Another general remark will not be out of place here, which is, that, as the children of the cultivated classes grow up, a great contradiction appears.  I refer to the fact, that they are urged and trained by parents and teachers to deport themselves moderately, intelligently, and even wisely; to give pain to no one from petulance or arrogance; and to suppress all the evil impulses which may be developed in them; but yet, on the other hand, while the young creatures are engaged in this discipline, they have to suffer from others that which in them is reprimanded and punished.  In this way the poor things are brought into a sad strait between the natural and civilized states, and, after restraining themselves for a while, break out, according to their characters, into cunning or violence.

Force may be warded off by force; but a well-disposed child, inclined to love and sympathy, has little to oppose to scorn and ill-will.  Though I managed pretty well to keep off the assaults of my companions, I was by no means equal to them in sarcasm and abuse; because he who merely defends himself in such cases is always a loser.  Attacks of this sort consequently, when they went so far as to excite anger, were repelled with physical force, or at least excited strange reflections in me which could not be without results.  Among other advantages which my ill-wishers saw with envy, was the pleasure I took in the relations that accrued to the family from my grandfather’s position of Schultheiss; since, as he was the first of his class, this had no small effect on those belonging to him.  Once when, after the holding of the Piper’s Court, I appeared to pride myself on having seen my grandfather in the midst of the council, one step higher than the rest, enthroned, as it were, under the portrait of the emperor, one of the boys said to me in derision, that, like the peacock contemplating his feet, I should cast my eyes back to my paternal grandfather, who had been keeper of the Willow Inn, and would never have aspired to thrones and coronets.  I replied, that I was in no wise ashamed of that, as it was the glory and honor of our native city that all its citizens might consider each other equal, and every one derive profit and honor from his exertions in his own way.  I was sorry only that the good man had been so long dead; for I had often yearned to know him in person, had many times gazed upon his likeness, nay, had visited his tomb, and had at least derived pleasure from the inscription on the simple monument of that past existence to which I was indebted for my own.  Another ill-wisher, who was the most malicious of all, took the first aside, and whispered something in his ear; while they still looked at me scornfully.  My gall already began to rise, and I challenged them to speak out.  “What is more, then, if you will have it,” continued the first, “this one thinks you might go looking about a long time before you could find your grandfather.”  I now threatened them