useful, and not to leave inactive the abilities with which God had
endowed him. In active life he was not in a position in which this
longing could be satisfied, and he had little hope of attaining to
any such position: his whole energies were therefore directed upon the
domain of science, and the benefit which he hoped to lay the foundation
of by his work was the object of his life. That, notwithstanding this,
the resolution not to let the work appear until after his death became
more confirmed is the best proof that no vain, paltry longing for praise
and distinction, no particle of egotistical views, was mixed up with
this noble aspiration for great and lasting usefulness.

Thus he worked diligently on, until, in the spring of 1830, he was
appointed to the artillery, and his energies were called into activity
in such a different sphere, and to such a high degree, that he was
obliged, for the moment at least, to give up all literary work. He then
put his papers in order, sealed up the separate packets, labelled them,
and took sorrowful leave of this employment which he loved so much. He
was sent to Breslau in August of the same year, as Chief of the Second
Artillery District, but in December recalled to Berlin, and appointed
Chief of the Staff to Field-Marshal Count Gneisenau (for the term of his
command). In March 1831, he accompanied his revered Commander to Posen.
When he returned from there to Breslau in November after the melancholy
event which had taken place, he hoped to resume his work and perhaps
complete it in the course of the winter. The Almighty has willed it
should be otherwise. On the 7th November he returned to Breslau; on the
16th he was no more; and the packets sealed by himself were not opened
until after his death.

The papers thus left are those now made public in the following volumes,
exactly in the condition in which they were found, without a word