pass for what he was,--nay, for that which he wished to pass for; and
thus the frankness of a fresh, youthful heart, which manifested itself
almost for the first time in its full bloom, made me many friends and
adherents. Our company of boarders increased to about twenty persons;
and, as Salzmann kept up his accustomed order, every thing continued in
its old routine,--nay, the conversation was almost more decorous, as
every one had to be on his guard before several. Among the new-comers
was a man who particularly interested me: his name was Jung, the same
who afterwards became known under the name of Stilling. In spite of an
antiquated dress, his form had something delicate about it, with a
certain sturdiness. A bag-wig did not disfigure his significant and
pleasing countenance. His voice was mild, without being soft and weak:
it became even melodious and powerful as soon as his ardor was roused,
which was very easily done. On becoming better acquainted with him, one
found in him a sound common sense, which rested on feeling, and
therefore took its tone from the affections and passions; and from this
very feeling sprang an enthusiasm for the good, the true, and the just,
in the greatest possible purity. For the course of this man's life had
been very simple, and yet crowded with events and with manifold
activity. The element of his energy was indestructible faith in God, and
in an assistance flowing immediately from him, which evidently
manifested itself in an uninterrupted providence, and in an unfailing
deliverance out of all troubles and from every evil. Jung had made many
such experiences in his life, and they had often been repeated of late
in Strasburg: so that, with the greatest cheerfulness, he led a life
frugal indeed, but free from care, and devoted himself most earnestly to
his studies; although he could not reckon upon any certain subsistence
from one quarter to another. In his youth, when on a fair way to become
a charcoal-burner, he took up the trade of a tailor; and after he had
instructed himself, at the same time, in higher matters, his knowledge-
loving mind drove him to the occupation of schoolmaster. This attempt
failed; and he returned to his trade, from which, however, since every
one felt for him confidence and affection, he was repeatedly called
away, again to take a place as private tutor. But for his most internal
and peculiar training he had to thank that wide-spread class of men who
sought out their salvation on their own responsibility, and who, while
they strove to edify themselves by reading the Scriptures and good
books, and by mutual exhortation and confession, thereby attained a
degree of cultivation which must excite surprise. For while the interest
which always accompanied them and which maintained them in fellowship
rested on the simplest foundation of morality, well-wishing and well-
doing, the deviations which could take place with men of such limited
circumstances were of little importance; and hence their consciences,
for the most part, remained clear, and their minds commonly cheerful: so
there arose no artificial, but a truly natural, culture, which yet had
this advantage over others, that it was suitable to all ages and ranks,
and was generally social by its nature. For this reason, too, these
persons were, in their own circle, truly eloquent, and capable of
expressing themselves appropriately and pleasingly on all the tenderest
and best concerns of the heart. Now, good Jung was in this very case.
Among a few persons, who, if not exactly like-minded with himself, did
not declare themselves averse from his mode of thought, he was found,
not only talkative but eloquent: in particular, he related the history
of his life in the most delightful manner, and knew how to make all the
circumstances plainly and vividly present to his listeners. I persuaded
him to write them down, and he promised to do so. But because, in his
way of expressing himself, he was like a somnambulist, who must not be
called by name lest he should fall from his elevation, or like a gentle
stream, to which one dare oppose nothing lest it should foam, he was
often constrained to feel uncomfortable in a more numerous company. His
faith tolerated no doubt, and his conviction no jest. "While in friendly
communication he was inexhaustible, every thing came to a standstill
with him when he met with contradiction. I usually helped him through on
such occasions, for which he repaid me with honest affection. Since his
mode of thought was nothing strange to me, but on the contrary I had
already become accurately acquainted with it in my very best friends of
both sexes; and since, moreover, it generally interested me with its
naturalness and /naïveté/,--he found himself on the very best terms
with me. The bent of his intellect was pleasing to me; nor did I meddle
with his faith in miracles, which was so useful to him. Salzmann
likewise behaved towards him with forbearance,--I say with forbearance,
for Salzmann, in conformity with his character, his natural disposition,
his age arid circumstances, could not but stand and continue on the side
