River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1879-05-15

IN thai eventful year After the final rum
of Napoleon in 1915 he had little more to
do with administration or diplomacy III
Prussia, though he gladly would have
taken part again. He was too powerful
dose for any but the most critical times
and when those were over the kings and
prime ministers got along without HIM
,rladly-for he was too much of a school
master for them, except when his disci-
plipG was needful to their safety. He
could scold and grumbe as well as Carlyle
ever could and he had a special sharpness
for bnrcaucrats whom he found govern
ing Prussia, and who had stood in the
way Hf his reforms.
Scarcely any man has ever drawn
more distinctly the portrait of those
bureau-people, who are not yet an extinct
race in Europe or in Massachusetts. In
1881 he wrote ON this subject thus:
"BWeaVcrGtS, sdldried, book learned, With
out Interests and ,oithout properly. These
four terms express the spirit of our soul
less government machine and of others
like It, Saaried, that means tendency
10 maintain and increase the number of
the sllaried Book learned that is liv-
ing IN the world of words, not of realities.
Without interests, for they are not con
nectcl with anv of the classes of citizens
that make up the State, but are caste
bv themselves, the caste of writers. With
out property; that means that all the
movements of property leave them I'M
affected, whether 1t is rain or sunshine,
whether taxes rise ~ fall All this does
not concern them while they draw their
salary ont of the treasury and sit writing,
"a. AZ oil
unhouorcd, in quiet Office with a good
lock a. it, and bring up their children
| IL them to he equally expert writing
machines. One machinery, the military
one, J saw fall in 1896, on the 14th of
October, battle of Jena, and | should not
wonder ii the writing machinery had its
l4th Df October too This is close
passage, and so far too is that in which
he describes one of his old colleagues in
the government who had mrny of these
bureau mcn about him. "lIe kept all good
propr at distance, and surrounded
himself solely with mediocre and often
with bad people; he undermined the old
pUsriian spirit of parsimoncy and obedi-
cucc. aud when he died he left the finance
in disorder and public affairs in the
handSof multitude of ill-chosen officials.
lie wAs not one who aimed ut what was
g1eat and good for its own sake, but only
as "A means to personal fame, and for that
reason he could not conceive it nor attain
to it,
OF Metternich, with whom he was
brought into close relations at one time,
Stein said, ''llc IS "A man who shrnkS
from every vigorous measure, sets his goal
near and concerns himself with contcmp-
tiblc patchwork" Ii seems that Meter
Mich got from The allies the rich vine
yards. of Johannisberg, which should
have gone To Stein, though the duke OF
Wcin,ar, Stems old friend, lIardenberg,
had Undertaken To secure Johannisberg
for him, and as Stein says, "entirely ne
elected at Vienna aud Paris, either from
jcalotsy or want of thought,an affair had
undertaken with the strongest expression
of readiness" No wonder Stein felt
piquGd Mettcmich himself said in 1883
"Stcin hated me; that followed from his
character; he belonged to the class of pco-
pie Who are properly described by the
English word impressonabe, | never
hated the Baron Won Stein, for love and
hatred of individuals are weaknesses
which exert no influence ON my conduct
of business and my relations to the de
ceased were purely those of business
Prof Seeicy rcrarks rather archly, for
him, that "it vas often Metternlch's for
tune IA bc misunderstood, and he enjoyed
posing IN the character of Statesman
whose high serenity could not be apprc-
Ciatcd by those who were themselves
slaves of passion" Perhaps the professor
had read his conversation with George
Tickn0r in 1896, wherein the old Austrian
assured our Bostonian as follows: IL have
much calmness. do not apply passion
to anything. | love truth and ensuc it;
| hate falsehood. | do not like my bust
ness If | did | should not he able
to preserve the calmness of spirit
neccs aiy to it," Mctternich added;
"WhcD | was live-and twenty years old
foresaw nothing but change and trouble
in my time, and sometimes thought then
ihat | would leave Europe and 80 to
America, or somewhere else, out of the
reach Of It." 1t would have been remark
able indeed, if Mettcrnich and Stein had
both l&kcu refuge in Kentucky, in order
10 escape the troubles and responsibilities
of Eurdpe!
These Germans did not then take many
lessons from America many more in fact
from England. Schon, one of the early
coadintors of Stein in his land reforms,
says: "It was through England that be
came Statesman. Where the laborcr,
busy among his cabbages, called out to
me in cNultation that he had read my
king WAS about to join the coalition
against France along with England
there you have, in the ruest sense of the
word, public life" This was in 1898,
too, when England was far from being at
her best The good man would bc still
more astonished at some of the evidences
Of true public life in America, could he
see rs nov. Schon complains that Stein
knew little of political science, and adds:
"Stcip would have been much cmbarrass-
ed if hG had been required to give an
answer t. the question, What Is "A state,
and 10 what end do we live and ought we
To live in State?" Toanswer such conun-
drums was not his business in life, but
ON the contrary, to see that theorists like
Schon had Il state 20 live in