107. HUMBOLDT TO VARNHAGEN.
Friedrich Kapp translation
Berlin, Feb. 20th, 1846.
Do you guess, my dear friend, who sent me this strange article? Do you guess anything from the seal and the name on the envelope, “M.?” Is that the author, and to what journal may the article belong? Profound, of enlarged political views, it certainly is not. The passage on p. 8 is underscored by the author himself, and it contains a contradiction! Prussia is to have unity in an American confederacy. His remarks, p. 3, on Frederick II. and on his works, and on “Kant a guillotine,” p. 5, are as Minister Thiele would write them. I am indignant at both. The author knows all the news, all the names, all the gossip, of the “Eckensheher,”[45] and is touched by the liberalism of Bodelschwingh, p. 14, who 204still defends every day the expulsion of the Baden Representatives. He does not dare to name Eichhorn with censure. The last line only is grand and fine.
With unalterable devotion,
Yours,
A. v. Humboldt.
Friday.