of the rational, or rather the common-sense, Christians, whose religion
properly rested on the rectitude of their characters, and a manly
independence, and who therefore did not like to meddle or have any thing
to do with feelings which might easily have led them into gloom, or with
mysticism, which might easily have led them into the dark. This class,
too, was respectable and numerous: all men of honor and capacity
understood each other, and were of the like persuasion, as well as of
the same mode of life. Lerse, likewise our fellow-boarder, also belonged
to this number: a perfectly upright young man, and, with limited gifts
of fortune, frugal and exact. His manner of life and housekeeping was
the closest I ever knew among students. He was, of us all, the most
neatly dressed, and yet always appeared in the same clothes; but he
managed his wardrobe with the greatest care, kept every thing about him
clean, and required all things in ordinary life to go according to his
example. He never happened to lean anywhere, or to prop his elbow on the
table; he never forgot to mark his table-napkin; and the maid always had
a bad time of it when the chairs were not found perfectly clean. With
all this, he had nothing stiff in his exterior. He spoke cordially, with
precise and dry liveliness, in which a light ironical joke was very
becoming. In figure he was well built, slender, and of fair height: his
face was pock-pitted and homely, his little blue eyes cheerful and
penetrating. As he had cause to tutor us in so many respects, we let him
be our fencing-master besides, for he drew a very fine rapier; and it
seemed to give him sport to play off upon us, on this occasion, all the
pedantry of this profession. Moreover, we really profited by him, and
had to thank him for many sociable hours, which he induced us to spend
in good exercise and practice.
By all these peculiarities, Lerse completely qualified himself for the
office of arbitrator and umpire in all the small and great quarrels
which happened, though but rarely, in our circle, and which Salzmann
could not hush up in his fatherly way. Without the external forms, which
do so much mischief in universities, we represented a society bound
together by circumstances and good feeling, which others might
occasionally touch, but into which they could not intrude. Now, in his
judgment of internal piques, Lerse always showed the greatest
impartiality; and, when the affair could no longer be settled by words
and explanations, he knew how to conduct the desired satisfaction, in an
honorable way, to a harmless issue. In this no man was more clever than
he: indeed, he often used to say, that since heaven had destined him for
a hero neither in war nor in love, he would be content, both in romances
and fighting, with the part of second. Since he remained the same
throughout, and might be regarded as a true model of a good and steady
disposition, the conception of him stamped itself as deeply as amiably
upon me; and, when I wrote "Götz von Berlichingen," I felt myself
induced to set up a memorial of our friendship, and to give the gallant
fellow, who knew how to subordinate himself in so dignified a manner,
the name of Franz Lerse.
While, by his constant humorous dryness, he continued ever to remind us
of what one owed to one's self and to others, and how one ought to
behave in order to live at peace with men as long as possible, and thus
gain a certain position towards them, I had to fight, both inwardly and
outwardly, with quite different circumstances and adversaries, being at
strife with myself, with the objects around me, and even with the
elements. I was then in a state of health which furthered me
sufficiently in all that I would and should undertake; only there was a
certain irritability left behind, which did not always let me be in
equilibrium. A loud sound was disagreeable to me, diseased objects
awakened in me loathing and horror. But I was especially troubled with a
giddiness which came over me every time I looked down from a height. All
these infirmities I tried to remedy, and, indeed, as I wished to lose no
time, in a somewhat violent way. In the evening, when they beat the
tattoo, I went near the multitude of drums, the powerful rolling and
beating of which might have made one's heart burst in one's bosom. All
alone I ascended the highest pinnacle of the minster spire, and sat in
what is called the neck, under the nob or crown, for a quarter of an
hour, before I would venture to step out again into the open air, where,
standing upon a platform scarce an ell square, without any particular
holding, one sees the boundless prospect before; while the nearest
objects and ornaments conceal the church, and every thing upon and above
which one stands. It is exactly as if one saw one's self carried up into
the air in a balloon. Such troublesome and painful sensations I repeated
until the impression became quite indifferent to me; and I have since
then derived great advantage from this training, in mountain travels and
geological studies, and on great buildings, where I have vied with the
carpenters in running over the bare beams and the cornices of the
