Download or read book The Passage to Cosmos written by Laura Dassow Walls and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2011-11-15 with total page 421 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Humboldt offered the world a vision of humans & nature as integrated halves of a single whole. He espoused the idea that while the univerise of nature exists apart from human purpose, its beauty & order are human achievements. Laura Dassow Walls traces the emergence of this philosophy to Humboldt's 1799 journey to America.