Prof. I. Bernard Cohen
5 Stella Road
Belmont MA 02178
1994 July 27

Dr. Joshua Ledefferg
Rockefeller University
New York City, NY

Dear Dr. Ledeberg:

Our first contact, as I well remember, was when I was a graduate
student (probably in my late twenties) when you sent me a letter
(was it from Wisconsin?) asking about a source of a quotation.

Now, a half a century or so later, we "meet" again in the same way,
with a request for a source of a quotation.

Over the years I have often received a query about this very
quotation, usually attributed to Humboldt. I have on several
eccasions sought for it in vain. Some years ago, during a
centenary celebration of Humboldt at the American Academy, the
question arose of the source of this very quotation. Neither his
biographer nor the German scholars present, who (supposedly) knew
something about his writings, could give a source.

Of course, Humboldt could have written or said what you quote. I
only report my failure ever to have found a source to prove it.

But I shall not utterly disappoint you.

First--I have written to Roy Porter (in London), who is currently
compiling a dictionary of scientific quotes. He may have found it.

I have asked him to make direct contact with you since I know you
have accumulated a great store of such quotations and perhaps would
be willing to share some of them with the world at large.

Second--I do know of a source for a similar quotation, one that
actually aroused some considerable notice in the eighteenth
century. It led to a remark much like the one attributed to
Humboldt, but one one occasion attributed to Lagrange or Laplace (TI
can’t recall which). This source is my old "friend" Benjamin
Franklin. I enclose a xerox of his complete statement. Humboldt
certainly knew Franklin’s writings, and perhaps made a paraphrase.

I hope we may meet some time during the coming year to talk about
that phase of your work and its analysis (by yourself and by
Harriet Zuckerman) that was the subject of our correspondence a few
years ago. I hope to get on to that work during the coming months.

Regards

I.Bernard Cohen is Cup.

 
se

a. There are every where a
number of people, who, being totally destitute of any in.
- ventive faculty themselves, do ‘not readily conceive that
others.may possess it: :They think of inventions as of
mirdcles; there might be such formerly, but they are
‘ceased.: With thesé, every one who offers a new invention
-is deemed a pretender: He had it from some other country,
or from some book: ‘A man of fheir'own acquaintance; one
* who has no more sense than themselves, could not possibly,
~in their opinion, have been the inventer of any thing,
.. They are confirmed; too, in these sentiments, by the fre-
i.’ quent instances of pretensions to invention, which vanity
.. is daily producing. That vanity too, though an incitement
“2 to invention, is, at the same time, the pest of inventors.
_.. Jealousy and Envy deny the merit or the novelty of your
invention;- but’ Vanity, when the novelty and merit are
established, claims it for its own. The.smaller your inven-"
-- tion is,. the more mortification you receive in having the
vr, eredit of it disputed with you by a rival, whom the jealousy
wand envy of others are ready to support against you, at
v/ least so far as to make the point doubtful. Itis notin itself .
_’ " cof importance enough for a dis ute; no one would think.
i’ your proofs and reasons worth their attention: And yet.if
"you do not dispute the point, and demonstrate your right,
‘you not only lose’ the credit of being in‘ that instance in- |
', genious, but you suffer the disgrace of not being.i. ingenuous;

',, notonly of being“a plagiary but of being a plagiary for
“ trifles. TIn A thn fuecnmalne Leow oo

 

 

  

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