in German; the rest are all Latin or French. He had it in
contemplation at one time to establish a philosophical journal in
Berlin, but doubts, in his letter to M. La Croye on the subject, in
what language it should be conducted: "Il y a quelque tems que j'ay
pense a un journal de Savans qu'on pourroit publier a Berlin, mais
je suis un peu en doute sur la langue ... Mais soit qu'on prit le
Latin ou le Francois," [13] etc. It seems never to have occurred to him
that such a journal might be published in German. That language was
then, and for a long time after, regarded by educated Germans very much
as the Russian is regarded at the present day, as the language of vulgar
life, unsuited to learned or polite intercourse. Frederic the Great,
a century later, thought as meanly of its adaptation to literary
purposes as did the contemporaries of Leibnitz. When Gellert, at his
request, repeated to him one of his fables, he expressed his
surprise that anything so clever could be produced in German. It may
be said in apology for this neglect of their native tongue, that the
German scholars of that age would have had a very inadequate audience,
had their communications been confined to that language. Leibnitz
craved and deserved a wider sphere for his thoughts than the use of
the German could give him. It ought, however, to be remembered to
his credit, that, as language in general was one among the
numberless topics he investigated, so the German in particular
engaged at one time his special attention. It was made the subject
of a disquisition, which suggested to the Berlin Academy, in the
next century, the method adopted by that body for the culture and
improvement of the national speech. In this writing, as in all his
German compositions, he manifested a complete command of the language,
and imparted to it a purity and elegance of diction very uncommon in
his day. The German of Leibnitz is less antiquated at this moment
than the English of his contemporary, Locke.