e with whom he
agreed, only served as a spur to set his ideas more on the gallop.
And he would go with the most admirable patience into long details of
fact, in order to bring round his adversary to his opinion. I was
struck particularly by the decidedly polemical character of his
remarks: ever and anon he drew this or the other Prussian statesman
into the argument, and in criticising severely their conduct, seemed
not seldom to give as much ease to his own heart as instruction to
me. His whole manner was such as in the Opposition side of a British
Parliament might have produced the most extraordinary effects. In his
extreme fits of eloquent indignation, a sort of convulsive tremor
would seize his whole voice and movements; he would shut his eyes,
and could scarcely bring out his words with the due articulation. But
immediately thereafter he would become calm again; and with what a
breadth and penetration of glance did he then look through his
adversary, reading every secret objection on his countenance, and
preparing a new and more terrible onset to carry the citadel of his
doubts by storm! To converse with him was indeed to carry on a
continued battle; for it pleased him, even when the person with whom
he conversed for the moment agreed with him, to consider him as an
adversary, and to argue with him as in all points a decided opponent
of his views: always, however, without any ill-will or the least
personal feeling. This sort of animated irritation gave a peculiar
charm to Stein's conversation; the Emperor Alexander, in particular,
was quite charmed with the roughness and bluntness of his manner;
for, except by a slight admixture of humour, Stein never attempted to
tame the rudeness of his address, even in the presence of the most
august personages.

"In literature, his taste was decidedly anti-speculative, although
rather practical. Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were the men of his
heart; he had a high opinion of Niebuhr, both as a historian and as a
practical statesman: Heeren he praised and recommended as the rough
and practical: Fichte gained his good opinion by his patriotic
addresses to the German people; but for philosophy in general he had
no taste: Schleiermacher's philosophical religion was too subtle for
him, and, in respect of orthodoxy,