LEIBNIZ 117 



Leibniz had, in a letter to him in 1676, already communi- 

 cated to him something concerning the nature and range of 

 his new method of calculation; but the position was soon 

 reversed, since the Royal Society claimed all credit for the 

 first originator, Newton. Contemporary judgments of this 

 kind must necessarily rest upon the opinion of outside persons, 

 that is of persons who not only did not make the discovery 

 or invention, but were actually remote from it, and there- 

 fore not capable of making it, or at any rate did not follow 

 the development of the ideas in question, and hence were 

 not capable of forming a judgment. The consequence 

 of this is that contemporary judgments concerning the credit 

 for great advances must always be worthless, the more so 

 because even the knowledge of what such achievements 

 depend upon, and what makes their excellence and en- 

 hances their value, is in any case only accessible, by inward 

 experience, to the few who themselves belong to the ranks of 

 the great investigators. Posterity can more easily form a 

 correct judgment; it already possesses and controls the ideas, 

 about the origin of which a judgment is to be formed, and it 

 also has at its disposal more complete means of following 

 back all threads leading to the origin. But contemporaries 

 can form a true judgment of the living investigator from his 

 manner and style of work, and they can recognise unusual 

 powers by unusual achievements, whereby, however, a 

 satisfactory judgment is always only possible between men of 

 like nature (race). For this very reason every man of science 

 ought to, and should, find deserved recognition first of all 

 among his own people. This was not the case with Leibniz. 

 He was certainly, when young, highly regarded by not a few 

 German princes, with some of whom he was even on terms of 

 personal friendship, but when these princely patrons of his, 

 whom he served with love and devotion, were dead, he found 

 little consideration, and indeed at the last neglect from their 

 successors (George of Hanover, who became King of England 



