seats of learning unique.
LETTERS
To Maurice Amos
16th June 1930
Dear Maurice
You wrote me a very nice letter last October and I have not answered it yet.
When you wrote it I was touring America, which leaves one no leisure for
anything beyond the day’s work. I meant to answer your letter, but as the
right moment went by, the impulse died.
I like Jean’s book. It is amusing how the physicists have come round to
poor old Bishop Berkeley. You remember how when we were young we
were taught that although idealism was, of course, quite the thing, Bishop
Berkeley’s form of it was rather silly; now it is the only form that survives. I
do not see how to refute it, though temperamentally I ?nd it repulsive. It
ought, of course, in any case to be solipsism. I lectured on this subject at
Harvard, with Whitehead in the Chair, and I said it seemed to me improbable
that I had composed the parts of his books which I could not understand, as I
later years of telegraph house 413should be compelled to believe if I were a solipsist. Nevertheless I have never
succeeded in ?nding any real evidence that I did not do so.
I am very much interested in what you say about your book on the British
Constitution, and especially amused that you had written 46,000 out of the
50,000 requisite words before you reached Parliament. Parliament has
become a somewhat unimportant body. In the 19th century the Prime
Ministers resigned when defeated in Parliament until Gladstone altered
the practice; now by the threat of dissolution they terrorise Parliament. The
Constitution would not be appreciably changed if the Prime Minister were
directly elected, selected the Government, and had to seek re-election either
after ?ve years or when a leader appeared against him in his own Party Press.
I think you are entirely right in what you say about the Labour Party. I do
not like them, but an Englishman has to have a Party just as he has to have
trousers, and of the three Parties I ?nd them the least painful. My objection to
the Tories is temperamental, and my objection to the Liberals is Lloyd George.
I do not think that in joining a Party one necessarily abrogates the use of
one’s reason. I know that my trousers might be better than they are; neverthe-
less they seem to me better than none.
It is true that I had never heard of Holdsworth’s History of English Law, but
in fact I have never read any books at all about law except one or two of
Maitland’s.
Since I returned from America I have been very much tied here, but I
expect to be in London occasionally during the autumn and I should very
much like to see you then.
Sanger’s death was a great grief to me.
Ever yours a?ectionately
Bertrand Russell
From and to Bronislaw Malinowski,
the anthropologist The London School of Economics
13th November 1930
Dear Russell
On the occasion of my visit to your School I left my only presentable
brown hat in your anteroom. I wonder whether since then it has had the
privilege of enclosing the only brains in England which I ungrudgingly
regard as better than mine; or whether it has been utilised in some of the
juvenile experimentations in physics, technology, dramatic art, or prehistoric
symbolism; or whether it naturally lapsed out of the anteroom.
If none of these events, or shall we rather call them hypotheses, holds
good or took place, could you be so good as to bring it in a brown paper
parcel or by some other concealed mode of transport to London and
advise me on a post card where I could reclaim it? I am very sorry that my
the autobiography of bertrand russell 414absentmindedness, which is a characteristic of high intelligence, has exposed
you to all the inconvenience incidental to the event.
I do hope to see you some time soon.
Yours sincerely
B. Malinowski
15th Nov. 1930
Dear Malinowski
My secretary has found a presentable brown hat in my lobby which I
presume is yours, indeed the mere sight of it reminds me of you.
I am going to the School of Economics to give a lecture to the Students’
Union on Monday (17th), and unless my memory is as bad and my intelli-
gence as good as yours, I will leave your hat with the porter at the School
of Economics, telling him to give it to you on demand.
I too hope that we may meet some time soon. I made the acquaintance of
Bri?ault
1
the other day, and was amazed by his pugnacity.
Yours sincerely
Bertrand Russell
From and to G. E. Moore
86, Chesterton Road
Cambridge
Mar. 9/30
Dear Russell
The Council of Trinity made a grant to Wittgenstein last June to enable him
to carry on his researches on the foundations of Mathematics. There is now a
question of making him a further grant; & they wish, before they decide, to
have expert reports on the work he has done since the last grant was made.
