The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1860-08-11
,,u,.h.,a, ana Louis Napoleon.

IN tho outbreak Of the Italian war, Louis
NApe1pos, In order to fiatter the Prus.
sians. published decree ordering a statue
10 he erected in honor of HUMBOLDT. This
decree, 1t now appears, has been quashed, the
admiration of the Emperor Of the French for
the great philosopher having had bucket OK
ice water thrown over II soon after HUN
BoLpr's decease.
dead men tell no tales" but there are some
exceptions to every general rule, ane an eNceP-
ton TO this Is undoub tedy the postnnmou'
publication of ALEXANDER Won HUMBOLDT .
Corrsspoudence with VoRNHAaEN Won nHsn.
In that correspondence the good ha'uiea
H,rxnorpr. who seems 10 have been the punk
and ptcture Of politeness and piaeidity wheh
ia the company Of royal personases, ana who'
in addition to being the greatest son OF science
in m,dern times was even more remarkable
IN his mowers of discrimination and double
dealing. is very severe on LOUIS BoNAPARTR,
whom he speaks of as the son of Admiral
yERauKL, and of his brother MoRNY, the SON
of Gen. FLAnAuLr. He does not spare the
French Empire either. but says: {" have al
ways been of opinion that the widest Repub-
lie can never infnct SO great and lasting a
damage on the intellectual progress of man
kind, on its conscience and its honor, as my
uncle's' system of government"
The statue of Baron Won HUMBOLDT will
therefore not 60 up this year. Nor is this all
According 10 Paris letter, the man of Deem
Der has let loose his Zouayes of the pen upon
the defunct philosopher. and is attempting to
strike him off the list of the great intellectual
Powers. In the Pays, one BoMBEY D'AUFE-
gILLY transflxes the reputation of HUMBOLDT
upon his giittering bayonet, and proves that
il was merely bladder of enormous size, mat
only REQ uired TO be puuctured TO explode. He
accounts for a portion of his popularity by the
euphony of his name, there being to his ina
eination something high sounding in the
very word "HuMBoLDT," though perhaps
TO BAYARpTAYLoR's ears, il is now somewhat
suggestive of Humbug He engrossed pub bile at
tention because in tead of being true man of
science. in which case the world would not have
understood him, he tcnS a fine talksr Of science.
Nature had done much for him, but Fortune
had done more than Nature. But, with all
his advantages, he was only q Trareler, speak
ing passonately of his Journeys, land one
may ask himself what HUMBOLDT would have
had to say if he had not travelled Whether he
was ever able to think without having seen -
Moreover, he was devoid of philosophy.
he was "of skeptical cast of mind, and only
born in too late a period of the eighteenth
century to become back boned materialist,
a good ATHEIST of the stamp OF DIDENoT or La
LAND. He was not only skeptic, but weak
skeptic, a self-contradictory skeptic.
Having thus accounted for HUMBoLDT's
reputation, and shown that he was nothing
but fine talker of science, this Zouaye of the
Pen attempts an enterprise which ought 10
put to the blush those Zouaves of the Bayonet,
who came back from Italy without attempt
ing the quadrangular Notifications. He I'M
dertakes an exploit infinitely more desperate
ana tool hardy; that is to say, he Makes a
rush upon Cosmos. THE Cosmos, after all"
he says, lis but description, vast memo
randum of physics, protocoliZed by ALExAN-
DER Won HUMBOLDT" Descriptive poetry, it
is known, is 4 very low sort of poetry, and So
is descriptive science. He quotes concession
from HUMBOLDT himself, that Ibis Cosmos is
no idea, nor a system of IDEAS" but simply "a
picture show" HUMBOLDT is "a MOSES,
who does not descend from the Horeb, with
the Tables of the Law, but from the Chimbo-
razo, with an album in his pocket" In re-
gard TO the Correspondence" NJ. AUvERILLY
remarks, zone is not othered with that grand
Eloquent style which, in HUMDoLDT's scien-
tifc works, he adopted, from mere 'ceremo-
NOUS uetry with the academies, the Uni
verse and posterity'" There is at least that
difference between the vigorous gossip of the
globe, and the small gossip of the Berlin sa-
Ions"
We take it for granted that all this is salts
factory TO Louis NAPOLEON and-BAYARD
TAYLOR. And yet we should not be surprised
if HUMBOLDT's name should survive that
of Monsieur BoMBEY DAUYERILLY, which
the world never happens TO have heard of be-
FORE and we dare say never will again. We
should not be surprised if the immortal fame
OF the German philosopher should "travel IS
in light through future ages, and continue 10
circle around the globe which his genius ex-
plored and illumiued, as long as that globe
travels itself in life and beauty around the
sun. We cannot, however deny the dark
spots upon the orb. as they appear in the
famous correspondence. How often is great
genius found in alliance with great moral de-
fects-in the case of HUMBOLDT with the mean
and degrading vices of discrimination and hy-
pocrisy. There was scarcely man in Europe
to whom he had extended the hand of apparent
friendship, whom that same hand, while it
was yet warm with the cordial pressure, did
not libel and deride.