238 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 



for, and without order, so that his vacillation, always re- 

 markable, was occasionally incomprehensible, and had more the 

 appearance of the wavering of weakness than the aimless exer- 

 cise of will. He was a born dilettante, not only in the arts, for 

 which he had considerable taste, and in politics, for which he 

 almost felt an aversion, but even in the affairs of social life ; 

 always full of schemes and impulses, always striving after some- 

 thing new, at first in a spirit of noble emulation, but soon 

 becoming exhausted, dispirited, disenchanted, wearied, and 

 embittered. Nothing was ever carried to completion ; of his 

 actions little is to be said, and that only of a negative character ; 

 steadiness of purpose he alone displayed in his opposition to 

 all the requirements of his century. For it seemed as if fate 

 had prescribed to him a class of duties which he was least 

 capable of performing ; he conceded that which was least re- 

 quired, and considered it to be his first duty to withhold that 

 which was most earnestly coveted. For this his antecedents and 

 early education were to blame, for upon his accession to the 

 throne his character was as far complete as was possible to a 

 nature like his. 



The traditions connected with a religion prescribed by an 

 ecclesiastical polity and a strictly monarchical form of govern- 

 ment, among which he had been nurtured, had been early 

 grafted into his mind, and, in accordance with his usual custom, 

 been invested with a phantasy of his own his taste for the 

 romantic leading him to clothe them with a kind of fictitious 

 beauty. Against the systematised theories of modern liberalism, 

 which struggled with increasing impatience for practical reali- 

 sation, he was imbued with deep hatred. The more keenly he 

 was conscious of his vacillation and of his almost feminine 

 susceptibility, which to a large extent was due to physical 

 defects, the more did he feel bound to display force of character 

 and strength of will. It so happened that in his views of the 

 political wants of the age there lay some elements of truth 

 that had been too hastily rejected by the levelling doctrines 

 of the day. Hence arose the conflict of his life: the conces- 

 sion of a liberal constitution was the one great demand urged 

 upon him by the majority of hie subjects ; but his opposition 



