"On the other hand, it was contrary to my nature to talk over my poetic

plans with anybody--even with Schiller. I carried everything about with

me in silence, and usually nothing was known to any one till the whole

was completed. When I showed Schiller my _Hermann and Dorothea_

finished, he was astonished, for I had said not a syllable to him of any

such plan.

"But I am curious to hear what you will say of _Wallenstein_ tomorrow.

You will see noble forms, and the piece will make an impression on you

such as you probably do not dream of."

_Saturday, November_ 15.--In the evening I was in the theatre, where I

for the first time saw _Wallenstein_. Goethe had not said too much; the

impression was great, and stirred my inmost soul. The actors, who had

almost all belonged to the time when they were under the personal

influence of Schiller and Goethe, gave an ensemble of significant

personages, such as on a mere reading were not presented to my

imagination with all their individuality. On this account the piece had

an extraordinary effect upon me, and I could not get it out of my head

the whole night.

_Sunday, November 16_.--In the evening at Goethe's; he was still sitting

in his elbow-chair, and seemed rather weak. His first question was about

_Wallenstein_. I gave him an account of the impression the piece had

made upon me as represented on the stage, and he heard me with visible

satisfaction.

M. Soret came in, led in by Frau von Goethe, and remained about an hour.

He brought from the duke some gold medals, and by showing and talking

about these seemed to entertain Goethe very pleasantly.

Frau von Goethe and M. Soret went to court, and I was left alone with

Goethe.

Remembering his promise to show me again his Marienbad Elegy at a

fitting opportunity, Goethe arose, put a light on the table, and gave

me the poem. I was delighted to have it once more before me. He quietly

seated himself again, and left me to an undisturbed perusal of the

piece.

After I had been reading a while, I turned to say something to him, but

he seemed to be asleep. I therefore used the favorable moment, and read

the poem again and again with a rare delight. The most youthful glow of

love, tempered by the moral elevation of the mind, seemed to me its

pervading characteristic. Then I thought that the feelings were more

strongly expressed than we are accustomed to find in Goethe's other

poems, and imputed this to the influence of Byron--which Goethe did not

deny.

"You see the product of a highly impassioned mood," said he. "While I

was in it I would not for the world have been without it, and now I

would not for any consideration fall into it again.

"I wrote that poem immediately after leaving Marienbad, while the

feeling of all I had experienced there was fresh. At eight in the

morning, when we stopped at the first stage, I wrote down the first

strophe; and thus I went on composing in the carriage, and writing down

at every stage what I had just composed in my head, so that by the

evening the whole was on paper. Thence it has a certain directness, and

is, as I may say, poured out at once, which may be an advantage to it as

a whole."

"It is," said I, "quite peculiar in its kind, and recalls no other poem

of yours."

"That," said he, I "may be, because I staked upon the present moment as

a man stakes a considerable sum upon a card, and sought to enhance its

value as much as I could without exaggeration."

These words struck me as very important, inasmuch as they threw a light

on Goethe's method so as to explain that many-sidedness which has

excited so much admiration.

1824

_Friday, January 2._--Dined at Goethe's, and enjoyed some cheerful

conversation. Mention was made of a young beauty belonging to the Weimar

society, when one of the guests remarked that he was on the point of

falling in love with her, although her understanding could not exactly

be called brilliant.

"Pshaw," said Goethe, laughing, "as if love had anything to do with the

understanding. The things that we love in a young lady are something

very different from the understanding. We love in her beauty,

youthfulness, playfulness, trustingness, her character, her faults, her

caprices, and God knows what _'je ne sais quoi'_ besides; but we do not

_love_ her understanding. We respect her understanding when it is

brilliant, and by it the worth of a girl can be infinitely enhanced in

our eyes. Understanding may also serve to fix our affections when we

already love; but the understanding is not that which is capable of

firing our hearts, and awakening a passion."

We found much that was true and convincing in Goethe's words, and were

very willing to consider the subject in that light. After dinner, and

when the rest of the party had departed, I remained sitting with Goethe,

and conversed with him on various interesting topics.

We discoursed upon English literature, on the greatness of Shakespeare,

and on the unfavorable position held by all English dramatic authors who

had appeared after that poetical giant.

"A dramatic talent of any importance," said Goethe, "could not forbear

to notice Shakespeare's works, nay, could not forbear to study them.

Having studied them, he must be aware that Shakespeare has already

exhausted the whole of human nature in all its tendencies, in all its

heights and depths, and that, in fact, there remains for him, the

aftercomer, nothing more to do. And how could one get courage only to

put pen to paper, if one were conscious in an earnest, appreciating

spirit, that such unfathomable and unattainable excellences were

already in existence!

"It fared better with me fifty years ago in my own dear Germany. I could

soon come to an end with all that then existed; it could not long awe

me, or occupy my attention. I soon left behind me German literature, and

the study of it, and turned my thoughts to life and to production. So on

and on I went in my own natural development, and on and on I fashioned

the productions of epoch after epoch. And at every step of life and

development, my standard of excellence was not much higher than what at

such step I was able to attain. But had I been born an Englishman, and

had all those numerous masterpieces been brought before me in all their

power, at my first dawn of youthful consciousness, they would have

overpowered me, and I should not have known what to do. I could not have

gone on with such fresh light-heartedness, but should have had to

bethink myself, and look about for a long time, to find some new

outlet."

I turned the conversation back to Shakespeare. "When one, to some

degree, disengages him from English literature," said I, "and considers

him transformed into a German, one cannot fail to look upon his gigantic

greatness as a miracle. But if one seeks him in his home, transplants

oneself to the soil of his country, and to the atmosphere of the century

in which he lived; further, if one studies his contemporaries, and his

immediate successors, and inhales the force wafted to us from Ben

Jonson, Massinger, Marlowe, and Beaumont and Fletcher, Shakespeare

still, indeed, appears a being of the most exalted magnitude; but still,

one arrives at the conviction that many of the wonders of his genius

are, in some measure, accessible, and that much is due to the powerfully

productive atmosphere of his age and time."

"You are perfectly right," returned Goethe. "It is with Shakespeare as

with the mountains of Switzerland. Transplant Mont Blanc at once into

the large plain of Lüneburg Heath, and we should find no words to

express our wonder at its magnitude. Seek it, however, in its gigantic

home, go to it over its immense neighbors, the Jungfrau, the

Finsteraarhorn, the Eiger, the Wetterhorn, St. Gotthard, and Monte Rosa;

Mont Blanc will, indeed, still remain a giant, but it will no longer

produce in us such amazement."

"Besides, let him who will not believe," continued Goethe, "that much of

Shakespeare's greatness appertains to his great vigorous time, only ask

himself the question, whether a phenomenon so astounding would be

possible in the present England of 1824, in these evil days of

criticising and hair-splitting journals?"

"That undisturbed, innocent, somnambulatory production, by which alone

anything great can thrive, is no longer possible. Our talents at present

lie before the public. The daily criticisms which appear in fifty

different places, and the gossip that is caused by them amongst the

public, prevent the appearance of any sound production. In the present

day, he who does not keep aloof from all this, and isolate himself by

main force, is lost. Through the bad, chiefly negative, æsthetical and

critical tone of the journals, a sort of half culture finds its way into

the masses; but to productive talent it is a noxious mist, a dropping

poison, which destroys the tree of creative power, from the ornamental

green leaves, to the deepest pith and the most hidden fibres.

"And then how tame and weak has life itself become during the last two

shabby centuries. Where do we now meet an original nature? and where is

the man who has the strength to be true, and to show himself as he is?

This, however, affects the poet, who must find all within himself, while

he is left in the lurch by all without."

The conversation now turned on _Werthe_. "That," said Goethe, "is a

creation which I, like the pelican, fed with the blood of my own heart.

It contains so much from the innermost recesses of my breast--so much

feeling and thought, that it might easily be spread into a novel of ten

such volumes. Besides, as I have often said, I have only read the book

once since its appearance, and have taken good care not to read it

again. It is a mass of congreve-rockets. I am uncomfortable when I look

at it; and I dread lest I should once more experience the peculiar

mental state from which it was produced."

I reminded him of his conversation with Napoleon, of which I knew by the

sketch amongst his unpublished papers, which I had repeatedly urged him

to give more in detail. "Napoleon," said I, "pointed out to you a

passage in _Werther_, which, it appeared to him, would not stand a

strict examination; and this you allowed. I should much like to know

what passage he meant."

"Guess!" said Goethe, with a mysterious smile.

"Now," said I, "I almost think it is where Charlotte sends the pistols

to Werther, without saying a word to Albert, and without imparting to

him her misgivings and apprehensions. You have given yourself great

trouble to find a motive for this silence, but it does not appear to

hold good against the urgent necessity where the life of the friend was

at stake."

"Your remark," returned Goethe, "is really not bad; but I do not think

it right to reveal whether Napoleon meant this passage or another.

However, be that as it may, your observation is quite as correct as

his."

I asked the question, whether the great effect produced by the

appearance of _Werther_ was really to be attributed to the period. "I

cannot," said I, "reconcile to myself this view, though it is so

extensively spread. _Werther_ made an epoch because it appeared--not

because it appeared at a certain time. There is in every period so much

unexpressed sorrow--so much secret discontent and disgust for life, and,

in single individuals, there are so many disagreements with the

world--so many conflicts between their natures and civil regulations,

that _Werther_ would make an epoch even if it appeared today for the

first time."

"You are quite right," said Goethe; "it is on that account that the book

to this day influences youth of a certain age, as it did formerly. It

was scarcely necessary for me to deduce my own youthful dejection from

the general influence of my time, and from the reading of a few English

authors. Rather was it owing to individual and immediate circumstances

which touched me to the quick, and gave me a great deal of trouble, and

indeed brought me into that frame of mind which produced _Werther_. I

had lived, loved, and suffered much--that was it."

"On considering more closely the much-talked-of _Werther_ period, we

discover that it does not belong to the course of universal culture, but

to the career of life in every individual, who, with an innate free

natural instinct, must accommodate himself to the narrow limits of an

antiquated world. Obstructed fortune, restrained activity, unfulfilled

wishes, are not the calamities of any particular time, but those of

every individual man; and it would be bad, indeed, if every one had not,

once in his life, known a time when Werther seemed as if it had been

written for him alone."

_Sunday, January_ 4.--Today, after dinner, Goethe went through a

portfolio, containing some works of Raphael, with me. He often busies

himself with Raphael, in order to keep up a constant intercourse with

that which is best, and to accustom himself to muse upon the thoughts of

a great man. At the same time, it gives him pleasure to introduce me to

such things.

