SOURCE: A letter to Auguste Comte on November 8, 1841, in The Correspondence of John Stuart Mill and Auguste Comte, edited and translated by Oscar A. Haac, Transaction Publishers, 1995, pp. 35-6.

In the following letter to Comte, Mill discusses his intellectual indebtedness to Comte and his system.

I don't know, Sir, whether someone completely unknown to you may take a few moments of time as precious as yours, to tell you about himself and the great intellectual debt he owes you; but with the encouragement of my friend, Mr. Marrast, and believing that, in the midst of your great philosophical enterprises, you would perhaps not be entirely displeased to receive an expression of sympathy and support from abroad, I dare hope that you will not judge my present letter inappropriate.

It was in the year 1828, dear Sir, that I read your short essay on Positive Polity for the first time...