[Here may be added two later letters bearing in part upon the same subject:—]
Hodeslea, Eastbourne, March 23, 1894.
Dear Sir,
I ought to have thanked you before now for your letter about Nietzsche's works, but I have not much working time, and I find letter-writing a burden, which I am always trying to shirk.
I will look up Nietzsche, though I must confess that the profit I obtain from German authors on speculative questions is not usually great.
As men of research in positive science they are magnificently laborious and accurate. But most of them have no notion of style, and seem to compose their books with a pitchfork.
There are two very different questions which people fail to discriminate. One is whether evolution accounts for morality, the other whether the principle of evolution in general can be adopted as an ethical principle.
The first, of course, I advocate, and have constantly insisted upon. The second I deny, and reject all so-called evolutional ethics based upon it.
I am yours faithfully,
T.H. Huxley.