of Europe, and was an especial favourite with the English royal family.
His hospitality was ample, especially to visitors from India, where he
was far better known than any other European Orientalist. His
distinctions, conferred by foreign governments and learned societies,
were innumerable, and, having been naturalized shortly after his arrival
in England, he received the high honour of being made a privy
councillor. In 1898 and 1899 he published autobiographical reminiscences
under the title of _Auld Lang Syne_. He was writing a more detailed
autobiography when overtaken by death on the 28th of October 1900. Max
Müller married in 1859 Georgiana Adelaide Grenfell, sister of the wives
of Charles Kingsley and J. A. Froude. One of his daughters, Mrs
Conybeare, distinguished herself by a translation of Scherer's _History
of German Literature_.
Though undoubtedly a great scholar, Max Müller did not so much represent
scholarship pure and simple as her hybrid types--the scholar-author and
the scholar-courtier. In the former capacity, though manifesting little
of the originality of genius, he rendered vast service by popularizing
high truths among high minds. In his public and social character he
represented Oriental studies with a brilliancy, and conferred upon them
a distinction, which they had not previously enjoyed in Great Britain.
There were drawbacks in both respects: the author was too prone to build
upon insecure foundations, and the man of the world incurred censure for
failings which may perhaps be best indicated by the remark that he
seemed too much of a diplomatist. But the sum of foibles seems
insignificant in comparison with the life of intense labour dedicated to
the service of culture and humanity.
Max Müller's _Collected Works_ were published in 1903. (R. G.)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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