Category: LETTERS Page 35 of 274

Letters in Limbo ~ October 14, 1927

On October 14, 2024

To Charles Augustus Strong
Venice, Italy. Oct. 14, 1927

I am tempted to say something about the philosophical part of your letter, although you know my disbelief in the value of controversy on these points. What is required is clearness in the respective conceptions: as to which is true, if any, we can leave it to God or to the horse sense of mankind. Now, I have felt for some time that your views were changing, and although of course my first choice would be that you should agree with me heartily and completely, if this is impossible, my second choice would be that you should take up an entirely different position from mine: there might then be either diversity without real conflict, or a fundamental difference of attitude or judgement, and not, what is most annoying, mutual misunderstandings.
It wouldn’t surprise me if, on the point you mention, misunderstandings stood between us rather than a real disagreement. I should agree that “the datum of perception” is not an essence. The phrase “datum of perception” can be understood only in the sense in which we speak of “data of ethics”—the elementary facts which make up our knowledge in that field. The “data of perception” would then be things, or the events in one’s life. But when I maintain that “data” are essences and that nothing “given” exists, I am using the term in a much stricter sense. By a “datum” I mean something which exists only speciously, and is exhausted by being given; so that there can be no such thing as a “datum of perception” at all. The deliverance of perception is the existence of an object: but this, by my definition, cannot be given: it can only be posited, as existing on its own account; and it is on its own account, if at all, that it exists. There can be “data” of intuition or feeling; there cannot be “data” of perception, but only objects. The data in perception are the essences which feeling or intuition is then manifesting in their entirety and raising to specious existence as terms in that perception: but the object of the perception (isn’t this what you mean by its “datum”?) is a fact outside the perception: whereas a “datum”, in my sense, can never be a fact outside intuition or feeling (which is simply intuition of a simple essence: for you understand that I am speaking of conscious feeling).
I don’t know whether this explanation does more than re-iterate what you know already to be my view: but I thought it worth while to repeat it, since your use of the phrase “datum of perception”, as if it were unobjectionable, suggests that my meaning of “datum” and “given” was not at the moment before your mind.
Miller used to be a hopeless victim of psychologism, not seeing that if the moments of life have no ulterior objects, consciousness of living must itself have no ulterior object, and the psychological flux must be only the “idea” or “datum” of a psychological flux, abusing the Cherub in his timeless ecstasy. I hope you have succeeded in bring this Cherub to earth, and making him recognize the omnipresence of animal faith, even in his own warblings.

From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Three, 1921-1927. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2002.
Location of manuscript: Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow NY.

Letters in Limbo ~ October 13, 1945

By David Spiech

On October 13, 2024

In LETTERS

To John Hall Wheelock
Via Santo Stefano Rotondo, 6
Rome. October 13, 1945

I see that you take kindly to my ugly ducklings. This morning I left at Miss Tindall’s the MS of one of the two plays, Philosophers at Court, which is long, in blank verse, and represents the visit of Plato to Sicily, to reform the government of Dionysius—the Younger, in my non-historical arrangement—and his discomfiture there. I am satisfied with the form this play has now taken, and will send you a copy as soon as Miss Tindall has typed it. I don’t think it will be much liked, although symbolically it is not without application to the present state of affairs: it is pessimistic—but gaily pessimistic, which perhaps makes it worse. I believe I have already written to you about some complaints I have received about Persons & Places, to the effect that I don’t say how good all my friends were, in spite of small defects in them which I ought not to have hinted at. Lyon Phelps made the same criticism about The Last Puritan, that there was not a single good person in the book: and this, by the same criterion, will be doubly true of Philosophers at Court. And somehow the same fatality—the absence of goodness in everybody—pursues the other play: The Marriage of Venus. This is short, and in rhymed verse after the manner of my Lucifer. The plot and the principal scenes seem to me all right: but there are horrible lax, flaccid passages and superfluous “poetic” expressions. I think, however, that without trusting to any positive new inspiration at my age, I can trust my experience to make negative corrections, chiefly omissions, and substitution of terse for conventional “poetic” language in various places. For instance, I can make these Olympians call one another you instead of thou and thee; and I can change their names from Greek to Latin, which is more intelligible in English, and lends itself better for comedy. I mean, then, to rewrite this play: otherwise I should be ashamed to publish it. You must therefore be patient, if you want the two plays to appear together. Meantime I shall be curious to see what you think of Philosophers at Court.

