Chapter IX (1)

OF THE SCHOOLING OF THE GERMAN CITIZEN.
(1790.)

Many races of poets had passed away; their hearts had never been stirred by vivid impressions of a heroes life; they celebrated the victories of Alexander and the death of Cato in countless forms, with chilling phrases and in artificial periods. Now the smallest story told at the house-door by an invalid soldier caused transports, even that the great King of Prussia had been seen by him at the cathedral and had spoken five words to him. The tale of the simple man brought at once, as if by enchantment, before the minds of his hearers the exalted image of the man, the camp, the watch-fire, and the watch. How weak was the impression produced by the artificial praise of long-spun verses against such anecdotes which could be told in a few lines! They excited sympathy and fellow-feeling, even to tears and wringing of hands. In what lay the magic of these slight traits of life? Those few words of the King were so characteristic, one could perceive in them the whole nature of the hero, and the rough true-hearted tone of the narrator gave his account a peculiar colouring which increased the effect. A poetic feeling was undoubtedly produced in the hearer, but different as heaven from earth to the old art. And this poetry was felt by every one in Germany after the Silesian war; it had become as popular as the newspapers and the roll of the soldiers' drum. He who would produce an effect as a German poet, must know how to narrate, like that honest man of the people, in a simple and homely way, as from the heart, and it must be a subject which would make the heart beat quicker. Goethe knew well why he referred the whole of the youthful intellectual life of his time to Frederic II., for even he had in his father's house been influenced by the noble poetry which shone from the life of that great man on his contemporaries. The great King had pronounced "Goetz von Berlichingen" a horrible piece, yet he had himself materially contributed to it, by giving the poet courage to weave together the old anecdotes of the troopers into a drama. And when Goethe, in his old age, concluded his last drama, he brought forward again the figure of the old King, and he makes his Faust an indefatigable and exacting master, who carries his canal through the marsh lands of the Vistula. And it was not different with Lessing, to say nothing of the minor poets. In "Minna von Barnhelm," the King sends a decisive letter on the stage; and in "Nathan"--the antagonism betwixt tolerance and fanaticism, betwixt Judaism and priestcraft--is an ennobled reflex of the views of D'Argen's Jewish letters.

It was not only the easily moved spirit of poets that was excited by the idea of the King: even the scientific life of the Germans, their speculative and moral philosophy, were elevated and transformed by it.

For the freedom of conscience which the King placed at the head of his maxims of government, dissolved like a spell the compulsion which the church had hitherto laid on the learned. The strong antipathy which the King had for priestly rule, and every kind of restraint of the mind, worked in many spheres. The most daring teaching, the most determined attacks on existing opinions, were now allowed; the struggle was carried on with equal weapons, and science obtained for the first time a feeling of supremacy over the soul. It was by no accident that Kant rose to eminence in Prussia; for the whole stringent power of his teaching, the high elevation of the feeling of duty, even the quiet resignation with which the individual had to submit himself to the "categorical imperative," is nothing more than the ideal counterpart of the devotion to duty which the King practised himself and demanded of his Prussians. No one has more nobly expressed than the great philosopher himself, how much the State system of Frederic II. had been the basis of his teaching.

Historical science was not the least gainer by him. Great political deeds were so intimately blended with the imaginations and the hearts of Germans, that every individual participated in them; manly doings and sufferings appeared so worthy of reverence, that the feeling for what was significant and characteristic animated in a new way the German historical inquirer, and his precepts for the nation attained a higher meaning.

It was not, indeed, immediately that the Germans gained the sure judgment and political culture which are necessary to every historian who undertakes to represent life of his nation. It was remarkable that the historical mind of Germany deviated so much from that of England and France, but it developed itself in a way that led the greatest intellectual acquisitions.

And these new blossoms of intellectual life in Germany, which were unfolded after the year 1750, bore a thoroughly national character; indeed, their highest gain remains up to the present time almost entirely to the German. It began to be recognised that the life of a people develops itself, like that of an individual, according to certain natural laws; that, through the individual souls of the inventor and thinker, a something national and in common penetrates from generation to generation, each at the same time limiting and invigorating it. Since Winckelman undertook to discern and fix the periods of ancient sculptural art, a similar advance was ventured upon in other domains of knowledge. Semler had already endeavoured to point out the historical development of Christianity in the oldest church. The existence of old Homer was denied, and the origin of the epical poem sought in the peculiarities of a popular life which existed 3000 years ago. The meaning of myths and traditions, striking peculiarities in the inventions and creations of the youthful period of a people, were clearly pointed out; soon Romulus and the Tarquins, and finally the records of the Bible, were subjected to the same reckless inquiries.

But it was peculiar that these deep-thinking investigations were united with so much freedom and power of invention. He who wrote the "Laocoon" and the "Dramaturgie" was himself a poet; and Goethe and Schiller, the same men whose springs of imagination flowed so full and copiously, looked intently into its depth, investigating, like quiet men of learning, the laws of life of their novels, dramas, and ballads.

