The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Travels In Germany.
• Chapter I.: Courts For the Administration of Justice.
• Chapter II.: Hannover—civil Laws and Processes.
• Chapter III.: Criminal Laws—processes and Punishments.
• Chapter IV.: Hannover.—appropriation of Landed Property.
• Chapter V.: Hannover—agriculture.
• Chapter VI.: Hannover.—manufactories.
• Chapter VII.: Hannover.—commerce.
• Chapter VIII.: Hannover—schools.
• Chapter IX.: University of GÖttingen.
• Chapter X.: On the German Language.
• Chapter XI.: Literature.
• Chapter XII.: Influence of the Situation of the Germans On Their Literature.
• Chapter XIII.: Private Life and Morals.
• Chapter XIV.: Alteration of Morals.
• Chapter XV.: Cassel and Frankfort.
• Appendix.
• Appendix.: No. I.
• No. II. Persons Composing the States of Hannover.
• No. III.: Translation. Regulations For the Meeting of the General States At Hannover, the 15 Th December 1814.
• No. IV. List of the Public Lectures Given In One Year At Göttingen, For the Half Year Beginning In April 1818.
• No. V. Measures, Weights, and Monies, Mentioned In This Work.

CHAPTER IX.

university of gÖttingen.

Fashion seems to be followed in seeking places of study, so well as in dress, and novelty in both has more influence than convenience. At least it appears so in Germany, where the comparatively modern universities of Jena, Göttingen, and Berlin, are crowded with students, while many of greater antiquity, as Helmstädt, Wittenberg, Rinteln, and Erfurth, are forsaken and suppressed. This is chiefly owing to the patronage of monarchs, each of whom, in his day, sighs for the “song of praise,” and strives to secure the admiration of posterity by bounteously rewarding those learned men who are the keepers of the records of the world.

German professors and students, and I may add soldiers and statesmen, have never had, time out of mind, any other country but Germany. While they have professed the most profound obedience to their sovereigns, they have always served that one who paid them best. These tradesmen offered their wares to the highest bidder, and seldom asked any other question of the purchaser than if he were a Catholic or a Protestant. This well known fact is mentioned merely to explain the sudden rise or fall of German universities. Every tradesman should carry his industry to the best market;—teaching,—guiding armies,—conducting affairs, are all species of industry, and no love of country, and no sacred duty towards it, can imperiously command the services of subjects when its name and character are habitually usurped and prostituted by princes to the purposes of their own ambition. No love of country, therefore, ever keeps a German professor within the dominions of the sovereign under whose sway he was born.

By offering sufficient rewards, each sovereign is thus enabled, when he has determined to patronise any university, to bring to it the cleverest men of the whole of Germany. In some countries, those persons who are candidates for any public situation must study in the university of those countries. For example, in Darmstadt all the people who choose to study, must go for two years to the university of Giessen. With this exception, the students have no attachment to native universities, and they who can bear the expence choose that place to study at of which the reputation of the professors is greatest. Celebrated professors are invariably sought and followed by a multitude of students, and the reputation of a university is thus established when they can be procured. The King of Prussia has recently founded a university at Bonn, and already the professors’ chairs are said to be all filled, and the halls to be attended by students. In 1810 he also founded a university at Berlin, which has since then been much frequented. The university at Göttingen was founded by George II.∗ in 1733, and learned professors were brought to it from all parts of Germany. It has since then become known to all Europe, and, owing to the continued favour of the sovereign, has enjoyed a reputation far beyond the oldest universities of Germany.

Accustomed as we are to regard our ancient universities as an integral part of our constitution, which it would be almost sacrilege to amend or destroy, this rising and sinking of universities, so that they sometimes scarcely last longer than the life of their founder, appears very strange. The facility to change is derived from the institutions being the mere bubbles of the monarchs’ will. Griefswalde, in what was formerly Swedish, but what is now Prussian Pomerania, is an exception to this. It has funds of its own, and is said to be richly endowed. The consequence is, that it resembles an English university. It has twenty-two professors and teachers, and sixty students. Now that it is Prussian, these gentlemen will assuredly not be suffered to fatten in idleness. Leipsic also has funds of its own, and many of the others have stated incomes, though dependant on the sovereign. The sovereigns retain the power to appoint and reward professors, though the faculty may recommend them,—to alter the laws and regulations,—and they generally keep the funds for the maintenance of the establishment in their own hands. In every state of Germany there is a department of the ministry under which the universities are particularly placed. And the sovereigns alter and regulate them at their pleasure. German universities are, therefore, essentially different from the universities of England, which are corporate bodies, regulated by laws of their own, possessing large revenues, and independent of every thing but the laws of the land. Some part, however, of this facility to change, seems common to all corporate bodies of Germany. Religious corporations, corporations of towns and guilds, all of which are regarded with a sort of veneration in England, have been swept away in Germany at the will of the monarchs.

That philosophy which considers the control of sovereigns over the education of society as an evil, regards this state of the German universities as a matter of deep regret. But while it allows them to be altered and improved as men improve, it may possibly be regarded as a less evil than if they were regulated by laws which cannot be amended. Universities which living men can alter are better than those which slumber on, century after century, and take no note of all the improvements that rise on every side. German universities can always be so organized as to answer the ideas which the sovereign of the day has of what is excellent in universities; but unalterable corporate bodies, with Gothic regulations, answer no man’s ideas of excellence but those of their own well-paid members. Without placing much confidence in sovereigns, it may at least be supposed, that, checked and informed as they now are by public opinion, they are as capable of organising a university as the same class of men were three or four centuries ago. It is at all times to be regretted that an undue veneration for the regulations of men who are almost forgotten should allow the immense sums, or rather quantities of the labour of the present generation, which they appropriated for education, to be wasted in producing very little good. There is probably no country of Europe in which larger funds are appropriated to this purpose than in England, and, owing to our rigid adherence to Gothic regulations, there is no one in which so little good is effected by them. The revenues of the two universities of England are probably greater than all the sums expended in the whole north of Germany for the education of the people. In one country they serve to maintain a few individuals in idleness and luxury; in the other they have diffused knowledge and morality among the poorest of the people.

The whole expence of Göttingen, and, compared with other German universities, it is magnificently endowed, is for books, for the salaries of professors, for buildings, and all other expences, about 70,000 R. Thalers, or somewhat more than L. 11,000 Sterling per year; a sum that possibly equals the incomes of four of the heads of houses in one of our celebrated seminaries. At Göttingen there is no other expences than paying the teachers, and providing books, instruments, &c. A few students are educated at the expence of some towns, and of the sovereign, and they have a free table and lodging given them; but Göttingen has no good things to bribe its younger members to a continued adherence to taught opinions. There is no warm and well-lined stall of orthodoxy, and no means are taken to influence the students’ conscience through their stomachs. They believe according as they discover truth, and not according to the prebends, and bishopricks, and fellowships, which reward a particular faith. The German universities are said to teach theology very well, but they cannot gild it and render it delightful, as other universities do, to many learned and estimable men. The Germans do not squabble, therefore, who shall have it. Notwithstanding the want of large incomes, the Germans are, however, some of the most learned theologians of the day, and the most heartily charitable and tolerant of all the people of Europe.

The only builings belonging to the university at Göttingen are, the library, a museum, an observatory, and a council-house. Several others belong to the medical part of the university. There is a lying-in-hospital, a botanical and agricultural garden, and one large hall, where some of the professors give lectures; but the professors and students live scattered about the town, and, in general, the instruction is given in the houses and private rooms of the former. In Göttingen almost every house is a lodging-house. The students board where they lodge, or their meals are procured from some cook’s shop, or they feed in taverns; but they are never collected at a common table, and fed from the public funds. It is a general characteristic of most German universities, that the professors and students live where and how they please.

