42 The Germs of Srew/ion

not send it to FitzGerald because I am sure he would put it
into the paper. ... I know the undue lenience which he lends
to my performances, and believe you to be the sterner critic
of the two. That there are some good things in it you will,
I think, feel; but I am almost sure that considering usque ad
nauseam etc., you will think it had better not appear. ... I
think you and he will like that sentence: ( There was a
moral government of the world before man came into it.'
There is hardly a sentence in it written without deliberation ;
but I need hardly say that it was done upon tea, not upon
whiskey. . . .

" P.S. If you are in any doubt about the expediency of the
article take it to M.

" P.P.S. Perhaps better take it to him anyhow"

The preface to the 1901 edition of Erewhon contains some
further particulars of the genesis of that work, and there are
still further particulars in Unconscious Memory, Chapter II,
" How I wrote Life and Habit."

The first tentative sketch of the Life and Habit theory occurs
in the letter to Thomas William Gale Butler which is given post.
This T. W. G. Butler was not related to Butler, they met first
as art-students at Heatherley's, and Butler used to speak of him
as the most brilliant man he had ever known. He died many
years ago. He was the writer of the " letter from a friend now
in New Zealand," from which a quotation is given in Life and
Habit, Chapter V (pp. 83, 84). Butler kept a copy of his letter-
to T. W. G. Butler, but it was imperfectly pressed ; he after-
wards supplied some of the missing words from memory, and
gave it to the British Museum.

Darwin among the Machines

[To the Editor of the Press, Christchurch, New Zealand—
13 June, 1863.]

Sir—There are few things of which the present generation
is more justly proud than of the wonderful improvements
which are daily taking place in all sorts of mechanical ap-
pliances. And indeed it is matter for great congratulation
on many grounds. It is unnecessary to mention these here,
for they are sufficiently obvious; our present business lies
with considerations which may somewhat tend to humble