Meanwhile all the best spirits of the nation were enchanted with their poems; the beautiful was suddenly poured out over the German soil as if by a divinity. With an enthusiasm which often approached to worship, the German gave himself up to the charms of his national poetry. The world of shining imagery acquired in his eyes an importance which sometimes made him unjust to the practical life which surrounded him. He, who so often appeared as the citizen of a nation without a State, found almost everything that was noble and exalted in the golden realm of poetry and art; the realities about him appeared to him common, low, and indifferent.

How through this an aristocracy of men of refinement were trained,--how the great poets themselves were occupied in looking down with proud resignation from their serene heights on the twilight of the German earth,--has often been portrayed. Here we will only relate how the time worked on the common run of men, remodelling their characters and ideas.

It is the year 1790, four years after the death of the great King; the second year in which the eyes of Germany had been fixed with astonishment on the condition of France. A few individuals only interested themselves in the struggle going on in the capital of a foreign country betwixt the nation and the throne. The German citizen had freed himself from the influence of French culture; indeed Frederic II. had taught his country people to pay little attention to the political condition of the neighbouring country. It was known that great reforms were necessary in France, and the literary men were on the side of the French opposition. The Germans were more especially occupied with themselves; a feeling of satisfaction is perceptible in the nation, of which they had been long deprived; they perceive that they are making good progress; a wonderful spirit of reform penetrates through their whole life: trade is flourishing, wealth increases, the new culture exalts and pleases, youths recite with feeling the verses of their favourite poet, and rejoice to see on the stage the representations of great virtues and vices, and listen to the entrancing sounds of German music. It was a new life, but it was the end of the good time. Many years later the Germans looked longingly back for the peaceful years after the Seven Years' War.

If any one at this time entered the streets of a moderate-sized city, through which he had passed in the year 1750, he would be struck by the greater energy of its inhabitants. The old walls and gates are indeed still standing; but it is proposed to free from brick and mortar the entrances which are too narrow for men and waggons, and to substitute light iron trellis-work, and in other places to open new gates in the walls. The rampart round the city moat has been planted with pollards, and in the thick shade of the limes and chestnuts the citizens take their constitutional walks, and the children of the lower orders breathe the fresh summer air. The small gardens on the city walls are embellished; new foreign blossoms shine amongst the old, and cluster round some fragment of a column or a small wooden angel that is painted white; here and there a summer-house rises, either in the form of an antique temple or as a hut of moss-covered bark, as a remembrance of the original state of innocence of the human race, in which the feelings were so incomparably purer and the restraints of dress and _convenances_ were so much less.

But the traffic of the city has extended itself beyond the old walls, where a high road leads to the city, and suburban rows of houses stretch far into the plain. Many new houses, with red-tiled roofs under loaded fruit-trees, delight the eyes. The number of houses in the city has also increased; leaning with broad fronts, gable to gable, there they stand, with large windows and open staircases enclosing wide spaces. The ornaments that adorn the front are still modestly made of plaster of Paris; bright lime-washes of all shades are almost the only characteristics, and give the streets a variegated appearance. They are, for the most part, built by merchants and manufacturers, who are now almost everywhere the wealthy people of the city.

The wounds inflicted by the Seven Years' War on the prosperity of the citizens are healed. Not in vain have the police, for more than fifty years, admonished and commanded; the city arrangements are well regulated; provisions for the care of the poor are organised, funds for their maintenance, doctors, and medicine supplied gratuitously. In the larger cities much is done for the support of the infirm; in Dresden, in 1790, the yearly amount of funds for the poor was 50,000 thalers; in Berlin also, where Frederic William had done much for the poor, the government warmly participated in rendering assistance,--it was reported that more was done there than elsewhere. But the benevolence which the educated classes evinced towards the people was deficient in judgment--alms-giving was the only thing thought of; a few years later it was considered truly patriotic in the finance minister, von Struensee, to remit to the Berlin poor a considerable portion of his salary. At the same time there were loud complaints of the increasing immorality, and of the preponderance of poor. It was remarked, with alarm, that Berlin, under Frederic II., had been the only capital in the world in which more men were born in the year than died, and that now it was beginning to be the reverse. At Berlin, Dresden, and Leipzig, beggars were no longer to be seen; indeed there were few in any of the Prussian cities, with exception of Silesia and West Prussia; but in the smaller places in Lower Saxony they still continued to be a plague to travellers. They congregated at the hotels and post-houses, and waylaid strangers on their arrival.

But a greater and more satisfactory improvement was made by the exertions of the government in the increased care of the sick: the devastating pestilence and other diseases were--one has reason to believe--shut out from the frontiers of Germany. From 1709-11 the plague had raged fearfully in Poland, and even in 1770 there had been deaths from it; whole villages had been depopulated by it, but our native land was little injured. There was one disease which still made its ravages among rich and poor alike--the small-pox. It was Europe's great misery--the repulsive visitant of blooming youth, bringing death and disfigurement. It was the turning-point of life, how they passed through this malady. Much heart-rending misery has now ceased; the beauty of our women has become more secure, and the number of diseased and helpless, has considerably diminished since Jenner and his friends established in London, in 1799, the first public vaccinating institution.

