Great Congress of Philosophers at Berlin. 227 



hall of meeting, on which the numbers of the seats were printed 

 in black ink, and his own peculiar seat marked in red ink, so 

 that every person immediately found his own place, and knew 

 where to look for any friend whom he might wish to find. 



At the hour appointed for the opening of the meeting, the 

 members being assembled, and the galleries and orchestra 

 being filled by an assemblage of a large part of the rank and 

 beauty of the capital, and the side-boxes being occupied by 

 several branches of the royal family, and by the foreign am- 

 bassadors, the session of the Academy was opened by the 

 eloquent address of the President. 



Speech made at the opening of the Society of German Natu- 

 ralists and Natural Philosophers at Berlin, the 1 8th Septem- 

 ber 1828. By Alexander Von Humboldt. 



Since through your choice, which does me so much honour, 

 I am permitted to open this meeting, the first duty which I 

 have to discharge is one of gratitude. The distinction which 

 has been conferred on him who has never yet been able to at- 

 tend your excellent Society, is not the reward of scientific ef- 

 forts, or of feeble and persevering attempts to discover new 

 phenomena, or to draw the light of knowledge from the unex- 

 plored depths of nature. A finer feeling, however, directed 

 your attention to me. You have assured me, that while, dur- 

 ing an absence of many years, and in a distant quarter of the 

 globe, I was labouring in the same cause with yourselves, I 

 was not a stranger in your thoughts. Yoii have likewise 

 greeted my return home, that, by the sacred tie of gratitude, 

 you might bind me still longer and closer to our common 

 country. 



What, however, can the picture of this our native land pre- 

 sent more agreeable to the mind than the assembly which we 

 receive to day for the first time within our walls ; from the 

 banks of the Neckar, the birth-place of Kepler and of Schiller, 

 to the remotest border of the Baltic plains ; from hence to the 

 mouths of the Rhine, where, under the beneficent influence 

 of commerce, the treasures of exotic nature have for centuries 

 been collected and investigated, the friends of nature, inspired 

 with the same zeal, and, urged by the same passion, flock toge- 



