WCP3253

[1]^{1 2 3}

42 Astonville St

Southfields

London

S.W.

UNIVERSITY OF LONDON,

SOUTH KENSINGTON, S.W.

March 26 1908

My dear Sir

The interest and satisfaction I have experienced in reading your volumes of essays "Studies Scientific and Social" must be my excuse in writing to you. Your two articles ‘Coal a National Trust’ & ‘Reciprocity the essence of Free Trade’ though written 30 years ago, are as valuable now as when they first appeared though alas the public mind troubles too little about such matters. Your papers on the ‘Land Problem’ and ‘Limitation of Slate Functions’ express so clearly and much more fully what one’s own imperfect ideas on the subject have been, that it [2] is truly gratifying to read these things so much better treated.

Too often, do we find the student of Science so absorbed in his own particular branch of study that he cares little about the welfare of the mass of mankind, and sometimes in his own way is as eager to make money and "toady" to the rich and powerful as the rest of mankind.

Others there are who no doubt, optimists, think this is the best of all possible worlds, and like a colleague of mine considers that every man’s condition is his own doing "everyone who chooses can be rich and unemployment is the result of idleness" a lively[?] comforting doctrine if one really believes it!

The true Optimist however is not the man who thinks everything is at its best now, but he who tries to improve his [3]⁴ own little corner, so that the whole may be made clean and the world may be a little better for his having existed.

Your essay ‘Why live a Moral Life?" interests me very much. No doubt as you say a belief in Spiritualism must serve as a mighty incentive to morality, but are we to believe without investigation! Speaking only for myself, I have never had any experience of phenomena such as are usually attributed to spirit agency. As a student of Science I think it is not right to dismiss all such phenomena or alleged phenomena as delusions, which is the ^convenient way many have, but to accept without investigation for oneself is simply an act of "faith". The surroundings and the state of mind of those present at "seances" are I believe such as lend themselves very readily to deception, not necessarily wilful, but [4]⁵ the judgement of most men can be very easily misled. Personally, the idea of Spiritualism is attractive but for that very reason one should be more careful lest in the desire to believe we accept in insufficient evidence.

If it be true that in another life (the future) there in progression beyond our present condition, could not the existence of spirits of the now dead be irrefragably demonstrated to all? The spirits, say of Newton and Laplace[?] should be far advanced beyond all living mathematicians and they might teach us all things that it will take us many years to find otherwise. Yet, so far as I can learn, the revelations of "spirits" have so far been of a trivial nature. That is my difficulty, apart from the fact that I have not had any personal experience.

Believe me, | Sincerely yours, | F. W. Henkel [signature]