From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Seven, 1941-1947. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2006.
Location of manuscript: Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Libraries, Princeton NJ

Letters in Limbo ~ October 12, 1950

By David Spiech

On October 12, 2024

In LETTERS

To George Rauh
Via S. Stefano Rotondo, 6
Rome. October 12, 1950

Dear Mr Rauh,

My chief divergence from American views lies in that I am not a dogmatist in morals or politics and do not think that the same form of government can be good for everybody; except in those matters where everybody is subject to the same influence and has identical interests, as in the discipline of a ship in danger, or of a town when there is a contagious disease. But where the interests of people are moral and imaginative they ought to be free to govern themselves, as a poet should be free to write his own verses, however trashy they may seem to the pundits of his native back yard. I think the universal authority ought to manage only economic, hygienic, and maritime affairs, in which the benefit of each is a benefit for all; but never the affairs of the heart in anybody. Now the Americans and OUN’s way of talking is doctrinaire, as if they were out to save souls and not to rationalize commerce. And the respect for majorities instead of for wisdom is out of place in any matter of ultimate importance. It is reasonable only for settling matters of procedure in a way that causes as little friction as possible: but it is not right essentially because it condemns an ideal to defeat because a majority of one does not understand its excellence. It cuts off all possibility of a liberal civilization. And it is contrary to what American principles have been in the past, except in a few fanatics like Jefferson who had been caught by the wind of the French Revolution. Americans at home are now liberal about religion and art: why not about the forms of government? I mean to send you or Lawrence Butler my new book on “Dominations and Powers”, when it appears, where all this is threshed out naturalistically. Glad to know that Lawrence is well. Yours sincerely

G Santayana

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

Letters in Limbo ~ October 11, 1936

By David Spiech

On October 11, 2024

In LETTERS

To Daniel MacGhie Cory
Hotel Bristol
Rome. Oct. 11, 1936

It occurred to me too, at once, that, with the new value for the lira, it would be easier for us to square our accounts in Italy. You can come when ever you like and stay at the Bristol or elsewhere, as you prefer. I shall have enough pocket money to provide for any extras that may occur, without deplenishing my London bank account. If you preferred to join me in summer at Cortina, you can do that instead, or in addition, just as your fancy dictates. It was altogether pleasant to see you last summer in Paris; but Paris no longer attracts me. Besides, there was too much Strong. I want to keep up simple pleasant relations with him to the end; but for this purpose it is better to avoid frequent meetings or discussions. You and I talked too much about him, and too unkindly. Better let all that sleep. He is much gratified now that Macmillan has instantly and (apparently) joyfully agreed to publish his new book. Nevertheless he probably would like to have a few more séances with you, and it is natural that you should wish to please him. You can stop to see him at Cannes—you would enjoy Cannes in winter or spring—or at Fiesole on your return. But you understand these somewhat delicate matters as well or better than I, and you can make your plans accordingly.

From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Five, 1933-1936. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Butler Library, Columbia University, New York NY

Letters in Limbo ~ October 10, 1917

By David Spiech

On October 10, 2024

In LETTERS

To Susan Sturgis de Sastre
22 Beaumont St.
Oxford, England. October 10, 1917

Some time has passed since I have written to you or Josephine and you may like to hear that I am sin novedad. My lodgings here and the routine of my life in Oxford suit me pretty well, and when I go away it is always to return with a sense of relief and freedom. Of course, it is well for me to have a little change occasionally, and see people. I went some time ago to Bath to meet my old friend Moncure Robinson, who is now a confirmed old bachelor of forty-two with luxurious habits. He took me in his motorcar to London where he has a house, and I spent one night there before going on to Lord Russell’s, whose wife No 3 has now come back to him, so that she is as good as if she were No 4. They were having a middle-aged second honey-moon.embarrassing and not very agreeable sight for the by-stander. The lady, however, is very nice to me, pretends to read my books, etc. I made attempts some time ago to send you one of her novels, but I suppose the censor intercepted it. I ought to have had it sent by the publisher; in that case they let books through, I believe, but I am not sure that you would really be amused by her not very amiable recollections of her life in Germany.

In London I have seen Elsie Beal and her very plain daughter Betty, who is eighteen. They came with the idea of spending the winter in England, as Boylston is at the American embassy here: but Elsie is not amusing herself, and they are going back. Elsie is rather a wreck, looks like a Wigglesworth, and isn’t clever or kind enough to make up for her lost looks and manners, which last were never natural. The daughter is unaffected and robust, but deplorably ugly, except for a nice complexion.

My chief preoccupation now is a book to which Strong and I are contributing: it is to be published in America, and there is a lot of sending manuscript and comments—we are trying to agree, at least in our vocabulary—to and fro, which often involves delays due to the necessity of getting permits from the censor, and the slowness of communications. We haven’t yet lost anything at sea, however, which I suppose is rather good luck under the circumstances. Strong writes from Switzerland: “Margaret has been in Zurich for a month, riding, going to the opera, & dancing the tango (with an Argentinian dancing-master named Fernandez!!!). She comes back on Sunday to lead a sober and I hope literary life at this institution. I am flourishing generally but disabled still as to my feet—half dead from the knees down. But the future is not unhopeful”.

Oxford, which has been full of cadets for a year, now has a new species—the American Aviation Corps, with their strange appearance—yet so familiar to me that I sometimes fancy I am at Harvard going to a foot ball game. One has brought a letter to me, but I found him rather dreadful..—I receive the Lectura Dominical regularly (on Saturdays). Love to all from Jorge Santayana

From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Two, 1910-1920. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001.
Location of manuscript: Alderman Library, University of Virginia at Charlottesville