To Arthur Davison Ficke
22 Beaumont St.
Oxford, England. December 4, 1917
It is a pleasure to hear from you and to see that you are at close quarters, as well as at head quarters, with the army. You will doubtless be useful, and the experience will transform (I should think) your sense for human life and give all you write hereafter an added value. I myself am too old to improve very much: yet I think whatever I may find it possible to undertake in the future will be bronze instead of lead, or of gingerbread,–whatever you think has been my rather cheap material hitherto.
From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Two, 1910-1920. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001.
Location of manuscript: The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven CT