When teachers and students are collected in colleges, as in England, they may need a particular code of laws, and ought, perhaps, in all things which regards college discipline, to be subjected to the tribunals of the university alone; but the mode of living in German universities neither calls for such a separate code, nor justifies giving the students regulations and tribunals different from the common laws and tribunals of the country. Yet the separation, in Germany, of the members of a university from the other citizens, is more complete than in England. When professors are appointed, and when the students have paid their matriculation-money;—when they have received a copy of the university-laws, and have given their hand—Handshlag—to obey them, they are both, from that moment, with all their families, domestics, and dependants, university citizens—Academische Bürger,—and they are both, from that moment, set free from the control of the civil magistrate, and rendered entirely independent of any other laws or tribunals than those of the university. This is an important fact, because it partly explains in what the freedom of the universities of Germany consists, when they are, at the same time, dependant on the sovereigns. The great substantial privilege of both professors and students is, that they are subjected, in no case whatever, to any other tribunals than those composed of the professors themselves. This is an admirable security for the professors.

In every university there is more than one teacher for any particular branch of knowledge which is much studied. Although the professors are appointed, and, in general, paid by the sovereign, much of their income, at the same time, is derived from the fees which the students pay to hear their lectures. Of course, each professor is anxious to have as many hearers as possible, and all are careful, in their capacity of magistrates so well as in their capacity of teachers, never to irritate or offend the students. There is both a competition amongst the different professors at the same university, and a competition amongst those of different universities; and the students are sometimes tempted to choose the place of their study rather by the indulgences allowed than by the reputation of the professors. Thus Jena is praised by them, because they can enter the class-rooms in a morning-gown and slippers,—and Göttingen because they are there treated with more gentlemanly respect. This situation of the student relative to the professor, thus ensures him the protection of this latter, who is his only judge and master; and herein consists the freedom or the licence of all the students of Germany.

Because a professor is not limited to one state, and because the sovereigns have been greatly desirous to be praised for their patronage, the latter necessarily protect the former. There is a competition amongst the sovereigns who shall have the most learned professors, and which of their universities shall be best attended. The consequence is, that the professors, and with them the students, are protected against that power of the monarch, which is the only one superior to both. Another thing which has given importance and freedom to the members of German universities, is the immunity which they have long enjoyed to print whatever they please without their works being subjected to any other censure before publication than that of the faculty of which the person printing was a member. It is a great advantage that the censors should be brother professors, and without any power, either over hope or fear, to produce the suppression of a truth. In these points consists that independence of which the members of German universities are so deservedly proud.

In most cases, the laws of the society are the laws which are administered by the tribunals of a university; but there are also separate regulations for the conduct of the students. They prescribe almost every trifling particular of their conduct, not only in their class-rooms, but in their private life. They forbid them to collect in multitudes, prescribe how much money they may be trusted for confectionary, and how much for clothes. A man who shaves them may give them twelve months’ credit; while he who only dresses their hair, as this is a luxury, must not trust them for more than six. They forbid them to wear tassels of a particular colour to their pipes, and they fix the time for which they can hire a room. They must not give or hold large entertainments without permission. In short, if the conduct of the students is not inimitably correct, it is not for want of most minute and precise regulations.∗

There are three university courts in Göttingen to administer the laws and regulations. A certain portion of the professors form the four faculties of learning; to each faculty there is a dean, who is changed every year; and the resident chief of the university is a pro-rector, who is changed every year, and who is taken alternately from each of the faculties. The first court is called the university-council. It is composed of the pro-rector, president, all the members of the four faculties, and the actuary and the syndicus of the university, who are both jurisconsults. It meets once a-month, and transacts business relative to the whole university, so well as tries important causes, which may involve a serious punishment.

The second court is called the university deputation. The pro-rector is president. The deans of the four faculties, and when the pro-rector is not a jurisconsult, the person who is next in turn to be dean of the faculty of jurisprudence, with the syndicus and actuary, compose this court. It meets whenever it may be necessary, and it decides in cases of importance relative to justice or to discipline.

The pro-rector, the syndicus, and the actuary, form a little court, and meet twice a-week to hear and decide complaints of lesser moment. All complaints against any member of the university, or against their wives, families, and servants, must be made to one or other of these tribunals. The university itself can be complained of only to the government, under whose special superintendence it is.

An extraordinary feature in German universities is the number of professors. At Berlin, in 1818, there were 55;∗ and at Göttingen there were 35 ordinary professors, 5 extraordinary ones, and 30 persons who were authorized by the government, and gave lectures or instruction on some topic or other. A dancing, a music, a fighting, and a drawing master, with a person to teach architecture, and another to teach the French language, are all nominated by government, and considered necessary to complete the education. Seven of the professors, and other licensed persons, teach theology; 14 teach jurisprudence; 13 the healing art; and 33 what is called philosophy, which includes history, languages, mathematics, political science, metaphysics, &c.

A more minute account will shew precisely what is taught at a German university. I shall therefore give in the Appendix a scheme of the studies for one half-year; which will also shew accurately the manner in which teaching, as a branch of industry, is divided in Germany. The courses of lectures and examinations amount in one-half year, and they are not less numerous in the other half, to 148 different ones. A few professors give only one course of lectures, but most of them give more; and the most popular read three, and sometimes four, lectures daily. There is no branch of school-knowledge, therefore, however numerous its twigs, which has not at this celebrated university its appropriate teacher.

The most celebrated of the professors at present at Göttingen are Messrs Hugo, for civil law; Meister, for criminal law; the venerable Blumenbach, for natural history; Osiander-Himly-Langenbeck, in the healing art; Stromeyer, jun. for chemistry; Eichhorn, the elder, for philology and theology; Sartorius, for political philosophy, statistics, &c.; Gauss and Harding, for astronomy; Hausmann, for mineralogy and geology; Heeren, for history and ethnography; Bouterwek, for metaphysics and moral philosophy; and Thibaut, for mathematics and natural philosophy. Each of these gentlemen may have improved the science which he teaches, or the method of teaching it. They have compiled a vast body of information, which, from being collected, is afterwards more easily diffused through the world;—but, except some philological observations made by Professor Eichhorn, some trifling discoveries in chemistry made by Professor Stromeyer, and the elucidations of some passages of the Roman law, by Professor Hugo, I am not aware that any one of them has materially enlarged the boundaries of human knowledge, or added to human power. Professor Heeren has followed the steps of his illustrious predecessor Spittler, and has added considerably to historical literature; and Professor Sartorius is doing much towards spreading proper notions of political economy, the science of which he has deeply studied. The great merit, however, of all these gentlemen rather consists in having better arranged the knowledge which was already in existence, and in having corrected many learned errors of their predecessors, than in having discovered any valuable truths. Even this is a great merit; for between the discovery of a valuable truth, and the rectification of a learned error, there seems to be no other difference than that the former may become the property of the whole race; while it is scarcely possible that any of the latter, except those which a class of men may be set apart to teach, should ever be extensively diffused. The errors which learned men rectify, and the ignorance which they enlighten, are merely the errors and the ignorance of other learned men, and rarely those of mankind.

The list of what these gentlemen teach, the manner in which the sciences are divided and subdivided, will suggest to the reader the spirit of what is taught. There seem to be no outlines which the student can fill up at his leisure—no large and comprehensive views, whose subordinate parts, acquired by secret industry, make knowledge valuable, by making it truly the property of the individual. Every thing seems explained to the very utmost limit of minuteness; and the plan of teaching rather resembles the manner in which schoolmasters repeat trifles to their scholars, than that of great philosophers giving hints for study, which industry must adopt and improve. Many of the lectures on theology and jurisprudence consist in mere verbal criticism, explanations of different readings, restorations of corrupted passages, and all that can make the old books, whether of law or of religion, intelligible to the young hearers. I am aware of the presumption of censuring, even in the most remote way, the pursuits of men who are distinguished in the world, and who only do what has been done and applauded for ages. Yet I cannot avoid thinking that very much of what is here taught is the veriest trifling which idle monks ever adopted as an amusement, and which the learned world has believed to be an heritage of wisdom from them long after their other doctrines and themselves are forgotten. It is trifling with which any man may innocently and rationally amuse himself, but which no man can be paid by a government for teaching without a waste of the national substance; and which no man can be induced, by extra rewards, to learn without a most deplorable waste and perversion of his talents.

