V O L U M E 8 , D O C U M E N T 2 7 0 a 3 3
I am very glad that the wife is feeling better. Do let her stay long enough in the
Theodosianum.[3]
She shouldn’t worry herself about the expense. I will pay extra
for all the costs arising from the illness. She doesn’t have to bother about that at all.
It is, after all, too boisterous at home with the lively boys. It is fortunate beyond
words that you and your wife are looking after my family in Zurich like this;
otherwise I wouldn’t know what to do. On the other hand, it is fortunate for more
than one reason that they are in Zurich and not here.
In Holland I spent fine days with people of rare intellectual profundity and cul-
tivation who have not swallowed ramrods and aren’t suffering from any mass
psychosis.[4]
I read Treitschke with
Ehrenfest.[5]
You should do that as well. This
is the name one could apply as the label for the upper class here. Otherwise, I am
also reading Tolstoy’s booklet, A Confession, whose train of thought is somewhat
erratic but I feel much affinity with it while
reading.[6]
He recognizes after a hard
struggle that a vivacious and thoughtful person cannot live without clinging onto
something extrapersonal. But I cannot share his view that this extrapersonal thing
must be the childish belief in God.
Since my last letter I have produced little on my own, mainly only a formal sim-
plification of the general theory of
relativity.[7]
I am lecturing again this
semester,[8]
and there is a man wanting to condense this course into a book. This is
commendable, because I myself lack the enterprising spirit to do it.
I hope you are completely healthy again and happily at work. Cordial greetings
from your
Einstein.
Vol. 8, 270a. From Heinrich Zangger
[between 31 October and 13 December
1916][1]
Dear friend Einstein,
You will have to explain the perihelion motion to me sometime, [I get] stuck at
the mathematics.[2] I am likewise unclear about the gravitation-electricity relations
you are implying.[3] Your visit is necessary, as you can see. The situation is getting
progressively worse, many factories are at a standstill because we aren’t getting any
raw materials—so that one can overextend the goodwill of the Swiss, I read in a
letter. If it wasn’t an economic war, it’s being made into one because they are saving
up all exploitable elements, because they seem to need them in this fine world.
Justice Minister Klein[4] did [not?] respond, the 2000 tuberculars aren’t coming
to Switzerland.[5] They are kept in the prison camps. What will be the conse-
quence? The standard for the [prospects?] of the future are, in the end, different
over there [—], for otherwise I don’t understand, [. . .]