DARWIN AND HUMBOLDT. 



[347] 43 



it. It is not easy to place one's self 

 in the right point of view with ref- 

 erence to these confidential letters. 

 It must be remembered that Hum- 

 boldt was a Republican at heart. 

 His most intimate friends, from 

 Forster, in his early youth, to 

 Arago, in his mature years, were 

 ardent Republicans. He shared their 

 enthusiasm for the establishment of 

 self-government among men. An 

 anecdote preserved to us by Lieber 

 shows that he did not conceal his 

 sympathies, even before the King 

 who honored him so highly. Lieber, 

 who was present at the conversation, 

 gives the following account of it : 

 "The King of Prussia, Humboldt, 

 and Niebuhr were talking of the 

 aff airs of the day, and the latter spoke 

 in no flattering terms of the political 

 views and antecedents of Arago, who, 

 it is well-known, was a very advanced 

 Republican of the Gallican School, an 

 uncomprimising French democrat. 

 Frederic William the Third simply 

 abominated Republicanism ; yet when 

 Niebuhr had finished, Humboldt 

 said with a sweetness which I vividly 

 rememb er : " Still this monster is the 

 dearest friend I have in France." 



Can we, therefore, be surprised, that 

 in his confidential letters to a sym- 

 pathizing friend, he should not refrain 

 from expressing his dislike of the 

 petty intrigues and low sentiments 

 which he met among courtiers. I re- 

 ceived, myself, a letter from Hum 

 k .ildt, written in the days when the 

 reactionary movements were at their 

 height in Prussia, in which, in a strain 

 of deep sadness and despondency, he 

 expresses his regret at the turn po- 

 litical affairs had taken in Europe, 

 and his disappointment at the failure 

 of those aspirations for freedom with 

 which he had felt the deepest sym- 

 pathy in his youth. We may wish 

 that this great man had been wholly 

 consistent, that no shadow had rested 

 upon the loyalty of his character, that 

 he had not accepted the friendship 

 and affection of a King whose court 

 he did not respect and whose weak- 

 nesses he keenly felt. But let us 



remember that his official station 

 there gave him the means of in- 

 fluencing culture and education in his 

 native country in a way which he 

 could not otherwise have done, and 

 that in this respect he made the 

 noblest use of his position. His sym- 

 pathy with the oppressed in every land 

 was profound. We see it in his feel- 

 ing for the aborigines in South Amer- 

 ica, in his abhorrence of slavery. I 

 believe that he would have experien- 

 ced one of the purest and deepest 

 joys of his life had he lived to hear of 

 the abolition of slavery in the United 

 States. His dislike of all subserviency 

 and flattery, whether toward himself 

 or others, was always openly ex- 

 pressed, and was unquestionably gen- 

 uine. 



The philosophical views of Hum- 

 boldt, his position with reference to 

 the gravest and most important 

 questions concerning man's destiny, 

 and the origin of all things, have been 

 often discussed, and the most op- 

 posite opinions have been expressed 

 respecting them by men who seem 

 equally competent to appreciate the 

 meaning of his writings. The modern 

 school of Atheists claims him as their 

 leader ; as such we find him represent- 

 ed by Burmeister in his scientific 

 letters. Others bring forward his 

 sympathy with Christian culture as 

 evidence of his adherence to Chris- 

 tianity in his broadest sense. It is 

 difficult to find in Humboldt's own 

 writings any clew to the exact nature 

 of his convictions. He had too great 

 regard for truth, and he knew too well 

 the Aryan origin of the traditions 

 collected by the Jews, to give his 

 countenance to any creed based upon 

 them Indeed, it was one of his 

 aims to free our civilization from the 

 pressure of Jewish tradition ; but it is 

 impossible to become familiar with his 

 writings without feeling that, if Hum- 

 boldt was not a believer, he was no 

 scoffer. A reverential spirit for every- 

 thing great and good breaths through 

 all his pages. Like a true philosopher, 

 he knew that the time had not yet 

 come for a scientific investigation in- 



