I pity you the infliction of this most unmerciful letter. Pray remember me most kindly to Mrs. Lyell when you arrive at Kinnordy. I saw her name in the landlord's book of Inverorum. Tell Mrs. Lyell to read the second series of 'Mr. Slick of Slickville's Sayings.'...He almost beats "Samivel," that prince of heroes. Goodnight, my dear Lyell; you will think I have been drinking some strong drink to write so much nonsense, but I did not even taste Minerva's small beer to-day.
Yours most sincerely, CHAS. DARWIN.
CHARLES DARWIN TO C. LYELL. Friday night, September 13th [1838].
My dear Lyell,
I was astonished and delighted at your gloriously long letter, and I am sure I am very much obliged to Mrs. Lyell for having taken the trouble to write so much. (Lyell dictated much of his correspondence.) I mean to have a good hour's enjoyment and scribble away to you, who have so much geological sympathy that I do not care how egotistically I write...
I have got so much to say about all sorts of trifling things that I hardly know what to begin about. I need not say how pleased I am to hear that Mr. Lyell (Father of the geologist.) likes my Journal. To hear such tidings is a kind of resurrection, for I feel towards my first-born child as if it had long since been dead, buried, and forgotten; but the past is nothing and the future everything to us geologists, as you show in your capital motto to the 'Elements.' By the way, have you read the article, in the 'Edinburgh Review,' on M. Comte, 'Cours de la Philosophie' (or some such title)? It is capital; there are some fine sentences about the very essence of science being prediction, which reminded me of "its law being progress."