Item 54 - William Whewell to Julius Charles Hare

4 pp.

Thanks JCH for his letter concerning WW's dilemma [WW is unsure whether to take a college living or become a country clergyman, see WW to JCH, 15 Dec. 1840]: 'I shall have to think about it a good deal longer before I have done with it'. WW has not got JCH's sermon with him, but if WW differed with it in his last letter 'it must have been rather a remnant of my disputationess, which you know of, than any serious difference of thinking' [see WW to JCH, 15 Dec. 1840]. Although he doubts whether JCH 'could establish a tenable distinction between maxims and principles'. WW questions whether there could be 'any solid ground for a moral decision in talking of matters of principle' until we had established a system of principles. Whereas he sees no reason to limit maxims and gives the following example: 'the Governors of a state are not to acknowledge that they act from fear of those who threaten to violate the laws - and on this ground I condemn the D. of W.'s [Duke of Wellington] manner of passing the Catholic Relief Bill - for I with you do not pretend to decide the rightness of the measure itself by means of such maxims'. WW is to visit Rev. Waddington in his parish of Masham to discuss further WW's suitability in succeeding him.