We afterwards spoke about the _Divan_[10]--especially about the "book of

ill-humor," in which much is poured forth that he carried in his heart

against his enemies.

"If I have, however," continued he, "been very moderate: if I had

uttered all that vexed me or gave me trouble, the few pages would soon

have swelled to a volume.

"People were never thoroughly contented with me, but always wished me

otherwise than it has pleased God to make me. They were also seldom

contented with my productions. When I had long exerted my whole soul to

favor the world with a new work, it still desired that I should thank it

into the bargain for considering the work endurable. If any one praised

me, I was not allowed, in self-congratulation, to receive it as a

well-merited tribute; but people expected from me some modest

expression, humbly setting forth the total unworthiness of my person and

my work. However, my nature opposed this; and I should have been a

miserable hypocrite, if I had so tried to lie and dissemble. Since I was

strong enough to show myself in my whole truth, just as I felt, I was

deemed proud, and am considered so to the present day.

"In religious, scientific, and political matters, I generally brought

trouble upon myself, because I was no hypocrite, and had the courage to

express what I felt.

"I believed in God and in Nature, and in the triumphs of good over evil;

but this was not enough for pious souls; I was also required to believe

other points, which were opposed to the feeling of my soul for truth;

besides, I did not see that these would be of the slightest service to

me.

"It was also prejudicial to me that I discovered Newton's theory of

light and color to be an error, and that I had the courage to contradict

the universal creed. I discovered light in its purity and truth, and I

considered it my duty to fight for it. The opposite party, however, did

their utmost to darken the light; for they maintained that _shade is a

part of light_. It sounds absurd when I express it; but so it is: for

they said that _colors_, which are shadow and the result of shade, _are

light itself_, or, which amounts to the same thing, _are the beams of

light, broken now in one way, now in another_."

Goethe was silent, whilst an ironical smile spread over his expressive

countenance. He continued--

"And now for political matters. What trouble I have taken, and what I

have suffered, on that account, I cannot tell you. Do you know my

'Aufgeregten?'"[11]

"Yesterday, for the first time," returned I, "I read the piece, in

consequence of the new edition of your works; and I regret from my heart

that it remains unfinished. But, even as it is, every right-thinking

person must coincide with your sentiments."

"I wrote it at the time of the French Revolution," continued Goethe,

"and it may be regarded, in some measure, as my political confession of

faith at that time. I have taken the countess as a type of the nobility;

and, with the words which I put into her mouth, I have expressed how the

nobility really ought to think. The countess has just returned from

Paris; she has there been an eye-witness of the revolutionary events,

and has drawn, therefore, for herself, no bad doctrine. She has

convinced herself that the people may be ruled, but not oppressed, and

that the revolutionary outbreaks of the lower classes are the

consequence of the injustice of the higher classes. 'I will for the

future,' says she, 'strenuously avoid every action that appears to me

unjust, and will, both in society and at court, loudly express my

opinion concerning such actions in others. In no case of injustice will

I be silent, even though I should be cried down as a democrat.'

"I should have thought this sentiment perfectly respectable," continued

Goethe; "it was mine at that time, and it is so still; but as a reward

for it, I was endowed with all sorts of titles, which I do not care to

repeat."

"One need only read _Egmont_," answered I, "to discover what you think.

I know no German piece in which the freedom of the people is more

advocated than in this."

"Sometimes," said Goethe, "people do not like to look on me as I am,

but turn their glances from everything which could show me in my true

light. Schiller, on the contrary--who, between ourselves, was much more

of an aristocrat than I am, but who considered what he said more than

I--had the wonderful fortune to be looked upon as a particular friend of

the people. I give it up to him with all my heart, and console myself

with the thought that others before me had fared no better.

"It is true that I could be no friend to the French Revolution; for its

horrors were too near me, and shocked me daily and hourly, whilst its

beneficial results were not then to be discovered. Neither could I be

indifferent to the fact that the Germans were endeavoring, artificially,

to bring about such scenes here, as were, in France, the consequence of

a great necessity.

"But I was as little a friend to arbitrary rule. Indeed, I was perfectly

convinced that a great revolution is never a fault of the people, but of

the government. Revolutions are utterly impossible as long as

governments are constantly just and constantly vigilant, so that they

may anticipate them by improvements at the right time, and not hold out

until they are forced to yield by the pressure from beneath.

"Because I hated the Revolution, the name of the '_Friend of the powers

that be_' was bestowed upon me. That is, however, a very ambiguous

title, which I would beg to decline. If the 'powers that be' were all

that is excellent, good, and just, I should have no objection to the

title; but, since with much that is good there is also much that is bad,

unjust, and imperfect, a friend of the 'powers that be' means often

little less than the friend of the obsolete and bad.[12]

"But time is constantly progressing, and human affairs wear every fifty

years a different aspect; so that an arrangement which, in the year

1800, was perfection, may, perhaps, in the year 1850, be a defect.

"And, furthermore, nothing is good for a nation but that which arises

from its own core and its own general wants, without apish imitation of

another; since what to one race of people, of a certain age, is a

wholesome nutriment, may perhaps prove a poison for another. All

endeavors to introduce any foreign innovation, the necessity for which

is not rooted in the core of the nation itself, are therefore foolish;

and all premeditated revolutions of the kind are I unsuccessful, _for

they are without God, who keeps aloof from such bungling_. If, however,

there exists an actual necessity for a great reform amongst a people,

God is with it, and it prospers. He was visibly with Christ and his

first adherents; for the appearance of the new doctrine of love was a

necessity to the people. He was also visibly with Luther; for the

purification of the doctrine corrupted by the priests was no less a

necessity. Neither of the great powers whom I have named was, however, a

friend of the permanent; much more were both of them convinced that the

old leaven must be got rid of, and that it would be impossible to go on

and remain in the untrue, unjust, and defective way."

_Tuesday, January 27._--Goethe talked with me about the continuation of

his memoirs, with which he is now busy. He observed that this later

period of his life would not be narrated with such minuteness as the

youthful epoch of _Dichtung and Wahrheit_.[13] "I must," said he, "treat

this later period more in the fashion of annals: my outward actions must

appear rather than my inward life. Altogether, the most important part

of an individual's life is that of development, and mine is concluded in

the detailed volumes of _Dichtung and Wahrheit_. Afterwards begins the

conflict with the world, and that is interesting only in its results.

"And then the life of a learned German--what is it? What may have been

really good in my case cannot be communicated, and what can be

communicated is not worth the trouble. Besides, where are the hearers

whom one could entertain with any satisfaction?

"When I look back to the earlier and middle periods of my life, and now

in my old age think how few are left of those who were young with me, I

always think of a summer residence at a bathing-place. When you arrive,

you make acquaintance and friends of those who have already been there

some time, and who leave in a few weeks. The loss is painful. Then you

turn to the second generation, with which you live a good while, and

become most intimate. But this goes also, and leaves us alone with the

third, which comes just as we are going away, and with which we have,

properly, nothing to do.

"I have ever been esteemed one of Fortune's chiefest favorites; nor will

I complain or find fault with the course my life has taken. Yet, truly,

there has been nothing but toil and care; and I may say that, in all my

seventy-five years, I have never had a month of genuine comfort. It has

been the perpetual rolling of a stone, which I have always had to raise

anew. My annals will render clear what I now say. The claims upon my

activity, both from within and without, were too numerous.

"My real happiness was my poetic meditation and production. But how was

this disturbed, limited, and hindered by my external position! Had I

been able to abstain more from public business, and to live more in

solitude, I should have been happier, and should have accomplished much

more as a poet. But, soon after my _Goetz and Werther_, that saying of a

sage was verified for me--'If you do anything for the sake of the world,

it will take good care that you shall not do it a second time.'

"A wide-spread celebrity, an elevated position in life, are good

things. But, for all my rank and celebrity, I am still obliged to be

silent as to the opinion of others, that I may not give offense. This

would be but poor sport, if by this means I had not the advantage of

learning the thoughts of others without their being able to learn mine."

* * * * *

Wednesday, February 25.--Today, Goethe showed me two very remarkable

poems, both highly moral in their tendency, but in their several motives

so unreservedly natural and true, that they are of the kind which the

world styles immoral. On this account he keeps them to himself, and does

not intend to publish them.

"Could intellect and high cultivation," said he, "become the property of

all, the poet would have fair play; he could be always thoroughly true,

and would not be compelled to fear uttering his best thoughts. But, as

it is, he must always keep on a certain level; must remember that his

works will fall into the hands of a mixed society; and must, therefore,

take care lest by over-great openness he may give offense to the

majority of good men. Then Time is a strange thing. It is a whimsical

tyrant, which in every century has a different face for all that one

says and does. We cannot, with propriety, say things which were

permitted to the ancient Greeks; and the Englishmen of 1820 cannot

endure what suited the vigorous contemporaries of Shakespeare; so that,

at the present day, it is found necessary to have a Family Shakespeare."

"Then," said I, "there is much in the form also. The one of these two

poems, which is composed in the style and metre of the ancients, would

be far less offensive than the other. Isolated parts would displease,

but the treatment throws so much grandeur and dignity over the whole,

that we seem to hear a strong ancient, and to be carried back to the age

of the Greek heroes. But the other, being in the style and metre of

Messer Ariosto, is far more hazardous. It relates an event of our day,

in the language of our day, and as it thus comes quite unveiled into

our presence, the particular features of boldness seem far more

audacious."

"You are right," said he; "mysterious and great effects are produced by

different poetical forms. If the import of my Romish elegies were put

into the measure and style of Byron's _Don Juan_, the whole would be

found infamous."

The French newspapers were brought. The campaign of the French in Spain

under the Duke d'Angoulême, which was just ended, had great interest for

Goethe. "I must praise the Bourbons for this measure," said he; "they

had not really gained the throne till they had gained the army, and that

is now accomplished. The soldier returns with loyalty, to his king; for

he has, from his own victories, and the discomfitures of the many-headed

Spanish host, learned the difference between obeying one and many. The

army has sustained its ancient fame, and shown that it is brave in

itself, and can conquer without Napoleon."

Goethe then turned his thoughts backward into history, and talked much

of the Prussian army in the Seven Years' War, which, accustomed by

Frederic the Great to constant victory, grew careless, so that, in after

days, it lost many battles from over-confidence. All the minutest

details were present to his mind, and I had reason to admire his

excellent memory.

"I had the great advantage," said he, "of being born at a time when the

greatest events which agitated the world occurred, and such have

continued to occur during my long life; so that I am a living witness of

the Seven Years' War, of the separation of America from England, of the

French Revolution, and of the whole Napoleon era, with the downfall of

that hero, and the events which followed. Thus I have attained results

and insight impossible to those who are born now and must learn all

these things from books which they will not understand.