Everywhere, about this time, began complaints of the want of economy, and immoderate love of pleasure of the working classes: complaints which certainly were justified in many cases, but which must inevitably be heard where the greater wealth of individuals increases the necessities of the people in the lower classes. One must be cautious before one assumes from this a decrease in the popular strength; the awakening desires of the people is more frequently the first unhealthy sign of progress. On the whole it does not appear to have been so very bad. Smoking was indeed general; it constantly increased, although Frederic II. had raised the price in Prussia by his stamp on each packet. The coloured porcelain-headed pipe began to supplant the meerschaum. In Northern Germany the white beer became the new fashionable drink of the citizens; staid old-fashioned tradesmen shook their heads, and complained that their favourite old brew became worse, and that the consumption of wine among the citizens increased immoderately. In Saxony they began to drink coffee to a great extent, however thin and adulterated it might be, and it was the only warm drink of the poor. The general complaint of travellers, who came from the south of Germany, was that the cooking in Prussia, Saxony, and Thuringia was poor and scanty.

The public amusements, also, were neither numerous or expensive. Foremost was the theatre; it was quite a passion with the citizens. The wandering companies became better and more numerous, the number of theatres greater; the best place was the parterre, in which officers, students, or young officials, who were frequently at variance, gave the tone. The sensation dramas, with dagger, poison, and rattling of chains, enchanted the unpretending; pathetic family dramas, with iniquitous ministers of state, and raving lovers excited feeling in the educated; and the bad taste of the pieces, and the good acting, astonished strangers. The entrance of one of these companies within walls was an event of great importance; and we see, from the accounts of many worthy men, how great was the influence of such representations upon their life. It is difficult for us to comprehend the enthusiasm with which young people of education followed these performances, the intensity of the feelings excited in them. Iffland's pieces, "Verbrechen aus Ehrgeiz" and "Der Spieler," drew forth not only tears and sobs, but also oaths and impassioned vows. Once at Lauchstaedt, when the curtain fell at the end of the "Spielers" (Gamblers), one of the wildest students of Halle rushed up to another, also of Halle, but whom he scarcely knew, and begged him, the tears streaming from his eyes, to record his oath that he would never again touch a card. According to the account the excited youth kept his word. Similar scenes were not extraordinary. Poor students saved money for weeks to enable them to go even once from Halle to the theatre in Lauchstaedt, and they ran back the same night, so as not to miss their lectures the next morning. But, lively as was the interest of the Germans in the drama, it was not easy for the society of even the larger cities to keep up a stationary theatre. At Berlin the French theatre was changed to a German one, with the proud title of National Theatre; but this, the only one in the capital, was, in 1790, little visited, although Fleck and both the Unzelmanns played there. The Italian Opera was, indeed, better attended, but it was given at the King's expense; every magistrate had his own box; the King still sat, with his court, in the parterre behind the orchestra; and throughout the whole winter there were only six representations--one new and one old, each performed three times. Then, undoubtedly, the public thronged there, to see the splendour of this court festival, and were astounded at the great procession of elephants and lions in "Darius." It is mentioned that at Dresden, also, the children's theatricals in families were far more in request than the great theatre; and in Berlin, which was considered so particularly frivolous and pleasure-seeking, this same winter, at the great masquerade, of which there was so much talk in the country, there was only one person dressed in character; the others were all spiritless dominoes, and the whole was very dull to strangers.[24] All this does not look much like lavish expenditure.

The usual social enjoyment, also, was very moderate in character; it was a visit to a public coffee-garden. Nobles, officers, officials, and merchants, all thronged there for the sake of some unpretending music and coloured lamps. This kind of entertainment had been first introduced at Leipzig and Vienna about 1700; the great delights of this coffee-drinking in the shade were celebrated in prose and verse, and the more frivolous boasted how convenient such assemblages were for carrying on tender liaisons. These coffee-gardens have continued characteristic of German social intercourse for nearly 150 years. Families sat at different tables, but could be seen and observed; the children were constrained to behave themselves properly, and careful housewives carried with them from home coffee and cakes in cornets.

With the well-educated citizen, hospitality had become more liberal, and entertainments more sumptuous; but in their family life they retained much of the strict discipline of their ancestors. The power of the husband and father was predominant; both the master and mistress of the house required prompt obedience; the distinction between those who were to command and to obey was more clearly defined. Only husband and wife had learnt to address each other with the loving "_thou_"; the children of the gentry, and often also of artisans, spoke to their parents in the third person plural: the servants were addressed by their masters with the "_thou_," but by strangers in the third person singular. In the same way the "_he_" was used by the master to his journeymen, by the landed proprietor to the "_schulze_," and by the gymnastic teacher to a scholar of the upper classes; but in many places the scholar addressed his _Herr Director_ with "your honour."

