Oegst-geest by Leiden
Holland
June 10'[19]13
Mr. Alfred Russell [sic] Wallace
Broadstone, Eng.
Dear Sir:
My dear friend, Edwin Markham1, the poet, has often spoken to me about you, and now that I am about to visit England June 23—29th I should be delighted to meet one so long by me admired. Especially do I desire this, because I would like to discuss with you my symphonic drama of evolution, to which I have devoted ten years. I have tried to make the abstractions and principles live and construct a cosmos[?] in accord with both science and religion. A difficult task. I do not pretend to have solved the mysteries, but to harmonize what seems contradictory. It is above all a drama of personality — the antithesis of Descartes — I say: Sum, ergo cogitur. The first thing is (the spiritual fact: The I[?] antedates its manifestations, as also it [2] will remove[?] them. The lesson of evolution is that the most conscious is the greatest. To suffer is to reign!
Would it be possible for you to receive me some day between June 25 & 29th?
Hoping that you are well, I am, Yours Very Truly |Leonard van Noppen [signature]2, 3
Status: Draft transcription [Letter (WCP3333.3301)]
For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon
Please cite as “WCP3333,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 28 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP3333