whom he is not bound by the closest ties of affection. Love alone has insight. Indifference, curiosity, hate are blind. The advantage is wholly on the side of the biographer, when he is writing of one united to him by blood. Hereditary tendencies enable him to appreciate by his own experience the radical character, which is essentially the same though superficially modified in all the members of a family. Friendship is, however, a better qualification for a biographer than consanguinity; for friends are relatives not in the blood but in the spirit. They are bound together from seeing in each other's characters the germ or full-grown beauty of what they know to be best in themselves, or yet oftener, from finding there the very qualities, of which they are consciously deficient, and which they most need to complete their ideal. Friends are born together of God, and learn through love to know the greatness of the nature, which casual acquaintance overlooks, and which the rudeness of worldly collisions drives into the hiding-places of reserve. A man's real spirit is a walled city to his fellow-man, till confidence has unbarred the gates. Relationship, whether by birth or friendship, is the best preparation for a biographer.

We should have taken up this memoir of Charles Follen by his wife, then, with the prepossession, that we should find there portrayed his most characteristic features, even if we had not known how very pure, tender, and perfect was the love that bound and still binds these friends together. But we frankly confess, we were not prepared, from what we knew of the enthusiasm of the author, for the tone of subdued affection which makes the charm and constitutes the atmosphere of this book. We have felt, in reading it, how very near must have seemed to her the presence of him, who has passed into the world of transparent truth. The duty has been faithfully rendered which she thus simply and touchingly describes.

"It was only for the sake of my child, that I first thought of writing the history of his father's life, feeling the conviction, that it would be the best blessing I could confer upon him; but my friends convinced me, that I ought to have a wider aim and a higher purpose than this, and that many hearts might be elevated, many souls quickened and blessed, by the contemplation of the life and character of such a being.

"I may say with truth, and in his own words, 'I have wished to perform this duty in his spirit, not attempting to present what my own mind might invent, or my personal feelings

dictate, but, from such records as I have, to give the simple story of his life, which is his best eulogy.'

"I feel an unutterable shrinking from thus removing the veil of privacy from all that is most dear and holy in my own existence; but by no other means could the beautiful image of his life and character be given. No one knew him as I did. Therefore, with an unhesitating faith and a cheerful courage, I commit this inadequate record of my husband's life to the public, remembering, that the weak feeling, which makes this act a sort of self-crucifixion, will pass away, and that, while the hand that drew it will be forgotten, this faithful picture of human excellence will live forever in the minds of many.

"The effort to suppress the anguish of soul, which would unfit me for my sacred task, has contributed much towards the fulfilment of his parting charge to me, to be of good courage' till we meet again.' pp. 581, 582.

Charles Follen was the second son of Christopher Follen, counsellor of law and judge, first at Giessen, and then at Friedberg in Hesse-Darmstadt. He was born on the 4th of September, 1796. It was ominous of an eventful life, that while the ceremony of his christening was going on, the hitherto quiet house was suddenly filled with a troop of French soldiers, with General Jourdan at their head. The son united in beautiful harmony the characters of the parents. The father is thus described in a letter from Charles, written after his death.

"How clear and living does the image of my father's soul stand before me. His penetrating and comprehensive understanding; his uprightness and firmness; his glowing justice, aiding the oppressed, unmoved by the prayers or power of the oppressor; his contempt of all false appearances; his self-sacrificing, untiring sense of duty, which acknowledged no superior, regarded no relationship, which knew neither friend nor foe, which kept him always ready to stand before the highest judgment. Who of us does not remember with a painful pleasure his cheeful disposition, his wit, his power of entertaining, his noble and truly youthful interest in the generous though imprudent exertions of young people; his childlike pleasure in children, whom he attached to himself by his humorous inventive imagination, and gift at story-telling." pp. 317, 318.

The mother was a gentle lady, full of loveliness, who died when Charles was but three years old; and probably we see the traces of her softness in the feeling, which made him through life remember the "sad day, when he sat all alone

upon the great old-fashioned stairs, feeling as if he were forgotten, and no one of those who passed up and down spoke a word to him, and he heard a bell toll, and felt that something very sorrowful, he knew not what, had happened, and he cried, he knew not why." p. 4. After his mother's death, the two other sons and the daughter were sent away, and Charles remained alone at home, where his father devoted himself to his improvement with a patient affection, which may be tested by the amusing and pleasing anecdote, that he allowed Charles to stretch wires across every part of his study, and hang them with bells to make a tune, without complaining of their jangle or of the trouble in stooping under them. Surely an indulgent man for a studious judge! Indeed it is plain, that the father's heart was peculiarly poured out on this beloved son. And a friendship then began which each remaining year served only to ripen. The tone of hearty love, in which the father addressed his son through the period when he was following a course that his own sobered judgment did not wholly approve, and the frankness with which he proposes to come and live with him in America, speak volumes as to the truth of the relation that bound them together. They were what parent and child should ever be, intimate, confiding friends. The simple words of the father to Augustus and Charles, when they told him they had enlisted, "If you had not done so, I should not have acknowledged you as my sons," shows the manly freedom in which he desired them to stand. Christopher Follen was a good father.

