EECEEATIVE SCIENCE. 



59 



spare my bleeding country. Have these 

 realms in thy special keeping. Confound and 

 level in the dust all those who would rob 

 the people of their just rights and lawful 

 prerogatives." Cranmer held his hand into 

 the fire, the hand which had signed his re- 

 cantation. " This hand," said he, " hath 

 offended, this unworthy right hand." When 

 Ealeigh died, he spoke as nobly as he had 

 lived. Hunning his finger along the edge of 

 the axe, he said, "This is a sharp medicine, but 

 it wUl cure aU diseases ;" and he told his exe- 

 cutioner when he altered the position of his 

 head, " So the heart be right, man, no matter 

 which way the head lies." Napoleon, acting 

 in his death over again the scenes of his life, 

 mutters as his last words, " Tete d'armee."* 

 Wolsey, whose tortuous church policy had 

 raised him to be the chief man, under the 

 king, throughout broad England, mourned 

 that he had not served God as weU as he 

 had served his king, for then, indeed, " he 

 would not have been deserted." Groethe, who 

 had endeavoured to know all that was know- 

 able, cried out, as death's shadow hovered over 

 him, for "Light, more light." And Newton, 

 the great discoverer of the laws which re- 

 gulate our sphere, the first who could clearly 

 read the system of the Maker, said, meekly, 

 " I do not know what I may appear to the 

 world, but to myself I seem to have been 

 only like a boy playing on the sea-shore, and 

 diverting myself in finding now and then a 

 smoother pebble than ordinary, whilst tTie 

 great ocean of truth lay aU undiscovered 

 before me." 



Characteristic all these. Curious also is 

 it, as regards Humboldt, that Jean Jacques 

 Rousseau should have anticipated him in his 

 death words. Jean Jacques, who loved na- 

 ture as intensely as any one, although his 

 brain had been turned by "vain philosophy," 

 lay dying on a fine evening; there was a 

 sunset glow in the sky, which, as Sidney 



* Some historians write, " Tete * * * Armee." The 

 difference,is essential. 



Smith would say, " glorified the room," and 

 Jean Jacques breathed his last aspirations 

 thus — " How pure and beautiful is the sky. 

 There is not a cloud. I trust the Almighty 

 will receive me there." 



It is on the 5th of May, in this present 

 year of grace, and at three in the afternoon, 

 that Humboldt lies dying ; the sun shines 

 brniiantly into the room, and the departing 

 philosopher thus addressed his niece : — " Wie 

 herrlich diese strahlen ; sie scheinen die Erde 

 zum Himmel za rufen !" " How glorious are 

 these rays, they seem to call the Earth to 

 Heaven !"* 



When he was committed to the grave 

 Berlin presented a scene that will be ever 

 memorable to those who witnessed it. Early 

 in the morning the people assembled in 

 countless crowds in the Unter den Linden, 

 and in Friedrich-strasse, through which the 

 procession was to pass. Oranienburger- 

 strasse, at No. 67, in which street Humboldt 

 died, was closed to the populace, and nearly 

 all the houses in it were draped with black 

 flags and other insignia of mourning. Those 

 who were about to take part in the cortege 

 assembled by degrees before the house, and 

 soon the greater part of the literati and 

 known men of Berlin assembled, when those 

 who had not seen the great philosopher since 

 his death hastened to take a last look at his 

 remains. The coffin consisted of a single 

 shell of oak, and was placed in Humboldt's 

 study. Leaves of palm-trees and blooming 

 exotics surrounded his portrait by Hilde- 

 brandt, the emblems reminding the spec- 

 tator of the long and dangerous travels in 

 tropical lands which Humboldt had accom- 

 plished. 



AU his friends having taken a last linger- 

 ing look at the body, it was conveyed to the 

 catafalque in front of the house, and as soon 

 as the coffin appeared in sight all of the im- 

 mense crowd who were able to obtain a sight 

 of it instantly uncovered in token of the 

 * That is, to link the Mortal with the ImmortaL 



