Item 187 - William Whewell to Richard Jones

4 pp.

Ireland - Thanks RJ for the criticism to his preface to James Mackintosh's Dissertation [see WW to RJ, 10 Aug. 1835]: 'But I am rather puzzled with what you say. There is nothing in the Dissertation or in my preface which appears to me to be an attempt to establish a parallel between the moral sense and our physical senses. That our moral judgements belong to a peculiar faculty indeed, and cannot be resolved into judgements, concerning mere pleasure and pain is Mackintosh's [James Mackintosh] opinion and mine, but is far from new. The arguments which I have given in favour of this opinion are put in my own way rather than his and were intended to be the main nature of the essay'. WW is 'far from considering Mackintosh's [James Mackintosh] as allowing the whole truth; but that is to be remedied only by writing a new treatise. The great merit of the book in my eyes is that it connects some prevalent errors; and I certainly hoped that the arguments against the utilitarian view were likely to produce some effect'. WW is upset at the intended abolition of the East India College where RJ is Professor of Political Economy.