Item 42 - Richard Jones to William Whewell

4 pp.

The Quarterly Review is out - 'from the internal evidence of the article and the more direct testimony of old Jacob [William Jacob] I learn that it is not yours but another which Lockhart [John G. Lockhart] has permitted the same person to write who has done their political economy lately and has done Whately in this - now I know that we shall both feel exactly alike on this occasion - indignation at L's gratuitous impertinence mixed with thankfulness that our child has got this lift from any hand so opportunely in its hour of need' ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and the Sources of Taxation By Rev. Richard Jones, Quarterly Review, 1831]. RJ suggests ways of responding to J. R. McCulloch's adverse review ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and on the Sources of Taxation By the Rev. Richard Jones', Edinburgh Review, 1831]: 'I shall send you my papers on Macs article which I shall lay aside for the present - I have analysed it now pretty compleatly and desire no better weapon to belabor him with. It abounds with instances of misrepresentation and ignorance so glaring that they must be striking and what surprises me more, with more than one proof that he is often honestly (if I may complement a term with any thing belonging to him but honesty[)] incapable of understanding much of my reasoning deductive as well as inductive - how the devil did he understand Ricardo? or am I really more abstruse than I meant to be? - Mac's willful sins however predominate of which I hope he will live to repent'. The review of Whately is good in design but indifferent in execution [The Quarterly Review, 1832]. RJ expects a great piece of work from John Herschel 'if he lives and does not let astronomy engross him at last, about which I have my fears, for I can see nothing likely to come of it in either hemisphere which I think worthy of him.