edifice, and even in Rome, where one must run similar risks to obtain a
nearer view of important works of art. Anatomy, also, was of double
value to me, as it taught me to endure the most repulsive sights, while
I satisfied my thirst for knowledge. And thus I also attended the
clinical course of the elder Dr. Ehrmann, as well as the lectures of his
son on obstetrics, with the double view of becoming acquainted with all
conditions, and of freeing myself from all apprehension as to repulsive
things. And I have actually succeeded so far, that nothing of this kind
could ever put me out of my self-possession. But I endeavored to harden
myself, not only against these impressions on the senses, but also
against the infections of the imagination. The awful and shuddering
impressions of the darkness in churchyards, solitary places, churches,
and chapels by night, and whatever may be connected with them, I
contrived to render likewise indifferent; and in this, also, I went so
far that day and night, and every locality, were quite the same to me:
so that even when, in later times, a desire came over me once more to
feel in such scenes the pleasing shudder of youth, I could hardly compel
this, in any degree, by calling up the strangest and most fearful
images.
In my efforts to free myself from the pressure of the too gloomy and
powerful, which continued to rule within me, and seemed to me sometimes
as strength, sometimes as weakness, I was thoroughly assisted by that
open, social, stirring manner of life, which attracted me more and more,
to which I accustomed myself, and which I at last learned to enjoy with
perfect freedom. It is not difficult to remark in the world, that man
feels himself most freely and most perfectly rid of his own feelings
when he represents to himself the faults of others, and expatiates upon
them with complacent censoriousness. It is a tolerably pleasant
sensation even to set ourselves above our equals by disapprobation and
misrepresentation; for which reason good society, whether it consists of
few or many, is most delighted with it. But nothing equals the
comfortable self-complacency, when we erect ourselves into judges of our
superiors, and of those who are set over us,--of princes and statesmen,
--when we find public institutions unfit and injudicious, only consider
the possible and actual obstacles, and recognize neither the greatness
of the invention, nor the co-operation which is to be expected from time
and circumstances in every undertaking.
Whoever remembers the condition of the French kingdom, and is accurately
and circumstantially acquainted with it from later writings, will easily
figure to himself how, at that time, in the Alsatian semi-France, people
used to talk about the king and his ministers, about the court and
court-favorites. These were new subjects for my love of instructing
myself, and very welcome ones to my pertness and youthful conceit. I
observed every thing accurately, noted it down industriously; and I now
see, from the little that is left, that such accounts, although only put
together on the moment, out of fables and uncertain general rumors,
always have a certain value in after-times, because they serve to
confront and compare the secret made known at last with what was then
already discovered and public, and the judgments of contemporaries, true
or false, with the convictions of posterity.
Striking, and daily before the eyes of us street-loungers, was the
project for beautifying the city; the execution of which according to
draughts and plans, began in the strangest fashion to pass from sketches
and plans into reality. Intendant Gayot had undertaken to new-model the
angular and uneven lanes of Strasburg, and to lay the foundations of a
respectable, handsome city, regulated by line and level. Upon this,
Blondel, a Parisian architect, drew a plan, by which an hundred and
forty householders gained in room, eighty lost, and the rest remained in
their former condition. This plan accepted, but not to be put into
execution at once, now, should in course of time have been approaching
completion; and, meanwhile, the city oddly enough wavered between form
and formlessness. If, for instance, a crooked side of a street was to be
straightened, the first man who felt disposed to build moved forward to
the appointed line, perhaps, too, his next neighbor, but perhaps, also,
the third or fourth resident from him; by which projections the most
awkward recesses were left, like front court-yards, before the houses in
the background. They would not use force, yet without compulsion they
would never have got on: on which account no man, when his house was
once condemned, ventured to improve or replace any thing that related to
the street. All these strange accidental inconveniences gave to us
rambling idlers the most welcome opportunity of practising our ridicule;
of making proposals, in the manner of Behrisch, for accelerating the
completion, and of constantly doubting the possibility of it, although
many a newly erected handsome building should have brought us to other
thoughts. How far that project was advanced by the length of time, I
cannot say.
