154 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 



this letter, containing some important expressions in refer- 

 ence to the evangelical Jesuits in Prussia, be kept secret 

 till after the death of the prince.' The ' important expres- 

 sions ' employed by Wittgenstein are the less calculated to 

 create surprise, from the circumstance that the pietism which 

 was beginning to assert itself in Halle, and endeavouring to 

 undermine the influence of the school of Hegel at Berlin, was 

 setting itself in opposition to the new hymn-book which, in 

 the opinion of Humboldt, had been ' most judiciously com- 

 piled,' 1 and was, consequently, acting indirectly in opposition 

 to the Grovernment. In his * promiscuous writings ' Varn- 

 hagen has given a graphic description of the manner in which 

 Humboldt was accustomed to satirise, in the brilliant assem- 

 blies that gathered round Eahel, the various forms of piety 

 and hypocrisy that had 'come under his notice during his 

 extensive experience.' 2 Who could have suspected that the 

 new .pietism just then rising into notice amid the opposition 

 of the leading circles of the capital, was in the following reign 

 to exert undisputed sway ? Yet Humboldt was soon aware 

 that this state of things, although ' it might be treated with 

 ridicule, was becoming in real earnest a serious evil.' Though 

 he did not live to witness the complete degradation to which 

 the internal administration of Prussia was destined to sink 

 during the middle of the present century, he could not fail even 

 in those days to experience the grief, distress, and anxiety 

 which the unworthy and illiberal policy of the Grovernment 

 was fitted to produce ; and in these sentiments he met with 

 most hearty sympathy from his brother William, with whom 

 he enjoyed unity of thought on many similar topics. 



We cannot close this chapter without referring to the beauti- 

 ful affection that united the brothers in such close intimacy 

 during this period of their lives, and which had constituted, as 

 we have seen, the only real attraction offered to Alexander in 

 his settlement at Berlin. 'I cannot tell you,' he writes to 

 William from Moscow, on November 5, 1829, c how rejoiced I 

 am to hear that you lost your sciatica before going to Grastein, 



1 From a letter to Nagler of May 8, 1830, in W. F. A. Zimmermann's 

 < Humboldtbuch/ vol. ii. p. 38. 



2 ' Der Salon der Frau von Varnhagen ' (Berlin, March 1830). 