"What the next years will bring I cannot predict; but I fear we shall

not soon have repose. It is not given to the world to be contented; the

great are not such that there will be no abuse of power; the masses not

such that, in hope of gradual improvement, they will be contented with a

moderate condition. Could we perfect human nature, we might also expect

a perfect state of things; but, as it is, there will always be a

wavering hither and thither; one part must suffer while the other is at

ease, envy and egotism will be always at work like bad demons, and party

strife will be without end.

"The most reasonable way is for every one to follow his own vocation to

which he has been born, and which he has learned, and to avoid hindering

others from following theirs. Let the shoemaker abide by his last, the

peasant by his plough, and let the king know how to govern; for, this is

also a business which must be learned, and with which no one should

meddle who does not understand it."

Returning to the French papers, Goethe said: "The liberals may speak,

for when they are reasonable we like to hear them; but with the

royalists, who have the executive power in their hands, talking comes

amiss--they should act. They may march troops, and behead and hang--that

is all right; but attacking opinions, and justifying their measures in

public prints, does not become them. If there were a public of kings,

they might talk.

"For myself," he continued, "I have always been a royalist. I have let

others babble, and have done as I saw fit. I understood my course, and

knew my own object. If I committed a fault as a single individual, I

could make it good again; but if I committed it jointly with three or

four others, it would be impossible to make it good, for among many

there are many opinions."

Goethe was in excellent spirits today. He showed me Frau von Spiegel's

album, in which he had written some very beautiful verses. A place had

been left open for him for two years, and he rejoiced at having been

able to perform at last an old promise. After I had read the "Poem to

Frau von Spiegel," I turned over the leaves of the book, in which I

found many distinguished names. On the very next page was a poem by

Tiedge, written in the very spirit and style of his _Urania_. "In a

saucy mood," said Goethe, "I was on the point of writing some verses

beneath those; but I am glad I did not. It would not have been the first

time that, by rash expressions, I had repelled good people, and spoiled

the effect of my best works.

"However," continued Goethe, "I have had to endure not a little from

Tiedge's _Urania_; for, at one time, nothing was sung and nothing was

declaimed but this same Urania. Wherever you went, you found _Urania_ on

the table. _Urania_ and immortality were the topics of every

conversation. I would by no means dispense with the happiness of

believing in a future existence, and, indeed, would say, with Lorenzo

de' Medici, that those are dead even for this life who hope for no

other. But such incomprehensible matters lie too far off to be a theme

of daily meditation and thought-distracting speculation. Let him who

believes in immortality enjoy his happiness in silence, he has no reason

to give himself airs about it. The occasion of Tiedge's _Urania_ led me

to observe that piety, like nobility, has its aristocracy. I met stupid

women, who plumed themselves on believing, with Tiedge, in immortality,

and I was forced to bear much dark examination on this point. They were

vexed by my saying I should be well pleased if, after the close of this

life, we were blessed with another, only I hoped I should hereafter meet

none of those who had believed in it here. For how should I be

tormented! The pious would throng around me, and say, 'Were we not

right? Did we not predict it? Has not it happened just as we said?' And

so there would be ennui without end, even in the other world.

"This occupation with the ideas of immortality," he continued, "is for

people of rank, and especially ladies, who have nothing to do. But an

able man, who has some thing regular to do here, and must toil and

struggle and produce day by day, leaves the future world to itself, and

is active and useful in this. Thoughts about immortality are also good

for those who have not been very successful here; and I would wager

that, if the good Tiedge had enjoyed a better lot, he would also have

had better thoughts."

* * * * *

_Tuesday, November 9_.--I passed this evening with Goethe. We talked of

Klopstock and Herder; and I liked to listen to him, as he explained to

me the merits of those men.

"Without those powerful precursors," said Goethe, "our literature could

not have become what it now is. When they appeared, they were before

their age, and were obliged, as it were, to drag it after them; but now

the age has far outrun them, and they who were once so necessary and

important have now ceased to be _means to an end_. A young man who would

take Klopstock and Herder for his teachers nowadays would be far

behindhand."

We talked over Klopstock's _Messiah_ and his Odes, touching on their

merits and their defects. We agreed that he had no faculty for observing

and apprehending the visible world, or for drawing characters; and that

he therefore wanted the qualities most essential to the epic and

dramatic poet, or, perhaps it might be said, to the poet generally.

"An ode occurs to me," said Goethe, "where he makes the German Muse run

a race with the British; and, indeed, when one thinks what a picture it

is, where the two girls run one against the other, throwing about their

legs and kicking up the dust, one must assume that the good Klopstock

did not really have before his eyes such pictures as he wrote, else he

could not possibly have made such mistakes."

I asked how he had felt towards Klopstock in his youth. "I venerated

him," said Goethe, "with the devotion which was peculiar to me; I looked

upon him as my uncle. I revered whatever he had done, and never thought

of reflecting upon it, or finding fault with it. I let his fine

qualities work upon me; for the rest, I went my own way."

We came back to Herder, and I asked Goethe which of his works he

thought the best. "_His Idea for the History of Mankind" (Ideen zur

Geschichte der Menschheit)_, replied Goethe, "are undoubtedly the best.

In after days, he took the negative side, and was not so agreeable."

"Considering the great weight of Herder," said I, "I cannot understand

how he had so little judgment on some subjects. For instance, I cannot

forgive him, especially at that period of German literature, for sending

back the manuscript of _Goetz von Berlichingen_ without any praise of

its merits, and with taunting remarks. He must have utterly wanted

organs to perceive some objects."

"Yes, Herder was unfortunate in this respect," replied Goethe; "nay,"

added he, with vivacity, "if his spirit were present at this

conversation, it would not understand us."

"On the other hand," said I, "I must praise Merck, who urged you to

print _Goetz_."

"He was indeed an odd but important man," said Goethe. "'Print the

thing,' quoth he, 'it is worth nothing, but print it.' He did not wish

me to make any alteration in it, and he was right; for it would have

been different, but not better."

_Wednesday, November 24_.--I went to see Goethe this evening, before

going to the theatre, and found him very well and cheerful. He inquired

about the young Englishmen who are here. I told him that I proposed

reading with Mr. Doolan a German translation of Plutarch. This led the

conversation to Roman and Grecian history; and Goethe expressed himself

as follows:

"The Roman history," said he, "is no longer suited to us. We have become

too humane for the triumphs of Cæsar not to be repugnant to our

feelings. Neither are we much charmed by the history of Greece. When

this people turns against a foreign foe, it is, indeed, great and

glorious; but the division of the states, and their eternal wars with

one another, where Greek fights against Greek, are insufferable.

Besides, the history of our own time is thoroughly great and important;

the battles of Leipsic and Waterloo stand out with such prominence that

that of Marathon and others like it are gradually eclipsed. Neither are

our individual heroes inferior to theirs; the French Marshals, Blücher,

and Wellington, vie with any of the heroes of antiquity."

We then talked of the late French literature, and the daily increasing

interest in German works manifested by the French.

"The French," said Goethe, "do well to study and translate our writers;

for, limited as they are both in form and motives, they can only look

without for means. We Germans may be reproached for a certain

formlessness; but in matter we are their superiors. The theatrical

productions of Kotzebue and Iffland are so rich in motives that they may

pluck them a long time before all is used up. But, especially, our

philosophical Ideality is welcome to them; for every Ideal is

serviceable to revolutionary aims.

"The French have understanding and _esprit_, but neither a solid basis

nor piety. What serves the moment, what helps his party, seems right to

the Frenchman. Hence they praise us, never from an acknowledgment of our

merits, but only when they can strengthen their party by our views."

We then talked about our own literature, and of the obstacles in the way

of some of our latest young poets.

"The majority of our young poets," said Goethe, "have no fault but this,

that their subjectivity is not important, and that they cannot find

matter in the objective. At best, they only find a material, which is

similar to themselves, which corresponds to their own subjectivity; but

as for taking the material on its own account, when it is repugnant to

the subjectivity, merely because it is poetical, such a thing is never

thought of.

"Still, as I have said, if we only had important personages, formed by

great studies and situations in life, it might still go well with us,

at least as far as our young lyric poets are concerned."

1825

_Monday, January 10._--Goethe, consistently with his great interest for

the English, has desired me to introduce to him the young Englishmen who

are here at present.

After we had waited a few minutes, Goethe came in, and greeted us

cordially. He said to Mr. H., "I presume I may address you in German, as

I hear you are already well versed in our language." Mr. H. answered

with a few polite words, and Goethe requested us to be seated.

Mr. H.'s manners and appearance must have made a good impression on

Goethe; for his sweetness and mild serenity were manifested towards the

stranger in their real beauty. "You did well," said he "to come hither

to learn German; for here you will quickly and easily acquire, not only

a knowledge of the language, but also of the elements on which it rests,

our soil, climate, mode of life, manners, social habits, and

constitution, and carry it away with you to England."

Mr. H. replied, "The interest taken in the German language is now great,

so that there is now scarcely a young Englishman of good family who does

not learn German."

"We Germans," said Goethe, good-humoredly, "have, however, been half a

century before your nation in this respect. For fifty years I have been

busy with the English language and literature; so that I am well

acquainted with your writers, your ways of living, and the

administration of your country. If I went over to England, I should be

no stranger there.

"But, as I said before, your young men do well to come to us and learn

our language; for, not only does our literature merit attention on its

own account, but no one can deny that he who now knows German well can

dispense with many other languages. Of the French, I do not speak; it is

the language of conversation, and is indispensable in traveling,

because everybody understands it, and in all countries we can get on

with it instead of a good interpreter. But as for Greek, Latin, Italian,

and Spanish, we can read the best works of those nations in such

excellent German translations, that, unless we have some particular

object in view, we need not spend much time upon the toilsome study of

those languages. It is in the German nature duly to honor, after its

kind, everything produced by other nations, and to accommodate itself to

foreign peculiarities. This, with the great flexibility of our language,

makes German translations thoroughly faithful and complete. And it is

not to be denied that, in general, you get on very far with a good

translation. Frederick the Great did not know Latin, but he read Cicero

in the French translation with as much profit as we who read him in the

original."

Then, turning the conversation on the theatre, he asked Mr. H. whether

he went frequently thither. "Every evening," he replied, "and find that

I thus gain much towards the understanding of the language."

"It is remarkable," said Goethe, "that the ear, and generally the

understanding, gets the start of speaking; so that a man may very soon

comprehend all he hears, but by no means express it all."

