During forty years ho had enjoyed the well-deserved reputation of one of the greatest philosophers and linguists of Europe, and he was certainly an extraordivary man. The number of languages, most of them barbarous or half-civilised, which ho had thoroughly studied, besides the classical languages, was very great. Ha acquired the most difficult languages, as, for instance, the Basque, in fewer mouths than others would have spent years in learning them. He was equally distinguished for the views he took in comparing the development of languages with the development of the human mind, well as iu comparative grammar ; and as a critic of the ideal in poetry, philo sophy, and the fine arts, he had few equals in Germany. Humboldt was mediocre as a poet, and it seems he felt his inferiority in this respect, for after having published a few poems, he stopped. lie left a great number of poems in manuscript, chiefly sonnets, most of which were afterwards published by his brother Alexander ; but though they are beautifully written And of a most elegant and delicate versification, they aro vague and sentimental. Schiller, in a letter which was written when Humboldt first attempted authorship, speaks thus to his friend :—" I am convinced that the principal cause which seems to prevent your success as an author is the predominance of the reasoning faculties of your mind over the creating faculties, and consequently tho preventive influence of criticism over invention, which always proves destructive to mental production. Your becomes immediately an 'object' to you, although even in abstract sciences nothing can be created but by 'subjective' activity. In many concerns I cannot call you a genius ; yet I must avow that you are a genius in others. For your mind is of so particular a description that you are sometimes exactly the contrary of all those who are merely conspicuous through their reasoning faculties, through learning, or through abstract speculation. You will of course not attain perfection within the sphere of mental creation, but within the sphere of reasoning." Schiller'a judgment was at once frank and correct : the spirit of universal criticism was embodied in Humboldt, who, with the exception of one large work which he left unfinished in manuscript, composed only minor works, moat of them critical essays, which he published at different periods. The greater part of them was collected by his brother Alexander, and published under the title, 'Wilhelm von Humboldt's Gesammelte Werke, Berlin, 1841, 4 vole. 8vo.
The principal productions contained in the first volume are—Two Memoirs on the 'Bhagavadgita,' a Sanscrit poem, the first of which was first printed in the 'Memoirs of the Royal Academy of Berlin,' and in Schlegel's ' Indische Bibliothek ; "A Critique on F. A. Wolf's second edition of Homer's Odyssey,' previously printed in the Jenaische Literatur-Zeitnng ' (1795); ' Rom,' a poem, first published at Berlin, 1806; 'Die Senna (the Sun), a poem, first published at Berlin, Twenty-five Sonnets, not printed during the author's lifetime. Those of the second volume are—' Priifung der I7nter suchungen fiber die Urbewohner Hispaniena vermittelat der Vaskiachen Spracha' (` Examination of the Researches on the Aborigines of Spain, by means of the Basque Language '), first published at Berlin, 1821, 9to. This is a celebrated work, and has become the type on which many similar investigations have been modelled. Humboldt purposely went to the Basque provinces in order to learn the Basque language, and he confounded for ever the absurd theories of Lara mendi and many other Basque and Spanish scholars on the origin of the Basque language, which moat of them endeavoured to establish as the primitive language of mankind, and consequently of paradise. Humboldt's opinion is that the present Basques are the only unmixed descendants of the ancient Iberians, and he shows that in remote times the Iberians inhabited the whole panivaula south of the Pyrenees, the southernmost part of France (Aquitania included), Liguria iu Italy, and the islands of Sardinia, Corsica, part of Sicily, and the Baleares. In the time of the Romans the central part of Spain was
inhabited by Celtiberiana, a mixture of Celts and Iberian: the limits assigned by Humboldt to this mixed race, that is, the extent of country where the ancient local names were not purely Iberian or Celtic, but mostly Celtic and Iberian compounds, correapcnd with those assigned to the Celtiberiana by Caesar, Strabo, and other ancient writers. In the countries inhabited by the Celtici (the southernmost part of Portngal) and the Tamarici (Galicia), the ancient names are so exclu sively Celtic that the author concludes that both those nations were pure Celts. The Iberians, according to Humboldt, were of North African origin, and 'Berber' and 'Iber ' are probably the same. The second volume also contains a 'Memoir on the Limits within which Governments ought to confine themselvea in their care for the welfare of their Subjects;' A metrical German translation of the lst-13th, the 12th and 14th of Pindaia Olympia Odes; the let, 2nd, and 4th-9th of the Pythian Odes, among which No. 4 appeared first, with a commentary, in the Neue Deutsche Monataachrift' (1795), and No. 9, with a commentary, iu Schiller'a 'Horen ' (1797); the 4th, 6th, and 10th of the Nemean Odes;' Forty-one Sonnets printed from manuscript, &e. The contents of the third volume are :—A metrical German translation of the Agamemnon of /Eschylue, first published, Leipzig, 1816, 4to, considered to be a masterpiece; A metrical German translation of the Chorusea of the Eumenides ; An Essay on the Drama in Franca, firat printed iu °tithe's Propylxen;' Travelling Sketches from Biacay ; A most interesting Memoir on Comparative Linguistic, treated historically, and first printed in the Memoirs of the Royal Academy of Berlin;' Forty-two Sonnets from manuscript, &c. The fourth volume contains—tho celebrated critical essay on ()tithe's Hermann and Dorothea' (268 pages), which the author first published in the first volume of his 'Aesthetische Versiiehe,' Brunawick, 1799, 2 vols. 8vo ; An Essay on the influence of different Sexes on Organic Nature; Fifty-seven Sonnets from manu script, &c. Humboldt's ' Essay on the Dual' (' Ueber den Duals '), Berlin, 1823, 4to, is not in this collection.
During the last ten years of his life Humboldt was actively engaged in investigating the Malay and American languages; but finding the task above his strength, he abandoned the American languages to his friend Dr. Buschmann, for whom he afterwards obtained the place of chief librarian of the Royal Library at Berlin, and he devoted his time exclusively to the Malay languages, on which he intended to write an extensive work. When he died, the first volume was nearly finished, and It was prepared for the press by Dr. Buschmann and Alexander von Humboldt, who published it, with a preface of his own, under the title, 'Lieber die Kawl Sprache auf der Insel Java,' Berlin, 1836, 8vo, which attracted the attention of all Europa. The greater portion of this work comprehends invcatigationa of the progress of civilisation from the continent of India towards the large ialanda in the Indian Sea, which he traces in the monuments, the languages, and the litera ture of the different Malay nations; and only a small portion is devoted to the examination of the Kawi language. Humboldt bequeathed the store of valuable materials he had got togother with PO much labour, as well as a collection of rare manuscripts and books, chiefly on linguistic subjects, to the Royal Library at Berlin.