Sciences and arts must be valued by their utility; and they possess two sorts of utility. They are useful to the people who profess them, and they are useful to the society. But in what way are geology, mineralogy, ontology, zoology, philology, mathematics, and, in short, all those branches of human knowledge which are dignified by the name of the sciences, (the fine arts may also be added,) so much more useful to the society than the common mechanic arts, than agriculture, and weaving, and shoe-making, that the funds of a nation should be appropriated to pay their professors? The very circumstance, that the professors of many of the sciences and arts cannot find any reward for their labours in the common markets of the world, is a complete proof of their inutility to the society. That which is useful to men they will most assuredly reward. In general, the utility of these sciences and arts to those persons who are conversant with, and who practise them,—the pleasure which they give the individuals who have long studied them,—and the importance which they thus acquire in their minds,—have been substituted for their utility to the society, and governments have thus been persuaded to reward what is of no general use. The character of these sciences and arts has been always given by the persons who professed them. They have held the pen for the rest of mankind, and have written their own opinions as the opinions of the world. Far be it from me to doubt the positive and ultimate utility of the sciences and arts. I know what a beautiful and innocent amusement they are—how they enlarge, and soften, and improve the mind; but poetry, and novels, and music do all this, and no professors are required to teach how they should be written. It is, in fact, because some of the sciences and arts are useful that they do not need any extraordinary rewards. When these are bestowed they only stimulate a part of the system into diseased action, and its greatest beauty changes into monstrous excrescences that render the whole ugly in the sight of every sensible man. Thus collecting worms, impaling insects, and all the veriest trifling that ever amused children, become classed as art and science.

If it may be doubted whether the sciences and arts are so pre-eminently useful, that they ought to be encouraged by greater rewards than they receive in the common market, how much more may it be doubted of that particular science which is known as jurisprudence; whose professors, after having imposed shackles on mankind, must be paid for teaching how to rivet them? There is no greater evil than that the word of a man in all bargains and contracts should be of no value unless it is attested by lawyers. What should we think of rewarding a set of men to teach priestcraft to others—to teach them how to enchain us in ignorance? And assuredly lawcraft, or the dominion of lawyers over the understandings of men, is not a less evil than priestcraft was when it was in the pride of its power. There are no less than fourteen persons at Göttingen, the greater part of whom are appointed and paid by the sovereign to teach how to lengthen processes, how to confound right, and how to make a mystery and a property of justice.

It can be of no consequence to the present race of men how the Romans decided in any particular case; by referring to their decisions we are only prevented from examining the merit of the particular case, and deciding according to it. After the experience of so many ages, after so much knowledge has recently been accumulated on the rights and duties of men, if those of the present day are not better able to decide on any question of right than the wisest lawyers of the days of Justinian, it can only be because our guides have always confined us to the decisions of these ancient lawyers. People who please may study the Roman law as an amusement; but it is certainly absurd to bestow any of the national funds on those who do study it, and still more absurd to direct, by artificial rewards, the talents of a nation to so barren and pernicious a study.

It can also be of too little consequence to the present generation how the Greek language was constructed, and how the Jews spelled and wrote, and what the half-formed and barbarous jargons of these barbarous people signify, that professors should be employed to teach and to explain them. These are rational praiseworthy studies for individuals, but most certainly they are not what a nation should honour and reward. But a large part of the professors at Göttingen are paid for explaining the writings of Jewish priests and of the Greek poets.

It is a part of the system of instruction to explain all these things in a most minute way. An explanation for every verse may occupy an hour, and the tablets and the memory of the students are amply filled, however their understandings may be neglected.

Among the lectures which it is necessary for the students of jurisprudence to hear is one on the public law of the confederate states of Germany. It was numerously attended. I should have thought I was unlucky in the time of hearing it, and I should not have judged of the whole from a part, had I not known several students of jurisprudence who assured me that what I had heard resembled the whole; and they defended the professor against my remarks on what I thought his trifling nonsense. He was speaking of the post regulations of Germany; and he described them to such a degree of minuteness, that he omitted neither the horses, the conductors, the postilions, nor their uniforms and badges. He dwelt particularly on the certificate (Post Schein) which is always given to every person who either takes a place or sends a parcel. Professors ought to teach something difficult to learn which they had themselves acquired by years of labour; but, in this instance, something was taught of which no stranger who had ever travelled by the post coach could be ignorant. There was no international law to be elucidated by this. The whole regulations of each individual Post being made by the different sovereigns, and, like the notices of our own coach-offices, are printed on every certificate.

When the utility of the studies at this university is estimated, they give but small hopes of any accelerated improvement in mankind from the labours of the learned. The “lights of the world, and demi-gods of fame,” are employed teaching what is of doubtful utility; and most of the elite of Germany, the future “lights of the world,” are wasting the precious hours of youth in acquiring a veneration for trifles that abides by them through life. When the course of instruction for youth places equal value on the subtilities and chicaneries of jurisconsults,—on composing Greek verses,—on discriminating between stones formed by fire and by water,—on the hues of an insect,—and on the proudest lessons of moral and political wisdom,—need we wonder that men so instructed substitute the lessons of lawyers for plain honest wisdom, or that these subtilities become the rules of national councils; need we wonder that, classing the phenomena of magnetism, collecting and preserving intestinal worms, and impaling and arranging butterflies, should be deemed objects of great importance? A great many of the occupations of the learned in Germany are the merest trifling; and their love for this is chiefly to be attributed to a course of instruction at their universities, in which every thing that bears the name of a science, without any regard to its utility, is indiscriminately taught. There can be little doubt that, whatever is wrong in this system, is to be attributed to the patronage of sovereigns, who have equally rewarded every learned pursuit; or rather they have done all they could to encourage trifling, that the attention of men might be diverted from more important objects. The pleasure of the prince has been substituted for the good of the society, and his views have been made the criterion of general utility.

Although most of the professors are paid by the government, very few of them lecture gratis. The students are, in general, obliged to pay for every course of lectures they wish to hear. The price is one pistole, or 16s. 8d. for each course, though there are some of the medical courses which cost double, and even treble, that sum. The salaries of the professors are unequal, depending, in a great measure, on their reputation, and on the necessity the university or the sovereign has for them. Some of them are said to receive 2000 Thalers per year; others have not above so many hundreds; and some are contented with the mere honour of the appointment. Some of the best paid professors may, at the same time, make 2000 Thalers per year by the students, which makes the highest money reward which is probably acquired in Germany by teaching, amount to about L.670 per year. For this, however, many of them labour very hard; they read three or four lectures a day on five days of the week. In point of industry they are surpassed by no literary labourers of the world. Professor Eichhorn the elder, who is probably the cleverest man of the whole university, has been for many years in the habit of reading four lectures a-day on five days of the week; and he is also the author of more than eighty volumes of printed works on various subjects. Such a labourer can have had no rainy days.

Numerous as the retainers of every German government are, it is impossible that they can be well paid, compared with the servants of the British government. I am rather disposed to think that the emoluments of German professors, compared with the emoluments of other people in Germany, are large. L.600 or L.700 a-year, as the highest reward for teaching, is, at the same time, very little compared with what many schoolmasters and professors make in Britain. This poverty, if it really be poverty, is, however, compensated to the German professor by the honour to which teaching sometimes leads. A professor of theology in one of our universities may become a bishop; but, in Germany, the professors are frequently called to situations of dignity in the ministry. Spittler, who was professor at Göttingen, was afterwards one of the principal ministers of Wirtemberg; and Mr Martens, the present ambassador from the court of Hannover to Rome, was professor at Göttingen.

