EINSTEIN'S LIFE AND PERSONALITY
WE know from the biographies of great thinkers that they seldom
personify the character of a dramatic ideal. They are not heroes of
fiction who pass through complex experiences and struggle with
mysterious problems of existence that may unduly excite the imagination
of observers. Whoever follows their development remarks in the majority
of cases the predominance of the inner life, the course of which is
discoverable only by study of their works, no clue being given in the
confusion of ordinary exterior manifestations. An eminent man of
thought, whose energies are concentrated on mental effort, rarely finds
time to present in addition an interesting figure in the epic sense. The
poet who moulds his forms from life finds little scope in him as a
model, and only in exceptional cases has he succeeded in idealizing the
savant in a work of art.
It would be a fruitless undertaking to treat Einstein's life as one of
these exceptional cases. It is possible to trace the various phases of
his development, yet neither the writer nor the reader must disguise
from himself the fact that such outlines give only the external picture
of the man and chronological events of importance. Nevertheless, a book
of which he forms the theme cannot pass over the task of giving his
_curriculum vitæ_. And if it should partly appear aphoristic and
disjointed, it must be borne in mind that this account originated from
conversations and scraps of conversation that touched on various
episodes of his life, according as they had a bearing on the subject
under discussion.
The story of Einstein's life begins at Ulm, the town which possesses the
highest building in Germany. Gladly would I stand on the belfry of the
Ulm Cathedral in order to obtain a general survey of Einstein's youth.
But the view discloses nothing beyond the bare fact that he was born
there in March 1879. The detail which has already been mentioned above,
namely, that it was something physical that first arrested the child's
attention, remains to be noted. His father once showed the infant, as he
lay in his cot, a compass, simply with the idea of amusing him--and in
the five-year-old boy the swinging metal needle awakened for the first
time the greatest wonderment about unknown cohesive forces, a wonderment
that was an index of the research spirit that was still lying dormant in
his consciousness. The remembrance of this psychical event has a
significant meaning for the Einstein of to-day. In him all the
impressions of early childhood seem to be still vivid, the more so as
all other physical occurrences, such as the falling of an unsupported
body, left no impression on him. His attention was fixed on the compass,
and the compass alone. This instrument addressed him in oracular
language, indicating to him an electromagnetic field that was in later
years to serve him as a domain for fruitful research.
His father, who had a sunny, optimistic temperament, and was inclined
towards a somewhat aimless existence, at this time moved the seat of the
family from Ulm to Munich. They here lived in a modest house in an
idyllic situation and surrounded by a garden. The pure joy of Nature
entered into the heart of the boy, a feeling that is usually foreign to
the youthful inhabitants of cities of dead stone. Nature whispered song
to him, and at the coming of the spring-tide infused his being with joy,
to which he resigned himself in happy contemplation. A religious
undercurrent of feeling made itself manifest in him, and it was
strengthened by the elementary stimulus of the scented air, of buds and
bushes, to which was added the educational influence of home and school.
This was not because ritualistic habits reigned in the family. But it
had so happened that he learned simultaneously the teachings of the
Jewish as well as the Catholic Church; and he had extracted from them
that which was common and conducive to a strengthening of faith, and not
what conflicted.
Youthful impetuosity, which in boys of a similar age usually expresses
itself in rash enterprises and loose tricks, did not appear in him. His
spirit was adjusted to contemplation, and an inborn fatalism, diffused
with a super-sensuous element appertaining to dreams, restrained him
from responding to external impulses. He reacted slowly and
hesitatingly, and he interpreted what his senses offered him and all the
little experiences of early days in terms of a reverence reflected from
within. Words did not easily rise from his lips, and measured by the
ordinary scale of rapidity of learning and readiness in answering
questions, he would scarcely have been judged to possess unusual gifts.
As an infant he had started to talk so late that his parents had been in
some alarm about the possibility of an abnormality in their child. At
the age of eight or nine years he presented the picture of a shy,
hesitating, unsociable boy, who passed on his way alone, dreaming to
himself, and going to and from school without feeling the need of a
comrade. He was nicknamed "Biedermaier," because he was looked on as
having a pathological love for truth and justice. What at that time
seemed to be pathological, to-day appears as a deeply rooted and
irrepressible natural instinct. Whoever has got to know Einstein as a
man and as a scientist knows that this failing of his boyhood was but
the forerunner of a very healthy outlook.
Signs of his love for music showed themselves very early. He thought out
little songs in praise of God, and used to sing them to himself in the
pious seclusion that he preserved even with respect to his parents.
Music, Nature, and God became intermingled in him in a complex of
feeling, a moral unity, the traces of which never vanished, although
later the religious factor became extended to a general ethical outlook
on the world. At first he clung to a faith free from all doubt, as had
been infused into him by the private Jewish instruction at home and the
Catholic instruction at school. He read his Bible without feeling the
need of examining it critically; he accepted it as a simple moral
teaching and found himself little inclined to confirm it by rational
arguments inasmuch as his reading extended very little beyond its
circle.
Painful inner conflicts were not wanting. Jewish children formed a small
minority in the school, and it was here that the boy Albert felt the
first ripples of the anti-semitic wave that, sweeping on from without,
was threatening to overwhelm master and pupil alike. For the first time
he felt himself oppressed by something that was not in harmony with his
simple temperament. His modesty made him a prey to injustice, and in
defending himself his originally gentle and restrained nature gained a
certain independence and individuality.
If one may speak of achievements at all in a preparatory school, those
of Albert were of the average modest level. He was careful as a pupil,
generally satisfied requirements, but in no way betrayed special
talents: indeed, so much the less, as he showed himself to be possessed
of a very uncertain memory for words. The methodic plan of the
elementary school that he attended to his tenth year was, however, not
other than the usual scheme mapped out by drill-masters; it made up for
what was lacking in an understanding of the pupils by applying drastic
strictness. The beautiful sentence of Jean Paul: "Memory is the only
paradise from which we cannot be banished," finds no echo in Einstein's
school memories, of which he has often spoken to me without a shadow of
regret for a lost paradise. He told me with bitter sarcasm that his
teachers had the character of sergeants--those later in the _gymnasium_
(secondary school) were of the nature of lieutenants. Both terms are
used in the pre-armistice sense, and his words were directed against the
self-opinionated tone and customs of these garrison-schools of earlier
days.