"I experience daily," said Mr. H., "the truth of that remark. I

understand very well whatever I hear or read; I even feel when an

incorrect expression is made use of in German. But when I speak, nothing

will flow, and I cannot express myself as I wish. In light conversation

at court, jests with the ladies, a chat at balls, and the like, I

succeed pretty well. But, if I try to express an opinion on any

important topic, to say anything peculiar or luminous, I cannot get on."

"Be not discouraged by that," said Goethe, "since it is hard enough to

express such uncommon matters in one's own mother tongue."

He then asked what Mr. H. read in German literature. "I have read

_Egmont_," he replied, "and found so much pleasure in the perusal that

I returned to it three times. _Torquato Tasso_, too, has afforded me

much enjoyment. Now I am reading _Faust_, but find that it is somewhat

difficult."

Goethe laughed at these last words. "Really," said he, "I would

not have advised you to undertake _Faust_. It is mad stuff, and

goes quite beyond all ordinary feeling. But since you have done it of

your own accord, without asking my advice, you will see how you will get

through. Faust is so strange an individual that only few can sympathize

with his internal condition. Then the character of Mephistopheles is, on

account of his irony, and also because he is a living result of an

extensive acquaintance with the world, also very difficult. But you will

see what lights open upon you. _Tasso_, on the other hand, lies far

nearer the common feelings of mankind, and the elaboration of its form

is favorable to an easy comprehension of it."

"Yet," said Mr. H., "_Tasso_ is thought difficult in Germany, and people

have wondered to hear me say that I was reading it."

"What is chiefly needed for _Tasso_," replied Goethe, "is that one

should be no longer a child, and should have been in good society. A

young man of good family, with sufficient mind and delicacy, and also

with enough outward culture, such as will be produced by intercourse

with accomplished men of the higher class, will not find' Tasso

difficult."

The conversation turning upon _Egmont_, he said, "I wrote _Egmont_ in

1775--fifty years ago. I adhered closely to history, and strove to be as

accurate as possible. Ten years afterwards, when I was in Rome, I read

in the newspapers that the revolutionary scenes in the Nether lands

there described were exactly repeated. I saw from this that the world

remains ever the same, and that my picture must have some life in it."

Amid this and similar conversation, the hour for the theatre had come.

We arose, and Goethe dismissed us in a friendly manner.

As we went homeward, I asked Mr. H. how he was pleased with Goethe. "I

have never," said he, "seen a man who, with all his attractive

gentleness, had so much native dignity. However he may condescend, he is

always the great man."

Professor Riemer was announced, Rehbein took leave, and Riemer sat down

with us. The conversation still turned on the _motives_ of the Servian

love-poems. Riemer was acquainted with the topic, and made the remark

that, according to the table of contents given above, not only could

poems be made, but that the same motives had been already used by the

Germans, without any knowledge that they had been treated in Servia. He

mentioned some poems of his own, and I mentioned some poems by Goethe,

which had occurred to me during the reading.

"The world," said Goethe, "remains always the same; situations are

repeated; one people lives, loves, and feels like another; why should

not one poet write like another? The situations of life are alike; why,

then, should those of poems be unlike?"

"This very similarity in life and sensation," said Riemer, "makes us all

able to appreciate the poetry of other nations. If this were not the

case, we should never know what foreign poems were about."

"I am, therefore," said I, "always surprised at the learned, who seem to

suppose that poetizing proceeds not from life to the poem, but from the

book to the poem. They are always saying, 'He got this here; he got that

there.' If, for instance, they find passages in Shakespeare which are

also to be found in the ancients, they say he must have taken them from

the ancients. Thus there is a situation in Shakespeare, where, on the

sight of a beautiful girl, the parents are congratulated who call her

daughter, and the youth who will lead her home as his bride. And

because the same thing occurs in Homer, Shakespeare, forsooth, has

taken it from Homer. How odd! As if one had to go so far for such

things, and did not have them before one's eyes, feel them and utter

them every day." "Ah, yes," said Goethe, "it is very ridiculous."

"Lord Byron, too," said I, "is no wiser, when he takes _Faust_ to

pieces, and thinks you found one thing here, the other there."

"The greater part of those fine things cited by Lord Byron," said

Goethe, "I have never even read, much less did I think of them, when

I was writing _Faust_. But Lord Byron is great only as a poet; as

soon as he reflects, he is a child. He knows not how to help himself

against the stupid attacks of the same kind made upon him by his own

countrymen. He ought to have expressed himself more strongly against

them. 'What is there is mine,' he should have said, 'and whether I got

it from a book or from life, is of no consequence; the only point is,

whether I have made a right use of it.' Walter Scott used a scene from

my _Egmont_, and he had a right to do so; and because he did it

well, he deserves praise. He has also copied the character of my Mignon

in one of his romances; but whether with equal judgment, is another

question. Lord Byron's transformed Devil[14] is a continuation of

Mephistopheles, and quite right too. If, from the whim of originality,

he had departed from the model, he would certainly have fared worse.

Thus, my Mephistopheles sings a song from Shakespeare, and why should

he not? Why should I give myself the trouble of inventing one of my

own, when this said just what was wanted. If, too, the prologue to my

_Faust_ is something like the beginning of Job, that is again

quite right, and I am rather to be praised than censured."

Goethe was in the best humor. He sent for a bottle of wine, and filled

for Riemer and me; he himself drank Marienbad water. He seemed to have

appointed this evening for looking over, with Riemer, the manuscript of

the continuation of his autobiography, perhaps in order to improve it

here and there, in point of expression. "Let Eckermann stay and hear it

too," said Goethe; which words I was very glad to hear, and he then laid

the manuscript before Riemer, who began to read, commencing with the

year 1795.

I had already, in the course of the summer, had the pleasure of

repeatedly reading and reflecting on the still unpublished record of

those years, down to the latest time. But now to hear them read aloud in

Goethe's presence, afforded quite a new enjoyment. Riemer paid especial

attention to the mode of expression; and I had occasion to admire his

great dexterity, and his affluence of words and phrases. But in Goethe's

mind the epoch of life described was revived; he revelled in

recollections, and on the mention of single persons and events, filled

out the written narrative by the details he orally gave us. That was a

precious evening! The most distinguished of his contemporaries were

talked over; but the conversation always came back to Schiller, who was

so interwoven with this period, from 1795 to 1800. The theatre had been

the object of their united efforts, and Goethe's best works belong to

this time. _Wilhelm Meister_ was completed; _Hermann and Dorothea_

planned and written; _Cellini_ translated for the "Horen;" the "Xenien"

written by both for Schiller's _Musenalmanach_; every day brought with

it points of contact. Of all this we talked this evening, and Goethe had

full opportunity for the most interesting communications.

"_Hermann and Dorothea_," said he, "is almost the only one of my larger

poems which still satisfies me; I can never read it without strong

interest. I love it best in the Latin translation; there it seems to me

nobler, and as if it had returned to its original form."

_Wilhelm Meister_ was often a subject of discourse. "Schiller blamed me

for interweaving tragic elements which do not belong to the novel. Yet

he was wrong, as we all know. In his letters to me, there are most

important views and opinions with respect to _Wilhelm Meister_. But this

work is one of the most incalculable productions; I myself can scarcely

be said to have the key to it. People seek a central point, and that is

hard, and not even right. I should think a rich, manifold life, brought

close to our eyes, would be enough in itself, without any express

tendency, which, after all, is only for the intellect. But if anything

of the sort is insisted upon, it will perhaps be found in the words

which Frederic, at the end, addresses to the hero, when he says--'Thou

seem'st to me like Saul, the son of Kish, who went out to seek his

father's asses, and found a kingdom.' Keep only to this; for, in fact,

the whole work seems to say nothing more than that man, despite all his

follies and errors, being led by a higher hand, reaches some happy goal

at last."

We then talked of the high degree of culture which, during the last

fifty years, had become general among the middle classes of Germany, and

Goethe ascribed the merit of this not so much to Lessing as to Herder

and Wieland. "Lessing," said he, "was of the very highest understanding,

and only one equally great could truly learn of him. To a half faculty

he was dangerous." He mentioned a journalist who had formed himself on

Lessing, and at the end of the last century had played a part indeed,

but far from a noble one, because he was so inferior to his great

predecessor.

"All Upper Germany," said he, "is indebted to Wieland for its style. It

has learned much from him; and the capability of expressing itself

correctly is not the least."

On mentioning the _Xenien_,[15] he especially praised those of

Schiller, which he called sharp and biting, while he called his own

innocent and trivial.

"The _Thierkreis_ (Zodiac), which is by Schiller," said he, "I always

read with admiration. The good effects which the _Xenien_ had upon the

German literature of their time are beyond calculation." Many persons

against whom the _Xenien_ were directed, were mentioned on this

occasion, but their names have escaped my memory.

After we had read and talked over the manuscript to the end of the year

1800, interrupted by these and innumerable other observations from

Goethe, he put aside the papers, and had a little supper placed at one

end of the table at which we were sitting. We partook of it, but Goethe

did not touch a morsel; indeed, I have never seen him eat in the

evening. He sat down with us, filled our glasses, snuffed the candles,

and intellectually regaled us with the most agreeable conversation. His

remembrance of Schiller was so lively, that the conversation during the

latter part of the evening was devoted to him alone.

Riemer spoke of Schiller's personal appearance. "The build of his limbs,

his gait in the street, all his motions," said he, "were proud; his eyes

only were soft."

"Yes," said Goethe, "everything else about him was proud and majestic,

only the eyes were soft. And his talent was like his outward form. He

seized boldly on a great subject, and turned it this way and that, and

handled it this way and that. But he saw his object, as it were, only in

the outside; a quiet development from its interior was not within his

province. His talent was desultory. Thus he was never decided--could

never have done. He often changed a part just before a rehearsal.

"And, as he went so boldly to work, he did not take sufficient pains

about _motives_. I recollect what trouble I had with him, when he wanted

to make Gessler, in Tell, abruptly break an apple from the tree, and

have it shot from the boy's head. This was quite against my nature, and

I urged him to give at least some motive to this barbarity, by making

the boy boast to Gessler of his father's dexterity, and say that he

could shoot an apple from a tree at a hundred paces. Schiller, at first,

would have nothing of the sort: but at last he yielded to my arguments

and intentions, and did as I advised him. I, on the other hand, by too

great attention to _motives_, kept my pieces from the theatre. My

_Eugenie_[16] is nothing but a chain of _motives_, and this cannot

succeed on the stage.