Another subject on which the Protestant Strasburgers liked to converse
was the expulsion of the Jesuits. These fathers, as soon as the city had
fallen to the share of the French, had made their appearance and sought
a /domicilium/. But they soon extended themselves and built a
magnificent college, which bordered so closely on the minster that the
back of the church covered a third part of its front. It was to be a
complete quadrangle, and have a garden in the middle: three sides of it
were finished. It is of stone, and solid, like all the buildings of
these fathers. That the Protestants were pushed hard, if not oppressed
by them, lay in the plan of the society which made it a duty to restore
the old religion in its whole compass. Their fall, therefore, awakened
the greatest satisfaction in the opposite party; and people saw, not
without pleasure, how they sold their wines, carried away their books:
and the building was assigned to another, perhaps less active, order.
How glad are men when they get rid of an opponent, or only of a
guardian! and the herd does not reflect, that, where there is no dog, it
is exposed to wolves.
Now, since every city must have its tragedy, at which children and
children's children shudder; so in Strasburg frequent mention was made
of the unfortunate Praetor Klingling, who, after he had mounted the
highest step of earthly felicity, ruled city and country with almost
absolute power, and enjoyed all that wealth, rank, and influence could
afford, had at last lost the favor of the court, and was dragged up to
answer for all in which he had been indulged hitherto,--nay, was even
thrown into prison, where, more than seventy years old, he died an
ambiguous death.
This and other tales, that knight of St. Louis, our fellow-boarder, knew
how to tell with passion and animation; for which reason I was fond of
accompanying him in his walks, unlike the others, who avoided such
invitations, and left me alone with him. As with new acquaintances I
generally took my ease for a long time without thinking much about them
or the effect which they were exercising upon me, so I only remarked
gradually that his stories and opinions rather unsettled and confused
than instructed and enlightened me. I never knew what to make of him,
although the riddle might easily have been solved. He belonged to the
many to whom life offers no results, and who, therefore, from first to
last, exert themselves on individual objects. Unfortunately he had with
this a decided desire, nay, even passion, for meditating, without having
any capacity for thinking; and in such men a particular notion easily
fixes itself fast, which may be regarded as a mental disease. To such a
fixed view he always came back again, and was thus in the long run
excessively tiresome. He would bitterly complain of the decline of his
memory, especially with regard to the latest events, and maintained, by
a logic of his own, that all virtue springs from a good memory, and all
vice, on the contrary, from forgetfulness. This doctrine he contrived to
carry out with much acuteness; as, indeed, any thing may be maintained
when one has no compunction to use words altogether vaguely, and to
employ and apply them in a sense now wider, now narrower, now closer,
now more remote.
At first it was amusing to hear him; nay, his persuasiveness even
astonished us. We fancied we were standing before a rhetorical sophist,
who for jest and practice knew how to give a fair appearance to the
strangest things. Unfortunately this first impression became blunted but
too soon; for at the end of every discourse, manage the thing as I
would, the man came back again to the same theme. He was not to be held
fast to older events, although they interested him,--although he had
them present to his mind with their minutest circumstances. Indeed, he
was often, by a small circumstance, snatched out of the middle of a wild
historical narrative, and thrust into his detestable favorite thought.
One of our afternoon walks was particularly unfortunate in this respect:
the account of it may stand here instead of similar cases, which might
weary if not vex the reader.
