t
for them to act consistently.

This malady seized almost all the intellectual portion of the people.
The salons became _blase_, authors sensational, statesmen without fixed
purpose, and officials without energy: these were all different forms
of the same disease. It was everywhere destructive, nowhere more than
in Prussia; it gave to this State a specially helpless, nay, even hoary
aspect, that was in striking contrast to the respectable capacity which
was not lost in the smaller circles of the people.

But healing came, by degrees, and again in a circuitous way, sometimes
bounding forwards, and then retrograding; but, on the whole, since
1830, in continual progress.

For, at the same time in which the July revolution again excited,
throughout a wide circle of life, an interest in the State, a new
development of German popular strength began in other spheres,
especially through the industrious labours of countless individuals, in
the workshop and the counter. The Zollverein--the greatest creation of
Frederic William III.--threw down a portion of the barriers which had
divided separate German States; the railroads and the steam-boats
became the metallic conductors of technical culture from one end of the
country to the other. With the development of German manufacturing
activity came new social dangers, and new remedies had to be supplied
by the spontaneous activity of the people. Bit by bit was the narrow
system of government and of characterless officials destroyed; the
nation acquired a feeling of active growth; everywhere there was a
youthful interest in life; everywhere energetic activity in
individuals. A free intelligence developed itself in independent men,
as well as in the official order, together with other forms of culture
and other needs of the people. The labour of the inferior classes
became more valuable; to raise their views and increase their welfare
was no longer a problem for quiet philanthropists, but a necessity for
all, a condition of prosperity even for those highest in position.
Whilst it was complained that the chasm between employers and the
employed became greater, and the domination of capital more oppressive,
great efforts were in fact being made by the zeal of literary men, the
philanthropy of the cultivated, and by the monied classes for their own
advantage, to increase the knowledge of the people and improve their
morals. A comprehensive popular literature began to work, commercial