"Schiller's genius was really made for the theatre. With every piece he

progressed, and became more finished; but, strange to say, a certain

love for the horrible adhered to him from the time of _The Robbers_,

which never quite left him even in his prime. I still recollect

perfectly well, that in the prison scene in my 'Egmont,' where the

sentence is read to him, Schiller would have made Alva appear in the

background, masked and muffled in a cloak, enjoying the effect which the

sentence would produce on Egmont. Thus Alva was to show himself

insatiable in revenge and malice. I, however, protested, and prevented

the apparition. He was a great, odd man.

"Every week he became different and more finished; each time that I saw

him, he seemed to me to have advanced in learning and judgment. His

letters are the fairest memorials of him which I possess, and they are

also among the most excellent of his writings. His last letter I

preserve as a sacred relic, among my treasures." He rose and fetched it.

"See and read it," said he; giving it to me.

It was a very fine letter, written in a bold hand. It contained an

opinion of Goethe's notes to "Rameau's Nephew," which exhibit French

literature at that time, and which he had given Schiller to look over. I

read the letter aloud to Riemer.

"You see," said Goethe, "how apt and consistent is his judgment, and

that the handwriting nowhere betrays any trace of weakness. He was a

splendid man, and went from us in all the fulness of his strength. This

letter is dated the 24th of April, 1805. Schiller died on the 9th of

May."

We looked at the letter by turns, and were pleased both with the clear

style and the fine handwriting. Goethe bestowed several other words of

affectionate reminiscence upon his friend, until it was nearly eleven

o'clock, and we departed.

* * * * *

_Wednesday, October_ 15.--I found Goethe in a very elevated mood this

evening, and had the pleasure of hearing from him many significant

remarks. We talked about the state of the newest literature, when Goethe

expressed himself as follows:

"Deficiency of character in individual investigators and writers is," he

said, "the source of all the evils of our newest literature.

"In criticism, especially, this defect produces mischief to the world,

for it either diffuses the false instead of the true, or by a pitiful

truth deprives us of something great, that would be better.

"Till lately, the world believed in the heroism of a Lucretia--of a

Mucius Scævola--and suffered itself, by this belief, to be warmed and

inspired. But now comes your historical criticism, and says that those

persons never lived, but are to be regarded as fables and fictions,

divined by the great mind of the Romans. What are we to do with so

pitiful a truth? If the Romans were great enough to invent such stories,

we should at least be great enough to believe them.

"Till lately, I was always pleased with a great fact in the thirteenth

century, when the Emperor Frederic the Second was at variance with the

Pope, and the north of Germany was open to all sorts of hostile attacks.

Asiatic hordes had actually penetrated as far as Silesia, when the Duke

of Liegnitz terrified them by one great defeat. They then turned to

Moravia, but were here defeated by Count Sternberg. These valiant men

had on this account been living in my heart as the great saviors of the

German nation. But now comes historical criticism, and says that these

heroes sacrificed themselves quite uselessly, as the Asiatic army was

already recalled, and would have returned of its own accord. Thus is a

great national fact crippled and destroyed, which seems to me most

abominable."

After these remarks on historical critics, Goethe spoke of another class

of seekers and literary men.

"I could never," said he, "have known so well how paltry men are, and

how little they care for really high aims, if I had not tested them by

my scientific researches. Thus I saw that most men care for science only

so far as they get a living by it, and that they worship even error when

it affords them a subsistence.

"In _belles lettres_ it is no better. There, too, high aims and genuine

love for the true and sound, and for their diffusion, are very rare

phenomena. One man cherishes and tolerates another, because he is by him

cherished and tolerated in return. True greatness is hateful to them;

they would fain drive it from the world, so that only such as they might

be of importance in it. Such are the masses; and the prominent

individuals are not better.

"---- 's great talents and world-embracing learning might have done much

for his country. But his want of character has deprived the world of

such great results, and himself of the esteem of the country.

"We want a man like Lessing. For how was he great, except in

character--in firmness? There are many men as clever and as cultivated,

but where is such character?

"Many are full of _esprit_ and knowledge, but they are also full of

vanity; and that they may shine as wits before the short-sighted

multitude, they have no shame or delicacy--nothing is sacred to them.

"Madame de Genlis was therefore perfectly right when she declaimed

against the freedoms and profanities of Voltaire. Clever as they all may

be, the world has derived no profit from them; they afford a foundation

for nothing. Nay, they have been of the greatest injury, since they have

confused men and robbed them of their needful support.

"After all, what do we know, and how far can we go with all our wit?

"Man is born not to solve the problems of the universe, but to find out

where the problem begins, and then to restrain himself within the limits

of the comprehensible.

"His faculties are not sufficient to measure the actions of the

universe; and an attempt to explain the outer world by reason is, with

his narrow point of view, but a vain endeavor. The reason of man and the

reason of the Deity are two very different things.

"If we grant freedom to man, there is an end to the omniscience of God;

for if the Divinity knows how I shall act, I must act so perforce. I

give this merely as a sign how little we know, and to show that it is

not good to meddle with divine mysteries.

"Moreover, we should only utter higher maxims so far as they can benefit

the world. The rest we should keep within ourselves, and they will

diffuse over our actions a lustre like the mild radiance of a hidden

sun."

_Sunday, December_ 25.--"I have of late made an observation, which I

will impart to you.

"Everything we do has a result. But that which is right and prudent does

not always lead to good, nor the contrary to what is bad; frequently the

reverse takes place. Some time since, I made a mistake in one of these

transactions with booksellers, and was sorry that I had done so. But now

circumstances have so altered, that, if I had not made that very

mistake, I should have made a greater one. Such instances occur

frequently in life, and hence we see men of the world, who know this,

going to work with great freedom and boldness."

I was struck by this remark, which was new to me.

I then turned the conversation to some of his works, and we came to the

elegy _Alexis and Dora_.

"In this poem," said Goethe, "people have blamed the strong, passionate

conclusion, and would have liked the elegy to end gently and peacefully,

without that outbreak of jealousy; but I could not see that they were

right. Jealousy is so manifestly an ingredient of the affair, that the

poem would be incomplete if it were not introduced at all. I myself knew

a young man who, in the midst of his impassioned love for an easily-won

maiden, cried out, 'But would she not act to another as she has acted to

me?'"

I agreed entirely with Goethe, and then mentioned the peculiar

situations in this elegy, where, with so few strokes and in so narrow a

space, all is so well delineated that we think we see the whole life and

domestic environment of the persons engaged in the action. "What you

have described," said I, "appears as true as if you had worked from

actual experience."

"I am glad it seems so to you," said Goethe. "There are, however, few

men who have imagination for the truth of reality; most prefer strange

countries and circumstances, of which they know nothing, and by which

their imagination may be cultivated, oddly enough.

"Then there are others who cling altogether to reality, and, as they

wholly want the poetic spirit, are too severe in their requisitions. For

instance, in this elegy, some would have had me give Alexis a servant to

carry his bundle, never thinking that all that was poetic and idyllic in

the situation would thus have been destroyed."

From _Alexis and Dora_, the conversation then turned to _Wilhelm

Meister_. "There are odd critics in this world," said Goethe; "they

blamed me for letting the hero of this novel live so much in bad

company; but by this very circumstance that I considered this so-called

bad company as a vase into which I could put everything I had to say

about good society, I gained a poetical body, and a varied one into the

bargain. Had I, on the contrary, delineated good society by the

so-called good society, nobody would have read the book.

"In the seeming trivialities of _Wilhelm Meister_, there is always

something higher at bottom, and nothing is required but eyes, knowledge

of the world, and power of comprehension to perceive the great in the

small. For those who are without such qualities, let it suffice to

receive the picture of life as real life."

Goethe then showed me a very interesting English work, which illustrated

all Shakespeare in copper plates. Each page embraced, in six small

designs, one piece with some verses written beneath, so that the leading

idea and the most important situations of each work were brought before

the eyes. All these immortal tragedies and comedies thus passed before

the mind like processions of masks.

"It is even terrifying," said Goethe, "to look through these little

pictures. Thus are we first made to feel the infinite wealth and

grandeur of Shakespeare. There is no motive in human life which he has

not exhibited and expressed! And all with what ease and freedom!

"But we cannot talk about Shakespeare; everything is inadequate. I have

touched upon the subject in my _Wilhelm Meister_ but that is not saying

much. He is not a theatrical poet; he never thought of the stage; it was

far too narrow for his great mind: nay, the whole visible world was too

narrow.

"He is even too rich and too powerful. A productive _nature_[17] ought

not to read more than one of his dramas in a year if it would not be

wrecked entirely. I did well to get rid of him by writing _Goetz_, and

_Egmont_,[18] and Byron did well by not having too much respect and

admiration for him, but going his own way. How many excellent Germans

have been ruined by him and Calderon!

"Shakespeare gives us golden apples in silver dishes. We get, indeed,

the silver dishes by studying his works; but, unfortunately, we have

only potatoes to put into them."

I laughed, and was delighted with this admirable simile.

Goethe then read me a letter from Zelter, describing a representation of

Macbeth at Berlin, where the music could not keep pace with the grand

spirit and character of the piece, as Zelter set forth by various

intimations. By Goethe's reading, the letter gained its full effect, and

he often paused to admire with me the point of some single passage.

"_Macbeth_," said Goethe, "is Shakespeare's best acting play, the one in

which he shows most understanding with respect to the stage. But would

you see his mind unfettered, read _Troilus and Cressida_, where he

treats the materials of the _Iliad_ in his own fashion."

The conversation turned upon Byron--the disadvantage in which he appears

when placed beside the innocent cheerfulness of Shakespeare, and the

frequent and generally not unjust blame which he drew upon himself by

his manifold works of negation.

"If Lord Byron," said Goethe, "had had an opportunity of working off all

the opposition in his character, by a number of strong parliamentary

speeches, he would have been much more pure as a poet. But, as he

scarcely ever spoke in parliament, he kept within himself all his

feelings against his nation, and to free himself from them, he had no

other means than to express them in poetical form. I could, therefore,

call a great part of Byron's works of negation 'suppressed parliamentary

speeches,' and think this would be no bad name for them."

We then mentioned one of our most modern German poets, Platen, who had

lately gained a great name, and whose negative tendency was likewise

disapproved. "We cannot deny," said Goethe, "that he has many brilliant

qualities, but he is wanting in--love. He loves his readers and his

fellow-poets as little as he loves himself, and thus we may apply to him

the maxim of the apostle--'Though I speak with the tongues of men and

angels, and have not love (charity), I am become as sounding brass and a

tinkling cymbal.' I have lately read the poems of Platen, and cannot

deny his great talent. But, as I said, he is deficient in _love_, and

thus he will never produce the effect which he ought. He will be feared,

and will be the idol of those who would like to be as negative as

himself, but have not his talent."

