* * * * *
Of Margaret's studies while at Cambridge, I knew personally only of
the German. She already, when I first became acquainted with her, had
become familiar with the masterpieces of French, Italian and
Spanish literature. But all this amount of reading had not made her
"deep-learned in books and shallow in herself;" for she brought to
the study of most writers "a spirit and genius equal or superior."--so
far, at least, as the analytic understanding was concerned. Every
writer whom she studied, as every person whom she knew, she placed in
his own class, knew his relation to other writers, to the world, to
life, to nature, to herself. Much as they might delight her, they
never swept her away. She breasted the current of their genius, as a
stately swan moves up a stream, enjoying the rushing water the more
because she resists it. In a passionate love-struggle she wrestled
thus with the genius of De Staël, of Rousseau, of Alfieri, of
Petrarch.
The first and most striking element in the genius of Margaret was the
clear, sharp understanding, which keenly distinguished between things
different, and kept every thought, opinion, person, character, in
its own place, not to be confounded with any other. The god Terminus
presided over her intellect. She knew her thoughts as we know each
other's faces; and opinions, with most of us so vague, shadowy, and
shifting, were in her mind substantial and distinct realities. Some
persons see distinctions, others resemblances; but she saw both. No
sophist could pass on her a counterfeit piece of intellectual money;
but also she recognized the one pure metallic basis in coins of
different epochs, and when mixed with a very ruinous alloy. This gave
a comprehensive quality to her mind most imposing and convincing,
as it enabled her to show the one Truth, or the one Law, manifesting
itself in such various phenomena. Add to this her profound faith in
truth, which made her a Realist of that order that thoughts to her
were things. The world of her thoughts rose around her mind as a
panorama,--the sun-in the sky, the flowers distinct in the foreground,
the pale mountain sharply, though faintly, cutting the sky with its
outline in the distance,--and all in pure light and shade, all in
perfect perspective.
Margaret began to study German early in 1832. Both she and I were
attracted towards this literature, at the same time, by the wild
bugle-call of Thomas Carlyle, in his romantic articles on Richter,
Schiller, and Goethe, which appeared in the old Foreign Review, the
Edinburgh Review, and afterwards in the Foreign Quarterly.
I believe that in about three months from the time that Margaret
commenced German, she was reading with ease the masterpieces of its
literature. Within the year, she had read Goethe's Faust, Tasso,
Iphigenia, Hermann and Dorothea, Elective Affinities, and Memoirs;
Tieck's William Lovel, Prince Zerbino, and other works; Körner,
Novalis, and something of Richter; all of Schiller's principal dramas,
and his lyric poetry. Almost every evening I saw her, and heard an
account of her studies. Her mind opened under this influence, as the
apple-blossom at the end of a warm week in May. The thought and the
beauty of this rich literature equally filled her mind and fascinated
her imagination.
* * * * *
But if she studied books thus earnestly, still more frequently did she
turn to the study of men. Authors and their personages were not ideal
beings merely, but full of human blood and life. So living men
and women were idealized again, and transfigured by her rapid
fancy,--every trait intensified, developed, ennobled. Lessing says
that "The true portrait painter will paint his subject, flattering him
as art ought to flatter,--painting the face not as it actually is,
but as creation designed, omitting the imperfections arising from the
resistance of the material worked in." Margaret's portrait-painting
intellect treated persons in this way. She saw them as God designed
them,--omitting the loss from wear and tear, from false position, from
friction of untoward circumstances. If we may be permitted to take
a somewhat transcendental distinction, she saw them not as they
_actually_ were, but as they _really_ were. This accounts for her
high estimate of her friends,--too high, too flattering, indeed, but
justified to her mind by her knowledge of their interior capabilities.
* * * * *
The following extract illustrates her power, even at the age of
nineteen, of comprehending the relations of two things lying far apart
from each other, and of rising to a point of view which could overlook
both:--
'I have had,--while staying a day or two in Boston,--some of
Shirley's, Ford's, and Hey wood's plays from the Athenæum.
There are some noble strains of proud rage, and intellectual,
but most poetical, all-absorbing, passion. One of the finest
fictions I recollect in those specimens of the Italian
novelists,--which you, I think, read when I did,--noble, where
it illustrated the Italian national spirit, is ruined by the
English novelist, who has transplanted it to an uncongenial
soil; yet he has given it beauties which an Italian eye could
not see, by investing the actors with deep, continuing, truly
English affections.'
* * * * *
The following criticism on some of the dialogues of Plato, (dated June
3d, 1833,) in a letter returning the book, illustrates her downright
way of asking world-revered authors to accept the test of plain common
sense. As a finished or deliberate opinion, it ought not to be read;
for it was not intended as such, but as a first impression hastily
sketched. But read it as an illustration of the method in which her
mind worked, and you will see that she meets the great Plato modestly,
but boldly, on human ground, asking him for satisfactory proof of all
that he says, and treating him as a human being, speaking to human
beings.
