I should long ago have told you, my dearest friend, how much your letter
of last September delighted me, had I not been so plunged in the vortex
caused by the collision of old and new work, that I have had to deny
myself all correspondence. Since then I have heard from you, and of you
from Ernst and some travelling friends, and can therefore hope that you
continue well. As to what concerns me, I yesterday sent to press the MS.
of the last of the _three_ volumes which are to come out almost together.
Volumes III. and IV. (thirty-six sheets are printed) on the 1st of May;
Volume V. on the 15th of July. I have taken the bold resolution of
acquitting myself of this duty before anything else, that I may then live
for nothing but the “Biblework,” and the contest with knaves and
hypocrites in the interest of the faithful.
In thus concluding “Egypt,” I found it indispensable to give _all_ the
investigations on the beginnings of the human race in a compressed form.
Therefore SET==YAHVEH and all discoveries connected with this down to
Abraham. Also the Bactrian and Indian traditions. I have read on both
subjects all that is to be found here; above all Burnouf (for the second
time), and Lassen’s “Indian Antiquities,” with _Diis minorum gentium_. I
find then in Lassen much which can be well explained by my discoveries in
the Egyptian, Babylonian, and Phœnician, but a huge chasm opens out for
everything concerning the Vedas. I find in particular nothing analogous to
the history of the Deluge, of which you most certainly told me. I
therefore throw myself on your friendship, with the request that you will
write out for me the most necessary points, so far as they do not exist in
Colebrooke and Wilson, which I can order from Berlin. (1.) On the Deluge
tradition; (2.) On the Creation of Man, if there is any; (3.) On the Fall
of Man; (4.) On recollections of the _Primitive Homes_ on the other side
of Meru and Bactria, if such are to be found. I know of course what Lassen
says. I do not expect much, as you know, from these enthusiastic
emigrants; but all is welcome.
One must oppose with all one’s power, and in solemn earnest, such pitiful
nihilism and stupid jokes as Schwenk has made of the Persian mythology. I
have done this in the “Doctrine of Zoroaster;” I am to-day applying to
Haug about some _hard nuts_ in this subject. The number seven predominates
here also, of course, and in the symbolism depends on the time of each
phase of the moon; but the Amshaspands have as little to do with it as
with the moon itself. The Gahanbar resemble the six days of creation, if
the Sanskrit translation by Neriosengh (which I don’t understand) is more
to be trusted than the Vispered. But at all events there is an ideal
element here, which has been fitted in with the old nature worship.
The sanctity of the Hom (havam?) must also be ideal, the plant can only be
a symbol to Zoroaster. Can it be connected with Om? As to the _date_,
Zoroaster the prophet _cannot_ have lived later than 3000 B. C. (250 years
before Abraham therefore), but 6000 or 5000 before Plato may more likely
be correct, according to the statements of Aristotle and Eudoxus. Bactria
(for that surely is Bakhdi) was the first settlement of the Aryans who
escaped from the ice regions towards Sogd. The immigration, therefore, can
hardly fall later than 10,000 or 9000 before Christ. Zoroaster himself
must be considered as _after_ the migration of the Aryans towards the
Punjab, for his demons are your gods.
Now will you please let me have, at latest at Easter, what you can give
me, for on the 25th the continuation of the MS. must go off, and of this
the Indians form a part.
I do not find the account by Megasthenes of Indian beginnings (Plinius and
Arrianus) at all amiss: the Kaliyuga computation of 3102 B. C. is purely
humbug, just like the statement about the beginning of the Chinese times,
to which Lassen gives credit. How can Herodotus have arrived at a female
Mithra, Mylitta? Everything feminine is incompatible with the sun, yet
nowhere, as far as I can see, does any deity corresponding to _Mater_
appear among the Persians or Indians. Altogether _Mithra_ is a knotty
point in the system of Zoroaster, into which it fits like the fist into
the eye.