On the way through the city we were met by an old female mendicant, who,
by her beggings and importunities, disturbed him in his story. "Pack
yourself off, old witch!" said he, and walked by. She shouted after him
the well-known retort,--only somewhat changed, since she saw well that
the unfriendly man was old himself,--"If you did not wish to be old, you
should have had yourself hanged in your youth!" He turned round
violently, and I feared a scene. "Hanged cried he, "have myself hanged!
No: that could not have been,--I was too honest a fellow for that; but
hang myself--hang up my own self--that is true--that I should have done:
I should have turned a charge of powder against myself, that I might not
live to see that I am not even worth that any more." The woman stood as
if petrified; but he continued, "You have said a great truth, witch-
mother; and, as they have neither drowned nor burned you yet, you shall
be paid for your proverb." He handed her a /büsel/, a coin not
usually given to a beggar.
We had crossed over the first Rhine-bridge, and were going to the inn
where we meant to stop; and I was trying to lead him back to our
previous conversation, when, unexpectedly, a very pretty girl met us on
the pleasant foot-path, remained standing before us, bowed prettily, and
cried, "Eh, eh, captain, where are you going?" and, whatever else is
usually said on such an occasion. "Mademoiselle," replied he, somewhat
embarrassed, "I know not"--"How?" said she, with graceful astonishment,
"do you forget your friends so soon?" The word "forget" fretted him: he
shook his head and replied, peevishly enough, "Truly, mademoiselle, I
did not know!"--She now retorted with some humor, yet very temperately,
"Take care, captain: I may mistake you another time!" And so she hurried
past, taking huge strides, without looking round. At once my fellow-
traveller struck his forehead with both his fists: "Oh, what an ass I
am!" exclaimed he, "what an old ass I am! Now, you see whether I am
right or not." And then, in a very violent manner, he went on with his
usual sayings and opinions, in which this case still more confirmed him.
I can not and would not repeat what a philippic discourse he held
against himself. At last he turned to me, and said, "I call you to
witness! You remember that small-ware woman at the corner, who is
neither young nor pretty? I salute her every time we pass, and often
exchange a couple of friendly words with her; and yet it is thirty years
ago since she was gracious to me. But now I swear it is not four weeks
since this young lady showed herself more complaisant to me than was
reasonable; and yet I will not recognize her, but insult her in return
for her favors! Do I not always say, that ingratitude is the greatest of
vices, and no man would be ungrateful if he were not forgetful?"
We went into the inn; and nothing but the tippling, swarming crowd in
the ante-rooms stopped the invectives which he rattled off against
himself and his contemporaries. He was silent, and I hoped pacified,
when we stepped into an upper chamber, where we found a young man pacing
up and down alone, whom the captain saluted by name. I was pleased to
become acquainted with him; for the old fellow had said much good of him
to me, and had told me that this young man, being employed in the war-
bureau, had often disinterestedly done him very good service when the
pensions were stopped. I was glad that the conversation took a general
turn; and, while we were carrying it on, we drank a bottle of wine. But
here, unluckily, another infirmity which my knight had in common with
obstinate men developed itself. For as, on the whole, he could not get
rid of that fixed notion; so did he stick fast to a disagreeable
impression of the moment, and suffer his feelings to run on without
moderation. His last vexation about himself had not yet died away; and
now was added something new, although of quite a different kind. He had
not long cast his eyes here and there before he noticed on the table a
double portion of coffee, and two cups, and might besides, being a man
of gallantry, have traced some other indication that the young man had
not been so solitary all the time. And scarcely had the conjecture
arisen in his mind, and ripened into a probability, that the pretty girl
had been paying a visit here, than the most outrageous jealousy added
itself to that first vexation, so as completely to perplex him.
