Dr. Johann Wilhelm
Petersen--Fate of this couple, and their revelations--The later Pietism
and its aberrations--Opposition--Lamentations of the student, Ernst
Johann Semler--Progress of the people through Pietism

CHAPTER VI.

The Dawning of Light (1750).--Changes in the human mind from
the invention of printing--Mathematical discipline and natural
science--Law--Philosophy and its position with respect to theology--The
leaders--Change of literature by Wolf and his disciples--Description
of a German city about 1760, its police and artisans--The
gentry--Merchants and their commerce--Ecclesiastics, teachers, and
schools--Post and travelling--Dress and manners--Sentimentality, tears,
and self-contemplation--Marriage a business matter--Women and house
duties--Narrative of Johann Salomo Semler--Letter from a bride to her
bridegroom in the year 1750

PICTURES OF GERMAN LIFE.

Second Series.

INTRODUCTION.

The Man and the Nation! The course of life of a nation consists in the
ceaseless working of the individual on the collective people, and the
people on the individual. The greater the vigour, diversity, and
originality with which individuals develop their human power, the more
capable they are of conducing to the benefit of the whole body; and the
more powerful the influence which the life of the nation exercises on
the individual, the more secure is the basis for the free development
of the man. The productive power of man expresses itself in endless
directions, but the perfection of all powers is the political
development of the individual, and of the nation through the State. The
mind, the spirit, and the character are influenced and directed by the
political life of the State, and the share which the individual has in
the State is to him the highest source of honour and manly happiness.

If in the time of our fathers and grandfathers the German contemplated
his own position among other men, he might well question whether his
life was poor or rich, whether hope or sorrow predominated; for his
earthly position was in every way peculiar. Whilst he felt with
pleasure that he was in the enjoyment of a free and refined
cultivation, he was daily oppressed by the harsh despotism, or the weak
insignificance of his State, in which he lived as a stranger without
the protection of the law; he loo