ion and freedom of the press,
should act with honour, and do what was promised, seems, (if there be any
such thing as public morals at all,) under any form of government, nothing
more than what common policy as well as propriety would dictate. Those who
bear the rule in Germany, however, have, for the last thirty years, done
every thing that they possibly could do to make the royal word a public
mockery, and a shame; one cannot review the well-known despotic
proceedings of the German diet, first in 1829, and afterwards in 1832,
without subscribing a most full assent to the sentence of the Baron von
Stein, when he says, in reference to those very matters--"the falsehood
that prevails in our age is deserving of the most serious reprehension."
And again, "Our German government sink more and more daily in public
estimation by their timidity and perfidy." With regard to the whole
system, indeed, of Prussian government, the system of doing every thing by
official men, and nothing by voluntary movement of the people, and apart
from this special matter of the "_constitution_," Stein was accustomed to
use the strongest language of reprobation; witness the following letter to
Von Gagern, dated 24th August 1821. Coppenberg was a favourite seat of the
Baron in Westphalia.

"In the lonely woody Coppenberg, I live so remote from the world and
its doings, that nothing can disturb me in the enjoyment of nature
and a country life, except bad weather, which happily has left us a
few days ago, and is not likely soon to return. In Westphalia here,
my friends are more concerned about the new tax, and the new edict
about the peasants, (which satisfies no party,) than about the
schemes of Metternich on the banks of the Danube, and the great
events in Greece. For myself, I can say nothing more about public
affairs, than that, while I have little confidence in the present
leaders, I have an unbounded trust in Providence; and that, necessary
as a CONSTITUTION _is to Prussia, and beneficial as it would be if
fairly worked, I expect nothing from any machinery which will
necessarily be opposed by the persons who have possession of the
king's ear, and the court influence generally_: and I see plainly
that we are still, as we have hitherto been, to be governed by
salaried persons, equipped with mere book-learning, without any
substantial interest in the country, witho