More frequently than forty years before, did the German now leave his home to travel through some part of his Fatherland. The means of intercourse were intolerable, considering the great extension of commerce and the increased love of travelling. Made roads were few and short; the road from Frankfort to Mayence, with its avenues of trees, pavement, and footpaths, was reputed the best _chaussee_ in Germany; the great old road from the Rhine to the east was still only a mud road. Still did persons of consequence continue to travel in hired coaches or extra post; for though on the main roads the vehicles of the ordinary post had roofs, they had no springs, and were considered more suitable for luggage than passengers; they had no side doors; it was necessary to enter under the roof, or creep in over the pole. At the back of the carriage the luggage was stowed up to the roof, and fastened with cords; the parcels also lay under the seats; kegs of herrings and smoked salmon incessantly rolled on to the benches of the passengers, who were constantly occupied in pushing them back; as it was impossible for people to stretch out their feet on account of the packages, they were obliged in despair to dangle their legs outside the carriage. Insupportable were the long stoppages at the stations; the carriage was never ready to start under two hours; it took eleven weary days and nights of shaking and bruising to get from Cleves to Berlin. Travelling on the great rivers was better; down the Danube, it is true, there were as yet nothing but the old-fashioned barges, without mast or sails, drawn by horses; but on the Rhine the lover of the picturesque rejoiced in a passage by the regular Rhine boats; their excellent arrangements were extolled, they had mast and sails, and only used horses as an assistance; they also had a level deck, with rails, so that people could promenade on it, and cabins, with windows and some furniture. An ever-changing and agreeable society was to be found collected there, as many besides travellers on business used them; for Germans, after 1750, had made a most remarkable progress; the love of nature had attained a great development. The English landscape gardening took the place of the Italian and French architectural gardens, and the old Robinsonades were followed by descriptions of loving children, or savages in an enchanting and strange landscape. The German, later than the highly-cultivated Englishman, was seized with the love of wandering in distant countries; but it had only lately become an active feeling. It was now the fashion to admire on the mountains the rising sun and the floating mist in the valleys; and the pastoral life with butter and honey, mountain prospects, the perfume of the woods, the flowers of the meadows, and ruins, were extolled, in opposition to the commonplace pleasures of play, operas, comedies, and balls. Already did the language abound in rich expressions, describing the beauties of nature, the mountains, waterfalls, &c.; and already did laborious travellers explore not only the Alps, but the Apennines and Etna; but the Tyrol was hardly known.

It was still easy to discover by his dialect, even in the centre of Germany, to what province the most highly-educated man belonged; for the language of family life, giving expression to the deepest feelings of the heart, was full of provincial peculiarities, and those were called affected and new-fangled who accustomed themselves to pronounce words as they were written. Indeed, in the north, as in the south, it was considered patriotic to preserve the native dialect pure; the young ladies of some of the best families formed an alliance to defend the dialect of their city from the bold inroads of the foreigners, who had come to settle there. It was said, to the credit of Electoral Saxony, that it was the only part where even in the lowest orders intelligible German was spoken. A praise that is undoubtedly justified by the prevalence for three centuries of the Upper Saxon dialect in the written language, which is worthy of our observation, as it gives us an idea how the others must have spoken.

In 1790, one might assume that a city community, which was reputed to have made any progress, was situated in a Protestant district; for it was evident to every traveller that the culture and social condition in Protestant and Roman Catholic countries was very different; but even in the same Protestant district, within the walls of one city, the contrast of culture was very striking. The external difference of classes began to diminish, whilst the inward contrast became almost greater; the nobleman, the well-educated citizen, and the artisan with the peasant, form three distinct circles; each had different springs of action, so that they appear to us as if each belonged to a different century.

The most confident and light-hearted were the nobles; there was also some earnestness of mind in them, not unfrequently accompanied by ample knowledge; but the majority lived a life of easy enjoyment: the women, on the whole, were more excited than the men, by the poetry and great scientific struggle of the time. Already were the dangers which beset an exclusive position very visible, more especially in the proudest circles of the German landed aristocracy; both the higher and lower Imperial nobility were hated and derided. They played the part of little Sovereigns in the most grotesque modes; they loved to surround themselves with a court of gentlemen and ladies, even down to the warder, whose horn often announced across the narrow frontier that his lord was taking his dinner; nor was the court dwarf omitted, who, perhaps in fantastic attire, threw his misshapen head every evening into the _salon_ of the family, and announced it was time to go to bed. But the family possessions could not be kept together; one field after another fell into the hands of creditors; there was no end to their money embarrassments. Many of the Imperial nobles withdrew into the capitals of the Ecclesiastical States. In the Franconian bishoprics on the Rhine, in Munsterland, an aristocracy established themselves, who, according to the bitter judgment of contemporaries, did not display very valuable qualities. Their families were in hereditary possession of rich cathedral foundations and bishoprics; they were slavish imitators of French taste at table, in their wardrobes, and equipages; but their bad French and stupid ignorance were frequently thrown in their teeth.

