172 ALEXANDEE VON HUMBOLDT. 



arranged classification of ideas to which he had been all his life 

 accustomed ruthlessly upset by the younger generation : 



The noble Werner scarce his back had turned, 

 When Neptune's kingdom rudely is o'erthrown. 

 Though all to Hephasstos obedience have learned, 

 I cannot yield him homage : 

 My faith can only on conclusions rest ; 

 Before me many diverse views have passed, 

 Each one by me more hated than the last, 

 New Deities and Idols. 1 



Doubtless Alexander von Humboldt is to be reckoned among 

 these new deities, for he and Leopold von Buch were the titanic 

 destroyers of the realm of Neptune. The chancellor Von 

 Miiller 2 relates that Goethe criticised with some bitterness 

 Humboldt's lecture upon volcanoes in 1824. ' Our friend,' said 

 he, ' has no true genius, he is possessed only of much sound 

 sense and a considerable amount of zeal and perseverance. In 

 aesthetics everyone may think and feel as he pleases, but in 

 science what is untrue and absurd is quite insupportable.' 

 He expressed himself subsequently, in 1828, with an equal 

 amount of pique : 3 ' If Alexander von Humboldt and the other 

 Plutonists incense me too much, I shall not hesitate to expose 

 them to obloquy. I am already secretly preparing several 

 epigrams against them ; posterity shall know that there lived 

 in this century at least one sensible man who could see through 

 these absurdities.' 



Time, however, somewhat modified this angry vehemence. 

 He wrote to Varnhagen on July 8, 1829, in the following 

 strain : 4 ' The sciences (geology, geography, and mineralogy) 



1 ' Kaum wendet der edle Werner den Riicken, 



Zerstort man das poseidaonische Reich. 

 Wenn alle sich von Hephastos biicken, 

 Ich kann es nicht sogleich, 

 Ich weiss nur in der Folge zu schatzen : 

 Schon haV ich manches Credo verpasst, 

 Mir sind sie alle gleich verhasst, 

 Neue Gotter und Gotzen.' 



2 Burckhardt, ' Goethe's Unterhaltungen mit dem Kanzler von Miiller ' 

 (Stuttgart, 1870), p. 56. 



3 Ibid. p. 124. 



4 Paulus, l Geisterrevue/ p. 390. 



