f the teacher, were necessary. Insecure was every
earthly position; everywhere strong and arbitrary power prevailed. Even
the greatest reputations trusted far more to the support of personal
admirers, than to the sound dignity of merit. Thus every individual
expression of praise and blame obtained an importance which we can now
hardly comprehend. Every one was therefore careful to oblige others, in
order to be approved of by strangers. German life was still deficient
in an enlightened daily press, and many individuals were entirely
without the discipline and restraint which is produced by a powerful
public opinion.

Nothing is so difficult as to form a correct judgment of the morality
in families of a far-distant period. For it is not sufficient to
estimate the sum of striking errors, which in itself is very difficult;
it is equally necessary to understand the individual injustice in
particular cases which is often impossible. Among the citizens, the
intercourse of both sexes was almost entirely confined to the family
circles: larger societies were rare. In the houses of intimates, the
habits of the young people were lively and unrestrained; the friends of
the sisters and the comrades of the brothers became part of the family.
The custom still continued of making confidences in jest which would
now be considered objectionable. Embracing and kissing were not
restricted to games of forfeits. Such a custom, however harmlessly and
innocently carried on by the young people, was calculated to give rise
to feelings of levity which we should view with regret, and it
frequently gave birth to a certain bold freedom in the intercourse
between the young men and maidens. Tender liaisons were quickly formed
in families between the unmarried members; no one thought them wrong,
and they were as speedily dissolved. These transient liaisons, full of
sentiment, seldom increased to a deeper passion, nay, in general, the
poetry of youth was extinguished by them. They seldom led, either, to
betrothal or marriage; for marriage at that period, about 1750, was
still as much an affair of business as of the heart. And the endless
blessing of love and faithfulness, which just then began to dawn upon
them, rested generally on other grounds than on the glow of a pure
passion, or a deep-seated communion of feeling preceding the betrothal.

The behaviour of the parties interested in the conclusion of a marriage
strikes us as remarkable. If the man ha