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Hotel Wolkenstein
in St. Christina, Gröden1
August 18, 1907
Dear Colleague
So the impoverishment of my personality brought about by the interruption of our correspondence has fortunately come to an end. Lazy myself and rambling about the world with my family,
I realize that you are back at work and your letters will remind me of what has become the most interesting topic to us both. Don't despair; probably what you wrote was only a figure of speech. It is immaterial whether or not one is understood by official representatives at the moment. Among the masses who anonymously hide behind them, there are enough people who want to understand and who, as I have often seen happen, will suddenly step forth. After all, one works primarily for the annals of history, and there your lecture in Amsterdam will stand out as a landmark. What you call the hysterical side of your character, the desire to create an impression and to influence people-the very qualities that make you a teacher and a pioneer-will come into its own, even if you haven't made any concessions to fashionable opinions. And if in addition you succeed to an even greater extent in imparting your personal leaven into the fermenting brew of my ideas, then there will no longer be any difference between your cause and mine.
I am not well enough to risk the prospective September journey to Sicily, where the sirocco is said to prevail at that time, so I don't know where I shall be spending those weeks. I shall stay here till the end of August, taking mountain trips and picking edelweiss; I won't be back in Vienna till the end of September. On the whole it would be better for you to write to my Vienna address, as the summer mail in the mountains is very unreliable. My little pocket notebook doesn't show a single entry for the past four weeks, which goes to show how thoroughly I have emptied all my intellectual channels. But I shall remain very grateful if you jog my memory a little.
Germany probably won't take any notice of