schoffen), though in the territory of Westphalia | alone. He could, indeed, exercise these prerogatives only when himself was initiated; this, however, was generally done by the master of the chair of the Imperial Chamber of Dortmund, on the coronation of the Emperor at Aix-laChapelle. If, however, the Emperor was not initiated in the mysteries of the secret tribunals, he could demand of the judges of the secret ban no other answer to his inquiries but yes and no.

The Duke of Saxony was supreme governor and administrator of the Westphalian secret tribun ls, and after the partition of the Duchy of Saxony, was superseded in this function by the archbishop of Cologne. To him also the members of the secret tribunals were obliged to swear obedience. The free-counts, whom he nominated for the duchies of Engern and Westphaly, were subjected to his examination and instruction, and after being invested by the Emperor with the royal ban, were not only installed by him, but made liable to be deprived of their function, at his pleasure, without being permitted to appeal.

Every master of the chair was authorized to prohibit the free-counts of his tribunals, to decide in certain cases, and to grant letters of protection against the proceedings of the latter. He received of every free-judge, admitted as a member of the tribunals subject to his jurisdiction, one mark of gold, if the candidate was of noble descent, if not, a mark of silver. Beside this; he also enjoyed other perquisites, amounting to a considerable sum.

resident in the free county, and natives of Westphaly. The number of these free-knights belonging to each tribunal, never was less than seven, nor did it amount to more than eleven. Seven free-knights, at least, were required to compose a plenary-court (Voltgericht), in which the final sentence was pronounced. Knights of other tribunals were indeed permitted to be present on these occasions as visitors, but were not reckoned, nor allowed to vote. On their recep

tion they promised on oath to be faithful in discharging their functions as free-knights; to give information to the secret tribunal of every thing coming under its jurisdiction, perceived by themselves or reported to them by creditable persons, and not to suffer any thing created betwixt heaven and earth, to divert them from the execution of their duty. They also bound themselves to promote the interest of the sacred Roman empire, and to invade the possessions of the masters of the chair and of the free-courts only on legal grounds. After having taken this oath, they were not permitted to reveal even to their confessors the secrets of the tribunal, and on transgressing this law, though only in the most trifling point, were hanged without mercy. They pronounced judgment according to the statutes of the Westphalian secret tribunal, and executed it conformably to the decrees of the free-courts. They knew each other by certain secret signals.

The free-bailiffs (Freyfrohnen) performed the office of messengers, and also were required to be freemen, begotten in legal wedlock, and of an unimpeached character,

The original constitution of the secret tribunals did, however, not long continue in force, bastards and wretches of the most abandoned character being admitted. The number of free-knights allowed to every tribunal, was originally limited to eleven, but in a short time in many amounted to fifty and more, who possessed not an inch of landed estate in Westphaly, and were induced by self-interest, ambition, thirst after vengeance, or other disgraceful motives, to join the association. The meeting places of the members of the secret tribunals degenerated into haunts of sanguinary banditti, who indiscriminately assassinated the innocent with the guilty. The masters of the chair being actuated by the most sordid avarice, divided the free-countries into numerous smaller seats of justice, whereby the number of spies and secret informers naturally was encreased to a most alarming degree, and numberless opportunities for fraud, imposition, and extortion were presented. Although they were originally authorized to pronounce sentence only in criminal cases, they interfered in private and domestic affairs, in order to encrease their fees, and contrived to lay even Counts and Princes

C

under contribution to their avarice. They vowed, on their admission, in the most solemn and awful manner, to judge with incorruptible impartiality,|| to regard no person, and even to be deaf to the feelings of the heart, in framing their decrees; but, on the contrary, they were swayed by selfishness, accessible to corruption, partial to their friends, and prosecuted their enemies with the most rancorous malice, and prostituted their function by rendering their authority subservient to the gratification of the most brutal lust. They were deaf to the lamentations of calumniated innocence, assassinated their relations to inherit their estates, and were more dreadful to the virtuous than the midnight ruffian. A freecount frequently acted at once as witness and as judge; the spy, informer, witness, and judge, were, in many instances, united in the same person; in short, the abuses which disgraced the secret tribunals, rendered them a real curse to mankind. Towards the close of the 14th, and in the beginning of the 15th century, their power in Germany rose to a most alarming degree; and we may safely maintain that the German empire at that time contained more than an hundred thousand free-knights, who without either previous notice or trial executed every one who was condemned by the secret ban. Bavarians, Austrians, Franconians and Suabians, having a demand on any one whom they could not bring to justice before the regular courts of his country, applied to the Westphalian secret tribunal, where they obtained a summons, and in case of nonappearance, a sentence, which was immediately communicated to the whole fraternity of freeknights, a step by which were put in motion those hundred thousand executioners bound by the most dreadful oath to spare neither father nor mother, nor to regard the sacred ties of friendship and matrimonial love. If a free-knight met a friend condemned by the secret ban, and gave him only the slightest hint to save his life by flight, all the other free-knights were bound to hang him seven feet higher than any other criminal. The sentence being pronounced in the secret ban, they were obliged to put it into immediate execution, and not permitted to make the least remonstrance, though they were perfectly convinced that the devoted victim was the best of men, and innocent of the crime alledged against him. This induced almost every man of rank and power to become a member of that dreadful association, in order to be more able to be on his guard. Every Prince had some freeknights amongst his counsellors, and the majority of the German nobility belonged to that secret order. Even Princes; for instance, the Duke of Bavaria, and the Margrave of Brandenbourgh were members of the Secret Tribunal. The

