Author: David Spiech Page 1 of 283

To [Susan Sturgis de Sastre]
PAU.—VUE SUR LA CHAÎNE DES PYRÉNÉES.
Pau, May 8, 1906

I have found this place just what I wanted—delightfully warm and sunny, not too crowded, the gardens in full flower, snow mountains in sight, and nothing to do but stroll and scribble. These three days I have spent mostly in the parks, sitting on some bench, and either reading the papers or writing in my note-book things suggested by my recent discussions with Strong. It has been very nice and restful. Pau is a much more wonderful place than I remembered it to be—most luxuriant and grand at the same time. This photograph doesn’t do the view justice, as the mountains are much higher & nearer than they look here.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book One, [1868]-1909.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001.
Location of postcard manuscript: Collection of Paloma Sanchez Sastre, Madrid, Spain

To George Sturgis
Hotel Bristol
Rome, May 7. 1928

The vagueness of the bequest to Harvard was intentional. It may be hard to find just the right man for the Fellowship even in the wide field of poetry, philosophy, theology, and the Harvard Lampoon: and when you remember that I hope to die a novelist, almost anyone not a chimney-sweep can hope for my legacy.

You are right about the reason for a Spanish child not having the same last name, although he has the same surname, as his father: the last is his mother’s family name. As to the middle name, as in the case of Manuela Ruiz de Santayana y Zabalgoitia, it is not necessary. Ruiz was originally our family name, Santayana being a place; but my father and his brothers got into the habit of using Santayana exclusively, for the sake of brevity. But the addition of the mother’s surname, now usually without the “y” prefixed, is legal, and necessary in a document. So you will find that your aunt’s will is signed “Susana Sturgis Borrás”. The Parkman is optional, and the husband’s name is not, in Spain, a wife’s name at all. She may be described as the wife, or politely, the lady, of so-and-so: but her name remains what it was originally. Calling your aunt, as she liked to be called, Susana Sturgis de Sastre, is not strictly correct; she was Doña Susana Sturgis y Borrás, señora de Sastre. The last words are a title or description, not a part of her name, as if you called me G. S, wedded to Metaphysics.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Four, 1928–1932.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: The Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge MA

To Augusto Guzzo
Via Santo Stefano Rotondo, 6,
Rome, May 5, 1948

According to Catholic dogma, in Christ himself, in Jesus, God existed as in no other man. But I am not discussing that doctrine, but only the teaching of the Gospel (especially in John) that God and Christ himself will come to dwell within others, Christ’s disciples. Here it is evident that God and Christ are forms of thought and with which may be infused into other spirits. God is an ideal in them; whether he exists also hypostatically in himself, is a question of fact, objective information conveyed by faith and dogma, not a question of the complexion of spiritual life in a man when he or others say that God is dwelling in him.

…When I say that Christ, being God, can reflect the whole divine nature, I am talking of the idea of Christ as conceived by Christian faith. I think that a myth: what I think real is the ideal and partial presence of divine will and knowledge and love in human beings.

What you mean by “God humanised” is not clear to me. The divine nature in Christ, according to Christian faith, was not humanised: it remained simply divine. But it was conjoined with a human psyche, so that the latter became sacred, utterly united in intent, by faith and love, to the divine nature, yet preserving the temporal, successive, limited experience proper to a human being. And I should add, proper to existence itself. For the life of God in eternity is an idea only: it has moral reality, but does not designate an actual fulfilled existence. But this is an endless subject.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Eight, 1948-1952.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2008.
Location of manuscript: Unknown

To George Sturgis
Grand Hotel
Rome, May 4, 1941

Yesterday I went to the Credito Italiano and received lire 12,600 and odd, which with what I had on hand gives me ample funds for two months more in Italy in any case, counting doctors’ bills, and possible journey to the frontier. This in case communication with the U.S. should be interrupted before you send me the next draft. I asked the now amiable gent at the Credito Italiano whether he thought the interruption was likely to occur, and he said no: that it would not be in the American interest. But people so seldom do what is for their own interest that I am not at all confident, and wish to be prepared for the worst. If all goes well until June 15 and you then send me $1000, I shall be all right until October at least; so that I should be able to spend a peaceful summer writing my amusing Autobiography—amusing at least to myself.

I am now practically well, except for a gouty knee that keeps me from taking long walks; but I can walk well enough for short distances, and take a cab when I wish to go farther. Cory has sent me Russell’s new book, which I am now reading with interest; and I can always fall back on the classics, Latin or Italian, which are to be had here; but being cut off from current books in French, particularly, is the most disagreeable effect, for me, of the present restrictions. Those in food do no harm: although beef, veal, and pork are limited to two days a week now, we can still have mutton, chicken, ginea fowl, partriges, tongue, liver, sweetbreads, and fish at all times—enough for an abstemious philosopher.

From The Letters of George Santayana:  Book Seven, 1941-1947.  Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2006.

Location of manuscript: The Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge MA