The poorer among the landed nobility were in the hands of the Jews, especially in East Germany; still, in 1790, the greater part of the money that circulated through, the country passed through the hands of the nobles. On their properties they ruled as Sovereigns, but the land was generally managed by a steward. There was seldom a good understanding betwixt the lord and the administrator of his property, whose trustworthiness did not then stand in high repute; placed between the proprietor and the villein, the steward endeavoured to gain from both; he took money from the countrymen, and remitted their farm service, and, in the sale of the produce, took as much care of himself as of his master.[25]

The country nobleman was glad to spend the winter months in the capital of his district; in summer the fashionable amusement was to visit the baths. There the family displayed all the splendour in their power. Much regard was paid to horses and fine carriages: the nobleman liked to use his privilege of driving four-in-hand, and there were always running footmen, who went in front of the horses, in theatrical-coloured clothes, with a large whip thrown over their shoulders, and they wore shoes and white stockings. At evening parties, or after the theatre, a long row of splendid carriages--many with outriders--were to be seen in the streets, and respectfully did the man of low degree look upon the splendour of the lords. They showed their rank also in their dress, by rich embroidery, and white plumes round their hats; at the masquerade they had a special preference for the rose-coloured domino, which Frederic II. had declared to be a privilege of the nobility. Many of the richer ones kept chaplains, small concerts were frequent; and at their country seats, early on the Sunday morning, there was a serenade under the windows, as a morning greeting to the lady of the house. Play was a fatal amusement, especially at the baths; there the German landed proprietors met together, and played chiefly with Poles, who were the greatest gamblers in Europe. Thus it often happened to the German gentlemen, that they lost their carriages and horses at play, and had to travel home, involved in debt, in hired carriages. Such mischances were borne with great composure, and speedily forgotten. In point of faith the greater part of the country nobility were orthodox, as were most of the village pastors; but more liberal minds clung to the French philosophy. Still did Paris continue to issue its puppets and pictures of fashions, hats, ribbons, and dresses throughout Germany; but even in the modes a great change was gradually beginning: hoops and hair cushions were no longer worn by ladies of _ton_, except at court; rouge was strongly objected to, and war was declared against powder; figures became smaller and thinner, and on the head, over small curly locks, the pastoral straw hat was worn; with men, also, embroidered coats, with breeches, silk stockings, buckled shoes, and the small dress-sword, were only worn as festival attire; the German cavalier began to take pleasure in English horses, and the round hat, boots, and spurs were introduced; and they ventured to appear in ladies' rooms with their riding-whips.[26]

An easy life of enjoyment was frequent in the families of the nobility--a cheerful self-indulgence without great refinement, much courtly complaisance and good humour; they had also the art of narrating well, which now appears to recede further eastward, and of interweaving naturally anecdotes with fine phrases in their conversation; and they had a neat way of introducing drolleries. The morals of these circles, so often bitterly reprobated, were, it appears, no worse than they usually are among mere pleasure-seekers. They were not inclined to subtle inquiries, nor were they generally much disquieted with severe qualms of conscience; their feelings of honour were flexible, but certain limits were to be observed. Within these boundaries they were tolerant; in play, wine, and affairs of the heart, gentlemen, and even ladies, could do much without fear of very severe comments, or disturbances of the even tenor of their life. What could not be undone they quietly condoned, and, even when the bounds of morality had been overstepped, quickly recovered their composure. The art of making life agreeable was then more common than now; equally enduring was the power of preserving a vigorous, active, genial spirit, and a freshness of humour up to the latest age, and of carrying on a cheerful and respectable old age, a life rich in pleasure, though not free from conflicts between duty and inclination. There may still be found old pictures of this time, which give us a pleasant view of the naive freshness and easy cheerfulness of the most aged men and women.

Under the nobility were the country people and petty citizens, who, as well as the lower officials, took that conception of life which prevailed in Germany during the beginning of the century. Life was still colourless. We deceive ourselves if we imagine that at the end of this century the philosophic enlightenment had produced much improvement in the dwellings of the poor, especially in the country. In the villages, undoubtedly, there were schools, but the master was frequently only a former servant of the landed proprietor, a poor tailor or weaver, who gave up his work as little as possible, and perhaps left his wife to conduct the school. The police of the low countries was still ineffective, and the vagrants were a heavy burden. There were certainly strict regulations against roving vagabonds: village watchmen and mounted patrols were to stop every beggar, and pass him on to his birth-place; but the village watchman did not watch, the communities shunned the expenses of transport or feared the revenge of the offenders, and the patrols preferred looking after the carriers, who went out of the turnpike roads, because these could pay a fine. Complaints were made of this even in Electoral Saxony.

The countryman still continued true to his church; there was much praying and psalm-singing in the huts of the poor, frequently a good deal of pious enthusiasm; there were still revivalists and prophets among the country people. In the mountain countries, especially where an active industry had established itself, in the poorest huts, among the wood carvers, weavers, and lacemakers of the Erzgebirger and of the Silesian valleys, a pious, godly feeling was alive. A few years later, when the continental embargo annihilated the industry of the poor, amid hunger and deprivations which often brought them to the point of death, they showed that their faith gave them the power of suffering with resignation.

