Letters dated 13 July 1858 - 22 Feb. 1859.
WW will see an article in the Times about the Address: 'I mention it only to say I had nothing to do with it nor do I know anything of its parentage except that it must be one of the parties represented by Mont. Villiers - I see no great harm in it except that it seems to postpone the universities to the London clergy which is not my taste. I have read Hare's [Julius Hare] letter and charge - they are excellent and practical. I think they must do good and I really feel obliged to him for them'. RJ is not so happy with Hare's 'tinkering of the address'. On the whole RJ sees 'a prospect of union which must give great strength and have really left off being scared about Tractarian wars'. RJ is very concerned about Charlotte Jones's health. The new Professor at Haileybury has been installed: 'I see nothing to dislike in him but he is not quite so striking a person as I was led to expect...his name is Buckley'.
RJ describes the precarious state of his health. Attached is a short note from Charlotte Jones.
DT is pleased to say that WW's portrait has arrived safely at Charlotte Jones's [wife of Richard Jones]. He thanks WW for the present of his 'Bridgewater Treatise I had read before' ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 2nd edition 1834] and the 'other book' ['Architectural Notes on German Churches', new edition, 1835].
East India College - RJ plans to come to Cambridge on Thursday after his lecture. Charlotte Jones 'was so affected and excited by your note that she has been really ill since and she thinks I can never tell you enough of her feeling of your brotherly conduct'. [Attached to this letter is the following which may instead belong to RJ to WW, 22 May 1852] Lord Derby has predictably declined RJ's claim for a pension on the ground that his office was considered temporary: 'But it lasted 15 years. It would never have been considered temporary could that have been foreseen - a man the best days of whose life have been passed in continued duties has he no equitable case for being taken out of the list of mere temporary servants and his last days seen to'.
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.
RJ has heard nothing so far regarding the King's College professorship in political economy [see RJ to WW, 21 March 1832]. RJ has been in Brighton 'where Mrs Jones is - much better and going through a regular course of galvanising - a most severe process as I learnt by trying it but she has faith in abundance and I a little'. RJ met John Lockhart in Brighton - 'he talked away much and with apparent openness and amongst other sallies abused you in much an edifying manner that I wished for you there - he says you can write reviews and of all kinds capitally - prose or serious, light or philosophical but that you are a careless hasty fellow and take no little pains that you are rather provoking than not and enough to make an editor mourn the not being able to manage such a desirable hand more to his mind - you would have laughed - so did I'.
RJ has been miserable about the review, Buller [Charles Buller], Haileybury and all his travelling to and fro. Barker [Peter Williams Barker] will be coming up to Trinity tomorrow: 'His an excellent fellow and I think a clever one - he will read steadily and unswervingly for your first class'. Both RJ and Charlotte Jones are very fond of him: 'If I died before my wife it is to him I would willingly look forward as her protector'.
Tithe Office - Mr Williams has a history of writing begging letters and is not altogether unworthy. Charlotte Jones has suffered more attacks of faintness. George Peacock 'has lately shewn an occasional want of worldly tact which has surprised and is just now embarrassing me - He wanted me to go to the Home Office on an errand which would have insured I am laughingly told their sending for a surgeon to bleed me and now he is pressing views about Peel's corn-measure which I think vexatious and wanting me to struggle for a modification of it on the part of the church which I should think a great calamity to the church'. As for the new list of towns, this 'will not affect us to the extent of 10s in the 100s if he or any one else can shew him it will do more Peel will remodel it and yet he wants to establish 2 lists for averages by one of which our incomes would be regulated - by the other prices and rents - I think the plan suicidal'. 'The whig-radicals are chuckling at the prospect of embroiling the church and the landowners and the government on this point and have been making some quiet attempts to convert me into a cats paw for their purpose - I laugh at them but am annoyed about Peacock who I know is sincere and honest'. RJ will 'get Peacocks views submitted to Peel if I can quietly but really I cannot adopt them'.
Haileybury - RJ will have to cancel their planned visit to Cambridge as Charlotte Jones is ill. RJ is sending her to Brighton - 'our first visit after she comes back shall be to you if it is convenient to you'. RJ is 'worried enough in London about Peel's measure etc. I find (I think) I am in a majority - as I neither share the fears of the minority nor can reconcile myself at all to their remedies I cannot promise to help them but I shall make their views known in all proper quarters' [see RJ to WW, 3 March 1842]. They are debating about demolishing the East India House. RJ thinks they will all 'be jobbed - all this uncertainty about my home and prospects for they hang on my position here'.
Tithe Commission - The idea of a protest had struck RJ. Charlotte Jones is coming home apparently in ill health. RJ had wanted to talk to WW about his lectures but has formed them without doing so - 'my course of lectures constitute a great book in my head which occasionally well nigh splits it - after resolving and re-resolving I have at last made up my mind to write out a very full syllabus and shall accomplish it in a month or two - this done I will get you to look at it and then determine on publishing in parts or as a whole'.
Tithe Commission - RJ has heard that WW has broken one of his ribs. Could WW let him know if this is the case. Edward Ryan is still in good spirits. The Herschels have invited RJ to join them and Maria Edgeworth at their home - 'but my wife will not move just now and I do not like to leave her'.
Brighton - RJ has only just 'got your pages yesterday as I was starting for this place where I cannot read them attentively' ['On the Fundamental Antithesis of Philosophy', Trans. of the Cambridge Phil. Soc., 1844]. Charlotte Jones is here ill. From what RJ has seen of WW's work he thinks 'the discussion is (at least the greater part of it) rapidly resolving itself into one of phraseology - fundamental belief - or laws of of the activity of the intellect no one objects to. The unlucky word necessary coming after these is the stumbling block necessary [']these beng admitted['] is what we want a phrase to express and to ordinary readers the naked word conveys a further indefinite necessity which staggers them'. The 'ideas suggested by fundamental laws of belief which are at the bottom of and must sustain the various sciences you justly treat as what it must be useful and deeply interesting to study and you do yourself no more than justice in claiming to have made studies here but you will get scant justice on this point from men who are choaking with the bitter necessary you are making them swallow against their will and habits'. They all had a good time at the Herschels - John Herschel is looking better than he has for at least 2 or 3 years.
Lord Francis Jeffrey is expecting a copy of WW's paper ['On the Fundamental Antithesis of Philosophy', Trans. of the Cambridge Phil. Soc., 1844] - 'you had better send one'. Charles Babbage would also like one Edward Ryan says. 'Ld. J. has been reading my copy and scribbling on it but he has been so seriously ill with the influenza that I have not had any talk with him about it '. John S. Mill 'has been publishing a paper to prove that a priori reasoning is not only good in Pol. Eco. but the only reasoning applicable to it. God help him and those this belief leads to trust in him[,] his Papa and his school'. Charlotte Jones is still an invalid and RJ is worried that her symptoms are precisely those which preceded the fatal illness of her sister.