Читать книгу Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 453 - Various - Страница 2

We have been reading with profound interest the life and letters of one of the great men of Germany, Barthold Niebuhr, published very recently in an English garb.1 The original work we have not seen, but we understand it is about one-third larger than the present selection, made in a great measure under the auspices of the Chevalier Bunsen, the friend of Niebuhr, and his immediate successor in the Prussian embassy to Rome. The interest of the book is, indeed, principally derived from the private letters of Niebuhr, the greater part of which were addressed to his early friend, M^me Hensler, whose younger sister was his first wife, and her niece his second. Most unfortunately, the valuable series of his letters to his father was destroyed by fire a short time before his own death; but the account given of him by M^me Hensler is quite sufficient to connect all that remains; and from this, and one or two other sources open to us, we shall try to fill up our present narrative.

Niebuhr is one of those men whose advent forms an era in the history of human knowledge. It is a mistake, however, to suppose that he was the first to infuse even into Roman story that element of doubt which has changed the whole fabric of historical science. If Niebuhr was a mere sceptic, he would be only the humble follower of Bayle, Lesurgnes de Pouilly, and other writers of the last century; but his merit lies in reconstruction—in the jealous care with which he distinguishes between the true monuments of history and the mass of traditional rubbish in which they lay entombed. In his Roman history, however, although by that alone he is known in England, we find only a portion of the intellectual man: he was learned in the learning of all times, modern as well as ancient; and yet he was so completely immersed, not merely as an observer, but as a participator, in the business of the world and the great events of his own time, that even literature seems to have been little more than a study indulged in during the pauses of active life. The history of a mind so vast is by no means, we are aware, adapted for pages like ours; and yet it seems important—indeed indispensable—that in a popular journal, flowing on with the spirit of the age, we should trace some authentic records of the character and career of the man.

Carsten Niebuhr, the father of the historian, had not the advantages of early education. He was no more than a free peasant, living on the marsh-farm in Friesland, which had been possessed by several generations of his ancestors; but at the age of two-and-twenty he put himself under mathematical tutorship at Hamburg, and then studied at Gottingen. He was invited to join a mission which the Danish government determined to send into Arabia; and the proposal, at first scarcely made in earnest to the half-educated young farmer, was accepted by him with eagerness. By a singular fatality, he was the only one of the travellers sent out on this expedition who returned; he was absent more than six years, during four of which he was alone, all his companions being dead. He had added largely to what was previously known of Egypt; had made scientific observations of great value in the deserts of Arabia, and undergone prodigious hardships; but the most remarkable thing was, that his eagerness to fulfil in some measure the purposes of the expedition, made the whole journey a work of preparation and study, as well as of actual exploration. In 1773, being then just forty years of age, he married the orphan daughter of Dr Blumenberg, a Thuringian physician, and lived at Copenhagen, with the rank of captain of engineers, till the year 1778. He then removed to Meldorf, a town in the province of Ditmarsch, Holstein, where he settled for life as collector of the revenues of the district.

Barthold George Niebuhr was born in Copenhagen on the 27th of August 1776; but with the little old town of Meldorf—once the capital of an ancient commonwealth—his earliest associations were connected. A kind of rude equality still reigned in the manners of the rustic population, which was not likely to be disturbed by the influx of the world into a bleak and gloomy district remote from the great roads. Here young Niebuhr grew up a studious and solitary boy; instructed by his father in French, the rudiments of Latin, and above all, in geography and history, which the old traveller taught him to illustrate by maps and plans, and by digging regular fortifications in the garden. The sheriff of Meldorf, and editor of the Deutsches Museum, a man of both fancy and learning, assisted in this early education; and the boy—who had never been a child—employed himself, even at seven years of age, in writing down the instructions he received. In future years, he regretted his having thus 'lost the life of a child.' 'I found matter for my childish fancy only in books, engravings, or conversation. I drew into its sphere all I read, and I read without reason and without aim; but the real world was closed to me, and I could not conceive or imagine anything which had not been first conceived or imagined by another.'

From this second-hand world he removed at the age of thirteen, when he was sent to the school at Meldorf, where the principal, Dr Jäger, gave him as much attention as he could spare for a pupil, who, though much the youngest, was the most advanced in the class. Afterwards, finding it was impossible to do for him what this strange child required, Dr Jäger advised his removal, and gave him a private lesson of an hour every day instead. This was continued with only a few months' interruption and unsuccessful trial of a school at Hamburg, till Barthold was eighteen, when he was sent to the university of Kiel.

His interest in politics dated from a very early period. At the age of eleven, he studied the newspapers, English ones especially, which he read with ease; and his knowledge of geography enabled him to follow all the details of a campaign with vivid interest.

His going to the university was an important incident in his life. His particular vocation, indeed, seems to have been clear enough from even an earlier period; for though he was a learned linguist, history especially, and philology, were the pursuits to which his heart was given. The letters he wrote from Kiel to his parents are amiable, full of affectionate outpourings about the new men and women to whom he was introduced, about his studies, and about his theories. He profits by the kindness of the physician, Dr Hensler, whose house and friendly advice were always accessible; but he declines evening-parties; and contemplates the mountain of knowledge, up whose steep sides he has yet to climb, with profound awe and some anxiety. 'My head swims when I survey what I have yet to learn—philosophy, mathematics, physics, chemistry, natural history. Then, too, I must perfect myself in history, German, and French; study Roman law, and the political constitutions of Europe, as far as I can, &c.; and all this must be done within five years at most.... I must know all these things; but how I shall learn them, Heaven knows! That I shall require them as a learned man, or in any position I may occupy, I am fully convinced.'

