The Project Gutenberg EBook of Debit and Credit, by Gustav Freytag

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Title: Debit and Credit
Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag

Author: Gustav Freytag

Translator: 'L. C. C.'

Release Date: November 11, 2006 [EBook #19754]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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DEBIT AND CREDIT.

Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag,

BY L.C.C.

WITH A PREFACE,

BY CHRISTIAN CHARLES JOSIAS BUNSEN,

D.D., D.C.L., D.PH.

NEW YORK:

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,

FRANKLIN SQUARE.

1858.

LETTER FROM CHEVALIER BUNSEN.

CHARLOTTENBERG, NEAR HEIDELBERG, _10th October, 1857._

DEAR SIR,--It is now about five months since you expressed to me a wish
that I might be induced to imbody, in a few pages, my views on the
peculiar interest I attached--as you had been informed by a common
friend--to the most popular German novel of the age, Gustav Freytag's
_Soll und Haben_. I confess I was at first startled by your proposal. It
is true that, although I have not the honor of knowing the author
personally, his book inspired me with uncommon interest when I read it
soon after its appearance in 1855, and I did not hesitate to recommend
translation into English, as I had, in London, recommended that of the
Life of Perthes, since so successfully translated and edited under your
auspices. I also admit that I thought, and continue to think, the
English public at large would the better appreciate, not only the
merits, but also the importance of the work, if they were informed of
the bearing that it has upon the reality of things on the Continent;
for, although _Soll und Haben_ is a work altogether of fiction, and not
what is called a book of _tendency_, p