* * * * *

1827

_Thursday evening, January_ 18.--The conversation now turned wholly on

Schiller, and Goethe proceeded thus: "Schiller's proper productive

talent lay in the ideal; and it may be said he has not his equal in

German or any other literature. He has almost everything that Lord Byron

has; but Lord Byron is his superior in knowledge of the world. I wish

Schiller had lived to know Lord Byron's works, and wonder what he would

have said to so congenial a mind. Did Byron publish anything during

Schiller's life?"

I could not say with certainty. Goethe took down the Conversations

Lexicon, and read the article on Byron, making many hasty remarks as he

proceeded. It appeared that Byron had published nothing before 1807, and

that therefore Schiller could have seen nothing of his.

"Through all Schiller's works," continued Goethe, "goes the idea of

freedom; though this idea assumed a new shape as Schiller advanced in

his culture and became another man. In his youth it was physical freedom

which occupied him, and influenced his poems; in his later life it was

ideal freedom.

"Freedom is an odd thing, and every man has enough of it, if he can

only satisfy himself. What avails a superfluity of freedom which we

cannot use? Look at this chamber and the next, in which, through the

open door, you see my bed. Neither of them is large; and they are

rendered still narrower by necessary furniture, books, manuscripts, and

works of art; but they are enough for me. I have lived in them all the

winter, scarcely entering my front rooms. What have I done with my

spacious house, and the liberty of going from one room to another, when

I have not found it requisite to make use of them?

"If a man has freedom enough to live healthy, and work at his craft, he

has enough; and so much all can easily obtain. Then all of us are only

free under certain conditions, which we must fulfil. The citizen is as

free as the nobleman, when he restrains himself within the limits which

God appointed by placing him in that rank. The nobleman is as free as

the prince; for, if he will but observe a few ceremonies at court, he

may feel himself his equal. Freedom consists not in refusing to

recognize anything above us, but in respecting something which is above

us; for, by respecting it, we raise ourselves to it, and by our very

acknowledgment make manifest that we bear within ourselves what is

higher, and are worthy to be on a level with it.

"I have, on my journeys, often met merchants from the north of Germany,

who fancied they were my equals, if they rudely seated themselves next

me at table. They were, by this method, nothing of the kind; but they

would have been so if they had known how to value and treat me.

"That this physical freedom gave Schiller so much trouble in his

youthful years, was caused partly by the nature of his mind, but still

more by the restraint which he endured at the military school. In later

days, when he had enough physical freedom, he passed over to the ideal;

and I would almost say that this idea killed him, since it led him to

make demands on his physical nature which were too much for his

strength.

"The Grand Duke fixed on Schiller, when he was established here, an

income of one thousand dollars yearly, and offered to give him twice as

much in case he should be hindered by sickness from working. Schiller

declined this last offer, and never availed himself of it. 'I have

talent,' said he, 'and must help myself.' But as his family enlarged of

late years, he was obliged, for a livelihood, to write two dramas

annually; and to accomplish this, he forced himself to write days and

weeks when he was not well. He would have his talent obey him at any

hour. He never drank much; he was very temperate; but, in such hours of

bodily weakness, he was obliged to stimulate his powers by the use of

spirituous liquors. This habit impaired his health, and was likewise

injurious to his productions. The faults which some wiseacres find in

his works I deduce from this source. All the passages which they say are

not what they ought to be, I would call pathological passages; for he

wrote them on those days when he had not strength to find the right and

true motives. I have every respect for the categorical imperative. I

know how much good may proceed from it; but one must not carry it too

far, for then this idea of ideal freedom certainly leads to no good."

Amid these interesting remarks, and similar discourse on Lord Byron and

the celebrated German authors, of whom Schiller had said that he liked

Kotzebue best, for he, at any rate, produced something, the hours of

evening passed swiftly along, and Goethe gave me the novel, that I might

study it quietly at home.

* * * * *

_Wednesday, February 21_.--Dined with Goethe. He spoke much, and with

admiration, of Alexander von Humboldt, whose work on Cuba and Colombia

he had begun to read and whose views as to the project for making a

passage through the Isthmus of Panama appeared to have a particular

interest for him. "Humboldt," said Goethe, "has, with a great knowledge

of his subject, given other points where, by making use of some streams

which flow into the Gulf of Mexico, the end may be perhaps better

attained than at Panama. All this is reserved for the future, and for an

enterprising spirit. So much, however, is certain, that, if they succeed

in cutting such a canal that ships of any burden and size can be

navigated through it from the Mexican Gulf to the Pacific Ocean,

innumerable benefits would result to the whole human race, civilized and

uncivilized. But I should wonder if the United States were to let an

opportunity escape of getting such work into their own hands. It may be

foreseen that this young state, with its decided predilection to the

West, will, in thirty or forty years, have occupied and peopled the

large tract of land beyond the Rocky Mountains. It may, furthermore, be

foreseen that along the whole coast of the Pacific Ocean, where nature

has already formed the most capacious and secure harbors, important

commercial towns will gradually arise, for the furtherance of a great

intercourse between China and the East Indies and the United States. In

such a case, it would not only be desirable, but almost necessary, that

a more rapid communication should be maintained between the eastern and

western shores of North America, both by merchant-ships and men-of-war,

than has hitherto been possible with the tedious, disagreeable, and

expensive voyage round Cape Horn. I therefore repeat, that it is

absolutely indispensable for the United States to effect a passage from

the Mexican Gulf to the Pacific Ocean; and I am certain that they will

do it.

"Would that I might live to see it!--but I shall not. I should like to

see another thing--a junction of the Danube and the Rhine. But this

undertaking is so gigantic that I have doubts of its completion,

particularly when I consider our German resources. And thirdly, and

lastly, I should wish to see England in possession of a canal through

the Isthmus of Suez. Would I could live to see these three great works!

it would be well worth the trouble to last some fifty years more for the

very purpose."

* * * * *

_Thursday, May 3_.--The highly successful translation of Goethe's

dramatic works, by Stapfer, was noticed by Monsieur J. J. Ampere in the

_Parisian Globe_ of last year, in a manner no less excellent, and this

affected Goethe so agreeably that he very often recurred to it, and

expressed his great obligations to it.

"Ampere's point of view is a very high one," said he.

"When German critics on similar occasions start from philosophy, and in

the consideration and discussion of a poetical production proceed in a

manner that what they intend as an elucidation is only intelligible to

philosophers of their own school, while for other people it is far more

obscure than the work upon which they intended to throw a light, M.

Ampere, on the contrary, shows himself quite practical and popular. Like

one who knows his profession thoroughly, he shows the relation between

the production and the producer, and judges the different poetical

productions as different fruits of different epochs of the poet's life.

"He has studied most profoundly the changing course of my earthly

career, and of the condition of my mind, and has had the faculty of

seeing what I have not expressed, and what, so to speak, could only be

read between the lines. How truly has he remarked that, during the first

ten years of my official and court life at Weimar, I scarcely did

anything; that despair drove me to Italy; and that I there, with new

delight in producing, seized upon the history of Tasso, in order to free

myself, by the treatment of this agreeable subject, from the painful and

troublesome impressions and recollections of my life at Weimar. He

therefore very happily calls Tasso an elevated Werther.

"Then, concerning Faust, his remarks are no less clever, since he not

only notes, as part of myself, the gloomy, discontented striving of the

principal character, but also the scorn and the bitter irony of

Mephistopheles."

In this, and a similar spirit of acknowledgment, Goethe often spoke of

M. Ampere. We took a decided interest in him; we endeavored to picture

to ourselves his personal appearance, and, if we could not succeed in

this, we at least agreed that he must be a man of middle age to

understand the reciprocal action of life and poetry on each other. We

were, therefore, extremely surprised when M. Ampere arrived in Weimar a

few days ago, and proved to be a lively youth, some twenty years old;

and we were no less surprised when, in the course of further

intercourse, he told us that the whole of the contributors of the.

_Globe_, whose wisdom, moderation, and high degree of cultivation we had

often admired, were only young people like himself.

"I can well comprehend," said I, "that a person may be young and may

still produce something of importance--like Mérimée, for instance, who

wrote excellent pieces in his twentieth year; but that any one at so

early an age should have at his command such a comprehensive view, and

such deep insight, as to attain such mature judgment as the gentlemen of

the _Globe_, is to me something entirely new."

"To you, in your Heath,"[19] returned Goethe, "it has not been so easy;

and we others also, in Central Germany, have been forced to buy our

little wisdom dearly enough. Then we all lead a very isolated miserable

sort of life! From the people, properly so called, we derive very little

culture. Our talents and men of brains are scattered over the whole of

Germany. One is in Vienna, another in Berlin, another in Königsberg,

another in Bonn or Düseldorf--all about a hundred miles apart from one

another, so that personal contact and personal exchange of thought may

be considered as rarities. I feel what this must be, when such men as

Alexander von Humboldt come here, and in one single day lead me nearer

to what I am seeking and what I require to know than I should have done

for years in my own solitary way."

"But now conceive a city like Paris, where the highest talents of a

great kingdom are all assembled in a single spot, and by daily

intercourse, strife, and emulation, mutually instruct and advance each

other; where the best works, both of nature and art, from all the

kingdoms of the earth, are open to daily inspection; conceive this

metropolis of the world, I say, where every walk over a bridge or

across a square recalls some mighty past, and where some historical

event is connected with every corner of a street. In addition to all

this, conceive not the Paris of a dull, spiritless time, but the

Paris of the nineteenth century, in which, during three generations,

such men as Molière, Voltaire, Diderot, and the like, have kept up

such a current of intellect as cannot be found twice in a single spot

in the whole world, and you will comprehend that a man of talent like

Ampere, who has grown up amid such abundance, can easily be something

in his four-and-twentieth year.

"You said just now," said Goethe, "that you could well understand how

any one in his twentieth year could write pieces as good as those of

Mérimée. I have nothing to oppose to this; and I am, on the whole, quite

of your opinion that good productiveness is easier than good judgment in

a youthful man. But, in Germany, one had better not, when so young as

Mérimée, attempt to produce anything so mature as he has done in his

pieces of _Clara Gazul_. It is true, Schiller was very young when he

wrote his _Robbers_, his _Love and Intrigue_, his _Fiesco_; but, to

speak the truth, all three pieces are rather the utterances of an

extraordinary talent than signs of mature cultivation in the author.

This, however, is not Schiller's fault, but rather the result of the

state of culture of his nation, and the great difficulty which we all

experience in assisting ourselves on our solitary way.