The next stage of his development was a course of study at the
Luitpold-Gymnasium in Munich, which placed him in the second class. In
Einstein's retrospect of these days more friendly recollections present
themselves, connected, however, only with particular persons, and not
breathing praise in general; on the contrary, from his account, it is
clear that although he conceived affection for individual teachers, he
felt the tone of the institute as a whole to be rough. As we know, many
things have been changed in these schools since then, following on a
revulsion from the convict atmosphere that used to characterize them,
and which meant suffering enough for the pupils. The result was that the
schoolboy Einstein developed a contempt for human institutions and
assigned little value to the subjects of study which he was obliged to
absorb in schematic form without the application of his own mental
energy. This gloomy picture is relieved at points by the presence of
several teachers, above all, one called Ruëss, who took pains in
exposing the beauty of classical antiquity to the fourteen-year-old boy.
We learn elsewhere that Einstein at present admits the humanistic ideal
for the school of the future only under very restricted limitations. But
when he thinks of this teacher and his influence, a warm appreciation of
classical study vibrates in his words, occasionally rising, indeed, to
an unbounded enthusiasm for the treasures of Greek history and
literature. His instruction was not restricted to the acquisition of a
perspective of the antique. Under the direction of the same teacher, he
was introduced into the poetic world of his native country, and learned
the magic of Goethe in his "Hermann and Dorothea"; this poem, as he
confesses, was explained to him in a really model manner. Thus there
were some oases in the desert of schematic teaching: they served as
refreshing halts for the spirit of the eager young searcher after
knowledge.
We must go back one or two years to note a weighty experience, which
occurred when he made his first acquaintance with elementary
mathematics; this subject presented itself to him with the intensity of
a revelation. It did not happen in the ordinary course of school-work,
but was due to a sort of wizard-like inquiring inner spirit that plied
him with questions and that gave him inward thrills of joy when he found
a sharp-witted solution. From the very beginning Albert proved himself
to be a good solver of problems, even before he achieved an arithmetical
virtuosity, and before he knew the technique of equations. He helped
himself by means of little tricks, experimented roundabout inventions,
and was happily excited when they led to the goal. One day he asked his
uncle, Jacob Einstein, an engineer who lived in Munich, a certain
question. He had heard the word "algebra" and surmised that his uncle
would be able to explain the term to him. Uncle Jacob answered: "Algebra
is the calculus of indolence. If you do not know a certain quantity, you
call it _x_ and treat it as if you do know it, then you put down the
relationship given, and determine this _x_ later." That was quite
sufficient. The boy received a book containing algebraic problems that
he solved all alone in accordance with this not exhaustive but expedient
direction. On another occasion Uncle Jacob told him the enunciation of
Pythagoras' theorem without giving him a proof. His nephew understood
the relationship involved, and felt that it had to be founded on some
reasoning. Again he set about all alone to furnish what was wanting.
This was, however, not a case for the "calculus of indolence" with an
_x_ that was to be determined. Here it was a question of developing a
facility for geometric argument, such as very few possess at such an
early stage of development. The boy plunged himself for three weeks into
the task of solving the theorem, using all his power of thought. He came
to consider similarity of triangles (by dropping a perpendicular from
one vertex of the right-angled triangle on to the hypotenuse), and was
thus led to a proof for which he had so ardently longed! And although it
concerned only a very old well-known theorem, he experienced the first
joy of the discoverer. The proof that he had found proved that the
ingenuity of the worrying young mind was awakening.
A new world was opened for him when he made the acquaintance of A.
Bernstein's comprehensive popular books on scientific subjects. This
work is looked on nowadays as being somewhat antiquated and, in the eyes
of many a professional scientist, has sunk to the level of a
pseudo-scientific "shocker"; even when Einstein as a boy made
explorations in it, there were signs of rust and decay in the work, for
it originated in the fifties of the previous century and, in point of
subject-matter, had long been transcended. Yet it could be read
then--and even now--as a story containing thousands of interspersed
physical, astronomical, and chemical wonders, and for the boy Einstein
it came to be a true book of Nature, which presented to his mind, greedy
for knowledge, as much as it did to his imagination.
Other vistas were opened up to him by Büchner's _Kraft und Stoff_
(_Force and Substance_), a book the cheapness of which he could not yet
discern, but which called up wonder in him without rousing his
criticism. In addition, his attention was chiefly occupied by a handbook
of elementary planimetry, containing an abundance of geometrical
exercises, which he fearlessly attacked and within a very short time
solved almost in their entirety. His delight grew when he ventured into
the difficulties of analytical geometry and infinitesimal calculus quite
apart from the curriculum of his school-work. Lübsen's textbook had
fallen into his hands, and these directions sufficed for his audacious
spirit. Whereas many of his school companions were still standing
undecidedly before the pools of theorems of congruence and repeating
decimals, he was already disporting himself freely in the ocean of
infinitesimals. His work did not remain concealed, and gained
appreciation. His mathematical teacher declared that the
fifteen-year-old boy was ripe for university study.
Yet he was not to find a way into the open by matriculating very early,
but through an event that unexpectedly threw him into new surroundings
of life. In 1894 his parents transferred their abode to Italy. The
chronicler has nothing to report of pangs of separation in Albert when
he left Bavarian soil. He was glad to get away from the drill academy,
Luitpold, and, as an inhabitant of Milan, he enjoyed the change in his
existence, and was not encumbered by attacks of home-sickness. All in
all, he had felt himself in an unhappy position under school compulsion
in Munich, in spite of the mathematical delights he had provided for
himself, and in spite of the rapturous moments that musical revelations
had created for him since his twelfth year. Defiance and distrust
against outside influences had remained active in him as forces that did
not allow the happy disposition proper to his age to assert itself. But
now the fetters had fallen and the pent-up joy of life burst forth as if
through opened sluices. The sun and landscape of the South, Italian
manners of life, art freely displayed in the market-place and on the
street, realized for him dream-pictures that had appeared to him earlier
during the hours of oppression. Whatever he saw, felt, and experienced
lay outside the ordinary course of his life, awakened his sense for
natural and human things, and set his spirit free from all bonds. There
was no question of his going to school in the first six months. He
enjoyed complete freedom, occupied himself with literature, and
undertook extended excursions. Starting from Pavia, he wandered all
alone over the Apennine to Genoa. Whilst he was being intoxicated with
the sublime Alpine landscape, he came into contact with the lower
stratum of the people, who aroused his deepest sympathy. The tour took
him over a short stretch of the Italian Riviera, the beauties of
which, as depicted by Böcklin, do not seem to have revealed themselves
to him. At that time he was probably subject to a feeling of upward
striving such as possessed Zarathustra.
