Joseph McCabe an Ernst Haeckel, London, 21. April 1903
8, Elm Grove,
Cricklewood,
London, N. W.
Apr. 21st / 03.
Dear Sir,
I am very much obliged to you for your prompt & full response to my questions. The glossary is now completed & will be inserted in the third sixpenny edition, as well as issued separately. I have told the publisher to send you a few copies. You will, of course, understand that || it is not intended for scientific readers but for people almost wholly ignorant of science, so that the „definitions” are rudimentary. As you probably know, some 50,000 copies of the cheap edition are in circulation & I trust the figure will soon reach 100,000. The work has been the sensation of these latter years & is doing an immense amount of good. It was a happy inspiration that prompted you to write || it. It has gone deep into every stratum of society. W. H. Mallock, one of our leading essayists, takes it as the one representative work of modern higher scientific thought in his latest work. You have probably seen it ‒ & seen how, though Mallock has been fighting our Agnostic leaders all his life, he grants you the victory on every point. I am told that Professor Ward (a very much more exacting thinker) also speaks with great respect of it in one of the articles in || the new edition of the Encyclopaedia Brittannica. At the other end of the scale one of our most popular Socialist papers- absit omen! ‒ has been commending it & following its lead for the last two months.
I do not claim for a moment that my translation has done anything for the book, but all the same I must thank you for your friendly greeting & acknowledgment. I trust I may have the honour of translating further work of yours before long. I would send you my photograph with pleasure, but I have not had it taken since I cast off my monastic & priestly dress six years ago.
Kindly accept an assurance of my great regards & respect
Yours truly
JmcCabe