D O C U M E N T 3 6 0 S E P T E M B E R 1 9 2 2 2 8 5 I was in Paris shortly after you had left that fine city. Everyone was speaking about you, mostly with the greatest admiration, which pleased me very much. I take the liberty of sending you my cordial regards as well as compliments to your esteemed wife. In live admiration, I remain yours very truly, Svante Arrhenius. 360. From Max Wertheimer Prague, 6 Poric, 17 September 1922 Dear Mr. Einstein, Thank you very much for your letter![1] and for the fine offer in it. I tried to think everything over. First of all, isn’t there some mistake? The meeting in the fall you wrote about, isn’t it taking place right now and is surely over by now? Before your letter arrived I read in the paper about the meeting of the Committee, Bergson’s speech, etc. So isn’t it already too late?[2] It is a first-rate and fine responsibility and, dear Mr. Einstein, as much as I was surprised by your proposal—it is not easy for me to say no to your suggestion, but many things do speak for that. If only because I do not speak French adequately, or rather little I can speak English (albeit in this, in some sense in any case, not uncomplicated situation, it might sometimes depend very much on complete com- prehension of what is being said at the moment), I am a Jew and, as a nat[ive] Ger- man Bohemian, now a Czechoslovak—. And all those reasons that made the matter so difficult for you during our conversation that time and made even you waver about your participation, loom before me, indeed affecting me so much more force- fully: for, if you take part, you are that Einstein, you know! whom the whole world knows, also as a person, and therefore all the obstacles are very much smaller, innocuous, even whereas I would be exposed to many, not unserious potential mis- haps. That might perhaps not be so very bad if I went, even officially, only to listen in and draw up reports for you and for the Ministry,—but even then, that I do not have the sufficient linguistic comprehension, (nor could this be properly remedied by constant interpreting). For reasons of the political moment concerning the Entente and in view of the Germans, wouldn’t the following solution perhaps be the best, after all? You could send as your personal substitute, also officially, just to listen in and draw up reports, a noted, Christian, and linguistically very gifted scholar? Would this be possible? This would appear to me to be very practicable in some respects, also for the sake