OF ARTS AND SCIENCES. 247" 



which he brought to his inquiries, and the thoroughness of his teaching, 

 as to his actual contributions to the progress of science, though these 

 have always been acknowledged as of great importance. With a mind 

 eminently qualified for the woi'k by an extensive knowledge of natural 

 history and comparative anatomy, as well as by methodical and careful 

 habits of investigation, he devoted himself earnestly and truthfully to 

 the advancement of his science. Animated by the spirit of an aphorism 

 of Bacon's, which he uses as a motto for one of his own works, " Non 

 fingendum aut excogitandum, sed quid natura facial observandum," he 

 labored to bring everything to the test of direct observation and ex- 

 periment. 



Christian Charles Josias (Baron) Bunsen died at Bonn on 

 the 28th of November, 1860, aged sixty -nine years. 



The key-note to Bunsen's literary life is struck in a single sentence 

 in one of Dr. Arnold's letters : " I find in you that exact combination 

 of tastes which I have in myself, for philological, historical, and philo- 

 sophical pursuits, centring in moral and spiritual truths." In philology 

 he sought to work his way up to the auroral life of mankind. Believ- 

 ing that language is in itself the most ancient and most certain record 

 of the human race, and firmly persuaded of the unity of the race, he 

 valued the remains of early speech as the oldest testimony to mental 

 development, and studied them as great historical facts. In them he 

 hoped to find a clew to the moral and spiritual formation of society. 

 The reconstruction of the history of language would, as he conceived, 

 furnish a scaffolding for the primeval history of religion. With these 

 views, he welcomed every new round in the ladder, as it was fixed or 

 supposed to be fixed by himself or his younger friends, and in his 

 work on Egypt dwelt with peculiar satisfaction on the intermediate, 

 but not unconnected, position which he thought was established for the 

 language of that country, between the Semitic and Indo-Germanic 

 families ; thus bringing together the two great factors of modern civ- 

 ilization, which have supplied the chief elements of his favorite study, 

 the philosophy of univei'sal history. 



Philology, philosophy, and theology were thus cemented in his mind. 

 To him the cardinal truth of historical philosophy was the final victory 

 of the divine principle of truth and justice. He saw in the past a 

 sure movement in that direction, and had no doubt that the future 

 would carry it through. Thus his method was professedly historical. 

 With the ?t«historical spirit, of which he saw about him the evils and 



