In May, 1858, Mr. Ticknor received the following letter from Baron Humboldt, of which, according to the request in the postscript, he immediately sent a translation to one of the Boston daily newspapers, with an appropriate preface. This does not[410] the largest-sized print. And apropos of this, did you ever read Mrs. Barbauld's ‘Essay on Inconsistent Expectations’? It is a little harsh and uncomfortable in its tone, but there is a cruel wisdom in it about education, which often comes up to plague me. . . . . I have always had two fixed ideas about young men: first, that they should be substantially educated in the country where they are probably to live; and second, that not a small part of the value of a university or public-school education consists in adjusting a young man, during the most flexible period of his life, to his place among the associates who can best help him onward. To these two considerations I should always be willing to sacrifice a good deal. But the question of exactly how much must be settled in each particular case, balancing all advantages and disadvantages. And this is exactly your trouble now. I wish I could help you, as you suggest, but I cannot. He who stands in the centre is the only person who can see truly all the relations of the circumference.
To Robert H. Gardiner, Esq.
dear Mr. Gardiner,—I received with much pleasure your kind letter of the 17th, and the copy of Buckle, all safe and in good condition.2 It is a remarkable book, as you say, and shows an astonishing amount of knowledge for a man of his years, and a power of generalization remarkable at any age. His views of what is connected with our spiritual nature are, no doubt, unsound, and his radicalism is always offensive. I have seldom read a book with which I have so often been angry, and yet I have learnt, I think, a great deal from it, and had my mind waked up by it upon many matters, for it has suggested to me a great variety of points for inquiry, of which I might otherwise never have thought. . . . . Yours very faithfully,
This text is part of:
In May, 1858, Mr. Ticknor received the following letter from Baron Humboldt, of which, according to the request in the postscript, he immediately sent a translation to one of the Boston daily newspapers, with an appropriate preface. This does not
1 In another letter, of nearly the same date, he says: ‘I shall be in town a great deal, and do my work there rather than in the country.’
2 Lent by Mr. Ticknor to Mr. Gardiner.
Boston, J. R. Osgood and company, 1876.
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