Spencer Heath Archive

Item 1618

Carbon of a letter from Heath to William Henry Chamberlin, Cambridge, Massachusetts

May 27, 1957

 

 

Dear Mr. Chamberlin:

 

     For a good many years, I have been instructed and entertained by your published writings on current and world affairs. In this I have learned a great deal about the quality and capacity of your mind, so much so that I take great pleasure in presenting to you with my compliments an advance copy of my Citadel, Market and Altar, which I trust will attract your attention and be found worthy of the inspiration under which it was written and the purposes towards which it is aimed.

 

     Communism has a false but definitive philosophy. Likewise, a false religion with glowing promises of Utopian freedom under political change. Capitalism, until of late, has been relatively inarticulate. It practices the golden rule of each serving others as he would be served, yet has little conscious knowledge of the sound philosophy and vital religion that it constantly puts into practical effect. The object of my own contri­bution has been to discover the scientific basis on which it rests, the social technology under which it operates, and the transcendent Utopian goal to which, of its own nature and in freedom, it leads.

 

     I shall be happy indeed if you can enter into the scientific, philosophic and religious spirit with which I have sought to give free enterprise capitalism its due. You will note that your namesake and my very dear friend, John Chamberlain, has been an important aid and influence in what I have done.

 

     Expressing again my appreciation of your sound writings and their influence upon public thought and action, I remain

                   Very sincerely yours,

 

 

                        Spencer Heath

 

 

SH/m

Encl.