"On the other hand, take up Béranger. He is the son of poor parents, the

descendant of a poor tailor; at one time a poor printer's apprentice,

then placed in some office with a small salary; he has never been to a

classical school or university; and yet his songs are so full of mature

cultivation, so full of wit and the most refined irony, and there is

such artistic perfection and masterly handling of the language that he

is the admiration, not only of France, but of all civilized Europe.

"But imagine this same Béranger--instead of being born in Paris, and

brought up in this metropolis of the world--the son of a poor tailor in

Jena or Weimar, and let him commence his career, in an equally miserable

manner, in such small places--then ask yourself what fruit would have

been produced by this same tree grown in such a soil and in such an

atmosphere.

"Therefore, my good friend, I repeat that, if a talent is to be speedily

and happily developed, the great point is that a great deal of intellect

and sound culture should be current in a nation.

"We admire the tragedies of the ancient Greeks; but, to take a correct

view of the case, we ought rather to admire the period and the nation in

which their production was possible than the individual authors; for

though each of these pieces differs a little from every other, and

though one of these poets appears somewhat greater and more finished

than the other, still, taking all things together, only one decided

character runs through the whole.

"This is the character of grandeur, fitness, soundness, human

perfection, elevated wisdom, sublime thought, pure, strong intuition,

and whatever other qualities one might enumerate. But when we find all

these qualities, not only in the dramatic works that have come down to

us but also in lyrical and epic works, in the philosophers, the orators,

and the historians, and in an equally high degree in the works of

plastic art that have come down to us, we must feel convinced that such

qualities did not merely belong to individuals, but were the current

property of the nation and the whole period.

"Now, take up Burns. How is he great, except through the circumstance

that the whole songs of his predecessors lived in the mouth of the

people--that they were, so to speak, sung at his cradle; that, as a boy,

he grew up amongst them, and the high excellence of these models so

pervaded him that he had therein a living basis on which he could

proceed further? Again, why is he great, but from this, that his own

songs at once found susceptible ears amongst his compatriots; that, sung

by reapers and sheaf-binders, they at once greeted him in the field; and

that his boon-companions sang them to welcome him at the ale-house?

Something was certainly to be done in this way.

"On the other hand, what a pitiful figure is made by us Germans! Of our

old songs--no less important than those of Scotland--how many lived

among the people in the days of my youth? Herder and his successors

first began to collect them and rescue them from oblivion; then they

were at least printed in the libraries. Then, more lately, what songs

have not Bürger and Voss composed! Who can say that they are more

insignificant or less popular than those of the excellent Burns? but

which of them so lives among us that it greets us from the mouth of the

people? They are written and printed, and they remain in the libraries,

quite in accordance with the general fate of German poets. Of my own

songs, how many live? Perhaps one or another of them may be sung by a

pretty girl to the piano; but among the people, properly so called, they

have no sound. With what sensations must I remember the time when

passages from Tasso were sung to me by Italian fishermen!

"We Germans are of yesterday. We have indeed been properly cultivated

for a century; but a few centuries more must still elapse before so much

mind and elevated culture will become universal amongst our people that

they will appreciate beauty like the Greeks, that they will be inspired

by a beautiful song, and that it will be said of them 'it is long since

they were barbarians.'"

_Tuesday, December 16_.--I dined today with Goethe alone, in his

work-room. We talked on various literary topics.

"The Germans," said he, "cannot cease to be Philistines. They are now

squabbling about some verses, which are printed both in Schiller's works

and mine, and fancy it is important to ascertain which really belong to

Schiller and which to me; as if anything could be gained by such

investigation--as if the existence of such things were not enough.

Friends, such as Schiller and I, intimate for years, with the same

interests, in habits of daily intercourse, and under reciprocal

obligations, live so completely in each other that it is hardly possible

to decide to which of the two the particular thoughts belong.

"We have made many distiches together; sometimes I gave the thought, and

Schiller made the verse; sometimes the contrary was the case; sometimes

he made one line, and I the other. What matters the mine and thine? One

must be a thorough Philistine, indeed, to attach the slightest

importance to the solution of such questions."

"Something similar," said I, "often happens in the literary world, when

people, for instance, doubt the originality of this or that celebrated

man, and seek to trace out the sources from whence he obtained his

cultivation."

"That is very ridiculous," said Goethe; "we might as well question a

strong man about the oxen, sheep, and swine, which he has eaten, and

which have given him strength.

"We are indeed born with faculties; but we owe our development to a

thousand influences of the great world, from which we appropriate to

ourselves what we can, and what is suitable to us. I owe much to the

Greeks and French; I am infinitely indebted to Shakespeare, Sterne, and

Goldsmith; but in saying this I do not show the sources of my culture;

that would be an endless as well as an unnecessary task. What is

important is to have a soul which loves truth, and receives it wherever

it finds it.

"Besides, the world is now so old, so many eminent men have lived and

thought for thousands of years, that there is little new to be

discovered or expressed. Even my theory of colors is not entirely new.

Plato, Leonardo da Vinci, any many other excellent men, have before me

found and expressed the same thing in a detached form: my merit is, that

I have found it also, that I have said it again, and that I have striven

to bring the truth once more into a confused world.

"The truth must be repeated over and over again, because error is

repeatedly preached among us, not only by individuals, but by the

masses. In periodicals and cyclopædias, in schools and universities;

everywhere, in fact, error prevails, and is quite easy in the feeling

that it has a decided majority on its side.

"Often, too, people teach truth and error together, and stick to the

latter. Thus, a short time ago, I read in an English cyclopædia the

doctrine of the origin of Blue. First came the correct view of Leonardo

da Vinci, but then followed, as quietly as possible, the error of

Newton, coupled with remarks that this was to be adhered to because it

was the view generally adopted."

I could not help laughing with surprise when I heard this. "Every

wax-taper," I said, "every illuminated cloud of smoke from the kitchen,

that has anything dark behind it, every morning mist, when it lies

before a steady spot, daily convinces me of the origin of blue color,

and makes me comprehend the blueness of the sky. What the Newtonians

mean when they say that the air has the property of absorbing other

colors, and of repelling blue alone, I cannot at all understand, nor do

I see what use or pleasure is to be derived from a doctrine in which all

thought stands still, and all sound observation completely vanishes."

"My good innocent friend," said Goethe, "these people do not care a jot

about thoughts and observations. They are satisfied if they have only

words which they can pass as current, as was well shown and not

ill-expressed by my own Mephistopheles:

"Mind, above all, you stick to words,

Thus through the safe gate you will go

Into the fane of certainty;

For when ideas begin to fail

A word will aptly serve your turn," etc.

Goethe recited this passage laughing, and seemed altogether in the best

humor. "It is a good thing," said he, "that all is already in print, and

I shall go on printing as long as I have anything to say against false

doctrine, and those who disseminate it.

"We have now excellent men rising up in natural science," he continued,

after a pause, "and I am glad to see them. Others begin well, but

afterwards fall off; their predominating subjectivity leads them astray.

Others, again, set too much value on facts, and collect an infinite

number, by which nothing is proved. On the whole, there is a want of

originating mind to penetrate back to the original phenomena, and master

the particulars that make their appearance."

A short visit interrupted our discourse, but when we were again alone

the conversation returned to poetry, and I told Goethe that I had of

late been once more studying his little poems, and had dwelt especially

upon two of them, viz., the ballad[20] about the children and the old

man, and the "Happy Couple" (_die glücklichen Gatten_).

"I myself set some value on these two poems," said Goethe, "although the

German public have hitherto not been able to make much out of them."

"In the ballad," I said, "a very copious subject is brought into a very

limited compass, by means of all sorts of poetical forms and artifices,

among which I especially praise the expedient of making the old man tell

the children's past history down to the point where the present moment

comes in, and the rest is developed before our eyes."

"I carried the ballad a long time about in my head," said Goethe,

"before I wrote it down. Whole years of reflection are comprised in it,

and I made three or four trials before I could reduce it to its present

shape."

"The poem of the 'Happy Couple,'" continued Goethe, "is likewise rich in

_motives_; whole landscapes and passages of human life appear in it,

warmed by the sunlight of a charming spring sky, which is diffused over

the whole."

"I have always liked that poem," said Goethe, "and I am glad that you

have regarded it with particular interest. The ending of the whole

pleasantry with a double christening is, I think, pretty enough."

We then came to the _Bürgergeneral_ (Citizengeneral); with respect to

which I said that I had been lately reading this piece with an

Englishman, and that we had both felt the strongest desire to see it

represented on the stage. "As far as the spirit of the work is

concerned," said I, "there is nothing antiquated about it; and with

respect to the details of dramatic development, there is not a touch

that does not seem designed for the stage."

"It was a very good piece in its time," said Goethe, "and caused us many

a pleasant evening. It was, indeed, excellently cast, and had been so

admirably studied that the dialogue moved along as glibly as possible.

Malcolmi played Märten, and nothing could be more perfect.

"The part of Schnaps," said I, "seems to me no less felicitous. Indeed,

I should not think there were many better or more thankful parts in the

repertoire. There is in this personage, as in the whole piece, a

clearness, an actual presence, to the utmost extent that can be desired

for a theatre. The scene where he comes in with the knapsack, and

produces the things one after another, where he puts the _moustache_ on

Märten, and decks himself with the cap of liberty, uniform, and sword,

is among the best." "This scene," said Goethe, "used always to be very

successful on our stage. Then the knapsack, with the articles in it, had

really an historical existence. I found it in the time of the

Revolution, on my travels along the French border, when the emigrants,

on their flight, had passed through, and one of them might have lost it

or thrown it away. The articles it contained were just the same as in

the piece. I wrote the scene upon it, and the knapsack, with all its

appurtenances, was always introduced, to the no small delight of our

actors."

The question whether the _Bürgergeneral_ could still be played with any

interest or profit, was for a while the subject of our conversation.

Goethe then asked about my progress in French literature, and I told him

that I still took up Voltaire from time to time, and that the great

talent of this man gave me the purest delight.

"I still know but little of him," said I; "I keep to his short poems

addressed to persons, which I read over and over again, and which I

cannot lay aside."

"Indeed," said Goethe, "all is good which is written by so great a

genius as Voltaire, though I cannot excuse all his profanity. But you

are right to give so much time to those little poems addressed to

persons; they are unquestionably among the most charming of his works.

There is not a line which is not full of thought, clear, bright, and

graceful."

"And we see," said I, "his relations to all the great and mighty of the

world, and remark with pleasure the distinguished position taken by

himself, inasmuch as he seems to feel himself equal to the highest, and

we never find that any majesty can embarrass his free mind even for a

moment."

