412
DOC.
403
DECEMBER
1917
let
me
know,
if
possible, by
return
post,
how much
you
have
disbursed for
me
in
total
(Tete, packages,
etc.).[4]
It
seems
to be
auspicious
for
money
transfers
at
the
moment.[5]
Healthwise,
I
am feeling
very
well. I have
gained
ca.
4
pounds
since
the
summer,
thanks
to Elsa’s
good
care.
She cooks
everything
for
me
herself,
since
this
has
proved
to be
necessary.
This
is
possible
because
I live
in the
apartment
next to
hers
(for
the
interim).[6]
I
am
working
hard,
lecturing
on
statistical
mechanics and
quantum
theory[7]
and
am
also
writing a
thing
or two,
but
nothing
of
particular
importance.
Truly
novel inventions
only
come
during
one’s
youth;
later
one
becomes
ever
more
experienced,
renowned
and-blockheaded.
Debye
has done
something very
fine
on
the
X-ray
spectrum, elaborating
on
Bohr and
Sommerfeld.[8] I
shall tell
you
about it
when I
come
to Switzerland
again.
Do
you
know
that
Smoluchowski died
of
dysentery?[9]
What
a pity.
Will
there
be
peace
soon?
No
one
knows.
About
a
week
ago
I
sent
a
lot of
papers
to
Weiss[10]
but
received
no
notice of
receipt.
He
had
asked
me
for
the
dispatch many times;
but
it
had
been
delayed owing
to
the
impediments.
Please
kindly
forward
the
papers
to
Weiss,
in
case
he should
be
absent
from Zurich.
The
general
theory
of
relativity is
being
received with
downright
enthusiasm
among
my
colleagues.[11]
How
can
it
ever
be
that
this
culture-loving
time
be
so
dreadfully
amoral?
I
am
becoming increasingly
inclined
to rate
everything
as
trivial
against charity
and
philanthropy.
Would it
not
be
good
for
the
world if
degenerate Europe
were
to
wreck
itself
totally?
When
I
hear
the
new
repugnant
term “toughening
up” [Ertüchtigung], my
stomach
turns.
All of
our
exalted tech-
nological progress,
civilization for
that
matter, is
comparable
to
an
axe
in
the
hand
of
a
pathological
criminal.
I
believe,
in all
seriousness,
that the
Chinese
ought
to
be held in
higher
esteem
than
we
and
hope
that their
healthy
prolifera-
tion
will
outlast the
extinction of
our
“toughened”
comrades.[12]
My
financial
situation
has
improved,
so
I
don’t need
to
worry
for
the time
being.[13]
But I
definitely
want Tete
to
be
brought
back down
again
from
up
there
in
the New
Year.[14]
I
am
opposed
to
having
such
a
child
spend
his
youth
in
such
a
distillery
disinfector. Our
life is corrupted not just
technologically
but
also
medically-which is actually
only
a
kind of
technological pollution.
Dear
Zangger,
do
not
be
angry
at
my
wild
ranting; people
must vent
them-
selves
in order not to
burst.
Do write
again
sometime, very
legibly,
to
your
old
A.
Einstein.
Do
please
put
in
a
good
word for
me
when
you
are
in Berne
again,
so
that
I
continue to
receive
the
“family
packages.”[15]
For
otherwise,
because
I
am
living
here
as a single Swiss,
they
just grant
me
“bachelor’s
packages,”
in which
there
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