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satisfaction. To your Excellency's mediating and 

 protecting hand the warmest thanks and blessings, 

 at all events, will be due ! 



I am much rejoiced at the new present which you 

 make me of the Grand Ducal epistle. Not only 

 is the conclusion in good taste and delicate, but 

 the style on the whole has pleasant turns ; the 

 admiration for your Excellency, especially, is ex- 

 pressed in a way the heartfelt sincerity of which 

 is unmistakeable. 



For some days past I have lived wholly on recol- 

 lections of bygone times and relations. I have been 

 spell-bound in a magic circle by the Correspondence 

 between Grentz and Adam Miiller, which has just 

 been published by Gotta, and I must once more, in 

 inward contemplation, live through the entire con- 

 tents of those life-pictures. I was intimate from early 

 life with both these men, and have had much to do 

 with them personally upon friendly terms, but in 

 matters of opinion much opposed to them. The supe- 

 riority of Gentz over the younger friend, who was 

 much over- valued by him, was never doubtful to me, 

 and is here confirmed anew. Only at the last, when 

 the murder of Kotzebue distracts and confuses his 

 mind, the force of terror drives the Statesman, once 

 such a lover of the Light, into those gloomy and misty 

 regions, into which his alarmed friend had long 

 since withdrawn. This correspondence is unique in 

 its way. The discussions, explanations, mutual 

 incitements, friendly approaches, and feuds, have the 

 charm of a drama. In Adam Miiller is concealed, more- 

 over, the complete germ of the Kreuzzeitung's party, 

 but only in ideal height as yet, without any contact 