The greater part also of the professors enjoy the honorary distinction of Hofräthe, and no less than nine of those of Göttingen are knights of the order of the Guelphs. No mere teacher at any of our universities has, I believe, been honoured with knighthood. This fact shews in what manner the want of large emoluments may be compensated, and also the manner in which teaching is honoured in Germany. This is not an example that we ought to wish imitated. Whenever monarchs take learning to their embraces, her illegitimate progeny are all rickety, ill-formed, and diseased; her offspring are only healthy when she lies in the arms of freedom. A gay ribbon may go farther than a pecuniary reward, and warp that knowledge to trifling, which is now dispensed in our country with a great regard to truth and utility.

This honour has not, however, saved these gentlemen from a species of degradation. A work that may be regarded as proceeding from the ministry of Hannover, said of the tumults of the Göttingen students, “that no official information had been given of them at Hannover, because the superiors of the university, it was well known from experience, loved rather to preserve silence than to make any reports that might be displeasing to the students.”∗ These same superiors also “begged of the commissioner, with great earnestness, when the students withdrew, that he would order away the hussars, and invite the students back.”† In short, a great many proofs may be found, from the manner in which the learned men have treated the students, that they are rather in a state of degrading dependence on them. In spite of the patronage of the sovereign, therefore, or rather in consequence of it, these learned men suffer a degradation to which no common schoolmaster of Britain would submit. Loaded, as I am afraid the reader will already find this book, with discussions, I would not say a word in explanation of this fact, were it not that a great body of men are constantly demanding of sovereigns more patronage for learning, and that this degradation appears to me to be occasioned by such a patronage.

Through every department of industry, wherever an artificial stimulus, that is, a stimulus greater that the natural demand, has been applied to encourage the production of any commodity whatever, the effect has always been, that a greater quantity of talents and of skill have been directed to its production than could at length find a proper profit or reward. The artificial stimulus is either withdrawn, or it is insufficient, and the people who have been induced by it to employ themselves in a particular way, are sure to fall into poverty and distress. The same fact is true of many of the manufactories of Britain, to which a larger portion of the skill of the nation has been directed than would have been but for the frequent unwise encouragements of the Legislature, and the manufacturers are now involved in distress. The same fact is true of the artists of Italy and France, who have been seduced, many of them, from mechanical pursuits, by the patronage which has been bestowed on the arts. All the minor artists of these countries, and under this term musicians, comedians, buffoons, and such people, must be classed, are some of the most degraded of the population of those countries. They have no other means of procuring a miserable subsistence than by flattering the lowest passions and the vilest lusts of degraded people. And the same fact is true of the learned of Germany, and perhaps of Europe.

Learning has long been patronized by princes, and they have patronized a learning not always saleable in the common markets. This is thought to be an honour for learning, and has induced a far greater number of men to follow it as a profession than princes could reward, or than the funds which the opinions and the wants of the world have destined to learning, could maintain. It is this sort of patronage, much more than any natural desire to study, or than any dazzlings of genius, which has directed so many people to follow learning as a pursuit; and more have engaged in it than could possibly be rewarded. Hence the little value paid for teaching and for authorship, and hence the complaints of the learned of their poverty. This cause has operated in Germany more, perhaps, than in any other country, from the number of sovereigns, all of whom are ready to patronize learning. The consequences are the immense number of professors at each university,—their competition one with another, and, at length, their dependence on the students. Did no extra stimulus, such as the bounties of the sovereign, induce a great number of men to follow learning as a profession, and to collect at one place, open and public competition would be admirable. Did no law of the society make these gentlemen who are thus dependent on the students, at the same time their judges, they could have no opportunity and no power to tempt the students to attend their lectures by any other means than superior teaching. And, without being patronized, and without having this power, they never could have been degraded as they now are; nor could the tumultuous conduct of the students, which has been in a great measure occasioned by the dependence of the professors, have ever brought the whole universities of Germany into one moment’s disrepute.

The manner in which the professors lecture is the same as that adopted at the university of Edinburgh. Each lecture lasts an hour, and, generally, the professors deserve credit for slowness and distinctness of delivery. The diligence of a student is measured by the quantity of notes which he makes, and, to permit them to do this, the professors are very particular in dividing their discourses into separate heads, and in waiting some time under each division, that, at least, the title may be written down, and the general topics known. I cannot in general praise the eloquence or the elegance of the manner of delivery. Professors Hugo, Sartorius, Bouterwek, Thibaut, had paid some attention to the graces of speaking; but most of the professors seemed to me, so utterly had their voices lost all the intonations of feeling, or of passion, much more to resemble speaking machines than men.∗

The professors are easy of access, and polite to strangers, whose notice, indeed, they are said “to court as a sort of honour.”∗ Before meeting with this remark, I had thought they seemed so accustomed to be visited, that they calculated on it, and were ready, like sovereigns, to receive the homage of every stranger who requested to see them. There may be a little vanity in this, but they are always extremely polite. No stranger need be shy in approaching any one of them, for he is sure to be received with urbanity and kindness, and to have every information given him he may wish to obtain.

The number of students at Göttingen, in 1818, was 1158.

It deserves remark, that, compared with a former year, the number of students in theology has increased as 1; in jurisprudence as 14; in the healing art as 12; and in philosophy as 10. It is not affirmed that this is a constant proportion, but there is reason to believe, from a comparison of several years, that the alteration in the number of students who study different sciences is not inadequately expressed by these numbers.∗

The list of what is taught, which is given in the Appendix, is also, in a great measure, the list of what is learnt; but, as some of the branches of knowledge there mentioned are more studied than others, it is necessary to make some observations on what is most generally learnt. Although the students of theology and of medicine may have a great influence on the whole society, they are not likely to have so much as those who study jurisprudence; for almost the whole of the efficient legislators and governors of Germany, the advocates, the judges, the professors of this science, and all the young men who are candidates for any office under the government higher than that of a copying-clerk, write their names down for three years to study jurisprudence.

From the list which has been given of the studies under this head, it will not be expected that, however much learning may be got from them, they will give much wisdom. In fact, much of what is taught under the head of jurisprudence may be described to be a knowledge of ancient systems of law, or of existing systems of law, both of which inquiring and wise men very generally allow to be far from perfect, if not absurd. Many things which are of themselves useless, are learnt from a necessity which exists, derived from these systems being established to learn them. Although it might be easy enough, from a knowledge of nature, and from mixing with the world, to learn what is deemed right in any society, yet it requires a particular study to know, in every case, what was deemed right by the Romans, and what is ordered by the laws, and hence a necessity arises from establishing foreign, or complicated codes of laws, for a large body of men, to devote their whole time to studying them. Of themselves they are a barren study, and when they require such a quantity of talent as we see devoted to them in Germany, it is surely a proof that they are a great evil. What might all the powerful minds which have been wasted on them not have effected for the human race had their talents been directed to some useful and productive study? The Roman laws have done much to ungermanise Germany. They have deprived the people of their particular usages, and much of their national character. Their own legislators have taken them as models, and there is not a single modern regulation or law, I believe, of the whole country, without expressions of the Roman law. With a constitution totally different from that of Rome, Germany has been deeply inoculated with the poison of Rome’s worse institutions. This is one of the many instances to be found in our times of a blind imitation of the ancients. To follow the Roman law at present is as rational as it would be to follow the Roman methods, if they be known, of weaving and of making war.

The students have no settled general plan of studying which can be accurately delineated, further than that each one attends those lectures he thinks will conduce most to his improvement. It is necessary for every young man to undergo a certain examination before the professors, and to receive a certificate of his qualifications, before he can procure any situation either under the government, or as an advocate, or as a surgeon. To obtain any respectable situation, it is necessary to study three years at some university; but, during this time, the student chooses for himself those lectures which he will attend. The young advocate must attend lectures on the Institutes, on the Pandects, on criminal jurisprudence, and on the elements of practice. In like manner, there are certain lectures which the medical and theological student must hear; there are others, such as those on general history, on statistics, and on geography, which they attend if they please; but, in general, all the students attend those professors principally whose reputation is great. Out of 1150, the number at the chemistry class was 39, at the political class 100, and at the class for the public law on Germany, it was still greater.

