GHL to Charles Bray, London, [February 1866]
Title
GHL to Charles Bray, London, [February 1866]
Title
GHL to Charles Bray, London, [February 1866]
Sender
George Henry Lewes
Recipient
Charles Bray
Date(s)
- 1866-02
Place
London
Letter Content
GHL to Charles Bray, London, [February 1866]
MS: Yale.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
My dear Mr. Bray
Your discovery is a very old friend with a new face -- and the new face one not presentable in scientific circles. I have no time if I had the desire for discussion of the various hazy conceptions and misconceptions of your pamphlet, 696 but with regard to the new face on [the discovery] which is to bridge over physics and metaphysics, let me point out this glaring logical error.
Mental force you first declare to be force [conditioned] by the brain. You then suppose this force can exist apart from its conditions -- floating free of brains like a bird in the air. Now the a.b.c of logic affirms that this force when no longer conditioned will no longer present the qualities it presented when conditioned -- i.e. the force which became mental under cerebral conditions will cease to be mental when those conditions on which its mentality depends are removed, it will assume its [unconditioned] state. Ergo the idea of emanation of mental states to form a thought atmosphere, is tantamount to the emanation of spectral brains spectrally active -- which for those who believe in spirits and rappers may be acceptable enough, but for those who are to follow the methods of science is an [unpresentable] idea.
Stripped of this illogical notion of a thought atmosphere away from the conditions of thought, your hypothesis is the old materialistic hypothesis clouded with the term of many meanings [Force.]
In a word while I sympathize with the pleasure you must have felt in weaving these speculations, I cannot but regret that you should have wasted money in printing anything so crude, and am quite sure you will get no man of science to pay the slightest attention to it.
Yours faithfully
G. H. Lewes.
MS: Yale.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
My dear Mr. Bray
Your discovery is a very old friend with a new face -- and the new face one not presentable in scientific circles. I have no time if I had the desire for discussion of the various hazy conceptions and misconceptions of your pamphlet, 696 but with regard to the new face on [the discovery] which is to bridge over physics and metaphysics, let me point out this glaring logical error.
Mental force you first declare to be force [conditioned] by the brain. You then suppose this force can exist apart from its conditions -- floating free of brains like a bird in the air. Now the a.b.c of logic affirms that this force when no longer conditioned will no longer present the qualities it presented when conditioned -- i.e. the force which became mental under cerebral conditions will cease to be mental when those conditions on which its mentality depends are removed, it will assume its [unconditioned] state. Ergo the idea of emanation of mental states to form a thought atmosphere, is tantamount to the emanation of spectral brains spectrally active -- which for those who believe in spirits and rappers may be acceptable enough, but for those who are to follow the methods of science is an [unpresentable] idea.
Stripped of this illogical notion of a thought atmosphere away from the conditions of thought, your hypothesis is the old materialistic hypothesis clouded with the term of many meanings [Force.]
In a word while I sympathize with the pleasure you must have felt in weaving these speculations, I cannot but regret that you should have wasted money in printing anything so crude, and am quite sure you will get no man of science to pay the slightest attention to it.
Yours faithfully
G. H. Lewes.
Signature
G. H. Lewes.
Citation
George Henry Lewes, GHL to Charles Bray, London, [February 1866], Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/94442