esteemed Herr
Professor,
in the interest of his
son.
I shall start
by
telling
you
that
my
son
Albert is 22
years
old,
that he studied at the Zurich
Polytechnikum
for 4
years,
and that he
passed his
diploma
examinations in mathematics and
physics
with
flying
colors last
summer.
Since
then,
he has been
trying unsuccessfully
to
obtain
a
position
as
Assistent,
which would enable him
to
continue
his
education in theoretical
&
experimental
physics. All those in
position
to
give
a
judgment
in the
matter,
praise
his talents; in
any case,
I
can assure
you
that he is
extraordinarily
studious and
diligent
and
clings
with
great
love to his science.
My son
therefore feels
profoundly
unhappy with his present lack
of
position,
and his idea that he has
gone
off the tracks with his
career
&
is
now
out of touch gets
more
and
more
entrenched each day.
In addition, he is
oppressed
by the
thought
that he is
a
burden
on us,
people
of modest
means.
Since it is
you,
highly
honored Herr Professor, whom
my
son seems
to admire and
esteem
more
than
any
other scholar currently active in
physics,
it is
you
to whom I have taken the
liberty
of
turning
with
the humble request to read his
paper
published
in the Annalen für
Physik
and to
write him,
if
possible,
a
few words of
encouragement,
so
that he
might
recover
his
joy
in
living
and
working.
If,
in
addition,
you
could
secure
him
an
Assistent's position for
now or
the next autumn,
my
gratitude
would know
no
bounds.
I beg
you once
again
to
forgive
me
for
my
impudence
in
writing
to
you,
and I
am
also taking the liberty of
mentioning
that
my
son
does
not know
anything
about
my
unusual
step.
I
remain, highly
esteemed Herr Professor,
your
devoted
Hermann
Einstein
100.
TO MARCEL GROSSMANN
Milan,
14
April
[1901]
Dear Marcel!
When I found
your
letter
yesterday,
I
was
deeply
moved
by
your
devotion and
compassion
which did
not
let
you
forget
your
old luckless
friend. I really believe it quite
unlikely
that
anyone
had better
colleagues
than I had in
you
and Ehrat.
I
don't have to tell
you
that
I
would be delighted
to
get such
a
nice sphere of activity
and that I
would
spare
no
effort
to
live
up
to
your
recommendation.
I
came
here
to
my
parents three weeks
ago
in
order to search from here for
an
assistant's
position
at
a
university.
I could have found
one
long
ago
had it not been for Weber's
underhandedness. All the
same,
I leave
no
stone unturned and do
not
give
up my
sense
of humor...God created the
donkey
and
gave
him
a
thick
hide.
We
have here
a
splendid spring,
and the whole world smiles
at
one
so
happily
that
one
automatically
sheds the old hypochondriac
self. In
addition,
my
musical
acquaintances protect
me
here from
getting
sour.
As for science, I have
a
few
splendid ideas,
which
now
only need
proper
incubation. I
am now
convinced that
my
theory of atomic
attraction forces
can
also be extended to
gases,
and that it will be
possible
to obtain the characteristic constants of almost all elements
without great
difficulty.
That will then also bring the problem of the
inner kinship between molecular forces and Newtonian
165