But Charles was greatly indebted also to his step-mother, a woman for whose spirit and character all that is said in the volume, and all that we can gather from her letters, awakens a warm respect; and to whom he was plainly attached as to a mother. And so the boy grew up in a loving home, where the sunshine which a child's heart needs was warm. He was delicate in health, and rather backward, sensitive, and gentle, yet resolute and persevering, inclined to be grave, though open-hearted to the romance of youth. All the little anecdotes he gives of his early years are full of beauty. You see the magnanimity of later years in the grand way, with which he held out his hand to his father, who had angrily punished him, and said, "Father, I forgive you." p. 6. A steady industry, so characteristic of his manhood, enabled him to mount rapidly from class to class, and he remained below only because his

age would not allow him to go higher. A delicate honor and self-respect shows itself in the violent fits of grief, which any attempt to banter him upon peculiarities awakened. Perhaps a somewhat stern and even morbid conscientiousness appears in his premature seriousness; and a mind too early thoughtful in the curiosity, which led him, after lying awake to solve some puzzling question, to rise and wake his father to answer it for him. He says, that he was naturally timid; but this we doubt, and should rather refer to the powerful action of imagination whatever may have seemed like fear. It is an error often made; and many a boy and man seems brave, who is merely hard and sluggish in his ideal nature. Certainly one anecdote, which Dr. Follen related of himself in after years, shows a most determined purpose, if not instinctive fearlessness. When he was at Coire, he found a bridge, deep beneath which the Rhine rushed foaming along. Being easily affected to dizziness when looking from a height, he thought a good opportunity here offered itself to subdue the weakness, and daily walked upon the parapet with his eyes upon the whirling stream, falling in upon the bridge when vertigo seized him, until by perseverance he was able to run backwards and forwards upon this narrow footing with perfect ease. He could scarcely have been fearful as a boy, who in manhood showed such steadiness of nerve. Another anecdote to the same effect we feel inclined to mention, as it is a remarkable indication of his courage and decision, and, like the foregoing one, does not appear in the narrative. He was once, with a party of fellowtravellers, threading his dangerous way along a mountain side in the pass well called "Via Mala;" where now, indeed, thanks to the policy of Austria, is a broad and smooth macadamized road; but where then was only the narrowest footpath, winding along on the face of the precipice. The companion before him, an Italian exile, had been eloquently discussing the wrongs of his country, quite unconscious of danger, till suddenly looking down into the yawning abyss, where hundreds of feet below the river lay like a skein of foam, he trembled, turned pale, and leaning against the side of the precipice declared, he could go no further. There was no time for parley, no room to turn, the fate of the whole party was at stake, for had he fallen he would have dragged with him the others. Dr. Follen instantly seized him by the neck, and calling him by name said, if you do not at once go forward, I will

dash you headlong down. Of course this appeal drove the blood from the Italian's heart again, courage returned, and they were safe. This shows him cool and brave. But that he was

all alive to strong impressions of the imagination we can well believe. His nature was poetical and tender. He liked to pass whole days by the brook, that ran behind his grandfather's garden in Romrod, and mingle his young thoughts with the gurgling waters. In a word, his boyish character was formed amidst all the loving charms, and simple tastes, and humble romances of a German home; and we doubt, if England or America can often show a soil so prodigal of hearty manliness and sweet courtesy. The Germans have a sensitive kindness pervading daily life, somewhat foreign to the hard AngloSaxons. Any one, who in after years saw Dr. Follen with children, a boy among boys, all awake to their little fancies, and winding the garlands of his sympathy and the crowns of his cheerfulness round them, needs not to be assured, that affection had filled his young mind with all gentle associations.

Having obtained many prizes for literary labors, and passed the regular examinations, Charles entered the University of Giessen in 1813, being under seventeen years of age, and devoted himself to jurisprudence. Immediately after the battle of Leipsic he joined a volunteer corps of riflemen, consisting mostly of students. And to understand his after character, his sterness against wrong, his heroic daring against all manner of oppression, his readiness to combat for justice, we must bear in mind the mighty influence which this German crusade against the tyrant of France excited. The spirit, that was nurtured into vigorous life in him through these stormy years, found its expression in the Funeral Hymn of Körner, which may be read on p. 610, Vol. I. Thus early he had consecrated himself to the cause of freedom, and was inspired with that hope, which then bound the youth of Germany into a living whole, and which, but for the cowardice and treachery of their governments, might ere this have redeemed their own land and Europe. Alas! when will such an opportunity return again, as was opened to Christendom by the outbreak of democracy, and the downfall of that apostate to freedom, who was called to be and might have been its favored son.

From this period we may date the history of Charles Follen's public life. Though devoting himself perseveringly