myself, and before I arrived at that unity which was so necessary to me,
between my inward and my outward life, and at the equally necessary
harmony between aim, career, and method.

Mankind as a whole, as one great unity, had now become my quickening
thought. I kept this conception continually before my mind. I sought
after proofs of it in my little world within, and in the great world
without me; I desired by many a struggle to win it, and then to set it
worthily forth. And thus I was led back to the first appearance of man
upon our earth, to the land which first saw man, and to the first
manifestation of mankind, his speech.

Linguistic studies, the learning of languages, philology, etc., now
formed the object of my attack. The study of Oriental tongues seemed to
me the central point, the fountain head, whither my search was leading
me; and at once I began upon them with Hebrew and Arabic. I had a dim
idea of opening up a path through them to other Asiatic tongues,
particularly those of India[72] and Persia. I was powerfully stimulated
and attracted by what I had heard about the study of these languages,
then in its early youth--namely, the acknowledgment of a relationship
between Persian and German. Greek also attracted me in quite a special
way on account of its inner fulness, organisation, and regularity. My
whole time and energy were devoted to the two languages I have
named.[73] But I did not get far with Hebrew in spite of my genuine zeal
and my strict way with myself, because between the manner of looking at
a language congenial to my mind and the manner in which the elementary
lesson book presented it to me, lay a vast chasm which I could find no
means to bridge over. In the form in which language was offered to me, I
could find and see no means of making it a living study; and yet,
nevertheless, nothing would have drawn me from my linguistic studies had