With all their joys and inspirations the experiences in Italy remained
but a short episode. Einstein resolved on a new tour, which was not
without a professional purpose. He made a pilgrimage to Switzerland with
the intention of studying mathematics and physics at the Zürich
Polytechnical Institute. But he was not to be successful in his first
effort to gain entrance. The conditions of entry required a standard in
descriptive sciences and modern languages that he had not yet reached.
So he turned to Aarau, where he was allowed to extend his knowledge with
the help of excellent methods at the Canton school. Even it the present
day Einstein talks with extreme enthusiasm of the organization of this
model school that corresponds in rank approximately to a German
Realgymnasium (or an English Grammar School). There was nothing to
remind him of the continual manipulation of the sceptre of authority at
the Luitpold school barracks; he easily obtained his leaving
certificate, and now the portals of the Zürich Polytechnicum were open
for him.
He himself was probably not aware that he carried a marshal's baton in
his own mathematical equipment. But, in looking back, we come across
astounding things. For it is a fact that even in the pupil at Aarau
problems had taken root that already lay in the vanguard of research at
that time. He was not yet a finder, but what he sought as a
sixteen-year-old boy was already stretching into the realms of his later
discoveries. We have here simply to register facts, and to abstain from
making an analysis of his development, for how are we to trace out the
intermediate steps, and to discover the sudden phases of thought that
lead a very young Canton pupil to feel his way into a still undiscovered
branch of physics? The problem that occupied him was the optics of
moving bodies, or, more exactly, the emission of light from bodies that
move relatively to the ether. This contains the first flash of the
grandiose complex of ideas that was later to lead to a revision of our
picture of the world. And if a biographer should state that the first
beginnings of the doctrine of relativity occurred at that time, he would
not be making an objectively false statement.
The ambitions of the youth by no means reached these flights of
imagination, for whereas the latter signified the coming power of his
wings, he himself set a modest goal. He wished to become a schoolmaster,
and imagined that in choosing this career he was allowing his hopes to
run high. This was in conformity with the esteem in which he held the
status of teachers. In the Zürich Technical School there is a section
equipped as a department for preparing teachers, and in this Einstein
studied from the age of seventeen to the age of twenty-one, perfectly
satisfied with the thought of sitting, not on the pupil's bench, but at
the master's desk, and of exercising a beneficial if limited influence
as a preceptor of the young.
He was still under the sway of the feeling that he was not sufficiently
experienced in life and that he dare not venture out into the light for
existence in the great turmoil of the world. He saw in this struggle,
which pitted man against man, led to exhibitions of violence, and
aroused ambition for glittering unrealities, cause only for disgust and
alienation. The prospect of personal success did not lure him to try
force against force. Thus, for the time being, it was his ideal to lead
a very modest existence. From various quarters he had been given hopes
of a position as assistant to some professor of physics or mathematics.
But for unknown reasons he was everywhere refused. These apparently
obscure grounds, it must be said with regret, become clearer when we
bear in mind his confession of faith. Nor did his hopes of teaching at a
gymnasium seem near fulfilment, as certain conditions of birth raised
obstacles. In the first place, he was not a Swiss; in fact, since his
stay in Milan he was without a nationality at all in the bureaucratic
sense, and then he had no personal connexions, without which, at least
at that time, there was no chance of progress even for a talented
person. Yet the young student who was entirely without protection of any
sort had to overcome the cares and satisfy the needs of daily life. He
could not rely on material help from his parents, who themselves lived
in restricted circumstances, and thus we find him a little later in
Schaffhausen and Bern, where he earned a small pittance as a private
tutor.
He found consolation in the fact that he preserved a certain
independence, which meant the more to him as his instinct for freedom
led him to discover the essential things in himself. Thus, earlier, too,
during his studies at Zürich he had carried on his work in theoretical
physics at home, almost entirely apart from the lectures at the
Polytechnic, plunging himself into the writings of Kirchhoff, Helmholtz,
Hertz, Boltzmann, and Drude. Disregarding chronological order, we must
here mention that he found a partner in these studies who was working in
a similar direction, a Southern Slavonic student, whom he married in the
year 1903. This union was dissolved after a number of years. Later he
found the ideal of domestic happiness at the side of a woman whose grace
is matched by her intelligence, Else Einstein, his cousin, whom he
married in Berlin.
In 1901, after living in Switzerland for five years, he acquired the
citizenship of Zürich, and this at last gave him the opportunity of
rising above material cares. His University friend, Marcel Grossmann,
lent him a helping hand by recommending him to the Swiss Patent Office,
the director of which was his personal friend. Einstein occupied himself
here from 1902 to 1905 as a technical expert, that is, as an examiner of
applications for patents, and this position gave him the chance of
moving about in absolute freedom in the realms of technical science.
Whoever has a strong predilection for discovery will perhaps feel
estranged to find Einstein so long in the sphere of "invention," but, as
Einstein himself emphasizes very strongly, both regions make great
demands on clearly defined and accurate thought. He recognizes a
definite relationship between the knowledge that he gained at the Patent
Office and the theoretical results that appeared at the same time as
products of intensive thought.
