304 JAMES CLERK MAXWELL. [CHAP. X. 



must just take what I say on trust. You know that I am 

 not given to big words. So have faith and you shall 

 know. 



... I don't write separately to Uncle Eobert, seeing 

 he is with you, and I am very busy, and just now I should 

 just write the same thing over again, and I have not a 

 copying press. So good-bye. Your affectionate nephew. 



To E. B. LITCHFIFLD, Esq. 



129 Union Street, 

 Aberdeen, 5th March 1858. 



My " lines " are so pleasant to me that I think that every- 

 body ought to come to me to catch the infection of happiness. 

 This college work is what I and my father looked forward 

 to for long, and I find we were both quite right that it was 

 the thing for me to do. And with respect to the particular 

 college, I think we have more discipline and more liberty, 

 and therefore more power of useful work, than anywhere else. 

 It is a great thing to be the acknowledged " regent " of one's 

 class for a year, so as to have them to one's self except in 

 mathematics and what additional classes they take. Then 

 the next year I get those that choose to come, which makes 

 a select class for the higher branches. They have all great 

 power of work. 



In Aberdeen I have met with great kindness from all sects 

 of people, and you now know of my greatest achievement in 

 the way of discovery, namely, the method of converting 

 friendship and esteem into something far better. We are 

 following up that discovery, and making more of it every day ; 

 getting deeper and deeper into the mysteries of personality, 

 so as to know that we ourselves are united, and not merely 

 attracted by qualities or virtues, either bodily or mental. 

 (Don't suppose we talk metaphysics.) . . . 



You will easily see that my " confession of faith " must 

 be liable to the objection that Satan made against Job's 

 piety. One thing I would have you know, that I feel as free 

 from compulsion to any form of compromised faith as I did 

 before I had any one to take care of, for I think we both 



