Letter 136 Euler to Razumovsky
Berlin, 11/22 August 1750
Synopsis: Euler receives 50 copies of his Treatise on Navigation. The Gmelin affaire comes to a conclusion. Euler recommends himself to be appointed as the Academy prize examiner
[...] the particular goodness, by which Your Excellency has been most willing to receive my humble congratulations, has filled my heart with the most lively feelings of regard and respect. Having received the news from M. Schumacher that Your Excellency has given instructions to have 50 copies of my treatise on navigation sent to me along with the most recent works of the Imperial Academy , is a most gracious gift which obliges me to take the liberty of presenting Your Excellency with my very humble and very subject thanks and as nothing will bring me closer to the Imperial Academy/117r/ than Your Excellency's grace, I will redouble my efforts to make myself more worthy as much by my zeal for the glory of the Academy as by my works. h I will not miss to send having the honor to present to Your Excellency at this time two papers which are hereby attached, and enclose in-depth research into the most sublime analysis. For having received the honor to fulfill this duty, which has not yet been filled, I do not believe that there is any work that I could do better than to continue to work in this part of mathematics.
I also take the liberty to present to Your Excellency the attached letter from M. Gmelin, by which he felt that it was his duty to witness to Your Excellency his very perfect submission by requesting your forgiveness concerning his unbalanced behavior. By thanking Your Excellency /118/ of his most generous decision to forget in future his mistakes by his continued work for the service of the Academy, insofar as he applies himself with diligence to pursue, for which it has pleased Your Excellency to entrust me, is on the point of ending.
I have no doubt that Your Excellency will receive before the end of the year some excellent papers on the questions which you have deemed important to publish for the first place prize of the Academy. On the advice of Messrs. Schumacher and Teplov, it could so happen that Your Excellency names me among the commissioners entrusted to examine the papers which will be sent. I have consulted on this matter so that I might maintain the perfect impartiality in what concerns the examination if it were the case. I have voluntarily relinquished all hope that I might have had regarding this prize, since it will be convenient to take all necessary precautions for the judging of this first prize, so that none can reproach the decision and as the majority of the papers will be based on the most profound analysis, I felt that I could be better employed to the service of the Academy by being prepared to examine them, in the case that Your Excellency would deem it appropriate to entrust the task to me.
Taking the liberty to recommend myself as well as all my family to the continued good graces of Your Excellency, I am with deepest respect[...]
Translated from the French
by J.S.D.Glaus