In Dr Hensler's house he saw frequently M^me Hensler, the widow of the doctor's son. She was six years older than Niebuhr; but to him, unused to female society, and admitted at once into domestic familiarity with a sensible and engaging woman, this disparity was nothing—perhaps, indeed, it added to the charm. From other sources, we learn that he at first became attached to M^me Hensler herself; but being discouraged as a lover, allowed her to introduce him to her younger sister, Amelia Behrens, a beautiful and intellectual woman; and although the attachment he then formed was not sudden or violent, it became very profound. After his engagement with this lady in 1797, and before his marriage, he visited England; and in Scotland—chiefly in Edinburgh—he spent nearly a year. The account given in his letters of his sojourn in our capital, would interest and amuse many of its present inhabitants. The Edinburgh of 1797 was more different perhaps from its present self in outward things, than in mental characteristics. His remarks on the want of a more open manifestation of feeling and affection among his friends there are striking. 'It is quite a national trait,' he says, 'not to dwell on what concerns us personally, upon what fills our heart; and it is as unnatural to them to hear me speak of the topics upon which I am feeling strongly, as it would be to do the same themselves.... I am far from attributing it to coldness in these good people. It is altogether national, and it is the same with every one I have known here, whatever their rank, calling, learning, or sex. It has quite surprised me, for example, that if you meet a person in whose family some one has been ill, he will hardly allude to it, beyond a short answer to your inquiries, or speak of it with any feeling. In this way, it must be allowed, people may easily be independent of each other. I believe firmly that the Scots love their children—that Playfair is a good father; and yet the former only speak of them because they have them with them in the evenings, and the boys make their presence known: the latter behaves exactly as if his boy were not in the room. So far from inviting me to speak of my relations, so far from Mr Scott making any inquiries as to my father's position—though he is, nevertheless, as much attached to him as possible—they have met every attempt on my part to talk to them on these subjects with a silence which admits of no other explanation, than that it is not in good taste to say much about these things. They have never once asked after my mother and sister.' We have copied the above, because there is no trace in any part of Niebuhr's writings, former or latter, of narrow national judgments; and he repeatedly bears testimony to the fatherly kindness with which he was welcomed, especially in the two houses mentioned in the above extract. It is simply the sense of a difference, and a difference we should be inclined to regret as well as he, between the German and the English or Scotch habit. We shall never forget the earnest, pained manner in which a young German in England once said, when adverting to the case of some very irreproachable English youths, who yet were never heard to express a feeling, scarcely to utter a kind thing: 'Your young countrymen seem to me positively ashamed of being good.'

The diligence of Niebuhr, though often impeded by illness, was immense. Languages, philosophy, history, natural science, all took their turn. His number of languages was not short of twenty at this time, and in some he was profoundly versed—in most, very respectably. But the most remarkable thing through life was his memory, and its wonderful combination of retentiveness and readiness. This, rather than the imaginative power, it was that made his descriptions so graphic. Seeing and retaining everything, he painted as if all history was before him. When he spoke of a striking event, the coast, the mountain-line, or the plain, all the accompaniments rose up and were grouped before him. You felt carried away with him, as if he had lived there, and was taking you up by the way.

His return to Denmark took place late in 1799. A double appointment awaited him at Copenhagen—two government offices, neither bringing in a large salary, but sufficient to allow of his marrying; and accordingly Amelia Behrens became his wife in May 1800. The five following years found him engaged in the civil service at Copenhagen—sometimes in very onerous and uncongenial duties, sometimes in a position of peril, for the bombardment of the city under Nelson took place in 1801, and he keenly entered into every political incident. During this period of five years, his official service was more than once changed, but it seems always to have been connected with finance. He still found time for study, straining every power of his mind, he says, at one time in investigating Roman history, sure 'that the representations of all the moderns, without exception, are but mistaken, imperfect glimpses of the truth.' This Copenhagen life allowed him time but for one visit to his parents; and a disappointment which annoyed him considerably, in what, he thought, a just expectation of preferment, disposed him, in 1806, to accept an offer from the Prussian government of a post at Berlin not unlike that he had occupied in Copenhagen, but promising many advantages in society and literary opportunities.

Never was there a more disastrous commencement of a new career. The Niebuhrs reached Berlin in October 5, 1806, and on the 14th came the dreadful battles of Jena and Auerstadt, while Napoleon, with his conquering army, marched rapidly upon the city, and seven of the Prussian ministers gave in their allegiance to the French without even the ceremony of communicating with their king. The new bank-director shared in the general misfortune, and was forced to fly, with the court and ministry, first to Danzig, then to Konigsberg, afterwards to Memel and Riga. A fearful time it was; yet still Niebuhr could write soothingly to his parents: 'You must not be uneasy: I can earn a living either as a scholar or a merchant; and if I do not succeed in one country, I shall in another.' To M^me