To Leslie Stephen.
5, Leon y Castillo,
Telde,
Las Palmas,
Gran Canaria.
20 Jan. 1902.
I was glad of your letter. I had been in a poor way and it cheered me. Now I am doing well and ride a bit on my cycle along one of the three roads of the island. I thought that you would like Joh. Althusius if you could penetrate the shell[28]. I like all that man's books, and his history of things in general as seen from the point of view of a student of corporations is full of good stuff, besides being to all appearance appallingly learned. I rather fancy that Hobbes's political feat consisted in giving a new twist to some well worn theories of the juristic order and then inventing a psychology which would justify that twist. I shall be very much interested to hear what you have to say about the old gentleman. A many years ago I saw in the Museum a copy of the Leviathan with a note telling how the wretched old atheist was buried head downwards or face downwards or something of the sort in a garden—a nice little legend in the making!
Have you read De Mirabilibus Pecci? Stevenson the Anglo-Saxon scholar, who travelled outwards with me, told me that the first recorded appearance of the name of the Peak (something like Pecesus) shows that the great cavern was called after the Devil's hinder parts. Did Hobbes know that? What a thing it is to be a philologer!