They have authorised me to ask you to make such a report for them. I’m afraid
it will involve a good deal of trouble. Wittgenstein has written a great deal; but
he says it would be absolutely necessary for him to explain it to you in conver-
sation, if you are to understand it. I think he would be very glad to have an
opportunity of doing this, but it would no doubt take up a good deal of your
time. I hope very much that you will nevertheless be willing to do it; for there
seems to be no other way of ensuring him a su?cient income to continue his
work, unless the Council do make him a grant; and I am afraid there is very
little chance that they will do so, unless they can get favourable reports from
experts in the subject; and you are, of course, by far the most competent
person to make one. They would, of course, pay a fee for the report.
There would be no need for you to come here to see Wittgenstein. He
would arrange to go to see you, when & where it suited you best.
Yours fraternally
G. E. Moore
later years of telegraph house 415Beacon Hill School
Harting, Peters?eld
11th March 1930
Dear Moore
I do not see how I can refuse to read Wittgenstein’s work and make a
report on it. At the same time, since it involves arguing with him, you are
right that it will require a great deal of work. I do not know anything more
fatiguing than disagreeing with him in an argument.
Obviously the best plan for me would be to read the manuscript carefully
?rst, and see him afterwards. How soon could you let me have his stu?? I
should like if possible to see him here before the 5th of April: on that date I
shall be going to Cornwall for Easter, and I do not want to have any work to do
while there, as I have been continuously very busy since the end of last sum-
mer. I do not know how long it will be necessary to argue with him. I could
spare three days, say the Friday, Saturday and Sunday preceding April 5th, but
it would be di?cult for me to spare more. Do you think this would be
enough?
Yours fraternally
Bertrand Russell
86, Chesterton Road
Cambridge
March 13/30
Dear Russell
Wittgenstein says that he has nothing written which it would be worth
while to let you see: all that he has written is at present in too confused a
state. I am sorry that I had not clearly understood this when I wrote to you
before. What he wants is merely to have a chance of explaining to you some
of the results which he has arrived at, so that you might be able to report to
the Council whether, even if you thought them mistaken, you thought them
important & such that he ought to be given a chance of going on working on
the same lines; and I hope that a report of this kind would be su?cient for the
Council. And I should think 3 days would be ample for this, & that it
wouldn’t be necessary for you to argue with him much. He is wiring to you
now to ask if he could see you on Saturday either at Harting or in London (if
you should be there), so as to try to make some arrangement with you. I
think he will be in Austria on April 5th.
Yours fraternally
G. E. Moore
the autobiography of bertrand russell 41617th March 1930
Dear Moore
Wittgenstein has been here for the weekend, and we have talked as much
as there was time for.
I should be glad to know what is the latest date for reporting to the
Council, since my impressions at the moment are rather vague, and he
intends while in Austria to make a synopsis of his work which would make it
much easier for me to report adequately. If it is impossible to wait
another month or so, I will do my best to draw up a report on the basis of
our conversations, but I hope this is not necessary. He intends to visit me
again in Cornwall just before the beginning of the May term, with his
synopsis.
Yours fraternally
Bertrand Russell
5th May 1930
Dear Moore
I had a second visit from Wittgenstein, but it only lasted thirty-six hours,
and it did not by any means su?ce for him to give me a synopsis of all that
he has done. He left me a large quantity of typescript, which I am to
forward to Littlewood as soon as I have read it. Unfortunately I have been ill
and have therefore been unable to get on with it as fast as I hoped. I think,
however, that in the course of conversation with him I got a fairly good idea
of what he is at. He uses the words ‘space’ and ‘grammar’ in peculiar senses,
which are more or less connected with each other. He holds that if it is
signi?cant to say ‘This is red’, it cannot be signi?cant to say ‘This is loud’.
