solution is this: Moral bias is necessary to life: but no particular form of life is necessary to the universe (or even to the human intellect, except the form of intellect itself). All contrary moralities are therefore equally acceptable prima facie: but the one organic to any particular species, or nation, or religion, or man must be maintained there unflinchingly, without compromise or heresy.

Yours sincerely,
G Santayana

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Four, 1928–1932.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Collection of Mrs. George W. Howgate

To Charles Augustus Strong
Hotel Victoria, Glion
Glion-sur-Montreux, Switzerland. August 26, 1936

Dear Strong,

I am glad to hear that you are seeing amusing things and that your proof-reading still keeps you profitably occupied. What are you going to take up next?

Everything here is as expected: few people, simple food, and no anxieties. The 16 francs were meant to cover pension and room: my first week’s bill, including 12 francs for the motor to bring me up from Montreux on my arrival, was about 170 francs. I have a light Neuchâtel wine; a bottle lasts two days. When I go down to Montreux to tea, which is about every other day, things look more lively and the tea-places are crowded. The weather, after a week of rain has become sunny, but not too warm for sleeping comfortably.

. . . .

You say nothing of your health, which I assume to be normal. Do you have a “bath-chair”—if not a “bathing-machine”—and do you bask on the beach in the midst of the nudities? I shouldn’t mind the nudities, but couldn’t stand the glare.

Yours ever G.S.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Five, 1933-1936.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow NY

To Daniel MacGhie Cory
Versailles, France. August 25, 1932

Dear Cory,

Thank you very much for looking at the rooms at 7, Park Place, St. James’s. From what you say and from the Manageress’s letter I judge that it is just the thing I wanted, and I have written engaging the rooms for the week beginning Sept 11th and saying that probably I should wish to keep them until Oct. 21st. This makes it possible for me to arrive in London and settle down with a minimum of friction.

Of course the 6 gineas are for the rooms alone: as exchange is now, that is only $3 a day, for 3 rooms: I count on paying service (fees at least) and food extra. My idea is to have breakfast and dinner in my rooms, as in Rome, and to go out for luncheon and tea. It will be very pleasant to revisit my old haunts (if they still exist) and I hope you will join me for lunch as often as you find it convenient. I can offer you Italian food, more or less.

A man named George Howgate, who is writing a doctor’s thesis about me, was here yesterday, with a frightening list of all my writings, including articles and reviews—and yet not complete. I have been doing a little work on the novel, although Locke is not finished, but I am not alarmed about Locke: the only thing that would prevent me from finishing the paper in London would be illness, and in that case I could beg off the lecture altogether.

I feel myself already walking in Hyde Park. Unfortunately, it will be getting too chilly to sit down.

Yours affly,
G.S.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Four, 1928–1932.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Butler Library, Columbia University, New York, NY