138 PANEGYRISTS OF LINN^US. 



The attacks of his opponents were by no means indifferent to h» 

 ambition; yet he thought it more prudent to commit them to oblivion, 

 than to acquire notoriety in defence of his name. His whole way of 

 thinking in this respeft, he expresses in the best manner in a letter to 

 Baron Hal ler, written in the year 1748*, when the latter had a 

 dispute with the Aulic Counsellor Hamberger of Jena<) about res- 

 piration. 



« If you will listen to the counsel of a sincere friend, I advise yoi» 

 " to give up the dispute with Hamberger and his whole set. Nay, 

 « that man is not your equal. The more he is beneath you, the more it 

 " aggrandizes his reputation and his notability, which is otherwise com- 



pressed in a very small sphere. Boerhaave, our great pattern never 

 " replied. I still remember what he told me." — « Never," said he, 



answer attacks. I promised to take his counsel, and found it 

 *' answered well. Your time, my dear Haller, is too precious to the 



public. You can do more for science than hundreds of others^ 

 " The plurality of men judge of matters which they do not understand. 

 ** How do kings wage war ? Their very conquests are attended with the 

 " loss of many thousands of subjects. Thus it is with the learned. If 

 « even they triumph, it happensby lessening their influence and merit. Be 



our assertions true or false, they will so remain, v/hether we defend them 

 ♦< ar not. Children, now occupied with infant sports, will judge us when 

 ** once we are gone. The hypotheses of Hamberger will never be 

 «* permanent if they are erroneous, however much they may enjoy the 

 « transitory triumph of deluded fashion. Remember the disputes of out 

 « ancestors in botany. Does not the very perusal of them inspire with 



* Epist. ad Haller, vol. ii. p. 409. 



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