In 1920, H.G. Wells published The Outline of History — Wells’ take on the unfolding of human civilization that was especially harsh on religion and superstition. In response, Hilaire Belloc, a devout Roman Catholic, wrote a series of articles attacking The Outline of History which he compiled into 1926’s A Companion to Mr. Wells’s “Outline of History”. Wells responded in the same year with a book-length rant, Mr. Belloc Objects to “The Outline of History”. Both books are apparently mostly invective that shed little light on the issues actually being discussed.
I wanted to read Wells’ response to Belloc, and it turns out the book can be for free legally on the Internet. But there’s a slight problem — I live between the series of imaginary lines that constitutes the United States. As the University of Pennsylvania’s website explains,
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I love the last paragraph — that the University of Pennsylvania can’t legally check to see if the link works or not. I have to confess, I went ahead and broke international copyright law and clicked on through to the link (I did think about those Foster’s beer commercials first, though, so its almost like I was in Australia anyway.)
So do you, dear reader, dare to follow my scofflaw ways? If so, H.G. Wells awaits.