in many places popular periodicals appeared, which
endeavoured to make the new discoveries of science available to the
artizan and manufacturer. Even into the hut of the poor peasant did
some rays of bright light penetrate; for him, also, arose a small
philanthropic literature. The moral working of every earthly vocation
was also exhibited; much that was elevating was said concerning the
worth and importance of operatives and of officials; the inward
connection of the material and spiritual interests of the nation were
proclaimed; incessantly was the necessity pointed out of abandoning the
beaten track of old customs, of taking interest in the progress of
foreign countries, and of learning their character and requirements.
Men wrote upon dress and manners in a new style, with humour, irony,
and reproof, but always with the wish of remoulding and improving. The
spiritual failings of the various classes and professions, the weakness
of women, and the roughness and dishonesty of men were incessantly
criticised and chastised, undoubtedly in an uncouth style, and
sometimes with pedantry and narrow-mindedness, but in an earnest and
upright spirit.

The whole private life of Germany was thrown into a state of restless
excitement; new ideas struggled everywhere with old prejudices;
everywhere the citizen beheld around and within him a change which it
was difficult to withstand. The period was still poor in great
phenomena, but everywhere in smaller events an impulsive power was
perceptible. Only a few years later, the new enlightenment was to bear
blossoms of gladness to the whole world. Still is philosophy and
popular culture of the people dependent on mathematics and natural
science; but since Johann Matthias Gesner, the knowledge of antiquity,
the second pole of all scientific culture, has begun to bear upon the
historical development of the popular mind. A few years after 1750,
Winkelmann travelled to Italy.

And how did the citizens live, from whose homes the greater part of our
thinkers and discoverers, our scholars and poets have gone forth, who
were to carry out the new culture further and bolder, more freely and
more beautifully?

Let us examine a moderate-sized city about 1750. The old brick walls
are still standing, with towers, not only over the gates, but here and
there upon the walls. A temporary wooden roof is placed on many, the
strongest have prisons in them, others that were decayed, having been
riddled w