w and then his life
was diversified by a drive. He was, moreover, hospitable; very often
foreign commercial friends came, and he frequently took his favourite
clerks from the writing-room to dine with him. He was fond of talking
politics, and often took correct views of the future. Though he was
grave, he could be very cheerful, and often joked with us. He was
open-handed to the highest degree; gave much to the poor, and gladly
supported industrious people. Sometimes a great disinclination to the
literary class came over him; therefore he frequently declaimed against
the albums of the scholars; yet he never gave less than one thaler
eight n. gr., often double, nay, three and four fold. All boasting was
foreign to him, and he hated all ostentation of riches. If he heard
that any members of his guild showed such ostentation, he only laughed
most satirically; but when the boaster made himself too ridiculous he
would say, 'We have not seen the end of it;' or, 'What wonderful things
that man has;' or, at all events, at the utmost he said, 'I am not a
nobody, either.' He was strictly religious, yet without superstition,
against which, as well as against Popery, priestly pride, and
hypocrisy, he would loudly declaim. He thought clearly on the most
important subjects, as he himself knew, and was indeed almost alarmed,
if he took, as he thought, too free views. It was touching to me; when
once at Leipzig, during my studies there, he expressed himself freely
upon confession, and then, drawing back with great modesty, said, 'Yet
I am saying too much, Fritz, for I know that I am no deep thinking
man.' He had, as a youth, read part of Wolf's philosophical works; but
they were too dry for him. In his judgments of men he struck, as they
say, the right nail on the head; yet he was, like all upright minds,
often caustic, sharp, and bitter. If he had once said, 'The fellow is
good for nothing!' he adhered to it.

"From his over-extensive business, in which he had no intelligent men,
but only mere machines to assist him, we saw but little of him. He was
obliged to intrust us to the tutor and the woman-kind; the result was
that we felt more reverence than confidential tenderness for him. Yet
we loved him from the bottom of our hearts, and his principles, his
teaching, and his simple life worked upon us beneficially.

"Our aunt had, it is true, her good days, yet she never succeeded in
entirely gaining our love. Her quarrels with the maids