There is one ‘space’ of colours and another ‘space’ of sounds. These ‘spaces’
are apparently given a priori in the Kantian sense, or at least not perhaps
exactly that, but something not so very di?erent. Mistakes of grammar result
from confusing ‘spaces’. Then he has a lot of stu? about in?nity, which is
always in danger of becoming what Brouwer has said, and has to be pulled
up short whenever this danger becomes apparent. His theories are certainly
important and certainly very original. Whether they are true, I do not know;
I devoutly hope they are not, as they make mathematics and logic almost
incredibly di?cult. One might de?ne a ‘space’, as he uses the word, as a
complete set of possibilities of a given kind. If you can say ‘This is blue’,
there are a number of other things you can say signi?cantly, namely, all the
other colours.
I am quite sure that Wittgenstein ought to be given an opportunity to
pursue his work. Would you mind telling me whether this letter could pos-
sibly su?ce for the Council? The reason I ask is that I have at the moment so
much to do that the e?ort involved in reading Wittgenstein’s stu?
later years of telegraph house 417thoroughly is almost more than I can face. I will, however, push on with it if
you think it is really necessary.
Yours fraternally
Bertrand Russell
86, Chesterton Road
Cambridge
May 7/30
Dear Russell
I don’t think your letter to me, as it stands, will quite do as a report to the
Council; but I don’t think it is necessary that you should spend any more
time in reading Wittgenstein’s synopsis. What I think is important is that
you should write a formal report (which they might, perhaps, want to keep
in their Report-Book), not necessarily any longer than your letter, but stating
quite clearly & expressly some things which are only implicit in your letter. I
think the report should state quite clearly just how much you have been able
to do by way of discovering what work W. has been doing since last June, i.e.
partly reading of the Synopsis & partly W.’s verbal explanations; and should
emphasise that your opinion of its importance, & that W. ought certainly to
be given an opportunity of continuing it, is based upon what you have been
able to learn of the nature of this new work itself, & not merely on your
previous knowledge of W. You see the Council already know that you have a
very high opinion of W.’s work in general, and what they want is your
opinion as to the importance of this particular new work, not merely based
on a presumption that anything W. does is likely to be important. I think you
should try to state, very brie?y, what its nature is & what its originality &
importance consists in.
I’m afraid that to write such a report will be troublesome; but I hope
it wouldn’t take you very long; and I do think it’s important that it should
be done.
Yours fraternally
G. E. Moore
Beacon Hill School
Harting, Peters?eld
8th May 1930
Dear Moore
I have just sent Wittgenstein’s typescript to Littlewood with a formal
report which he can pass on to the Council. It says just the same things as my
letter to you, but it says them in grander language, which the Council will be
able to understand. I enclose a copy.
the autobiography of bertrand russell 418I ?nd I can only understand Wittgenstein when I am in good health, which
I am not at the present moment.
Yours fraternally
Bertrand Russell
My report to the Council of Trinity on Wittgenstein’s work:
Beacon Hill School
Harting, Peters?eld
8th May 1930
Owing to illness I have been prevented from studying Wittgenstein’s
recent work as thoroughly as I had intended to do. I spent ?ve days in
discussion with him, while he explained his ideas, and he left with me a
bulky typescript, Philosophische Bemerkungen, of which I have read about a third.
The typescript, which consists merely of rough notes, would have been very
di?cult to understand without the help of the conversations. As it is, how-
ever, I believe that the following represents at least a part of the ideas which
are new since the time of his Tractatus:
According to Wittgenstein, when anything is the case there are certain
other things that might have been the case in regard, so to speak, to that
particular region of fact. Suppose, for example, a certain patch of wall is blue;
it might have been red, or green, or &c. To say that it is any of these colours is
false, but not meaningless. On the other hand, to say that it is loud, or shrill,
or to apply to it any other adjective appropriate to a sound, would be to talk
nonsense. There is thus a collection of possibilities of a certain kind which is
concerned in any fact. Such a collection of possibilities Wittgenstein calls a
‘space’. Thus there is a ‘space’ of colours, and a ‘space’ of sounds. There are
various relations among colours which constitute the geometry of that
‘space’. All this is, in one sense, independent of experience: that is to say, we
need the kind of experience through which we know what ‘green’ is, but not
the kind through which we know that a certain patch of wall is green.
