The New Old Heidelberg

When Mark Twain called Heidelberg "the last possibility of the beautiful." Germany's oldest university was gloriously awash with the Student Prince atmosphere of beer mugs, sabers and sashes. It was still the citadel that had beckoned Spinoza with the promise. "You will have the utmost freedom of philosophizing." U.S. students in the 19th century swarmed there for the great flowering of scholarship and the pleasant beguilements of student life.

All that died.in the late '30s with Hitler, the swastika, and a Nazi professor shouting: "We do not recognize truth for truth's sake." Many wondered if Heidelberg, which once so heavily influenced scholars and students from Tokyo to Texas, would ever rise again.

Last week, as the university celebrated its 575th anniversary, it was clear that "Alt Heidelberg" had risen again. Scholarship, if short of the great years, is high. And amid West Germany's smiling new prosperity, the old Lebenslust was back in style. Though most of the 9,000 students, a fourth of them girls, still have to scrimp, a golden fringe whipped along the Hauptstrasse in costly Porsches and red M.G.s. Some 20% sported the bright visored caps of 30 student societies, including the famed dueling and drinking fraternities.

A Great Century. Founded in 1386 by Prince Elector Ruprecht I of the Palatinate (and officially still called Ruprecht-Karl University). Heidelberg has survived wars before. For its Protestant loyalties. Roman Catholic armies looted the place in the Thirty Years' War (much of the library vanished into the Vatican). France's Louis XIV sacked it again; it reopened under Jesuit auspices in 1700 and foundered until the 19th century, when Protestants returned to launch the university's renowned reputation.

In law. Heidelberg reigned supreme throughout Germany. In philosophy, it boasted Hegel and later Karl Jaspers. In literature, it was a vibrant center of Germany's early 19th century Romantics (Brentano, Eichendorff, Holderlin). In natural sciences, it abounded with men like Bunsen and Kirchhoff, who in 1860 demonstrated spectrum analysis, and Helmholtz, one of the founders of the law of the conservation of energy. In medicine, it was a world-famed mecca, and over the years its professors won seven Nobel Prizes.

Heidelberg suffered no physical damage in World War II, and it reopened in 1945 with shabby, thoughtful veterans--both Germans and U.S. G.I.s. Today it has more foreign students (1,500 last semester) than any other German university. Biggest detachment: 313 Americans, most of them medical students. "Some of them may be odd in the American sense of the word, or lone wolves," says one professor. "But they are all wide awake and intelligent--the kind of student a European professor likes. They are more critical than our students, always ask questions and work very hard."

"To Serve My Fatherland." Apart from sorely needed new science and medical buildings. Heidelberg's thorniest problem these days is the rise of some old-style student societies that once were hotbeds of extreme nationalism. The faculty is hopeful that more prosperity--and ridicule--will tone them down. The goal is the liberal spirit of the new student oath, introduced in 1945 by postwar Rector Karl Heinrich Bauer: "I vow to . . honor the spirit of science in the service of truth for the benefit of all mankind, and thus also to best serve my fatherland."

One night last week 1,000 torch-carrying students marched up from the Neckar River to sing songs and orate in the university square. Next morning maroon-gowned Rector Gottfried Kothe led a bright-plumed academic procession into the great auditorium jammed with 2,500 dignitaries from all over the world. There were fireworks, a gala ball, and a learned address by famed Philosopher Jaspers on "Memories of Heidelberg." And everywhere there was music, from Bach and Beethoven to the obligatory lieder swelling from a 1,000-man chorus. Once again Heidelberg's motto, ''Living Spirit," was a living theme.

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