[The] university is a nursery of scientific research and spiritual education, a place for the cultivation of ideals for students as well as for teachers. Its significance as such is much greater than its practical value, and for this reason it can also be seen that in filling vacant positions men will be chosen who have distinguished themselves not only as teachers but as investigators and promoters of their "Wissenshaft", for every genuine researcher, whatever his field, who takes his task seriously, fundamentally follows purely ideal goals and is an idealist in the good sense of the word.

Thus I believe that.... teachers and students of the university should consider it an honor to be members of this organization. Pride in one's profession is demanded, not professorial conceit, exclusiveness, or academic presumptuousness, all of which grow from a false estimation of one's self.....

English transtlation by R. H. Stuewer, History as Myth and Muse, inaugural speech, 11 November 1998, Amsterdam.