In 1905, in the midst of his work, the storm broke loose in him with the
suddenness of a hurricane. In quick succession his mind disburdened
itself of the abundance of ideas that had stored themselves up in the
work of the preceding years, and these ideas signify more to us than a
definite stage in the development of an individual. What physicists have
come to regard as an elaboration of the heritage of Galilei and Newton
had matured in him. We merely record the title of dissertations, which
appeared in 1905 in the _Annalen der Physik_: "Concerning a Heuristic
Standpoint towards the Production and Transformation of
Light"--"Concerning the Inertia of Energy"--"The Law of Brownian
Movement."--Then the most important contribution: "The Electrodynamics
of Moving Bodies," that contained the revolutionary ideas underlying the
special theory of relativity. To these is to be added a dissertation for
his doctorate in the same year: "A New Determination of Molecular
Dimensions."
In all, these represent a life-work that belongs to the history of
science. It was certainly some considerable time before his work began
its triumphal march in the sight of the world, and it may be added that
treasures were hidden in these disquisitions that were not understood
till long years afterwards. Yet the youthful discoverer was not passed
over without signs of friendly appreciation. He received a letter,
couched in very warm terms, from the celebrated physicist, Max Planck,
who was a complete stranger to him at that time; it spoke in glowing
words of his essay, "The Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies." This letter
was the first diploma, the forerunner of all the honours that later
swept over him like a tidal wave.
It was his intention to obtain a tutorial position at the University. An
appointment to Bern was at first again hindered by certain obstacles
which he would probably have overcome if he had applied himself
energetically to attaining his goal. He finally received his
appointment, but exercised his duties for only a very short time, as
Zürich now opened her arms to him. In 1909 he accepted the position of
Professor extraordinarius there for theoretical physics, and soon
assembled a grateful audience about himself. Nevertheless, during the
earlier stages of his professorship he found it difficult to suppress a
longing for the quiet, unexcited life of his patent-office work, in
which he seemed to have had a still greater degree of independence. In
1911 he accepted a new appointment as Professor Ordinarius to Prague,
which offered him more favourable emoluments as an inducement. In the
autumn of 1912 he returned to Zürich as a Professor at the Polytechnic,
and in the early part of 1914 he was drawn into the strong magnetic
field of the northern capital; he arrived at the Spree, and has, since
then, lived among us. He is now a Swiss by nationality, a world citizen
by conviction, and, professionally, a member of the Berlin Academy and
attached in a lecturing capacity to the University. Here he perfected
his works on relativity, ending in the superlative elaboration of the
theory of gravitation, the beginnings of which stretch back to the year
1907. He had spent eight years in a concentrated effort of severe
thought to bring it to completion, and perhaps centuries will be
necessary before the world will gain a complete perspective of all the
consequences of his theory.
For the theory asks us to brush aside habits of thought that have
claimed an hereditary position in pre-eminent minds. One of the foremost
physicists, Henri Poincaré, had confessed as late as 1910 that it
caused him the greatest effort to find his way into Einstein's new
mechanics. Another whole year passed before he gave up his last doubts.
Then he passed with flying colours into Einstein's camp, and recommended
Einstein's appointment to the Professorship at Zürich, in conjunction
with the discoverer of radium, Madame Curie, in an exuberant letter
which may add its note of appreciation here:
"Herr Einstein," so wrote the great Poincaré, "is one of the most
original minds that I have ever met. In spite of his youth he already
occupies a very honourable position among the foremost savants of his
time. What we marvel at in him, above all, is the ease with which he
adjusts himself to new conceptions and draws all possible deductions
from them. He does not cling tightly to classical principles, but sees
all conceivable possibilities when he is confronted with a physical
problem. In his mind this becomes transformed into an anticipation of
new phenomena that may some day be verified in actual experience.... The
future will give more and more proofs of the merits of Herr Einstein,
and the University that succeeds in attaching him to itself may be
certain that it will derive honour from its connexion with the young
master."
We may be tempted to look back and ask whether the criteria that Wilhelm
Ostwald once set up as a test of great men are verified in Einstein's
case. He has certainly not broken the first and most general rule, the
principle of "early maturity." This showed itself clearly when his
impulse towards mathematical knowledge and discovery asserted itself,
and when he penetrated far into the future with his optical problems.
The history of science and of art may offer more striking examples in
this connexion, but at any rate in Einstein's case the indications are
sufficient to serve as a confirmation of the rule. On the other hand,
the second test of Ostwald seems to be valid only conditionally when
applied to Einstein. For Ostwald takes up arms against a "gradual
intensification" of ability, and proclaims it as an almost universal
rule that the exceptional achievement is the privilege of quite young
persons: "what he achieves later is seldom as impressive as his first
brilliant achievement." Thus, in Einstein's case, the exception is
evident. For if we fix on only two chief discoveries, passing over many
others, there is no doubt that the second (the theory of gravitation)
surpasses the first (special relativity) in both range and significance.
Indeed, we cannot escape from the idea of a "gradual intensification,"
for the second discovery could come about only as a result of the first.
Moreover, it is not yet night, and there is nothing to refute the
assumption that there will be a further progression.
Furthermore, Ostwald takes into consideration the tempo of the
intellectual pulse of inspiration to divide the main types of great men
into a classical and a romantic category: this classification cannot,
however, be applied to Einstein. He is decidedly classical, in so far as
his work seems calculated to serve later generations as a classical
foundation for all mechanical investigations of the macrocosm of the
heavens and the microcosm of atoms. On the other hand, his versatility,
the mobility and resource of his highly imaginative mind, stamp him as a
romantic spirit. His delight in teaching would also assign him to this
category, for in the case of many classical spirits there is a decided
aversion to imparting instruction. So that, although we might well be
able to speak of a synthesis of these two forms, it seems better to
estimate Einstein, not in the light of a ready scheme, but rather as a
type of which he is the unique representative.
