Item 105 - Letter from Augustus De Morgan

3 pp

7 C. St. & T. - Acknowledges receipt of Whewell's paper. Whewell's 'conception of objective must be subjective, these words make a crabbed question'. De Morgan would like nothing more than 'to give impulse to the making of words - if I were etymologist enough'. He has always liked the phrases 'vitreous and resinous electricity - they express one fact and no theory'. He thinks 'retinal and radial' would do to describe 'the action of rays on the retina, as an easily perceptible instance of an external agent and a produced condition'. If we admit objective 'is it likely that the ordinary antithesis of language should express an antithesis which people in general never think of'. He thinks 'objective and reflective might be made to do - but the idea we want is not that of turned back, but roused by means of, state produced by the suggestion of'.