There is no good student who does not attend three—most of them attend five, and some of them six—lectures in one day. They write down every thing which is said; they are never idle or inattentive; rigid laws amongst themselves prevent one from disturbing the others; and, on the whole, their industry is equal to the industry of the professors.

Some few students are older than the others, but in general young men go to the university between the ages of fourteen and seventeen. They may go after being confirmed, which always takes place at fourteen, and they generally do go immediately their studies at the upper schools are completed, which rarely extend beyond their seventeenth year. Latterly, owing to the disturbed state in which Germany and all Europe has been for so many years, and owing to a large part of the young population having being obliged to serve in the armies, a greater number of young men of a more advanced age have become students.

The students of Germany have lately occupied so much of the public attention, that I am tempted to give a more detailed account of their manners and conduct than I should have otherwise thought it right to give of a few young men, or rather boys, who, through injudicious treatment, have acquired a momentary influence in society. The community is in a diseased state when the voice of the young alone is heard on political questions; when their organized bands are so powerful that they are regarded as superior to the laws of their country; and when they fill the public ear and occupy the public mind, we may be sure that the rest of the society are submissive, degraded, and oppressed.

“Wir alle sind Brüder und einander gleich,”—We are all brothers and equal to one another,—is the motto of the students, and the sign of their university equality. And there is a freedom of intercourse amongst them that teaches, at least for the moment, both the future prince∗ and the future citizen to respect man more than his artificial dignities. The rich and the poor students have necessarily different sorts of lodging, different companions, and seek different amusements; but, whenever they meet there is amongst them a perfect equality, and all are, as they themselves say, brothers. It is one of the best features of their character, that they are always ready to help one another, with their hands, their heads, or their purses.

Mad. de Stael has truly remarked, that men of letters in Germany are more separated from the rest of society than in any other European country. The separation is fast diminishing; learned men mix more with the best society; they are called to offices in the state: but the distinction is yet so strong between the learned and the mere citizens, that it will be many years before it can be obliterated. It is perhaps one of the most singular circumstances in the life of Kant, that one of his most particular and oldest friends was a merchant. For, in general, there is little or no communication between such different classes of men. Most of the universities of Germany are in retired corners and small towns, where the learned are completely the superiors of the whole society, and never see any persons but their subjects, unless it is the passing stranger, who rather ministers to their vanity, by laying at their feet his homage of their talents. The tradesmen are, in general, in Germany, poor and despised; the farmers are bauers and stigmatized;—but few merchants are opulent; but few soldiers are learned; and, therefore, when a university is not in a large city, the learned necessarily live in their own circle, and quite separate from the rest of the society. In Germany also every class forms a Stand by itself. Guilds were common to all trades, and, though they have been in most instances abolished, the guild of the learned yet maintains itself with all its ancient privileges and powers.

This unhappy separation of the learned from the rest of the society, if it be not chiefly owing to the constitution of the universities, is yet much widened by it. The professors, with their separate privileges and tribunals, can have no common interest with the rest of the citizens; and the student, by this constitution, is made at once something which is not a citizen. At the beginning of his literary career his interest, his privileges, the laws under which he lives, are all different from those of the rest of the society; and if he do not afterwards fill some situation in the public service,—if he continue a literary man, he remains separate from the rest of the people through life. I met a literary man in Dresden who knew nothing whatever of the tribunals or administration of justice in his own country. And a learned professor at Göttingen was ignorant of all such matters in Hannover. From this separation, the learned have troubled themselves very little with the common concerns of life. Hence much of their learning is nothing but dreaming and mere words; it has no relation to the affairs of the world, and is of no other use but to amuse the learned. This separation is therefore mutually mischievous. The learned want common sense, and common men want learning. The recent political circumstances have done much to unite the classes. The writings of the day begin to have more wisdom, and the people more useful knowledge.

With this separation the learned, particularly the students, combine very naturally, from their superior privileges, an idea of being greatly superior to other classes. Fichte, a celebrated philosopher of the Kantian school, said, many years ago, “that the students speak of themselves as the elected of God, and that all other men are the rejected. Every other class must give way to them. Each person must be pleased with what they do, and nobody dare to displease them. Every person not a student, with the exception of their teachers, and the magistrates under whom they are placed, must speak them fair and honourably, and must recommend himself to their favour by carefully avoiding whatever might offend their delicate ears. This is the duty of every person towards them; but, from their exalted freedom and feelings, they may treat all persons unworthily. This is their right against every man.” They are not only, therefore, separated from the rest of the society, but they have learned to despise it. The contemptuous manner in which they speak of every body not a student, whom they call Philisters, (Philistines,) while they are the chosen of God, shews this unamiable part of their character in its full light.

They have no academical dress, and they therefore seek to distinguish themselves from the Philistines by any and every absurdity of clothing they can invent. Some cut their hair and dress themselves like Cossacks; many let both hair and beard grow in unpruned wildness, and have a costume peculiar to themselves, consisting of immense green trowsers, a red waistcoat, and a sort of white or grey coat, with some curious coloured cap. Most of them, however, are clad like the old Germans. Their hair is suffered to hang in ringlets on their shoulders. Neck handkerchiefs are rarely worn; but their white shirt collars, of which they are very proud, are doubled back also on their shoulders. Their little caps, (Mütze,) fastened under their chins by a leather strap, often assume somewhat the appearance of an open vizor, and give their scared faces, and flaxen ringlets, a curious appearance of ferocity and effeminacy.

This capricious violation of common fashions may appear to be of no consequence to those Germans who believe in the separate existence of a “noble, moral, and transcendental man.” But morality is, in general, little more than an obedience to the opinions of the world; and he who disregards that in trifles, may more easily be led to despise it in matters of importance. Men deviate from its fashions; they laugh at it when it reminds them of their follies; and at length they spurn it when it reproves their vices. German students differ from the rest of their countrymen in their manners so widely as in their dress; they are rude and boisterous; and seem to have put on with the dress of the Cossacks, and of their ancestors, all their harshness and unamiability. On ordinary occasions they abuse and ill-treat the servants of public places; they are ready to take insults and to insult; they walk about the streets in parties, singing and making hideous noises; they clatter with their heels and sticks on the pavements; they strike against the window-shutters of the Philistines; they not unfrequently cheat,∗ or, as they call it, prellen, the citizens; and, without being wicked, they seem to forget all the common civilities and little rules of life. The frequency of duels amongst themselves, from which results their scared faces, is well known, and is of itself a proof of their general character. Some gentlemanly steady young men are, of course, to be found amongst them—some who are afterwards to fill professors’ chairs, and be the ornaments and instructors of their age. Some I have known whom I yet love and respect; but these are the exceptions, and the general character of the students is what has been described.

Perhaps this character strikes a person more forcibly who has lived some time in Germany. He becomes accustomed to a high degree of gentleness and amiability in the elder people, and to such softness in children, that the contrast with the students is very great. The master of a respectable academy, who had frequently had English boys to teach and to educate, told me he always found them so ungovernable that he would rather have ten German boys than one English one. German boys are, in truth, compared to ours, extremely mild and soft, and these amiable qualities are put off whenever they become students. Three years of the life of a German are passed in total freedom from all other laws but the “Comment.” Before that he is a gentle child under the roof of his parents; and after that he is lost in the greater circle of the world, and follows implicitly its strict and regular rules. “A few years are allowed him between the discipline of the schools, and the restraints of office, in which, while he is taught, he may also indulge himself, and preserve a joyous remembrance of accomplished follies.”∗

That they may be countenanced in their absurdities, they have a set of rules made by themselves for their conduct, (the Comment,) which prescribe to them to demand satisfaction of any person who insults them, by applying to their conduct such epithets as foolish, strange, extraordinary, wonderful, monstrous, laughable, and all such other terms. In short, they seem to have proscribed every term of reproof that they might indulge unrestrained in every whim, and in every folly. According to this comment, all duels must be decided by the sword; and the weapon in common use is short, and made only to cut. No more than a certain number of rounds is permitted, so that the affair seldom terminates in any other way than in disfiguring their faces. This comment is the only law which is rigidly obeyed. Its violation is visited by the severest punishment the students can inflict. The culprit is put in Coventry, (in Verruf,) and during this time no person will associate with him, nor can he demand satisfaction for any insults he may receive. They have sometimes extended this Verruf to tradesmen; and, by depriving them of all student custom, have brought them to ruin, and rendered the whole of them extremely obedient and fearful.

