9 0 D O C U M E N T 8 2 S E P T E M B E R 1 9 2 5 the attention of the Utrecht committee before the faculty meeting (Monday, 28 Sep- tember).— Unfortunately, however, I, spineless dummy that I am, unthinkingly in- troduced an element into the whole business shortly before that which will cause God knows how much confusion & damage you are about to see what.— That is to say, on Saturday, at the Academy,[2] both Cohen & Kruyt came right up to me, thanking me very warmly for my letters to Ornstein & the two of them[3] & told me that O. had yielded to the extent that he will allow Kramers to be proposed as front runner by the committee, but that, with regard to the further dealings in the faculty, etc., he reserved full freedom (I’m not sure whether I am repeating this last point completely correctly).— I was, of course, terribly happy that the matter no longer seemed so hopeless and told them that I hoped to have a response from you before Monday that would certainly be completely favorable toward Kramers.— And I told them they absolutely should not abandon Kramers since he is a truly excellent young Dutch physicist and also a first-rate lecturer and a widely popular colleague. That, certainly in a short time, friendly collaboration between him & Ornstein would begin and that the other areas of the faculty would also benefit greatly from Kramers, which I explained in greater detail. And I said that I actually envied Utrecht this great young force and would have much preferred that he contribute to the flourishing of Leyden, the so-called City of Lorentz.— My dear Einstein! you know me well, and thus know how much has gone on & is going on with me these days—so it’s no wonder that Kruyt, with whom I am very well acquainted, quite simply said to me: Come to us in Utrecht and give Kramers your place, and every- thing will be taken care of with one blow, and he and Cohen said a lot of things about it with quite some passion.— In that moment, I made the mistake and transgression of reacting quite openly without ¢realizing² considering[4] what a confusing effect my statements could have on the handling of Kramers appoint- ment within the Utrecht faculty. It was, of course, my obligation in this regard to say only what would have focused Cohen’s & Kruyt’s attention and energy on get- ting Kramers’s appointment through ----- not until I had revealed my inner insecu- rity, and realized how, suddenly, their entire attention was focused on obtaining me, did I realize what I had done.— All this was a reaction of barely 30 seconds but even a train derails in a few seconds.— Since that moment, all hell has broken loose.— I asked both of them, truly quite alarmed, not to act on my careless words but by all means to bring about Kramers’s appointment however, should Kramers, for any reason, not accept, I would gladly be ready to calmly discuss everything with them again, etc.— Now, they said this and that in order to calm me down, but then the accident had already happened: they had just seen how confused I seemed. ----- When I got back to Leyden late in the evening, I found your response and de- cided to share your letter with Kruyt by phone the next morning (Sunday), which,