Now, before I could suspect any thing,--for I had hitherto been
conversing quite harmlessly with the young man,--the captain, in an
unpleasant tone, which I well knew, began to be satirical about the pair
of cups, and about this and that. The young man, surprised, tried to
turn it off pleasantly and sensibly, as is the custom among men of good
breeding: but the old fellow continued to be unmercifully rude; so that
there was nothing left for the other to do but to seize his hat and
cane, and at his departure to leave behind him a pretty unequivocal
challenge. The fury of the captain now burst out the more vehemently, as
he had in the interim drunk another bottle of wine almost by himself. He
struck the table with his fist, and cried more than once, "I will strike
him dead!" It was not, however, meant quite so badly as it sounded; for
he often used this phrase when any one opposed or otherwise displeased
him. Just as unexpectedly the business grew worse on our return; for I
had the want of foresight to represent to him his ingratitude towards
the young man, and to remind him how strongly he had praised to me the
ready obligingness of this official person. No! such rage of a man
against himself I never saw again: it was the most passionate conclusion
to that beginning to which the pretty girl had given occasion. Here I
saw sorrow and repentance carried into caricature, and, as all passion
supplies the place of genius, to a point really genius-like. He then
went over all the incidents of our afternoon ramble again, employed them
rhetorically for his own self-reproach, brought up the old witch at last
before him once more, and perplexed himself to such a degree, that I
could not help fearing he would throw himself into the Rhine. Could I
have been sure of fishing him out again quickly, like Mentor his
Telemachus, he might have made the leap; and I should have brought him
home cooled down for this occasion.
I immediately confided the affair to Lerse; and we went the next morning
to the young man, whom my friend in his dry way set laughing. We agreed
to bring about an accidental meeting, where a reconciliation should take
place of itself. The drollest thing about it was, that this time the
captain, too, had slept off his rudeness, and found himself ready to
apologize to the young man, to whom petty quarrels were of some
consequence. All was arranged in one morning; and, as the affair had not
been kept quite secret, I did not escape the jokes of my friends, who
might have foretold me, from their own experience, how troublesome the
friendship of the captain could become upon occasion.
But now, while I am thinking what should be imparted next, there comes
again into my thoughts, by a strange play of memory, that reverend
minster-building, to which in those days I devoted particular attention,
and which, in general, constantly presents itself to the eye, both in
the city and in the country.
The more I considered the /façade/, the more was that first
impression strengthened and developed, that here the sublime has entered
into alliance with the pleasing. If the vast, when it appears as a mass
before us, is not to terrify; if it is not to confuse, when we seek to
investigate its details,--it must enter into an unnatural, apparently
impossible, connection, it must associate to itself the pleasing. But
now, since it will be impossible for us to speak of the impression of
the minster except by considering both these incompatible qualities as
united, so do we already see, from this, in what high value we must hold
this ancient monument; and we begin in earnest to describe how such
contradictory elements could peaceably interpenetrate and unite
themselves.
First of all, without thinking of the towers, we devote out
considerations to the /façade/ alone, which powerfully strikes the
eye as an upright, oblong parallelogram. If we approach it at twilight,
in the moonshine, on a starlight night, when the parts appear more or
less indistinct and at last disappear, we see only a colossal wall, the
height of which bears an advantageous proportion to the breadth. If we
view it by day, and by the power of the mind abstract from the details,
we recognize the front of a building which not only encloses the space
within, but also covers much in its vicinity. The openings of this
monstrous surface point to internal necessities, and according to these
we can at once divide it into nine compartments. The great middle door,
which opens into the nave of the church, first meets the eye. On both
sides of it lie two smaller ones, belonging to the cross-ways. Over the
chief door our glance falls upon the wheel-shaped window, which is to
spread an awe-inspiring light within the church and its vaulted arches.
At its sides appear two large, perpendicular, oblong openings, which
form a striking contrast with the middle one, and indicate that they
belong to the base of the rising towers. In the third story are three
openings in a row, which are designed for belfries and other church
necessities. Above them one sees the whole horizontally closed by the
balustrade of the gallery, instead of a cornice. These nine spaces
described are supported, enclosed, and separated into three great
perpendicular divisions by four pillars rising up from the ground.
Now, as it cannot be denied that there is in the whole mass a fine
proportion of height to breadth, so also in the details it maintains a
somewhat uniform lightness by means of these pillars and the narrow
compartments between them.