Their conduct is marked by many eccentricities, of which the following is an instance:

In 1812, one of the students, either involved in debt in town, or in love in the country, retired from the town, and built himself a hermitage, in the neighbourhood of a house of amusement called Maria Spring. He made a very neat little place of it, planted a little garden, and lived here for nearly two years. It is said the great attraction was the daughter of the house from which he used to procure his provisions and other necessaries. Certainly he lived in this retirement for a considerable time, and then, I believe, went clandestinely away, leaving the daughter and parents to mourn over lost virtue, money, and happiness.

The separation of the students from the citizens, and their mutual differences and quarrels, gave originally occasion to the former to unite in a body for defence and aggression. The students are collected from different parts of Germany, many of which have different dialects. It was natural for the natives of any particular place to associate with their townsmen or countrymen more than with strangers. The inhabitants of the different parts are distinguished by something peculiar in their dress. From these causes there came to be formed amongst the students different little societies called “Landsmanschafts.” They were originally societies for pleasure, for amusement, for defence against the citizens, and sometimes for defence against other students; but they were originally and long remained destitute of any political aim whatever. Some of the young men in such societies acquired more influence than others, and thus each society soon came to have something like a leader; and through these leaders and these separate societies, the students were frequently brought to act together. Their power was soon felt, and many attempts have been made, by ordinances, and by severe punishments, to suppress the societies. The sovereigns, however, only gave importance to them by recognizing and forbidding them. They were founded in a natural feeling of attachment; they were strengthened by the power which uniting conferred; and they appeared only to have been rendered formidable by the multitude of decrees which have been issued against them.

Recent political events have, in some measure, tended to destroy the petty dissensions and divisions of the Germans. In the recent contest against the French for freedom, it was proposed in some political journals that the students should change their Landsmanschafts into a general union or allgemeine Burschenshaft. Some universities, as Halle and Jena, adopted this; others, as Göttingen, retained the old plan of Landsmanschafts. The French conscription had extended to many parts of Germany. Many of the young men belonged to the Landwehr. In 1813, the sovereigns called the students to the field, and led them to the combat. All these causes, together with the present tendency of the writings of several German authors, have combined to give the meetings of the students a political aim. University communicates with university; and all the students, whether united in Landsmanschafts or Burschenshafts, have recently been taught to act in bodies, and without any settled and fixed aim, they have spoken and acted decidedly in favour of freedom.

It is this union of purpose which has given to the German students, when there is no other body of men united for a common end, a power of making themselves heard and distinguished in the community. They have become more than any other body formidable to those sovereigns whose anxious cares extend to every thing. The ceremony of burning some emblems of tyranny at the Wartburg, in 1817, interested all Germany. Men were rejoiced or alarmed at it, as they were the advocates of freedom or of tyranny. Every newspaper was full of it, and every mouth spoke of it. When the students quitted Göttingen, in 1818, the same attention was excited throughout the country; and the ministry of Hannover concealed very ill the alarm which the conduct of the students excited in their bosoms. They mingled in the dispute, and seemed to have acquired no honour.

The students have been regarded by many people, particularly the political writers of Germany, as destined to make a great alteration in the welfare of their country, and to be its deliverers from oppression and slavery. When I had only heard of their processions, and their feasts, and their songs, this view appeared to me in part correct. It argued well when the whole of the future legislators, judges, and ministers of Germany, were the warm advocates of the interests of humanity. Since I have seen more of them, I have doubted if a set of young men, intoxicated by the power and importance which they derive from their momentary freedom, and from their numbers, can ever learn the value of freedom themselves, and I am sure they never can be fit to bestow it on others. In their own societies, they submit to the most severe slavery. A few bold spirits keep the whole in awe. Many of them would have gladly returned to their studies at Göttingen. Many of them wished never to leave it, but they were constrained, on these points, to obey the directions of a few. In the midst of their licentiousness, they are slaves, and they never can give to others that freedom which they themselves can never properly value nor possess.

But the students are also all of the privileged classes. The future clergymen, the future jurisconsults, judges, and ministers, are all students; and never did I hear any of them, except one, express any decided opinion against the quantity of lawyers, or the complicated systems of government, which are, in truth, the plagues of Germany. On the contrary, I heard these young men express a greater disdain of bauers and mechanics than I ever heard expressed by any other persons. These are, however, the oppressed classes of Germany, and they, I am quite sure, have nothing to hope from students. Their riots are symptoms of youthful turbulence—not of a love for freedom. They are certainly an evidence of enthusiasm—of a warmth of temper amongst the Germans greater than we are accustomed to ascribe to them; but it is the warmth of youth, the enthusiasm of hot blood and licentious living, and not of a rational and determined spirit.

The disturbance at Göttingen, in 1818, shews this, and it exemplifies their character and conduct better than any descriptions can do. It was of sufficient importance to be noticed at the time in all the public journals of Germany. Several pamphlets were published on the occasion, and it excited a sort of literary warfare. Its effects on the university are likely to be permanent; and although it has frequently been mentioned in our own periodical works, it seems to me to be of sufficient importance to demand further remark. I shall, therefore, give a short account of it. I reached Göttingen a short time after its commencement, and remained there till after its termination.

On the morning of July 2, 1818, one of the students, in passing through the meat market, where there was no regular road, and only a narrow covered path, thrust a child on one side, who was talking and laughing with a butcher. The butcher said to him, in no very polite tone, there was no road there. He replied, the “devil take you,”—Kerl, dich soll der Teufel holen. Some scuffling ensued betwixt them. Some witnesses say the butcher gave blows to the student; but this is denied both by the student and by the butcher. The student complained of the insult to the police, and was told, after the matter had been inquired into, that the police could do nothing more than give a reproof to the butcher; and if this did not satisfy the student, he must have recourse to a common prosecution. The student declared to the police magistrate that he was satisfied, but his comrades deemed the dignity of the whole body insulted. After thinking over the matter for nine days, or till the 11th of July, they met in consequence of a public notice, in great numbers, on the evening of that day, in a public garden close to the town, and resolved on doing themselves justice. Some of their number addressed them, and encouraged them to be valiant; and they marched in an orderly procession into the town, and demolished with stones and sticks the windows, doors, and some of the furniture of a house belonging to a man bearing the same name as he bore who had affronted the student, but not belonging to him; in fact, the house of another man. They demolished the furniture of the house, after breaking into it, in the presence of the man himself, his wife, and daughter. This gross injury to an unoffending individual, this insult and outrage to females, they called taking that satisfaction which had been denied them for an injury. After threatening the house of the magistrate to whom the butcher had been complained of, they marched, singing their songs of triumph, through the streets, and at length dispersed.

The citizens, alarmed at this outrage, so well as by some previous excesses, and each one fearing that his turn would come next, and the magistrates having no power whatever to protect them, they requested the magistrates to represent the matter to the ministry at Hannover, which was done in the warmest colours. It appears that, although the ministry had not been officially informed of many previous excesses, that it knew of them, and had resolved to seize the first opportunity to curb the students, and give to Göttingen a constitution better calculated for the exigencies of the times.∗ This appears to have been the principal motive why it was now resolved thoroughly to sift the conduct of the students, and to make a severe example of the guilty. Mistrusting the impartiality, and knowing the bias of the usual tribunals of the university in favour of the students, the ministry sent a gentleman from Hannover, with the title of Royal Commissioner, to inquire into the whole matter. He arrived on the 21st of July, nine days after the fray, during which time no further riot had taken place. He was followed the next day, very much to the displeasure of the students, by a detachment of Hussars.

