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This text is important both as one of the most interesting contributions to the liberalism of the German Enlightenment, and as the most significant source for the ideas which John Stuart Mill popularized in his essay On Liberty. Humboldt's concern is to define the criteria by which the permissible limits of the state's activities may be determined. His basic principle, like that of Mill, is that the only justification for government interference is the prevention of harm to others. He discusses in detail the role and limits of the state's responsibility for the welfare, security and morals of its citizens. Humboldt's special achievement in this work is to enlarge our sense of what a liberal political theory might be by his particularly sensitive grasp of the complexity of our attitudes to and our need of other people. Dr Burrow has based his translation on Coulthard's version of 1854. In an important introduction, he provides a most perceptive as well as scholarly guide to Humboldt's political thought

"Italien im Bannkreis Napoleons". Die römischen Gesandtschaftsberichte Wilhelm von Humboldts an den Landgraf/Großherzog von Hessen-Darmstadt 1803 bis 1809. Bearbeitet von Eva-Marie Felschow und Ulrich Hussong. Herausgegeben von Eckhart G. Franz. Hessische Historische Kommission, Darmstadt 1989. 459 S., Abb., geb. 84,- DM, kt. 76,- DM