Betwixt the nobility and the mass of the people stood the higher class of citizens: literati, officials, ecclesiastics, great merchants, and tradespeople. They also were divided from the people by a privilege, the importance of which would not be understood in our time,--they were exempt from military service. The severest oppression which fell on the sons of the people, their children were free from. The sons of peasants or artisans who had the capacity for study could do so, but they had first to pass an examination, the so-called "genius test," to exempt them from service in the army. But to the son of a literary man or a merchant it was a disgrace, if, after a learned school education, he sank so low as to fall into the hands of recruiting officers. Even the benevolent Kant refused the request of a scholar for a recommendation, because he had had the meanness to bear his position as a soldier so long and so meekly.[27]

In the literary circle there was still an external difference from the citizen in dress and mode of life: it was the best portion of the nation, in possession of the highest culture of the time. It included poets and thinkers, inventive artists and men of learning, all who won any influence in the domain of intellectual life, as leaders and educators, teachers and critics. Many of the nobility who had entered official life, or had higher intellectual tendencies, had joined them. They were sometimes fellow-workers, frequently companions and kindly promoters of ideal interests.

In every city there were gentry in this literary set. They were scholars of the great philosopher of Koenigsberg; their souls were filled with the poetic creations of the great poet, with the high results of the knowledge of antiquity. But in their life there was still much sternness and earnestness; the performance of duty was not easy or cheerful. Their conception of existence wavered betwixt ideal requirements and a fastidious, often narrow pedantry, which strikingly distinguished them, not always advantageously, from the nobleman.

It is a peculiarity of modern culture, that the impulse of intellectual power spreads itself in the middle of the nation between the masses and the privileged classes, moulding and invigorating both; the more any circle of earthly interests isolates itself from the educated class of citizens, the further it is removed from all that gives light, warmth, and a secure footing to its life. Whoever in Germany writes a history of literature, art, philosophy, and science, does in fact treat of the family history of the educated citizen class.

If one seeks what especially unites the men of this class and separates them from others, it is not chiefly their practical activity in a fortunate middle position, but their culture in the Latin schools. Therein lies their pre-eminent advantage,--the great secret of their influence. No one should be more willing to acknowledge this than the merchant or manufacturer, who has worked his way up from beneath, and entered into their circle.

He perceives with admiration the sharpness and precision in thought and speech which his sons have attained by occupying themselves with the Latin and Greek grammar, which are seldom acquired in any other occupation. The unartificial logic, which so strikingly appears in the artistic structure of the ancient languages, soon gives acuteness and promotes the understanding of all intellectual culture, and the mass of the foreign materials of language is an excellent strengthener of the memory.

Still more invigorating is the purport conveyed from that distant world that was now disclosed to the learner. Still does a very great portion of our intellectual riches descend from antiquity. He who would rightly understand what works around and in him, and has perhaps long been the common property of all classes of the people, must rise up to the source; and an acquaintance with a great unfettered national life, and a comprehension of some of the laws of life, its beauties and its limitations, give a freedom to the judgment upon the condition of the present which nothing else can supply. He whose soul has been warmed by the Dialogues of Plato, must look down with contempt on the bigotry of the monks; and he who has read with advantage the "Antigone" in the ancient language, will lay aside the "Sonnenjungfrau" with justifiable indifference.

But most important of all was the peculiar method of learning at the Latin schools and universities. It is not by the unthinking reception of the material presented to them, but their minds are awakened by their own investigations and researches. In the higher classes of the gymnasiums, and at the universities, the students became the intimates of earnest scholars. It was just the disputed questions which most stirred them: the inquiries still unanswered, and which most powerfully exercised the mind, were those which they most loved to impart. Thus the youth penetrated as free investigator into the very centre of life, and, however far his later vocation might remove him from these investigations, he had received the highest knowledge, and attained to the greatest results of the time; and for the rest of his life was capable of forming a judgment on the greatest questions of science and faith, by accepting or rejecting all the new materials and points of view which he had gained. That these schools of learning made little preparation for practical life, was no tenable complaint. The merchant who took his sons from the university to the counting-house, soon discovered that they had not learnt much with which younger apprentices were conversant, but that they generally repaired the deficiency with the greatest facility.

About 1790, this method of culture had attained so much value and importance, that these years might be called the industrious sixth-form period of the German people. Eagerly did they learn, and everywhere did active spontaneous labour take the place of the old mechanism. Philanthropically did the learned strive to create educational establishments for every class of the people, and to invent new methods of instruction by which the greatest results could be obtained from those who had least powers of learning. To instruct, to educate, and to raise people from a state of ignorance, was the general desire; not that this was useful to the nation in general, for the lower classes could not enter into the exalted feelings which gave to the literary such enjoyment and elevation of mind.

It is true they themselves felt an inward dissatisfaction. The facts of life which surrounded them were often in cutting contrast to their ideal requirements. When the peasant worked like a beast of burden, and the soldier ran the gauntlet before their windows, nothing seemed to remain to them but to shut themselves up in their studies, and to occupy their eyes and mind with times in which they were not wounded by such barbarities. For it had not yet been tried, what the union of men of similar views in a great association would accomplish, in bringing about changes in the State and every sphere of practical interest.