* * * * * * * *
Just as the external contour of his life is on the whole regular and
unbroken, so also his inner life is attuned to simplicity. Nowhere, it
might almost be said, do we observe a break, a spasmodic turn, or a
sudden intensification. Although he has grasped and suggested so many
problems, he himself presents no psychological riddle, and we meet with
no singularities in analysing his personality. It has already been
remarked several times that Art plays a part in his life. What I learned
from him himself about his affection for music coincides exactly with
what observation clearly discloses. The expression of his countenance
when he is listening to music is a sufficient indication of the
resonances induced in him. He is confessedly a classicist, and a sincere
devotee of the revelations of Bach, Haydn, and Mozart. What fascinates
and enraptures him above all is that which is directed inwards, which is
contemplative and erected on a religious basis. The simple masterful
flow in musical development and invention is all-important for him. The
architectonic structure that we marvel at in Bach, the Gothic tendency
towards heavenly heights, perhaps calls up in him sensations that
emanate from his hidden wealth of constructive mathematical ideas. It
seems to me that this possibility is not unworthy of remark. It suggests
a reason for the fact that he gives himself up only unwillingly to the
nervous strain of drama directed at emotional upheaval. He does not
gladly overstep the boundary that separates the simple from the
psychologically subtle, and whenever his desire to understand art
requires him to venture beyond it, his appreciation is not accompanied
by genuine pleasure. His subjectivity does not fix this boundary in
accordance with the ordinary rules of concert æsthetics, which are
actually not rules at all, but only changeable valuations and
crystallizations of the feelings of certain groups of people. He gives
himself up quietly and freely to what is presented, but makes no special
effort to assimilate experiences to which his being does not
spontaneously react. There would be no meaning in seeking to mark off
the limits of his receptivity in accordance with this, and to tell him
that it is too limited, and that it should be enlarged, and that he
should not regard as an opinionated exaggeration what appears to others
to be a deep and mighty revelation, or seems to be possessed of divine
sweetness. He would be able to point out that even in the case of
masters of the musical art a change of faith was not a rare occurrence,
and that they learned anew, or rejected what they once idolized, and
very often found no permanent haven in their own faith. Whoever, like
Einstein, gives himself up to the simply contemplative, and feels no
impulse towards sensationalism, is spared the task of learning afresh,
and finds still one world left for him even if many other worlds are
inaccessible. To mention only the main features, then, neither Beethoven
as a composer of symphonies, nor Richard Wagner, denote the pinnacles of
music for him; he could live without the Ninth Symphony, but not without
Beethoven's ensemble music. The number of composers and compositions
which are not a necessity of life for him is very considerable. It
includes the majority of romanticists, the erotically inclined school of
Chopin and Schumann, which revels in sensation, and, as already
mentioned, the neo-German dramatic composers. He has much objective
admiration for them, yet he does not conceal the fact that he also feels
lively opposition in the gamut of his sensations. He regards the
properly modern productions as interesting phenomena, and has various
degrees of disapproval for them, extending to complete aversion. It
costs him an effort to hear an opera of Wagner, and when he has done so,
he returns home bearing with him the _leitmotiv_ of Meister Eckhard:
"The lust of creatures is intermingled with bitterness." In general he
seems to take up approximately the point of view of Rossini. Wagner
gives him wonderful moments, followed, however, by periods of acute
emotional distress. I need hardly add that I myself, who confess to
being an ultra-Wagnerite, never strove in my conversations with Einstein
to make my opinion prevail against his. For I am deeply convinced that
in this matter there is no question of right and wrong, and that every
musical valuation represents no more than an accidental judgment
dependent on one's own nature, entirely egocentric and thus objectively
of no account.
Einstein also occupies himself in an active sense with music, and has
developed into a very fair violinist, without claiming higher degrees of
achievement. Among other things I once heard him play the violin part of
a Brahms Sonata, and his performance approached concert standard. He
draws a beautiful tone, infuses expression into his rendering, and knows
how to overcome the technical difficulties. Among the supreme artists of
his instrument who have exerted a personal influence on him, Joachim
assumes the first place. Einstein still speaks with great enthusiasm of
Joachim's performance of Beethoven's Tenth Sonata and of Bach's
Chaconne. He himself plays the latter piece, for which the purity and
accuracy of his double and multiple stopping fits him. Whoever chooses
the right moment--this good fortune has not yet befallen me--may
overhear Einstein at his pianistic studies. As he confessed to me,
improvisation on the piano is a necessity of his life. Every journey
that takes him away from the instrument for some time excites a
home-sickness for his piano, and when he returns he longingly caresses
the keys to ease himself of the burden of the tone experiences that have
mounted up in him, giving them utterance in improvisations.
The regular run of concerts in which displays of bravura play an
important part finds little favour with him; above all, he is not a
worshipper of the orchestral conductor, whom he regards only as an
interpreter and not as a virtuoso on the orchestral instrument. He
expressed this idea in unmistakable words: "The conductor should keep
himself in the background." I believe that his dearest wish would be to
breathe in the tones without a personal or material medium, merely out
of the air or out of space. Furthermore, I believe that there is an
unfathomable connexion between his musical instinct and his nature as a
research scientist. For the ear, as we know from Mach, is the true organ
that enables us to experience space, and thus things may occur within
the ear of the investigator of space that may have a different
significance from that of music which is representable in tones. I
strongly doubt whether traces of compositional form occur in Einstein's
tone-monologues, but perhaps they contain examples of an art for which
the æsthetics of a distant future may find a name.
* * * * * * * *
With regard to higher literature, and indeed all writings not connected
with science, Einstein has little to say. He himself rarely directs
conversation on to this topic, and still less rarely does he give vent
to an enthusiastic outburst that betrays warm interest. He restricts
himself to making short, aphoristic comments, and now and then allows
his listener to gather that he can easily imagine an existence without
literature. The number of accepted novels, tales, and poetic works which
he has not read is legion, and all the pretentiously artistic,
historical, and critical writings that are added to them have attracted
only a very momentary interest from him.
I have never seen him attracted in any way by the promising aspect of
some new book intended for diversion. If such a one happens to get into
his hands, he merely places it among the others. At times I was
constrained to think of Caliph Omar's words: "If the book contains what
is already in the Koran, it is unnecessary; if it contains something
else, it is harmful." It is harmful at least in the sense that it robs
us of time that may be better spent in another way. I am purposely
exaggerating here to make it quite clear that Einstein finds full
satisfaction in a narrow circle of literature, and that he experiences
no loss if numerous new works pass by and escape his notice.