The conduct of the Hannoverian ministry was much discussed on the occasion, and it was on account of employing the soldiers that they received most blame. The citizens, of course, who felt the want of protection, and the partizans of military power, justified it throughout. The advocates of the students, and generally the friends to liberal opinions, condemned it. Without being a friend to the employment of soldiers, to sabre any class of people into obedience, it appears to me that, on present occasion, there were some good reasons for sending soldiers into Göttingen.

The students had got to so great a pitch of intemperance and disorder, that it would have most certainly been impossible to subject any individuals of them to merited punishment, without the whole breaking out into riot and rebellion. They were resolved to stand by one another; and when the ringleaders of the riot were demanded, a list of nearly all the students was given in. If it were necessary to inquire into the disturbance, to punish the perpetrators of a gross outrage, and protect the citizens, an armed force was necessary. If it were necessary that the students should not be absolute masters of the town, soldiers alone could hinder them; for the civil magistrate had no power whatever. That they remained quiet from the 11th till the 21st of July, when there was neither inquiry going on, nor punishments inflicted, is no sort of proof that they would continue so when their conduct was investigated, and the ringleaders punished. But this part of their conduct gave them great advantages in arguing that the soldiers were not necessary. Whether this step was justifiable or not, it was a measure full of unpleasant consequences to most of the parties concerned.

On the evening of the day when the Hussars arrived, the students walked in great numbers through the streets, and sang songs. This is a common custom—only that on this evening the numbers were greater than usual. They were obliged by the soldiers to separate and go to their homes. On the following day, the students petitioned the Commissioner, under promises of good behaviour, that the Hussars might be withdrawn—of course, their petition was refused. They were, on the same day, forbidden, by a public notice, to collect in numbers, either in houses or in the streets, and they were also forbidden to sing in walking through the streets. Such parties are forbidden by the usual regulations of the university, and this order only enforced them. In the evening, however, a great many of them collected near the place where the guard of Hussars was posted, and began singing Schiller’s famous robber song, “Ein freyes Leben führen wir,”—“we lead a free life.” They then ridiculed and reproached the military, and at length pressed around them in such numbers as to impede the patroles from coming in. Something like the report of a pistol was heard, and the Hussars then received orders to drive the students away, and to strike them with the flat part of their swords. The students opposed them for a moment, but soon separated; and eight of them were cut or wounded in the fray. Considering all things, the soldiers appear to have behaved with moderation. I must here remark, that there is a great deal of difference between sending soldiers into the town, and the manner of employing them when there. Although I think their presence on the spot was necessary for the protection of the citizens, it is difficult to believe that there was any necessity for guards or patroles in the street; and that it was not wrong thus to excite opposition by an unnecessary display of power. In such cases it is always necessary to consider what the people have been before accustomed to. The students were unaccustomed to be awed by soldiers. Though contrary to the regulations of the university, they were accustomed to amuse themselves by singing through the streets without opposition or remark; and it appears, therefore, to have been most unwise to have forbidden that at this particular time, and to have enforced the decree by the terror of the soldiers. The only justification of sending them into the town was, that they were to protect the citizens; but they were employed unnecessarily to annoy the students. Of course, the students felt themselves grievously affronted by the assault of the Hussars, and talked of arming themselves, and taking revenge. More military were brought into the town on the 23d, the day following, which possibly prevented this determination, and induced the students to resolve on leaving Göttingen. They put this latter resolution in practice on the same day, and retreated to some of the villages, and to a little town belonging to Hesse Cassel, called Witzenhausen, which are in the neighbourhood.

They remained here till the 2d of August, negociating with the ministry of Hannover for the removal of the soldiers. As they were disappointed in this aim, they then came to a formal resolution, that all the students who were foreigners should leave Göttingen, and that no foreigner, which includes all other Germans but the Hannoverians, should, under penalty of being put out of the comment of all other universities, and out of the comment of the native students remaining at Göttingen, dare to go to Göttingen to study for two years. To be put out of the comment exposes the young men to all sorts of insult without any redress. This was putting Göttingen in Verruf, and the consequence was, that the whole of the foreigners immediately left the university. The students had no doubt, from this Verruf having been accepted by the students of most of the other German universities, that, till the two years are expired, few or no foreigners would go to Göttingen to study.∗

Such is the power, and such the actions of the Göttingen students. Individuals, both students and citizens, who had displeased them, had frequently before been put in Verruf, to the great mortification of the former, and sometimes to the ruin of the latter. But this, I believe, is the first instance of their having extended their power to a whole university, and of their having decreed it not to be lawful for certain classes of persons to go there to study. This conduct betrays, on their part, no want either of freedom or of presumption. I will not exculpate the ministry; but certainly the conduct of the students must be condemned. They took satisfaction for an imaginary insult, which, in fact, the individual offended allowed to have been satisfied, and, in doing this, they outraged some unoffending individuals, among whom were females; they displayed no contrition at this offence, but insulted the authorities they were bound to obey. Much might, and much ought to be pardoned, in young men; but this single action was but the type of their general spirit, and this was opposed to all the restraints, not only of laws, but of order and decency. This is not a hazardous assertion. I have already given some specimens of their conduct. The quotation before made from Fichte may shew that a bad spirit has long existed. The turbulent character has recently been somewhat augmented by a large number of the students having been in the armies, and then returned to study, bringing with them the habits of the camp. A respectable citizen of Göttingen told me, however, that he remembered four instances of the students withdrawing themselves from the town, and they had not returned without stipulating conditions. They had each time re-entered the town in triumph, and they expected, on this occasion, to have done the same. The author of the little pamphlet which I have quoted, whose work was evidently written with a view of justifying the conduct of the government, has enumerated five recent disturbances at Göttingen, in one of which the students routed all the armed guard of the town. This he attributes to the young men having been soldiers; but these were only specimens of their general conduct. They cannot be considered as anomalies in their character, but merely its common features thrust more conspicuously into notice. Göttingen has, however, been long considered as much superior to the other universities of Germany in point of manners. The following is Goethe’s remarks when he was a student towards the year 1765.—“In Jena and Halle rudeness was arrived at its highest pitch. Strength of body, skill in fighting, and the wildest self-will, were there the order of the day; and such dispositions could only be supported and encouraged by the most vulgar riots and turbulence. The relation of the students to the inhabitants of those cities, how different soever it might be, helped these dispositions. The rude stranger had no respect for the citizens, and looked on himself as a being privileged to use every freedom, and every impertinence.”∗ Such, therefore, as it now is, has their character long been, and from them there can arise no other hope but that they should pursue their studies, and learn what order and freedom are.

Every Englishman must be astonished at the patience with which the citizens bore, and bear, the insults, contumely, and outrages of these youths. It marks the difference between a German and an English tradesman. Had students conducted themselves in a similar manner to Englishmen, hussars might have been necessary to prevent bloodshed, or to protect the students. The citizens would assuredly have had spirit to protect themselves, and to punish the boys. But the Germans, pounded into submission with the iron pestle of authority, can neither judge nor act for themselves when undirected by a police officer, or an order from the government. From having been over-governed they have become imbecile, and they have changed the activity of intelligent beings for the mechanism of slaves. The citizens of Göttingen, as a free town, in the sixteenth century, were not behind those of Brunswick and Hannover in independence. The citizens of Göttingen, as a royal town, the seat of a university, are destitute of common vigour of mind.

There are seven or eight different tribunals in Göttingen, exclusive of those of the university. Yet among all these there was not one which could repress a common tumult, though there is a small armed force under the orders of the magistrates of the university. There was not one of these that was fit, in the judgment of the Hannoverian ministry, to inquire into and decide on the merits of the persons concerned in the riot. The legislators of Hannover must misdoubt their own institutions, and be sensible, after all the trouble they have given themselves, of the unfitness of their own creations to answer the end intended.

