Like unto Nature, eternally invoked, eternally giving, because eternally bountiful, you respond with ever returning goodness to every repeated solicitation. The proposal of your Excellency in regard to the young man of science, as suggested by the plan of M. de Varnhagen, is so excellent, that I can only beg for its speedy execution. For that purpose, it would seem desirable that M. de Varnhagen should instil the idea into the young men that our plentiful archives would repay a thorough search, if I could be induced to sanction it. I would do so at once, permitting the material part to follow hereafter. The period beginning with February of next year would seem to me best adapted for the literary investigation. The real object of the journey should remain a secret, so that I shall be entirely at liberty to see him, to appoint him, or not to appoint him.
I thank you with all my heart for that printed inclosure. This task also, by no means an easy one, you have performed with a master hand, and could do so better than any one else, because you, more than most men, have spoken to the world by noble actions.
I shall appropriate the Journal of Petermann. My veneration for you is the pledge of the effective truth of my aspirations. I beg you to preserve your interest in it, and your goodness also, being your most grateful admirer and servant,
Charles Alexander.
195.
HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN.
Berlin, Feb. 7th, 1857.
When I read anything in Berlin that enlists my political or literary attention, my first thought is of you. Lasaulx of Munich, of Baader’s tribe, was only known to me as a man of the “Kreuz Zeitung” and of Schubert’s World of Darkness, and the new historical work he sends me contains little originality of views, but it manifests, by way of allusion, a wealth of positive knowledge, which I had not expected of the man. Numerous citations indicate a great preference for the views of my brother. The Slavonic passage in regard to the Messiah is also remarkable, and the notes present a rich collection of antiquities. I should not look for anything of the sort from President Gerlach and his brother, to whom Professor Gelzer of Basle, and others, of opinions opposite to his, have been officially referred in the Neufchatel negotiations. If Lasaulx is not agreeable to you on account of his wishes for the restoration of the ancient German empire, you may find it interesting to skim over the work, and glance at the notes.
My cutaneous disease is much better, as also my nocturnal diligence. The fourth and last volume of Kosmos will consist of two parts, i.e., of two volumes, each of thirty-five sheets, the first of which has already left the press. Both the parts, however, are to appear together, to avoid spoiling the effect of a continuous description, beginning with the internal warmth of the earth, and ending with the different races of man.
The presumptuous want of caution with which the pitiful Neufchatel affair is carried on here, exposes Prussia to great humiliation at Paris. Waterloo will be avenged on Prussia as it has been on Russia.
Yours most truly,