Nevertheless, he speaks with reverence of a series of authors, to whom
he owes enrichment: among them are the classical writers, who naturally
occupy the highest position, with certain exceptions, which he equally
naturally wishes to be taken as a personal opinion and not in the sense
of a critical valuation. With him the difference reveals itself in the
intonation from which we may read a greater or lesser measure of
affection. When he says "Shakespeare," the eternal greatness seems to be
inherent in the actual sound of the name. When he says "Goethe," we
notice a slight undertone of dissonance, which may be interpreted
without difficulty. He admires him with the pathos of distance, but no
warmth glows through this pathos.
I had ventured to deduce from my knowledge of his nature the men and the
works which, in my opinion, should awaken strong echoes in him. A fairly
clearly defined line leads to the true path. Outside of any systematic
series, I may mention Dostojewski, Cervantes, Homer, Strindberg,
Gottfried Keller in the positive sense, Emile Zola and Ibsen in the
negative sense. Taken as a whole, this prognostication does not disagree
seriously with his own statement, excepting that he lays still greater
emphasis on Don Quixote and the Brothers Karamasoff than I had surmised.
He expressed himself with reserve about Voltaire. He has no belief in
Voltaire's poetic qualities, and sees in him only a subtle-minded and
amusing writer. Perhaps if Einstein were to devote himself a little more
intensively to Voltaire and Zola, he would assign a higher value to
these related spirits. But there is little hope of this occurring, as
the wide range of Voltaire's works tends to restrain him. Time, which
the physicist Einstein has shown to be relative, has an absolute value
for him when measured in hours, and whoever seeks to persuade him to
read thick volumes is not likely to gain his goodwill.
Our philosophical literature is not received with acclamation by him. If
some one wished to undertake the task of ascertaining Einstein's
attitude towards philosophy, he would be well advised to plunge into
Einstein's works rather than to ask him personally. In them the
questioner would find ample hints, pointing towards a new theory of
knowledge, the first indications of which are already perceptible. A
great portion of philosophic doctrine will yet have to pass through the
Einstein filter to be purified. He himself, it seems to me, leaves this
process of filtering mostly to other thinkers, but we must not lose
sight of the fact that these others derive their views of space, time,
and causality from Einstein's physics. It is thus immediately evident
that he does not find revelations about ultimate things in already
extant literature, for the simple reason that they are not to be found
there. For him famous works represent, in Kant's language, "Prolegomena
to every future system of metaphysics which can claim to rank as a
science." The accent is to be put on the future that has not yet become
the present. He praises many, particularly Locke and Hume, but will
grant finality to none, not even to the great Kant, not to mention
Hegel, Schelling, and Fichte, whom he barely mentions in this connexion.
To Schopenhauer and Nietzsche he assigns a high position as writers, as
masters of language and moulders of impressive thoughts. He values them
for their literary excellence, but denies them philosophic depth. As far
as Nietzsche is concerned, whom, by the way, he regards as too
glittering, Einstein certainly experiences ethical objections against
this prophet of the aristocratic cult whose views are so diametrically
opposed to Einstein's own opinion of the relations between man and man.
Earlier when we were talking of classical poetry he had particularly
emphasized Sophocles as one who was dear to him. And this name leads us
to the innermost source of Einstein as a man. "I am not here to hate
with you but to love with you," is the cry of Sophocles' Antigone, and
this cry is the keynote of Einstein's emotional existence. I shall not
give way to the temptation to follow those who in the turmoil of the
present day refer to Einstein as a political figure. That would lead to
a description of policy and party arguments that lie beyond the scope of
this book; so much the less am I inclined to do so as Einstein's
convictions may be expressed very clearly without reference to schematic
terms of a very elastic nature. An individuality such as his cannot be
compressed into a party programme. And if anyone should insist on
placing him among the radicals or on assigning him far to the left, I
should suggest that it would be better to choose, instead of the
classification right and left, that of above and below. I look up
towards his idealism, whose altitude may perhaps be reached one day by
the raising of our ethical standards. But not by means of paragraphs of
laws. I have seldom heard him talk of such schematic recipes, but so
much the more have I noted utterances which bore witness to a very
intense and ever-present sympathy with every human creature. His
programme, which is written not in ink but in heart's-blood, proclaims
in the simplest manner the categorical imperative: Fulfil your duty to
your fellow-being: offer help to every one: ward off every material
oppression. "Well, then, he is a socialist," so the cry runs. If it is
your pleasure to call him so, he will not deny you it. But to me this
term seems to denote too narrow limits for him. I see no contradiction
in applying the term, but there is no perfect congruence. If one word is
necessary, I should be rather more inclined to say that he is in the
widest sense a democrat of liberal trend.
For him the State is not its own aim, nor does he imagine himself to be
the possessor of a panacea. "The attitude of the individual to
socialism," he said, "is uncertain owing to the fact that we can never
ascertain clearly how much of the iron compulsion and blind working of
our economic system may be overcome by appropriate institutions." And I
should like to add that such institutions would scarcely have a
permanent result, but that more may be expected from the ethical example
of those who have the power of renunciation. Whoever realizes the motto
of Antigone, "I am here to love with you," brings us nearer the goal.
All in all, our longing continually flees from the confusion of
political considerations to simple morality. For Einstein this is the
primary element, that which is directly evident and not open to
misrepresentation. It includes sympathy, and, what is more important,
joy in conjunction with others. "The best that life has to offer," he
once exclaimed, "is a face glowing with happiness!"
This look is expressed on his own face when he discusses his ideals,
above all the internationality of all intellectual workers and the
realization of eternal peace among the nations. To him pacifism is a
matter of mind as well as of heart, and he is of the opinion that the
course of history so far is but the prelude to its realization. The
past, with its bloodstained fingers that reach into the present, does
not discourage him He points to the endless city wars of the Middle Ages
in Italy, which had finally to cease in answer to the increasing feeling
of solidarity. So he believes in the victory of peace, which the unified
consciousness of all humanity will one day win over the demonic powers
of tyranny and conquest.
