Though late, I send you my hearty greetings on your return to England. I
heard from Wilson that you were well, and that you had left your mother
well for the winter.
Hippolytus lies here _ready_ for you, on purpose that you may fetch it. I
hope you will do so on the 18th, for which you have already received the
invitation. You will find Morier also here. Is not that furious and
ridiculous article in the “Morning Chronicle” on the second volume (the
first article, as yet without a continuation) by the same man (of Jesus
College?) on whose article in the “Ecclesiastic” on Hippolytus’ book I
have thrown some degree of light? The leading thought is exactly the same
in both; the account of Calixtus’ knavery is interpolated (by Novatianus),
says the writer in the “Chronicle.” This is a proof that nothing can be
said against my argument requiring a serious answer. Gladstone felt
ashamed of the review. It has helped the book; but it would be read even
without this and the recommendation of the “Guardian”—so Longman says.
_One_ circulating library here has taken twenty-five copies, and wants
more. So the book cannot be ignored; and that is all I first of all wished
for, _aculeum reliqui_. As the people of this country, with a few
exceptions that one can count upon one’s fingers, do not understand the
book, not even the title, and have never had a conception of what it
means, to reproduce the spirit of a century of which men as yet, with the
exception of Irenæus, Tertullian, Clemens Alexandrinus, and Origen, know
only the names and enigmas (of which latter Hippolytus was one), their
fault-finding with the composition of the book does not affect me at all.
In spite of the timidity of nearly _all_ English theologians, _inter muros
academicos et extra_, I have received very many hearty and manly letters
from numerous and distinguished people. The King has, on my
recommendation, sent Dr. Boetticher to spend two years here and in Paris
in order to bring to light the Syriac treasures which have not been laid
claim to by Cureton. I see that I have not been mistaken in him in spite
of his sporadic many-sidedness. I am free from the 2d of December. There
is a letter of mine just printing to Miss Winkworth, “On Niebuhr’s
Political Character,” with extracts from letters.
[21.]