"Yes," said Goethe, "he bore himself like a man of rank. And with all

his freedom and audacity, he ever kept within the limits of strict

propriety, which is, perhaps, saying still more. I may cite the Empress

of Austria as an authority in such matters; she has repeatedly assured

me, that in those poems of Voltaire's, there is no trace of crossing the

line of _convenance_."

"Does your excellency," said I, "remember the short poem in which he

makes to the Princess of Prussia, afterwards Queen of Sweden, a pretty

declaration of love, by saying that he dreamed of being elevated to the

royal dignity?"

"It is one of his best," said Goethe, and he recited the lines--

"Je vous aimais, princesse, et j'osais vous le dire;

Les Dieux et mon reveil ne m'ont pas tout ôté,

Je n'ai perdu que mon empire."

"How pretty that is! And never did poet have his talent so completely at

command every moment as Voltaire. I remember an anecdote, when he had

been for some time on a visit to Madame du Chatelet. Just as he was

going away, and the carriage was standing at the door, he received a

letter from a great number of young girls in a neighboring convent, who

wished to play the 'Death of Julius Cæsar' on the birthday of their

abbess, and begged him to write them a prologue. The case was too

delicate for a refusal; so Voltaire at once called for pen and paper,

and wrote the desired prologue, standing, upon the mantlepiece. It is a

poem of perhaps twenty lines, thoroughly digested, finished, perfectly

suited to the occasion, and, in short, of the very best class."

"I am very desirous to read it," said I.

"I doubt," said Goethe, "whether you will find it in your collection. It

has only lately come to light, and, indeed, he wrote hundreds of such

poems, of which many may still be scattered about among private

persons."

"I found of late a passage in Lord Byron," said I, "from which I

perceived with delight that even Byron had an extraordinary esteem for

Voltaire. We may see in his works how much he liked to read, study, and

make use of Voltaire.

"Byron," said Goethe, "knew too well where anything was to be got, and

was too clever not to draw from this universal source of light."

The conversation then turned entirely upon Byron and several of his

works, and Goethe found occasion to repeat many of his former

expressions of admiration for that great genius.

"To all that your excellency says of Byron," said I, "I agree from the

bottom of my heart; but, however great and remarkable that poet may be

as a genius, I very much doubt whether a decided gain for pure human

culture is to be derived from his writings."

"There I must contradict you," said Goethe; "the audacity and grandeur

of Byron must certainly tend towards culture. We should take care not to

be always looking for it in the decidedly pure and moral. Everything

that is great promotes cultivation as soon as we are aware of it."

* * * * *

_Thursday, February 12_.--Goethe read me the thoroughly noble poem,

"Kein Wesen kann zu nichts zerfallen" (No being can dissolve to

nothing), which he had lately written.

"I wrote this poem," said he, "in contradiction to my lines--

'Denn alles muss zu nichts zerfallen

Wenn es im Seyn beharren will,' etc.

('For all must melt away to nothing

Would it continue still to be')--

which are stupid, and which my Berlin friends, on the occasion of the

late assembly of natural philosophers, set up in golden letters, to my

annoyance."

The conversation turned on the great mathematician, Lagrange, whose

excellent character Goethe highly extolled.

"He was a good man," said he, "and on that very account, a great man.

For when a good man is gifted with talent, he always works morally for

the salvation of the world, as poet, philosopher, artist, or in whatever

way it may be.

"I am glad," continued Goethe, "that you had an opportunity yesterday of

knowing Coudray better. He says little in general society, but, here

among ourselves, you have seen what an excellent mind and character

reside in the man. He had, at first, much opposition to encounter, but

he has now fought through it all and enjoys the entire confidence and

favor of the court. Coudray is one of the most skilful architects of our

time. He has adhered to me and I to him, and this has been of service to

us both. If I had but known him fifty years ago!"

We then talked about Goethe's own architectural knowledge. I remarked

that he must have acquired much in Italy.

"Italy gave me an idea of earnestness and greatness," said he, "but no

practical skill. The building of the castle here in Weimar advanced me

more than anything. I was obliged to assist, and even to make drawings

of entablatures. I had a certain advantage over the professional people,

because I was superior to them in intention."

We talked of Zelter.

"I have a letter from him," said Goethe, "in which he complains that the

performance of the oratorio of the Messiah was spoiled for him by one of

his female scholars, who sang an aria too weakly and sentimentally.

Weakness is a characteristic of our age. My hypothesis is, that it is a

consequence of the efforts made in Germany to get rid of the French.

Painters, natural philosophers, sculptors, musicians, poets, with but

few exceptions, all are weak, and the general mass is no better."

"Yet I do not give up the hope," said I, "of seeing suitable music

composed for _Faust_."

"Quite impossible!" said Goethe. "The awful and repulsive passages

which must occasionally occur, are not in the style of the time. The

music should be like that of Don Juan. Mozart should have composed for

_Faust_. Meyerbeer would, perhaps, be capable; but he would not touch

anything of the kind;[21] he is too much engaged with the Italian

theatres."

Afterwards--I do not recollect in connection to what--Goethe made the

following important remark:

"All that is great and skilful exists with the minority. There have been

ministers who have had both king and people against them, and have

carried out their great plans alone. It is not to be imagined that

reason can ever be popular. Passions and feelings may become popular;

but reason always remains the sole property of a few eminent

individuals."

_Sunday, December_ 6.--Today, after dinner, Goethe read me the first

scene of the second act of _Faust_.[22] The effect was great, and gave

me a high satisfaction. We are once more transported into Faust's study,

where Mephistopheles finds all just as he had left it. He takes from the

hook Faust's old study-gown, and a thousand moths and insects flutter

out from it. By the directions of Mephistopheles as to where these are

to settle down, the locality is brought very clearly before our eyes. He

puts on the gown, while Faust lies behind a curtain in a state of

paralysis, intending to play the doctor's part once more. He pulls the

bell, which gives such an awful tone among the old solitary convent

halls, that the doors spring open and the walls tremble. The servant

rushes in, and finds in Faust's seat Mephistopheles, whom he does not

recognize, but for whom he has respect. In answer to inquiries he gives

news of Wagner, who has now become a celebrated man, and is hoping for

the return of his master. He is, we hear, at this moment deeply occupied

in his laboratory, seeking to produce a Homunculus. The servant retires,

and the bachelor enters--the same whom we knew some years before as a

shy young student, when Mephistopheles (in Faust's gown) made game of

him. He is now become a man, and is so full of conceit that even

Mephistopheles can do nothing with him, but moves his chair further and

further, and at last addresses the pit.

Goethe read the scene quite to the end. I was pleased with his youthful

productive strength, and with the closeness of the whole. "As the

conception," said Goethe, "is so old--for I have had it in my mind for

fifty years--the materials have accumulated to such a degree, that the

difficult operation is to separate and reject. The invention of the

whole second part is really as old as I say; but it may be an advantage

that I have not written it down till now, when my knowledge of the world

is so much clearer. I am like one who in his youth has a great deal of

small silver and copper money, which in the course of his life he

constantly changes for the better, so that at last the property of his

youth stands before him in pieces of pure gold."

We spoke about the character of the Bachelor. "Is he not meant," said I,

"to represent a certain class of ideal philosophers?"

"No," said Goethe, "the arrogance which is peculiar to youth, and of

which we had such striking examples after our war for freedom, is

personified in him. Indeed, every one believes in his youth that the

world really began with him, and that all merely exists for his sake.

"Thus, in the East, there was actually a man who every morning collected

his people about him, and would not go to work till he had commanded the

sun to rise. But he was wise enough not to speak his command till the

sun of its own accord was really on the point of appearing."

Goethe remained a while absorbed in silent thought; then he began as

follows: "When one is old one thinks of worldly matters otherwise than

when one is young. Thus I cannot but think that the demons, to teaze and

make sport with men, have placed among them single figures, which are so

alluring that every one strives after them, and so great that nobody

reaches them. Thus they set up Raffael, with whom thought and act were

equally perfect; some distinguished followers have approached him, but

none have equalled him. Thus, too, they set up Mozart as something

unattainable in music; and thus Shakespeare in poetry. I know what you

can say against this thought; but I only mean natural character, the

great innate qualities. Thus, too, Napoleon is unattainable. That the

Russians were so moderate as not to go to Constantinople is indeed very

great; but we find a similar trait in Napoleon, for he had the

moderation not to go to Rome."

Much was associated with this copious theme; I thought to myself in

silence that the demons had intended something of the kind with Goethe,

inasmuch as he is a form too alluring not to be striven after, and too

great to be reached.

_Wednesday, December 16._--Today, after dinner, Goethe read me the

second scene of the second act of "Faust," where Mephistopheles visits

Wagner, who is on the point of making a human being by chemical means.

The work succeeds; the Homunculus appears in the phial, as a shining

being, and is at once active. He repels Wagner's questions upon

incomprehensible subjects; reasoning is not his business; he wishes to

act, and begins with our hero, Faust, who, in his paralyzed condition,

needs a higher aid. As a being to whom the present is perfectly clear

and transparent, the Homunculus sees into the soul of the sleeping

Faust, who, enraptured by a lovely dream, beholds Leda visited by swans,

while she is bathing in a pleasant spot. The Homunculus, by describing

this dream, brings a most charming picture before our eyes.

Mephistopheles sees nothing of it, and the Homunculus taunts him with

his northern nature.

"Generally," said Goethe, "you will perceive that Mephistopheles

appears to disadvantage beside the Homunculus, who is like him in

clearness of intellect, and so much superior to him in his tendency to

the beautiful and to a useful activity. He styles him cousin; for such

spiritual beings as this Homunculus, not yet saddened and limited by a

thorough assumption of humanity, were classed with the demons, and thus

there is a sort of relationship between the two."

"Certainly," said I, "Mephistopheles appears here in a subordinate

situation; yet I cannot help thinking that he has had a secret influence

on the production of the Homunculus. We have known him in this way

before; and, indeed, in the 'Helena' he always appears as a being

secretly working. Thus he again elevates himself with regard to the

whole, and in his lofty repose he can well afford to put up with a

little in particulars."

"Your feeling of the position is very correct," said Goethe; "indeed, I

have doubted whether I ought not to put some verses into the mouth of

Mephistopheles as he goes to Wagner, and the Homunculus is still in a

state of formation, so that his cooperation may be expressed and

rendered plain to the reader.

"It would do no harm," said I. "Yet this is intimated by the words with

which Mephistopheles closes the scene--

Am Ende hangen wir doch ab

Von Creaturen die wir machten.