It is the task of science to investigate the productive life of nations. To her the souls of nations are the highest fields of investigation that man is capable of knowing. Searching out every individuality, tracing every received impression, observing even the broken splinters, uniting all discernible knowledge, more guessing at truths and pointing out the way, than apprehending them, she seeks, as her highest aim, to prove the intellectual unity of the whole human race upon earth. Whilst pious faith with undoubting certainty places before man the idea of a personal God, the man of science reverently seeks to discover the Divine, in the great conceptions, which however they may surpass the understanding of the individual, yet are all attached to the life of the world. But however little he may consider their importance, in comparison with that which is incomprehensible in time and eternity, yet in his limited circle lies all the greatness that we are capable of understanding, all the beautiful which we ever enjoy, and all the good which has ennobled our life. But in those spheres which we do not yet know, and are anxiously investigating, there remains a boundless work. And this work is to seek the development of the Divine power in history.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1]: Even the great Imperial army that assembled before the battle of Nördlingen, in 1634, was a combination of several armies; that of Wallenstein, an Italian army, Spanish auxiliaries, and troops of Maximilian of Bavaria, altogether perhaps sixty thousand men, they only remained together a short time.
[Footnote 2]: This machine consisted of a number of short barrels, which, bound in parallel rows, formed a nearly cubic mass, the front of which showed from six to ten rows of as many mouths arranged in a square. This system of barrels rested on a carriage, and was fired in rows. Every single barrel was loaded with three or more balls, and could be fired separately or together. Fronsperg boasts that after one loading there could be a thousand shots from the hundred barrels of the gun.
[Footnote 3]: Wallhausen, 'Archiley Art of War,' 1617. For the corresponding French system of this time, a good description is to be found in the 'Etude sur le passé et l'avenir de l'artillerie par le Prince Napoléon Louis Bonaparte.' T. I.
[Footnote 4]: In the battle of Breitenfeld the metal guns of Sweden were overheated; there the leather cannon did their last great service against the Croats.
[Footnote 5]: Thus generated the ingenious comparison of guns with birds of prey; the thirty-six pounders were called eagles, the twenty-four pounders falcons, twelve pounders vultures, six pounders hawks, three pounders sparrowhawks, and the sixty-pound mortars owls.
[Footnote 6]: Yet he himself had a brigade which was called red.
[Footnote 7]: The lieutenants carried partisans, the non-commissioned officers halberds.
[Footnote 8]: About 1600 one gulden of the coin of the Empire was equal to forty silver groschen of our money; thus sixteen of these was equal to forty-two of our thalers.