Page images
PDF
EPUB

less isolated body than those of some other countries that enjoy an infinitely greater share of freedom in appearance: this arises from the regular army being usually filled up from the landwehr, or national militia; the members of which, though trained to the use of arms from the age of eighteen, remain in the bosom of their families till called on to serve in the line, or on local duties; and unlike the soldiers of some countries, who are estranged by long absence in distant colonies, generally return home at the end of the war, and continue to cultivate the endearing ties of domestic life, till a new contest calls them once more into the field.

Another great source of hope to the promoters of German liberty, may be traced to the fact of there being more unanimity and less party spirit amongst them than elsewhere. There exists between the crown and the people no privileged classes, who under pretext of supporting rational freedom, are, in fact, the first obstacle to rational innovation': fortunately no such obstacles exist in Germany; and if the yoke of despotism

b

be more galling there, than under a popular form of government, the evil is not only more apparent, but more clearly understood; while the people are sufficiently enlightened to require a new and improved order of things. In this respect, the state of public opinion in Germany, bears a most striking contrast with that of England. In some countries, factions are often known to coalesce against the people, no less for the security of their personal interests, than from a wish to preserve that power which has been obtained by craft, and perpetuated by violence in former days; but happily this event is not to be apprehended in Germany, where the favourite maxim of divide et impera, so successfully adopted in neighbouring states, cannot be resorted to with equal facility.

From the foregoing brief notice of the sentiments entertained by the people of Germany, and the causes which led to their also requiring an abrogation of all feudal dominion; is it singular that the students should have imbibed the notions of their fathers and teachers? Their ardour and determination

2

must arise from causes that can neither be prevented or controuled by government: a wiser system and more conciliatory measures, would, however, have long since tranquillized all parties; but what has been the course pursued by the cabinets of Vienna and Berlin? Such writers as Kotzebue, Stourdza, and Gentz,* are employed, nay paid, to vilify and calumniate not only the students but their professors; because the former happened to have adopted the universal wish of the nation, and the latter, so

*It is greatly to be deplored that this eloquent writer, who gained so large a share of celebrity by his work on the State of Europe, should have also lent himself to the views of despotism and injustice! for he could not avoid this lamentable error, in becoming the secretary of that congress, which has, by its impolitic decrees and tortuous policy, sown the seeds of many new troubles in Europe. But it has been the curse of our age, that men were found to condemn those measures in one ruler, which they not only applauded, but helped to bring about when adopted by another! Had not such men as Gentz, [for there are many like him,] left the people, and gone over to increase that power which was already too great, in what a very different state might not the public liberty of Europe have been at this day!

b 2

unlike the generality of their brethren in other places, are, almost without a single exception, the strenuous supporters of rational liberty and unalienable rights of mankind! When the natural tendency to enthusiasm in the German youths, heightened as it is by the abstruseness of those philosophical dogmas recently promulgated, and their intense application to study, is duly considered, it is by no means so very extraordi

[ocr errors]

*Four o'clock in the morning is the usual hour of a German student's commencing his studies; these are continued until the hour of dinner, and renewed till dark; the rest of the evening being devoted to amusement, such as light reading and visiting friends.

The author of a Tour, called "An Autumn on the Rhine," has given a very long and most unfavourable account of the German university system, merely describing that of Heidelberg, as a specimen of all the rest. This volume had reached Frankfort during the Editor's stay there; and all those with whom he conversed on the subject, concurred in representing the above account as grossly exaggerated. They admitted, however, that the author's "Scandalous Chronicle," relative to several instances of profligacy in high life, was correct to a limited extent; adding, that it was not in the aristocracy of Germany, any more than in other European countries, travellers were to form an estimate of national character and virtue.

nary, that out of ten or fifteen thousand such young men, a few should be so irritated by the malignant provocations of hireling writers, as to forget the obligations due to civil society and the laws; but, while we pity and condemn the fanaticism which prompts men to regard assassination as a virtue, what shall be said of those, who, being intimately acquainted with the combustible materials they are called upon to handle, instead of endeavouring to neutralize them, make every effort to produce an explosion?

Amongst the unworthy subterfuges devised for the purpose of justifying arbitrary measures, the ministerial press of Germany has also taken great pains to prove that Sand had accomplices. However this may answer the views of despotism, and impose on public credulity for a time, none but the most ignorant as well as profligate of mankind, would dream of propagating the monstrous supposition, of there being any political association, so abominably wicked, as to justify, much less encourage,

« PreviousContinue »