Duke William of Brunswick is reported to have said: I must order the Duke Adolphus, of Shleswic, to be hanged, if he should come to see me, lest the free-knights should hang me. It was difficult to elude the proceedings of the free knights, as they at all times contrived to steal at night, unknown and unseen, to the gates of castles, palaces and towns, and to affix the summons of the secret tribunal. When this had been done three times, and the accused did not appear; he was condemned by the secret ban, and summoned once more to submit to the execution of the sentence, and in case of non-appearance, solemnly out-lawed, when the invisible bands of free-knights watched all his steps till they found an opportunity of taking away his When a free-knight thought himself too weak to seize and hang the culprit, he was bound to pursue him till he met with some of his colleagues, who assisted him in hanging him to a tree, near the high road, and not to a gibbet, to signify thereby that they exercised a free imperial judicature throughout the whole empire, independent of all territorial tribunals. If the devoted victim made resistance, so as to compel them to poignard him; they tied the dead body to a tree, fixing the dagger over his head, to show that he had not been murdered, but executed by a free-knight.

life.

Their transactions were shrouded in the mast profound concealment; and the signal by which the initiated, or knowing ones, as they called themselves, recognized each her, never could be discovered. Their secret proceedings were not permitted to be disclosed to the Emperor himself, although he was supreme master of the chair. Only when he asked, has N. N. been condemned? the free-knights were allowed to reply in the affirmative or negative; but when he enquired who had been condemned by the secret ban? they were not permitted to mention any

name.

The Emperor, or his delegate, could create free-knights no where but on the red soil, i. e. in Westphaly, with the assistance of three or four free-knights who acted as witnesses. In this they likewise resembled the free-masons; and if we consider every tribunal as a lodge, and the supreme master of the chair, as the grand-master of all Westphalian lodges, this comparison is rendered still more striking. The real signification of the term red soil, and the reason why it was applied to Westphaly, has not yet been traced out. The King Wenzeslaus, had created free-knights out of Westphaly, and when the Emperor, Ruprecht, asked how they were treatedl by the regular free-knights, he received the answer, they are hanged without mercy.

The Emperor alone, and no other German

Prince, could grant a safe conduct to a person who was outlawed by the secret ban, which was a privilege which Charles the Great had reserved to himself in the Saxon capitulars. The free knights, however, maintained, it was more becoming the Emperor not to grant such letters of protection at all, as he was more interested in strengthening than in weakening the power of the secret tribunals: and in this they were right, as the free counts defended the imperial authority against the encroachments of territorial jurisdiction. The Emperor Sigismund took a certain Conrad of Langen, who was out-lawed by the

SULZER observes, in his Theory of the Fine Arts and Sciences, that an universal and irresistible inclination to novel and extraordinary scenes, a desire of feeling ourselves in a state of mental commotion, has given rise to dramatic exhibitions. Being exhausted by a too strenuous exertion of the mental faculties, enfeebled by the sameness and pressure of his professional occupations, and satiated by sensuality, man could not but feel a vacancy in his soul totally repugnant to the unremitting impulse to activity inheren. in human nature. Our nature, equally incapable of enduring for any length of time a state of mere animal existence, as of continuing the exertions of the higher faculties without intermission, panted after an intermediate state, uniting these two opposite extremes, relaxing the mind from a too intense bent of its powers, and facilitating the alternate transition from one state to the other. This advantage is invariably produced by a susceptibility of the impressions of beauty. But as a wise legislator should exert himself, above all things, to select from two effects that which is most efficacious, he will not be satisfied with having only disarmed the inclinations of his people, but, if possible, render them instrumental to the accomplishment of noble designs, and endeavour to convert them into sources of happiness. Actuated by these motives, legislators gave the preference to the stage, which opens a spacious field to a mind eager for exertion, affords nourishment to all the faculties of the soul, without overstraining any one of them, and unites the refinement of the understanding and the heart with the most innocent kind of amusement.

The person who first observed that religion is the strongest pillar of the state, and that it alone renders the laws effectual, has by this assertion, perhaps without intending or being sensible of it, defended the stage in the strongest manner. That very insufficiency and instability of positive laws, which render religion indispensably necessary for the state, determines also the whole inAuence the stage can produce. The laws confine themselves merely to negative duties, whereas religion extends its precepts to real actions. The laws counteract only those effects that dissolve the social bonds by which mankind is united, whilst religion prescribes such actions as render these bonds stronger. The laws decide only upon the visible effects of the will; deeds alone are subject to their exertion, whilst religion extends its jurisdiction to the inmost recesses of the heart, pursuing the thoughts of man to their primary sources. The laws are pliant, and as changeable as the humours and passions of man, whereas the bonds of religion are strong and eternal. Suppose that religion actually did exercise this powerful sway over every human heart, will and can it complete the entire refinement of man? Religion (which I distinguish here between its political and divine part) religion, in the aggregate, operates chiefly upon the sensual part of the people; but its efficacy would be lost, were we to purify it entirely from whatever strikes the senses. And what else is it that renders the stage efficacious? Religion ceases to operate upon the majority of the human race, if we divest it of its awful pictures and probleins, of heaven and hell, which operate alone by the influence they exercise over the imagination.

What addition of