'_June_ 3, 1833.--I part with Plato with regret. I could have
wished to "enchant myself," as Socrates would say, with
him some days longer. Eutyphron is excellent. Tis the best
specimen I have ever seen of that mode of convincing. There is
one passage in which Socrates, as if it were _aside_,--since
the remark is quite away from the consciousness of
Eutyphron,--declares, "qu'il aimerait incomparablement mieux
des principes fixes et inébranlables à l'habilité de Dédale
avec les tresors de Tantale." I delight to hear such things
from those whose lives have given the right to say them. For
'tis not always true what Lessing says, and I, myself, once
thought,--
"F.--Von was fur Tugenden spricht er denn?
MINNA.----Er spricht von keiner; denn ihn fehlt keine."
For the mouth sometimes talketh virtue from the overflowing of
the heart, as well as love, anger, &c.
'"Crito" I have read only once, but like it. I have not got it
in my heart though, so clearly as the others. The "Apology"
I deem only remarkable for the noble tone of sentiment, and
beautiful calmness. I was much affected by Phaedo, but think
the argument weak in many respects. The nature of abstract
ideas is clearly set forth; but there is no justice in
reasoning, from their existence, that our souls have lived
previous to our present state, since it was as easy for the
Deity to create at once the idea of beauty within us, as the
sense which brings to the soul intelligence that it exists in
some outward shape. He does not clearly show his opinion of
what the soul is; whether eternal _as_ the Deity, created
_by_ the Deity, or how. In his answer to Simmias, he takes
advantage of the general meaning of the words harmony,
discord, &c. The soul might be a result, without being a
harmony. But I think too many things to write, and some I have
not had time to examine. Meanwhile I can think over parts, and
say to myself, "beautiful," "noble," and use this as one of my
enchantments.'
* * * * *
'I send two of your German books. It pains me to part with
Ottilia. I wish we could learn books, as we do pieces of
music, and repeat them, in the author's order, when taking a
solitary walk. But, now, if I set out with an Ottilia, this
wicked fairy association conjures up such crowds of less
lovely companions, that I often cease to feel the influence of
the elect one. I don't like Goethe so well as Schiller now.
I mean, I am not so happy in reading him. That perfect wisdom
and _merciless_ nature seems cold, after those seducing
pictures of forms more beautiful than truth. Nathless, I
should like to read the second part of Goethe's Memoirs, if
you do not use it now.'
* * * * *
1832.--I am thinking how I omitted to talk a volume to you
about the "Elective Affinities." Now I shall never say half of
it, for which I, on my own account, am sorry. But two or three
things I would ask:--
'What do you think of Charlotte's proposition, that the
accomplished pedagogue must be tiresome in society?
'Of Ottilia's, that the afflicted, and ill-educated, are
oftentimes singled out by fate to instruct others, and her
beautiful reasons why?
'And what have you thought of the discussion touching graves
and monuments?
'I am now going to dream of your sermon, and of Ottilia's
china-asters. Both shall be driven from my head to-morrow,
for I go to town, allured by despatches from thence, promising
much entertainment. Woe unto them if they disappoint me!
'Consider it, I pray you, as the "nearest duty" to answer my
questions, and not act as you did about the sphinx-song.'
* * * * *
'I have not anybody to speak to, that does not talk
common-place, and I wish to talk about such an uncommon
person,--about Novalis! a wondrous youth, and who has only
written one volume. That is pleasant! I feel as though I could
pursue my natural mode with him, get acquainted, then make my
mind easy in the belief that I know all that is to be known.
And he died at twenty-nine, and, as with Körner, your feelings
may be single; you will never be called upon to share his
experience, and compare his future feelings with his present.
And his life was so full and so still.
Then it is a relief, after feeling the immense superiority of
Goethe. It seems to me as if the mind of Goethe had embraced
the universe. I have felt this lately, in reading his lyric
poems. I am enchanted while I read. He comprehends every
feeling I have ever had so perfectly, expresses it so
beautifully: but when I shut the book, it seems as if I had
lost my personal identity; all my feelings linked with such
an immense variety that belong to beings I had thought so
different. What can I bring? There is no answer in my mind,
except "It is so," or "It will be so," or "No doubt such and
such feel so." Yet, while my judgment becomes daily more
tolerant towards others, the same attracting and repelling
work is going on in my feelings. But I persevere in reading
the great sage, some part of every day, hoping the time will
come, when I shall not feel so overwhelmed, and leave off this
habit of wishing to grasp the whole, and be contented to learn
a little every day, as becomes a pupil.
'But now the one-sidedness, imperfection, and glow, of a mind
like that of Novalis, seem refreshingly human to me. I have
wished fifty times to write some letters giving an account,
first, of his very pretty life, and then of his one volume,
as I re-read it, chapter by chapter. If you will pretend to
be very much interested, perhaps I will get a better pen, and
write them to you.' * *