The pacifistic goal seems to him to be attainable without the
peculiarities of the various States being destroyed. National
characteristics arising from tradition and hereditary influences do not
signify in his eyes a contradiction to the internationalism that
embraces the common intellectual factors of civilized peoples. Thus the
desire for the preservation and care of particularities directs him to
the secondary goal of Zionism. His blood asserts itself when he supports
the foundation of a State in Palestine, which seems to him to be the
only means of preserving the national individuality of his race without
the freedom of the individual being affected.
We had left Art to talk of the State, and then returned to the former
theme to touch lightly on the pictorial arts. Painting was allowed to
pass with merely a fleeting remark. It plays no considerable part in
Einstein's existence, and he would not suffer great grief if it were to
vanish from the plane of culture, a consummation to which definite signs
seems to point. I have described these signs in other writings (as in
_Kunst in 1000 Jahren_), and maintain the point of view that the latest
branches of painting as represented by expressionism and cubistic
futurism denote, in essence, the last convulsions of a dying surface
art. And even the chief representatives of former flourishing periods
are beginning to fade away, and Einstein will not be the only one who
will relegate this art, as compared with music, to a lower plane among
the inspired arts that bring joy to humanity. He is only more frank than
others when he freely confesses that he cannot convince himself that a
life without the joys of pictorial art would be hopelessly impoverished.
But he bows his head to sculpture, and, for him, architecture is a
goddess. It is again his deeply rooted piety that asserts itself when
memory recalls to him the Gothic dome with its pinnacles striving
towards heaven. Goethe and Schlegel have called architecture "frozen
music," and this picture is present in his mind when he sees Gothic
architecture as frozen music of Bach. It is open to anyone to analyse
this specific impression in another way by seeking the fundamental
elements, in which the essence of the art is to provide support for a
weighty structure and to overcome gravitation. For a spirit that works
with mechanics and that feels within itself the pressures and tensions
occurring in external nature, architecture is a kind of statics and
dynamics transformed into a thing of beauty, a ravishing picture of his
own science.
* * * * * * * *
Einstein has told me many a story of his travels, and these reports were
characterized by an absence of definite purpose. The conception of
something worth seeing in the tourists' sense does not exist for him,
and he does not set out in eager pursuit of those things that are marked
with two asterisks in Baedeker. The intense romanticism of Swiss
scenery, that lay within such easy reach for him, has never enticed him
into its magic circle, and he has nothing to do with the abysmal terrors
of glaciers and the world of snow-peaks. His enthusiasm for landscape
beauty conforms with the behaviour of the barometer: the greater the
altitude, the lower the mercury. In simple contact with Nature he
prefers the lesser mountains, the seashore, and extensive plains,
whereas brilliant panoramic contours like those of the Vierwaldstetter
See do not rouse him into ecstasy. It is unnecessary to remark that he
does not arrange his living on the standard of the Grand Palace Hotels
en route. It is nearer the truth to picture him as a vagrant who tramps
along without a sense of time and without a goal, in the fairy
atmosphere of a joyous wanderer who has unconsciously adopted the old
rule of Philander: Walk with a steady step: make your burden small:
start early in the morn, and leave home all care!
Am I to record the list of pleasures and hobbies that are foreign to
him? The list would be very long, and I should arrive at my goal more
quickly by setting his sporting tendencies equal to zero. I once
suspected him of being given to aquatic sport, as I learned that he had
taken part in several yachting excursions. But I was mistaken. He sails
in the same way as he walks on his tours, without a set purpose,
dreaming, and uninterested in what is regarded by members of sailing
clubs as a "feat." In the negative list of his games we see even chess,
that usually exerts a strong attraction on natures with a mathematical
tendency. The particular types of combination offered by this game have
never tempted him, and the world of chess has remained _terra incognita_
for him. He is just as little interested in every kind of collection,
even that of books. I have seldom or never met a savant who attaches so
little value to the personal possession of numerous and valuable books.
This statement may be extended as far as saying that he experiences no
pleasure at all in possession as such: he says so himself, and his whole
manner of life proves it. There seems to me to be an element of
resignation in his amiable hedonism, a kind of monkish asceticism. He
never rids himself of the feeling that he is only paying a visit in this
world.
I do not know whether Einstein considers that his life-work can be
completed within the span of this visit. At any rate he makes no attempt
to extract more out of the day by following a rigid programme of work
than the day voluntarily offers. He does not compel himself to cover a
definitely circumscribed piece of ground with chronological exactitude.
There are brain-workers, especially artists, who actually never shake
off the fetters of the twenty-four hours day of work inasmuch as they
spin on the threads of daily effort into the nightly fabric of dreams.
Einstein can make a pause, interrupt his work, or divert himself into
side-channels at leisure and according to the demands of the hour, but
dreams offer him no inspiration and do not waylay him with problems.
On the other hand, however, he is waylaid so much the more during the
day by things and persons that make an assault on him. This starts as
soon as the first post arrives, to see through which requires a special
bureau. In addition to the communications of a professional or official
nature there appear innumerable letters from everywhere and anywhere
asking him to grant a little of his time. Whatever each individual
writer has thought about the principle of relativity, all his thoughts
and doubts, additions, and, above all, that which he has not been able
to understand, all this is to be answered by Einstein. Has he, the child
of fame, even a quarter of an hour for himself? There they wait in the
hall, the painter, the photographer, the sculptor, and the interviewer;
with whatever powers of persuasion and argumentative subtlety his
attentive wife may seek to defend his hours of rest, some of these
visitors will yet succeed in gaining the upper hand, and will produce
something in oil-colours, in plaster of Paris, in black and white, in
water-colours, or in print. Fame, too, demands her sacrifices, and if we
talk of a hunt after fame, then Einstein is certainly not the hunter,
but the hunted.
He sighs under the burden of his correspondence, not only as the
recipient, but also with the sender, whose letter has to remain
unanswered. Yet he is never roused to anger by the intruder on his time.
If this were not so, the aphorism of Cyrus that patience is the panacea
of all ills would not hold for him, and how would I myself otherwise
have dared to claim so many hours of him? A sense of guilt falls on me!
