542 LEOPOLD VON RANKE. 



rested in large degree upon the freedom of his art. He gave it dignity 

 and greatness. He never trifled. He reverenced his profession. He 

 was not afraid of repetition, trusting confidently to the constant diver- 

 sity of occasions and of needs to make monotony impossible. He will 

 be imitated, of course, in stupid and mechanical fashion ; but he will 

 also do what he would have most wished to do ; he will inspire men 

 to be real, simple, and sincere. He will make tricks and devices seem 

 unworthy of an art whose greatness he felt and declared in all his 

 buildings. 



Mr. Richardson was made a member of this Academy in 1881, of 

 the Archaeological Institute of America in 1881, and of the Royal In- 

 stitute of British Architects in 1886, only three weeks before he died. 

 When this last honor reached him, he said, "If they praise me so for 

 what I have done, what would they say if they saw what I can do." 

 It was the consciousness of unused power. To himself and to his 

 friends he seemed, dying at forty-eight, to be dying young. If he 

 could have had twenty years more of life, no man can say with what 

 work he might have enriched the world. But life had been a fight 

 with death for years. Everything he did had been done for years in 

 pain and sickness. Nothing but a vitality which seemed to have no 

 limit, an enthusiasm and buoyancy and joyousness that never failed, had 

 kept him in this world. At last the ever-advancing illness conquered 

 even them, and his work was over, and he died. 



His death took from his friends a character which they must always 

 remember with delisrht. To know him was to live in a land of won- 

 derful profusion. There was a charm about him which will not sub- 

 mit to be analyzed, and which can never be forgotten. He remains 

 a picture of breadth, openness, simplicity, happiness, and strength. 

 He seemed to enlarge the thought of human nature while he lived, 

 and to leave the world perceptibly more empty when he died. 



FOREIGN HONORARY MEMBERS 



LEOPOLD VON RANKE. 



Heredity is an important element in the making of great men. 

 "While this factor alone does not suffice to explain such a phenomenon 

 of historical genius as Leopold von Ranke, it is at least worthy of 

 careful observation. Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, in his biography 