And now I come to the subject of the inclosed Kuno Fischer has given a
most successful lecture in Berlin on Bacon, which has grown into a book, a
companion to Spinoza and Leibnitz, but much more attractive through the
references to the modern English philosophy and Macaulay’s conception of
Bacon. The book is admirably written. Brockhaus is printing it, and will
let it appear in May or at latest in June, about twenty-five sheets. He
reserves the right of translation. And now I must appeal to your
friendship and your influence, in order to find, 1st, the right
translator, and 2d, the right publisher, who would give the author £50 or
£100, for Fischer is dependent on his own resources. The _clique_ opposes
his appearance: Raumer has declared to the faculty that “a Privat-docent
suspended in any state of the Bund because of his philosophical opinions
which were irreconcilable with Christianity, ought not to teach in
Berlin.” The faculty defends itself. I have written public and private
letters to Humboldt, but what good does that do? Therefore it is now a
matter of consequence to enable this _very_ distinguished thinker and
writer, and remarkably captivating teacher (he had here 300 pupils in
metaphysics), to secure the means of subsistence. Miss Winkworth’s
publisher offered her £150 when she sent him the first chapter of my
“Signs;” Longmans half profits, that is—nothing! I only wish to have the
matter set going. The proof-sheets can be sent.
Who wrote the foolish article in the “Quarterly” against Jowett? The book
will live and bear fruit. We are well, except that George has had scarlet
fever. Frances is nursing him at Rheindorf. Heartily yours.
I have myself undertaken the comparison of the Aryan with the Semitic, on
Lassen’s plan. Two thirds of the stems can be authenticated. What a
scandal is Roth’s deciphering of the Cyprian inscriptions. Renan mourns
over the “Monthly Review,” but is otherwise very grateful. I have made use
of _your_ Alphabet in my “Egypt.”
[69.]
CHARLOTTENBERG, _March 12, 1856_.
MY DEAREST M.,—You receive at once a postscript. I have since read W.’s
essay on the Deluge of the Hindús, in the second volume of the “Indian
Studies;” and can really say now that I understand a little Sanskrit, for
the essay is written in a Brahmanic jargon, thickly strewn with very many
German and French foreign terms. O, what a style! I am still to-day
reading _Roth_ (Münchener Gelehrte Anzeigen). I know therefore what is in
it; that is, a child’s tale which came to India from the Persian Gulf, or
at least from Babylonia, about Oannes, the man in the shape of a fish, who
gives them their revelation and saves them. Have you really nothing
better? It is just like the fable of Deucalion, from the backward-thrown
λᾶς, that is, stones! Or was it ἀπὸ δρυὸς ἥ ἀπὸ _πέτρας_?
Faith in the old beliefs sits very lightly on all the emigrant children of
Japhet. Yet many historical events are clearly buried in the myths before
the Pâ_nd_avas. Wilson’s statement (Lassen, i. 479 n.) of the contents of
a Purâ_n_a, shows still a consciousness of those epochs. There _must_ be
(1) a dwelling in the primitive country (bordering on the ideal), quite
obscure, historically; (2) expulsion, through a change of climate; (3)
life in the land of the Aryans (Iran.); (4) migration to and life in the
Punjab.
For the western Aryans and _for southern Europe_, there is another epoch,
between 6000 and 5000 B. C. at latest, namely, the march of the Cushite
(Turanian) Nimrud (Memnon?) by Susiana, and then across Northern Africa to
Spain. The discovery of Curtius, of the Ionians being Asiatics that had
migrated from Phrygia, who disputed with the Phœnicians for the world’s
commerce long before the colonies started from Europe, is _very_
important.
Write me word what you think of Weber’s Indian-Semitic Alphabet.
I have to-day written to Miss Winkworth, to speak to the publisher. If he
will undertake it and pay Fischer well, both editions would appear at the
same time; and she must then come here in April, to make the translation
from the proof-sheets. The printing begins at Easter.
[70.]