D O C U M E N T S 3 7 2 , 3 7 3 N O V E M B E R 1 9 2 4 3 6 3
372. From Hermann Anschütz-Kaempfe
[Kiel, after 17 November
1924][1]
Dear esteemed Prof. Einstein,
Attached is a gratifying letter from
Albert,[2]
the reply to which I must put in
your hands because I don’t have the address in Zurich; I only know the one at home.
The letter followed me from Munich; I have been here for a few days. I am very
pleased about the decision and Albert’s inquiry; he will acquire a taste for technical
physics, all right, [once] he has stuck his nose into it a bit; in Lautrach it was a plea-
sure to see how skillfully he assisted you with the experiments on the sphere. The
latest sphere is being put to the test at the end of this week. It is a pity that you aren’t
here, but then again good, because the painters and masons are in your apartment
and repairing the faulty ceiling beams on the balcony; it looks
frightful.[3]
And the
weather is also frightful. You were right with your supposition that my doubts re-
garding the aluminum induction through the blowout magnet were nonsense; the
experiment was decidedly negative in that regard; besides, the H[oly]
Ghost[4]
has
excused himself for a while. In all due cordiality between households, and it is sad
that you are going across the great water
again;[5]
but I do feel glad about it for you.
Your devoted
Anschütz.
373. To Siegfried Ochs[1]
[Berlin,] 21 November 1924
Highly esteemed Mr. Ochs,
You brought out Beethoven’s profundities as virtually no one else could. I heart-
ily thank you for this experience that you conveyed to me. A religious work obliv-
ious to all else it is
not.[2]
God is not standing there but Beethoven, the human be-
ing. But he can stand it, since that fellow is a giant. And yet, the lucidity and self-
expression that Bach and Mozart achieved do seem to me to come closer not just
to me but, I believe, to the sensitivity of our time. The emphasis on the individual
has nearly totally disappeared in the last hundred years.
Thanking you heartily again, yours,
A. Einstein.