I Thought Of Our Surplus Revenue, And Laid My Hand On My Mouth.
But
yet there is a progress of democratic principle indicated by this very
understanding that the king is to hold things for the benefit of the
people.
Times are altered since Louis XIV. was instructed by his
tutor, as he looked out on a crowd of people, "These are all yours;"
and since he said, "_L'elot, c'est moi_"
Our guide seemed to feel bound, however, to exhaust himself in
comparison of our defects with their excellences.
"Some Prussians went over to America to live," he said, "and had to
come back again; they could not live there."
"Why not?" said I.
"O, they said there was nothing done there but working and going to
church!"
"That's a fact," said W., with considerable earnestness.
"Yes," said our guide; "they said we have but one life to live, and we
want to have some comfort in it."
It is a curious fact, that just in proportion as a country is free and
self-governed it has fewer public amusements. America and Scotland
have the fewest of any, and Italy the most. Nevertheless, I am far
from thinking that this is either necessary or desirable: the subject
of providing innocent public amusements for the masses is one that we
ought seriously to consider. In Berlin, and in all other German
cities, there are gardens and public grounds in which there are daily
concerts of a high order, and various attractions, to which people can
gain admittance for a very trifling sum. These refine the feelings,
and cultivate the taste; they would be particularly useful in America
in counteracting that tendency to a sordid materialism, which is one
of our great national dangers.
We went over the Berlin Museum. In general style Greek - but Greek
vitalized by the infusion of the German mind. In its general
arrangements one of the most gorgeous and impressive combinations of
art which I have seen. Here are the great frescoes of Kaulbach,
Cornelius, and other German artists, who have so grafted Grecian ideas
into the German stock that the growth has the foliage and coloring of
a new plant. One set of frescoes, representing the climate and scenery
of Greece, had on me a peculiar and magical effect. Alas! there never
has been the Greece that we conceive; we see it under the soft, purple
veil of distance, like an Alpine valley embraced by cloudy mountains;
but there was the same coarse dust and _debris_ of ordinary life
there as with us. The true Arcadia lies beyond the grave. The
collection of pictures is rich in historic curiosities - valuable as
marking the progress of art. One Claude Lorraine here was a matchless
specimen - a perfect victory over all the difficulties of green
landscape painting.
LETTER XLV.
WITTENBERG.
MY DEAR: -
I am here in the station house at Wittenberg. I have been seeing and
hearing to-day for you, and now sit down to put on paper the results
of my morning. "What make you from Wittenberg?" Wittenberg! name of
the dreamy past; dimly associated with Hamlet, Denmark, the moonlight
terrace, and the Baltic Sea, by one line of Shakspeare; but made more
living by those who have thought, loved, and died here; nay, by those
who cannot die, and whose life has been life to all coming ages.
How naturally, on reaching a place long heard of and pondered, do we
look round for something uncommon, quaint, and striking! Nothing of
the kind was here; only the dead flat of this most level scenery, with
its dreary prairie-like sameness. Certainly it was not this scenery
that stirred up a soul in Luther, and made him nail up his theses on
the Wittenberg church door.
"But, at any rate, let us go to Wittenberg," said I; "get a guide, a
carriage, cannot you?" as I walked to one window of the station house
and another, and looked out to see something wonderful. Nothing was in
sight, however; and after the usual sputter of gutturals which
precedes any arrangement in this country, we were mounted in a high,
awkward carriage, and rode to the town. Two ancient round tower and a
wall first met my eye; then a drawbridge, arched passage, and
portcullis. Under this passage we passed, and at our right hand was
the church, where once was laid the worn form that had stood so many
whirlwinds - where, in short, Luther was buried. But this we did not
then know; so we drove by, and went to a hotel. Talked English and got
German; talked French with no better success. At last, between W., G.,
and the dictionary, managed to make it understood that we wanted a
guide to the Luther relics. A guide was after a time forthcoming, in
the person of a little woman who spoke no English, whom, guide book in
hand, we followed.
The church is ancient, and, externally, impressive enough; inside it
is wide, cold, whitewashed, prosaic; whoever gets up feeling does it
against wind and tide, so far as appearances are concerned. We advance
to the spot in the floor where our guide raises a trap door, and shows
us underneath the plate inscribed with the name of Luther, and by it
the plate recording the resting-place of his well-beloved Philip
Melanchthon; then to the grave of the Elector of Saxony, and John the
Steadfast; on one side a full length of Luther, by Lucas Cranach; on
the other, one of Melanchthon, by the same hand. Well, we have seen;
this is all; "He is not here, he is risen." "Is this all?" "All," says
our guide, and we go out. I look curiously at the old door where
Luther nailed up his theses; but even this is not the identical door;
that was destroyed by the French. Still, under that arched doorway he
stood, hammer and nails in hand; he held up his paper, he fitted it
straight; rap, rap, - there, one nail - another - it is up, and he
stands looking at it.
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