Thus, with all their philanthropy, there arose a quiet despondency even among the best. They had more soundness and strength of mind than their fathers, the source of their morality was purer, and they were more conscientious. But they were still private men. Interest in their State, in the highest affairs of their nation, had not yet been developed. They had learnt to perform their duties as men in a noble spirit, and they contrasted, sometimes hypercritically, the natural rights of men in a State with the condition under which they lived. They had become honourable and strictly moral men, and endeavoured to cast off everything mean with an anxiety which is really touching; but they were deficient in the power which is developed by the co-operation of men of like views, under the influence of great practical questions. The noblest of them were in danger, when they could not withdraw into themselves, of becoming victims rather than heroes, in the political and social struggle. This quality was very striking in the construction of their poetry. Almost all the characters which the greatest poets produced in their highest works of art were deficient in energy, in resolute courage, and political sagacity; even in the heroes of the drama with whom such characteristics were least compatible, there was a melancholy tendency, as in Galotti, Goetz, and Egmont--even in Wallenstein and Faust. The same race of men who investigated with wonderful boldness and freedom the secret laws of their intellectual being, were as helpless and uncertain in the presence of realities, as a youth who first passes from the schoolroom among men.

A sentimentality of character, and the craving for great emotions on insignificant occasions, had not disappeared. But this ruling tendency of the eighteenth century, which has not been entirely cast off even in the present day, was restrained in 1790 by the worthier aims of intellectual life. Even sentimentality had had, since Pietism crept into life, its little history. First, the poor German soul had been strongly affected; it easily became desponding, and found enjoyment in observing the tears it shed. Afterwards the enjoyment of its feelings became more student-like and hearty.

When, in 1750, some jovial companions passed in the extra-post through a village, the inhabitants of which had planted the churchyard with roses, the contrast of these flowers of love and the graves so excited the imagination of these travellers, that they bought a bottle of wine, went to the churchyard, and, revelling in the comparison of roses and graves, drank up their wine.[28] But the student flavour of roughness which was evinced in this enjoyment, passed away when manners became more refined and life more thoughtful. When, in 1770, two brothers were travelling in the Rhine country, through a sunny valley among blooming fruit-trees, one clasped the hand of the other, in order, by the soft pressure of his, to express the pleasure he derived from his company; both looked at each other with tender emotion, blessed tears of quiet feeling rose in the eyes of both, and they embraced each other, or, as would then have been said, they blessed the country with the holy kiss of friendship.[29] When, about the same period, a society expected a dear friend--it must by the way be mentioned that it was a happy husband and father of a family--the feelings on this occasion also were far more manifold, and the self-contemplation with which they were enjoyed, was far greater than with us. The master of the house, with another guest, went to await the approaching carriage at the house door; the friend arrives and steps out of the carriage, deeply moved and somewhat confused. Meanwhile the amiable lady of the house, of whom in former days the new guest had been an admirer, also comes down the stairs. The new-comer has already inquired after her with some agitation, and seems extremely impatient to see her; now he catches sight of her and shrinks back with emotion, then turns aside, and at the same time throws his hat with vehemence behind him to the ground, and staggers towards her. All this has been accompanied with such an extraordinary expression of countenance, that the nerves of the bystanders are shaken. The lady of the house goes towards her friend with outspread arms; but he, instead of accepting her, seizes her hand and bends over it so as to conceal his face; the lady leans over him with a heavenly countenance, and says in a tone such as no Clairon or Duebois could vie with, "Oh, yes; it is you--you are still my dear friend!" The friend, roused by this touching voice, raises himself a little, looks into the weeping eyes of his friend, and then again lets his face sink down on her arm. None of the bystanders can refrain from tears; they flow down the cheeks of even the unconcerned narrator, he sobs, and is quite beside himself.[30] After this gushing feeling has somewhat subsided, they all feel inexpressibly happy, often press each other's hands, and declare these hours of companionship to be the most charming of their life. And those who thus comported themselves were men of well-balanced minds, who looked with contempt on the affectation of the weak, who wept about nothing and made a vocation of their tears and feelings, as did the hair-brained Leuchsenring.

But shortly after this, sentimental nature received a rude shock. Goethe had represented in Werther, the sorrowful fate of a youth who had perished in consequence of these moods; but had himself a far nobler and more sound conception of sentiment than existed in his contemporaries. His narrative was indeed a book for the moulding of finer natures, through which their sentimentality was turned towards the noble and poetic. Immense was the effect; tears flowed in streams; the Werther dress became a favourite costume with sentimental gentlemen, and Lotte the most renowned female character of that year. That same year, 1774, a number of tender souls at Wetzlar, men in high offices and ladies, agreed together to arrange a solemnity at the grave of the poor Jerusalem. They assembled in the evening, read "Werther," and sang the laments and songs on the dead. They wept profusely; at last, at midnight, the procession went to the churchyard. Every one was dressed in black, with a dark veil over the face, and a torch in the hand. Any one who met the procession considered it as a procession of devils. At the churchyard they formed a circle round the grave, and sang, as is reported, the song, "Ausgelitten hast du, ausgerungen;" an orator made a eulogy on the dead, and said that suicide was permitted to love. Finally the grave was strewed with flowers.[31] The repetition of this was prevented by prosaic magistrates.