But even Einstein's patience can come to an end, and this is at the
point where "society" begins: I mean the congregation of persons in a
salon, society entertainments to which one is invited to be seen, and so
that one may claim to have been there. A solemn representation in which
he is to be made the cynosure of all eyes is a torture to him. If in a
very exceptional case he is compelled to participate in such a
gathering, the joy of his hosts will not be entirely unmixed, for it
does not require a thought-reader to recognize the longing for solitude
imprinted on his countenance: "Could I but escape!"
So much the happier does he feel himself in the narrow circle of his
friends, who offer what means to him much more than admiration, namely,
affection, and an appreciation of his human self. He is what one wishes
him to be. He is happy when he can forget the doctor profundus, and can
yield himself up to the atmosphere of stimulating and unconstrained
converse. He is a master in the art of listening, and is not averse to
contradiction; when possible, he even emphasizes the arguments of his
opponent. _Audiatur et altera pars_! This is a further manifestation of
his altruistic personality, which rejoices when he extracts the true
kernel from the husk of the opposing opinion. Here he also displays a
characteristic which one does not usually expect to find among abstract
thinkers, a sense of humour that runs through the whole gamut from a
gentle smile to hearty laughter, and that is the happy source of many a
striking sally. It may happen that the subject of conversation excites
his anger, especially in political debates when he calls to mind
militaristic or feudal misgovernment. He then becomes roused, and, as a
cynical philosopher, sarcastically attacks personalities and points out
the primary source of perennial hate, immediately afterwards soaring up
to happy speculations of the future.
It is a matter for regret that the subjects that he has discoursed on
lightly have not been fixed phonographically. Such records would form an
interesting supplement to the conversations outlined in this book. It
would never occur to him to set down in permanent literary form the
inspiration of the moment. What he writes emanates from other regions,
and is, to use his own expression, a precipitate of "thick ink." This is
obvious, for what he has to proclaim as a scientist cannot be presented
in a "thin" form. But many a so-called writer would have reason to
congratulate himself, if so much thinly flowing matter occurred to him
in writing as to Einstein in speaking.
* * * * * * * *
The record of these conversations was begun in the summer of 1919, and
completed in the autumn of 1920.
INDEX
Aristoteles, 41
Arrhenius, 144
Babinet, 25
Bach, 88, 235
Bacon, 46
Baer, K. E. von, 162
Bailhaud, 144
Beethoven, 99, 234, 235
Bell, Graham, 25, 111
Béranger, 84
Bergson, 91
Bernoulli, 48
Bernstein, 225
Bessel, 32
Bohr, Niels, 57, 210
Brahe, Tycho, 94
Bruno, Giordano, 141
Büchner, 225
Bulwer, 76
Bunsen, 164
Byron, 9
Cantor, 52, 203
Cavendish, 111
Ceulen, Ludolf van, 158
Condillac, 216
Copernicus, 6, 90
Cosmati, 48
Curie, Madame, 79, 231
Cuvier, 196
Darboux, 152
Dase, 158
Descartes, 47, 133, 162
Dingeldey, 190
Dostojewski, 185, 187
Dove, 21, 155
Duhem, 105, 106
Dühring, 54, 56
Eckermann, 50, 85
Edison, 140
Euclid, 180
Euler, 98
Euripides, 85
Faraday, 39, 61, 84
Fechner, 110, 182
Fermat, 97, 190
Fizeau, 113
Flammarion, 115
Franklin, 102
Fresnel, 45
Galilei, 6, 40, 150, 179, 181
Galle, 6
Galvani, 110
Gauss, 55, 185, 186
Goethe, 13, 23, 179, 197, 212, 236
240
Grillparzer, 95
Grossmann, 229
Hansen, 134
Hebbel, 77, 86
Hegel, 42
Heine, 49
Helmholtz, 25, 26, 53, 73
Heraclitus, 23
Herschel, 84
Hertz, 60
Hooke, 41
Horace, 3
Humboldt, 49
Hume, 161
Huyghens, 56, 109, 132
Jean Paul, 86, 223
Joule, 84
Jung Stilling, 84
Kant, 35, 121, 170, 177, 179, 237
Kepler, 6, 42, 84, 176, 177
Kirchhoff, 104-107, 148, 212
Kleist, 130
Kummer, 190
Lamarck, 197
Lange, 47
Laplace, 40, 45, 140, 165
Leibniz, 26, 128
Leonardo da Vinci, 11, 50-54
Leverrier, 6, 10
Liebig, 55
Lindemann, 158
Linné, 196
Lorentz, 57, 72
Lothar Meyer, 107
Lucretius, 210
Mach, 46, 77, 108, 149, 169
Mauthner, 95
Maxwell, 39, 60
Mayer, Robert, 25, 55, 56
Melanchthon, 82
Menander, 86
Mendelejew, 107
Mezzofanti, 63
Michelangelo, 49
Michelson and Morley, 112
Mill, 45
Mithridates, 63
Montaigne, 77
Mozart, 233
Newton, 2, 6, 8, 39, 40, 43, 96
Nietzsche, 63, 217, 237
Nollet, 103
Odilon, Helene, 135
Oersted, 109
Ostwald, 83, 231, 232
Ovid, 197
Pascal, 93, 98
Pasteur, 175
Perrin, 154
Pflüger, 35
Philander, 241
Picard, 144
Planck, 57, 59, 91, 230
Poincaré, 1, 7, 112, 116, 231
Pope, 54
Priestley, 111
Psellus, 156
Pyrrhon, 92
Pythagoras, 101, 179
Quetelet, 182
Regiomantus, 52
Reis, 25
Riemann, 186
Riggenbach, 25
Ruëss, 224
Rutherford, 36, 210
Schiller, 74, 94, 170
Schlegel, 240
Schlick, Moritz, 168
Schopenhauer, 41, 237
Schwann, 175
Shakespeare, 236
Siemens, 25, 27-30
Slade, 136
Sophocles, 238
Spinoza, 84, 162
Stephenson, 25
Terence, 191
Thomas Aquinas, 165
Torricelli, 166
Vaihinger, 43, 169
Vitruvius, 101
Volta, 110, 111
Voltaire, 47, 237
Wagner, 234
Weber, 182
Weierstrass, 152
Weyl, 34
Whewell, 45
Wien, 173
Zelter, 84
Zöllner, 137