Wittgenstein uses the word ‘grammar’ to cover what corresponds in lan-
guage to the existence of these various ‘spaces’. Wherever a word denoting a
region in a certain ‘space’ occurs, the word denoting another region in that
‘space’ can be substituted without producing nonsense, but a word denoting
any region belonging to any other ‘space’ cannot be substituted without bad
grammar, i.e. nonsense.
A considerable part of Wittgenstein’s work is concerned with the inter-
pretation of mathematics. He considers it false to say that mathematics is logic
or consists of tautologies. He discusses ‘in?nity’ at considerable length and
links it with the conception of possibility that he has developed in connection
with his various ‘spaces’. He believes in ‘in?nite possibility’, as he calls it, but
not in actual ‘in?nite classes’ or ‘in?nite series’. What he says about in?nity
later years of telegraph house 419tends, obviously against his will, to have a certain resemblance to what has
been said by Brouwer. I think perhaps the resemblance is not so close as it
appears at ?rst sight. There is much discussion of mathematical induction.
The theories contained in this new work of Wittgenstein’s are novel, very
original, and indubitably important. Whether they are true, I do not know. As
a logician who likes simplicity, I should wish to think that they are not, but
from what I have read of them I am quite sure that he ought to have an
opportunity to work them out, since when completed they may easily prove
to constitute a whole new philosophy.
Bertrand Russell
To W. W. Norton, publisher
27th Jan. 1931
Dear Norton
Thank you for your letter of January 14th...
With regard to The Meaning of Science, I have an abstract of it and have done
some 10,000 words. I am afraid I could not do the sort of conclusion that
you suggest. I do not believe that science per se is an adequate source of
happiness, nor do I think that my own scienti?c outlook has contributed very
greatly to my own happiness, which I attribute to defecating twice a day with
unfailing regularity. Science in itself appears to me neutral, that is to say, it
increases men’s power whether for good or for evil. An appreciation of the
ends of life is something that must be superadded to science if it is to bring
happiness. I do not wish, in any case, to discuss individual happiness, but
only the kind of society to which science is apt to give rise. I am afraid you
may be disappointed that I am not more of an apostle of science, but as I grow
older, and no doubt as a result of the decay of my tissues, I begin to see the
good life more and more as a matter of balance and to dread all over-
emphasis upon any one ingredient. This has always been the view of elderly
men and must therefore have a physiological source, but one cannot escape
from one’s physiology by being aware of it.
I am not surprised at what people thought of The Conquest of Happiness on your
side of the Atlantic. What surprised me much more was that English high-
brows thought well of it. I think people who are unhappy are always proud of
being so, and therefore do not like to be told that there is nothing grand about
their unhappiness. A man who is melancholy because lack of exercise has
upset his liver always believes that it is the loss of God, or the menace of
Bolshevism, or some such digni?ed cause that makes him sad. When you tell
people that happiness is a simple matter, they get annoyed with you.
All best wishes,
Yours sincerely
Bertrand Russell
the autobiography of bertrand russell 42017th Feb. 1931
Dear Norton
Thank you for your letter of February 9th. My method of achieving happi-
ness was discovered by one of the despised race of philosophers, namely,
John Locke. You will ?nd it set forth in great detail in his book on education.
This is his most important contribution to human happiness; other minor
contributions were the English, American, and French revolutions.
The abstract [of The Scienti?c Outlook] that I sent you is not to be taken as
covering all the ground that I shall, in fact, cover. Certainly education must be
included in technique in society, though I had regarded it as a branch of
advertising. As for behaviourism, I have included it under Pavlov. Pavlov did
the work which Watson has advertised.
I have now done 36,000 words of the book, but after I have ?nished it, I
shall keep it by me until the end of May for purposes of revision, and of
adding malicious foot-notes.
