Part 1 - The Institute Libraries - Institute for Advanced Study

hononed him,
Dr. Einstein first visited the United States in that yesr on a
tour with Dr. Chaim Wefznrann in support of the Zionist cause and of the
University of Jerusalem. On the 9th of May, 1921, Princeton avarded
Einstein an honorary degree, President Ribben speaking in German with
moving sentiment: tWe salute the neu C~lurrbus of science, ~oyzging
through the strange seas of thought alone." Shortly after that, Ein-
stein delivered a series of lectures at the University on the theory of
relativity, which were the high point of what Dr. Philip Frank has called
61
"an event In the cultural history of the 20th century." These memories
left a distinct iqress of shared greatness on the University and fts
mathemticlans ~ n d physicists. In 1925 Princeton htd offered Dr. Einstein
a professorship, which he declined graciously with an epigram variously
rendered as 'Wan is an animal, but w a n is a vegetable, whom to move is
to uproot ," or "One must nor disturb a flowering plant.n42 Both alluded .
to Mrs. Einstein, who was reluctant to leave Berlin.
A rumor from Germany was published in August, 1932, that Ein-
stein was cmfng to the fnstftute, and the press tried in vain to conffm
it, Flexner confided only in the Fatmders and one or two of the Trustees,
The Board met in a mood of high anticipation. But the minutes do not re-
Elect any elation, Flexner's taste uas for underplaying the m n t of
an t 1s event
trimnph, If his memoires are any guide to his sense of dramticq/semd
to be no exception, His report mncerned itself with what he regarded as
most important to impress upon the minds of fmstees and Founders at this
moment -- that salaries and retirent benefits to embers of the kssti-
tutems faculty would be so Itberat that they would be expected to devote