To Daniel MacGhie Cory
Via Santo Stefano Rotondo, 6
Rome. April 25, 1947
Dear Cory—
The German book by Alfred Weber on saying goodbye to history as hitherto written is the best thing I have seen about the present state of the world. I have suspended all other work for a few days in order to read it, devour it rather. Unfortunately, towards the end, as happens with things written in haste, it peters out into a debased Platonism—debased because it keeps the mythological taint of Platonism while discarding its moral definiteness and inspiration. But the historical part, and the honest sentiment in the whole are superior to anything I have seen in English or Italian or French.
From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Seven, 1941–1947. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2006.
Location of manuscript: Butler Library, Columbia University, New York NY.