When we reflect for a moment on the consequences of such a riot, had it taken place in England, we may be sure that no armed force beyond the common civil power, aided by the citizens, could have been requisite to keep a few students in order. But, where men rely only on the military, they may, and must, use them equally to oppose rebellion or repress a tumult; to stifle the clamours of a nation, or stop the throats of noisy boys. They are instruments of despotism always at hand; and that violence which ought to be the last refuge of the government, is used the moment there is the least question of opposition to its will.

No extraordinary tribunal would be required in Britain to decide on the conduct of a few students; nor can a cabinet ministry in our country ever find it necessary to listen to their complaints. The Hannoverian ministry had to interfere between the students and the laws; they set themselves formally to negociate with them, and degraded themselves from statesmen to police officers. They brought this degradation on themselves by that meddling spirit which compels them always to direct the most minute actions of the subjects, instead of trusting them to the common laws of nature. How much more powerful does the law appear in our country, where it is exposed to examination and to censure, than in this, where it is above inquiry, but rests on the will of some individuals; and where it is an engine of government, and nothing which the people are interested in supporting.

In the dependence of the university magistrates which has been described, there was a very good reason for not allowing this matter to be investigated by them. And their dependence on the students is to be considered as the great cause, not only of this riot, but of all the past, the present, and the growing turbulence of the students. What can be expected from them but excesses and violence, when the persons appointed to govern them not only do not reprove, but are ready to palliate their excesses? And they may well reproach the university magistracy for its compliance, and the government for placing it in a situation to fear them. It was from similar offences having been long tolerated that at length brought on them the shame of being put down by soldiers. It must not, however, be argued from the present dependence of the professors, that they should have greater salaries given them to make them above the students. This is not the reformation which is required. This would make them neglect teaching. The students ought not to be removed, as they now are, from the control of the civil magistrate. Both professors and students should be subjected to the common laws of the land, and to the same tribunals as other people. This restriction is perfectly distinct from interfering with teaching. It is much to be wished that this should be rendered wholly independent of governments, rescued both from their patronage and from their control. But it is at the same time to be wished, that the professors and students should not be separated, by different laws and privileges, from the rest of the society.

It has been mentioned, that the reason why Göttingen was chosen for the seat of a university, was the ruined and impoverished state of the town.∗ “The inhabitants were to be maintained and nourished by the professors and students.” The consequence of this has been, that the former have become utterly dependent on the latter. The students know this; they know that the prosperity or the ruin of the inhabitants of Göttingen depends on them; they know that the citizens, so well as the professors, fear above all things that they should withdraw themselves, and thus ruin both. This power over the welfare of the citizens of Göttingen, and its consequent arrogance, has therefore been given to the students by that act of the government which was dictated by a wish to render Göttingen flourishing by founding a university at it. It has before been shewn, that a great cause for the turbulent disposition of the students was the dependence of the professors; and this also was originally caused by a desire in the rulers to have the honour of being the patrons of learning.

Another assigned cause for the present turbulence of disposition was the great number of students who were in Göttingen. Lodgings could scarcely be found for them all. In moral reasoning, it is the height of folly to fix all our attention on the last of any series of human actions, and to leave all its causes unexplored and uncondemned; or, in this case, although the students were presumptuous, riotous, and turbulent,—although they had collected in Göttingen in greater numbers than could be accommodated, it is absurd to throw all the blame of such dispositions on them, or to attribute their coming in such multitudes to chance. German boys are mild and amiable beings, and students are rendered otherwise by nothing but the constitution of the university, and their relative situation to the citizens. For this constitution,—for this situation,—the government, its vain desires and regulations, are entirely and alone to blame. Presumption and turbulence in young men are necessary consequences of possessing power, and the overt acts of insulting people, and of rioting, are the consequences of such dispositions. The number of students collected in the little town of Göttingen was owing to the patronage of the government, and unless men should be determined not to extend their view beyond immediate causes, they must blame the silly vanity which aspires to the honour of being the Mecænas of the age, and the regulations of the government, so well as those dispositions of the students, which these regulations cause.

These latter observations account only for the arrogance of the students of Göttingen, while a similar disposition evidently now forms, and has long formed, part of the character of all German students. But it must be remembered, the principal causes for their presumption, namely, their independence of the laws of society, the patronage of the monarchs, and their exclusive privileges as a Stand, are common to them all, and that many of them share in that particular cause for the presumption of the Göttingen students, which is derived from knowing that the welfare of the little town in which the patronized university is situated depends on them. A class of reasoners are constantly blaming the evil passions of our nature as the causes of our misery. They teach all mankind to curse our common mother. If it were not for fear of being paradoxical I should assert, that what are called our good passions do as much mischief as our evil ones. At least, the evil passions of the students, and, probably, many other of the evil passions of all classes of society, may be clearly traced to that disposition in the rulers of the world which most men applaud as benevolent. Admitting that the intention of patronizing universities is most laudable, it is evident that its effects are most mischievous.

[∗]The reputation of this monarch is different in England and in Germany. Mr Boswell, in his Life of Johnson, says, “that it is too well known that the second George never was an Augustus to learning or genius.” In Hannover he is certainly honoured as an Augustus to learning.

[∗]For the last regulations for Göttingen, (there have been a great many,) see Gesetz Sammlung 3 Abtheilung, No. 30, p. 44.

[∗]In 1819, there were 67 teachers at Berlin—at Heidelberg, 51—at Breslau, 52—who advertised 140 courses of lectures.

[∗]Actenmässige, Darstellung, &c. &c. p. 26.

[†]Ibid. p. 79.

[∗]“Many teachers, not celebrated, lecture much more amusingly and instructively than more celebrated men. The manner in which these latter speak is so confused, so likely to lull to sleep, that when a student has not a very great love for what they teach, he would do much wiser to hear the lectures of less celebrated gentlemen.”—Der Göttinger Student, p. 38.

[∗]Der Göttinger Student, p. 24.

[∗]The reader may perhaps be pleased to see the number of students in some other universities. I add, therefore, an account of such as chance has made me acquainted with. In Wurzburg, in 1819, there were 576,—128 were foreigners, 117 study philosophy, 126 theology, 149 jurisprudence, 184 medicine; in Tubingen, 700; in Jena, in 1815, 321,—in 1816, 374,—1817, 493,—1818, 634,—1819, 669. Jena, therefore, is rapidly increasing in reputation and numbers of students. Two hundred and twenty were to study jurisprudence, 103 medicine, 287 theology, and 59 philosophy. In the same year there were, at Vienna, 995,—at Berlin, 942,—at Leipsic, 911,—at Prague, 850,—at Landshut, 640,—at Halle, 503,—at Breslaw, 366,—at Heidelberg, 363,—at Giessen, 241,—at Marburg, 197,—at Rostock, 180,—at Kiel, 167,—and at Griefswald, 55.

[∗]Many of the minor sovereigns of Germany, when young, study at the universities.

[∗]I shall justify this part of the assertion by a quotation from a work written by a student:—“Misstrauisch gegen die Studenten sind sie (Die Einwohner) allerdings in der Regel, allein mit vollem Rechte denn man prellt sie auf zu vielfache Art und zu oft.” Der Göttinger Student, p. 21.—The English is—That the citizens are mistrustful of the students; but with perfect right, for they are cheated too often, and in too many ways.

[∗]Goethe, Aus meinem Leben.

[∗]Actenmässige Darstellung der Vorfälle, &c. Zu Göttingen, p. 27.

[∗]The Verruf does not appear to have had all the success intended from it. In 1819 Göttingen had 770 students, and above 130 of these were foreigners.

[∗]Aus meinem Leben, Vol. II. p. 89.

[∗]Vol. I. p. 341.