38 Humboldt's Letters. 



two volumes will contain the whole. There will be no 

 notes under the text, but at the end there will be notes 

 appended, containing solid erudition, and minuteness of 

 detail ; these, however, may be left unread. 



The work is not what is commonly called " Physical 

 Description of the Earth." It comprises heaven and 

 earth everything existing. I began to write it fifteen 

 years ago in French, and called it " Essai sur la Phy- 

 sique du Monde." In Germany I thought first of 

 calling it " The Book of Nature /" a title already 

 adopted in the middle age by Albertus Magnus. But 

 all this is too vague. The title shall be "JZbsmos," 

 Sketch of a Physical Description of the World, by A. v. 

 H., enlarged outlines of his Lectures in 1827 and 1828. 

 Cotta, Publisher. 



I wanted to add the word Kosmos, and to force 

 people to call the book by this name in order to avoid 

 their calling it "Humboldt's Physical Geography," 

 which would throw the thing in the class of Mitter- 

 sacher's writings. " Description of the World" (formed 

 after History of the World) would, as a designation 

 seldom used, always be confounded with " Description 

 of the Earth." I know that " Kosmos" sounds rather 

 pretending, and the word is indeed not without a 

 certain " Affeterie ;" but this title says in one and the 

 same striking word, "Heaven and Earth," and is quite 

 opposed to " Gaea," the title of that rather imperfect 