But the tragical conclusion of Goethe's narrative shocked men of sound understanding. It was no longer a question of jest with flowers and doves: it was convulsive earnest. When the respectable son of an official could arrive at such extravagance as suicide, there was an end of jest. Thus this same work gave rise to a reaction in stronger natures, and violent literary polemics, from which the Germans gradually learnt to regard with irony this phase of sentiment, yet without becoming entirely free from it.

For it was undoubtedly only a variation of the same fundamental tendency, when souls that had become weary of sighs and tears threw themselves into the sublime. Even the monstrous appeared admirable. To speak in hyperbolies--to express with the utmost strength the commonest things, to give the most insignificant action the air of being something extraordinary--became for a long time the fashionable folly of the literary circle. But even this exaggeration disappeared About 1790, the past was looked back upon with smiles, and the spirits of men were contented with the homely, modest style in which Lafontaine and Iffland produced emotion.

The growth of a child's mind at this period shall be here portrayed. It is a narrative of his early youth--not printed--left by a strong-minded man to his family. It contains nothing uncommon; it is only the unpretending account of the development of a boy by teaching and home, such as takes place in a thousand families. But it is just because what is imparted is so commonplace, that it is peculiarly adapted to excite the interest of the reader. It gives an instructive insight into the life of a rising family.

In the first years of the reign of Frederic the Great, a poor teacher at Leipzig was lying on his deathbed; the long vexations and persecutions he had endured from his predecessor, a vehement pastor, had brought him there. His spiritual opponent sought reconciliation with the dying man; he promised the teacher, Haupt, to take care of his uneducated children, and he kept his word. He placed one son in the great commercial house, Frege, which was then at the height of prosperity. The young Haupt won the confidence of his principal; and when he wished to establish himself at Zittau, the house of Frege made the needy youth a loan of 10,000 thalers. The year after, the new merchant wrote to his creditor to say that his business was making rapid progress, but that he should get into great difficulties if he had not the same sum again. His former principal sent him the double. After eight years the Zittau merchant repaid the whole loan, and the day on which he sent the last sum, he drank in his house the first bottle of wine. The son of this man, Ernst Friederich Haupt (he who will give an account of his school hours in his father's house), studied law and became a Syndicus, and afterwards Burgomaster of his native town; he was a man of powerful character and depth of mind, and also a literary man of comprehensive knowledge; some Latin poems printed by him are among the most refined and elegant specimens of this kind of poetry. His life was earnest, and he laboured in a very restricted sphere with a zeal which never seemed sufficient to satisfy himself. But the weight of his energetic character became, at the beginning of the political commotions in 1830, burdensome to the young democrats among the citizens. It was in the city where he dwelt that the agitation was carried on by an unworthy man, who later, by his evil deeds, brought himself to a lamentable end. In the bewilderment of the first movement, the citizens destroyed the faithful attachment which for thirty years had subsisted between them and their superior. The proud and strict man was wounded to his innermost soul by heartlessness and ingratitude; he withdrew from all public occupation, and neither the entreaties nor the genuine repentance evinced by his fellow-citizens shortly after, could make him forget the bitter mortification of those years which had left their mark upon his life. When he walked through the streets, looking quietly before him, a noble melancholy old man with white hair, then--it is related by eye-witnesses--the people on all sides took off their caps with timid reverence; but he stepped on without looking to right or left, without thanks or greeting to the crowd. From that time he lived as a private man, given up to his scientific pursuits. But his son, Moriz Haupt, Professor of the University of Berlin, became one of our greatest philosophers, one of our best men.

Thus begins his account of his first years of school:--

"My earliest recollections begin with the autumn of the year 1776, when I was two years and a half old. We travelled to the family property; I sat on my mother's lap, and the soft bloom on her face gave me great pleasure. I was amused with looking at the trees which appeared to pass the carriage so quickly. Still do the same trees stand on the other side of the bridge; still, when I look at them, does this recollection of the pure world rise before me.

"Already have four-and-forty years passed over the resting-place of your holy dust, dear departed! So early torn away from us! Gentle as thy friendly face, must thy soul have been! I knew thee not; only faint recollections remain to me. I have no picture of thee, not even a sweet token of remembrance. Yet shortly before they sent me, not seventeen years of age, to Leipzig, I stood on the holy spot that contains thy ashes, and sobbing vowed to thee that I would be good!

"Well do I remember the Sunday morning on which my sister Rieckhen was born. Running hurriedly--I had got up sooner than my brother--and, unasked for, had run into my mother's room. I announced it to every one that I found. Some days after, all around me wept 'Mamma is going away!' called out our old nurse, wringing her hands. 'Away! where, then?' I inquired with astonishment 'To heaven!' was the answer, which I did not understand.

"My mother had collected us children once more round her, to kiss and bless us. My half-sister Jettchen, then almost ten years old, and my brother Ernst, who was four, had wept. I--as I have often been told, to my great sorrow--scarcely waited for the kiss, and hid myself playfully behind my sister, 'Fritz! Fritz!' said my mother, smiling, 'you are and will remain a giddy boy; well, run away!'