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from your tone that you were annoyed. I’m sorry about that from the bottom of my
heart; so please forgive me if I am so trivial as to express to you specially by letter
that I—contrary to all fine custom—gladly share your annoyance and, like any de-
cent physicist, will stand by you with all my might. It is a disgrace that political
passions can exhibit such symptoms in our times; but I hope, on the other hand, that
such phenomena will also open many eyes; anti-Semitism has now arrived at a level
that no decent person can tolerate
anymore.[3]
Nor is it true that it is pervasive
throughout the whole population; neither the masses nor the truly educated let
themselves be dragged along, only the semieducated public, which is unfortunately
drawing quite a lot of attention to itself at
universities.[4]
I consider it out of the
question that even just one physicist of renown—no matter how far to the right he
stands politically—will join the ranks of your
opponents[5]
and only hope that the
newspaper report about your moving away is
untrue[6]
and that the voices of your
thousand friends and admirers will weigh more heavily with you than this clamor,
which you don’t have to listen to at all. We Germans, who don’t tarnish a true love
for the fatherland with foolish nationalistic slogans, regard you as a piece of our
cultural heritage that we do not want to lose. Please also remember that the rebuild-
ing of new intellectual life, so direly needed by Germany now, is made more diffi-
cult if victory is made easy for the nationalist enemies of all stripes.
Otherwise, I hope you are physically healthy and mentally in high spirits, except
for that small annoyed piece of your psyche, and I send you and your esteemed wife
my best regards!
Yours ever truly and devotedly,
Ludwig Hopf.
129. From Willem H. Julius
Baarn, 26 Laan St., 2 September 1920
Dear Colleague,
What a strange and, if it were not so obnoxious, almost ludicrous smear cam-
paign has been organized against you
there![1]
I did not think that Weyland’s stupid
plan would have any such success. At the beginning of August, I received a long
letter from Mr. Weyland urging me to deliver a “talk against Einstein” somewhere,
preferably in
Berlin![2]
A number of names of those whom they were hoping to add
to the list were mentioned—who I could not imagine would accept, though. I was
disgusted by the whole, obviously personally malevolent and not “purely profes-