I have already done a chapter on ‘Science and Religion’, which is explicitly
atheistical. Do you object to this? It would, of course, be possible to give
the whole thing an ironical twist, and possibly this might make it better
literature. One could go through the arguments of the scientists, Eddington,
Jeans, and their accomplices, pointing out how bad they are, and concluding
that fortunately our faith need not depend upon them, since it is based upon
the impregnable rock of Holy Scripture. If you prefer this as a literary form, I
am prepared to re-cast the chapter in that sense. At present it is straight-
forward, sincere, and full of moral earnestness.
Unless I hear from you to suggest an earlier date, I propose to mail the
manuscript, or to hand it to Aannestad if he is still in England, during the
second week in June. It is perfectly feasible to send it sooner, but I can always
improve it so long as I keep it.
I much enjoyed seeing Aannestad.
Yours sincerely
Bertrand Russell
11th March 1931
Dear Norton
You will have seen that my brother died suddenly in Marseilles. I inherit
from him a title, but not a penny of money, as he was bankrupt. A title is
a great nuisance to me, and I am at a loss what to do, but at any rate I do
not wish it employed in connection with any of my literary work. There
is, so far as I know, only one method of getting rid of it, which is to be
attainted of high treason, and this would involve my head being cut o? on
Tower Hill. This method seems to me perhaps somewhat extreme, but I
later years of telegraph house 421am sure I can rely upon you not to make use of my title in the way of
publicity.
Yours sincerely
Bertrand Russell
To Mr Runham Brown
21st March 1931
Dear Mr Runham Brown
Einstein’s pronouncement on the duty of Paci?sts to refuse every kind of
military service has my most hearty agreement, and I am very glad that the
leading intellect of our age should have pronounced himself so clearly and so
uncompromisingly on this issue.
For my part I do not expect, much as I desire it, that any very large number
of men will be found to take up the position of refusing to bear arms in
wartime, nor do I think that a refusal on the part of two per cent would be
su?cient to prevent war. The next war will, I think, be more ?erce than
the war which as yet is still called ‘Great’, and I think Governments would
have no hesitation in shooting the paci?st two per cent. A more e?ective
form of war resistance would be strikes among munition workers. But on the
whole I expect more from international agreements than from the actions of
individual paci?sts. While, therefore, I agree with Einstein as to the duty
of paci?sts, I put a somewhat di?erent emphasis upon the political and
individual factors respectively.
There is one point upon which perhaps I disagree, on principle, with him
and with many other Paci?sts. If an international authority existed and
possessed the sole legal armed forces, I should be prepared to support it even
by force of arms.
Yours sincerely
Bertrand Russell
To Dr Steinbach
19th May 1931
Dear Dr Steinbach
I am afraid I have nothing very helpful to say about the English language. I
notice that literary persons in America tend to study it as one studies a dead
language, that is to say, it does not occur to them that the written word can be
merely the spoken word transcribed. For my part, while I am willing to read
good authors for the sake of their rhythms, and also to enrich my vocabulary,
it would not occur to me to read them with any grammatical purpose.
I should de?ne correct English in the year nineteen hundred and thirty-
one as the habits of speech of educated people in that year, and I see no point
in making a distinction between speech and writing. When once a distinction
the autobiography of bertrand russell 422of this sort is allowed to creep in, one soon arrives at the condition of the
literary Chinese. I knew a learned Chinese who was very keen on substituting
the vernacular (as it is called) for the classical language. I asked him whether
this movement made much progress; he replied that there are times when it
does and times when it does not. ‘For example,’ he said, ‘it made great
progress during the thirteenth century.’ I do not know Chinese, but I inferred
that classical Chinese corresponded to Latin, and that the vernacular corres-
ponded to Chaucer. I do not wish this sort of thing to happen to those who
speak English.
Yours very truly
Bertrand Russell
This and the following letter are the long and the short of it.
From and to Will Durant
44, North Drive
Great Neck, N.Y.
June 8th, 1931
Earl Bertrand Russell
Carn Voel, Porthcurno
Cornwall, England
