Chapter XVII: Part THE SECOND (7)

Now I might perhaps have reconciled myself to this style also, as my feelings, like my judgment, did not readily reject anything entirely; but the subject was excessively revolting to me. These pictures contained the history of Jason, Medea, and Creusa, and therefore an example of the most unhappy marriage. To the left of the throne was seen the bride struggling with the most horrible death, surrounded by persons full of sympathizing woe; to the right was the father, horrified at the murdered babes before his feet; whilst the Fury, in her dragon-car, drove along into the air. And that the horrible and atrocious should not lack something absurd, the white tail of that magic bull flourished out on the right-hand from behind the red velvet of the gold-embroidered back of the throne, while the fire-spitting beast himself, and the Jason who was fighting with him, were completely covered by the sumptuous drapery.

Here all the maxims which I had made my own in Oeser's school were stirring within my bosom. It was without proper selection and judgment, to begin with, that Christ and the apostles were brought into the side-halls of a nuptial building, and doubtless the size of the chambers had guided the royal tapestry-keeper. This, however, I willingly forgave, because it had turned out so much to my advantage; but a blunder like that in the grand saloon put me altogether out of my self-possession, and with animation and vehemence I called on my comrades to witness such a crime against taste and feeling. "What!" cried I, without regarding the bystanders, "is it permitted so thoughtlessly to place before the eyes of a young queen, at her first setting foot in her dominions, the representation of the most horrible marriage that perhaps was ever consummated! Is there then among the French architects, decorators, upholsterers, not a single man who understands that pictures represent something, that pictures work upon the mind and feelings, that they make impressions, that they excite forebodings! It is just the same as if they had sent the most ghastly spectre to meet this beauteous and pleasure-loving lady at the very frontiers!" I know not what I said besides; enough, my comrades tried to quiet me and to remove me out of the house, that there might be no offence. They then assured me that it was not everybody's concern to look for significance in pictures; that to themselves, at least, nothing of the sort would have occurred, while the whole population of Strasburg and the vicinity which was to throng thither, would no more take such crotchets into their heads than the queen herself and her court.

I yet remember well the beauteous and lofty mien, as cheerful as it was imposing, of this youthful lady. Perfectly visible to us all in her glass carriage, she seemed to be jesting with her female attendants, in familiar conversation, about the throng that poured forth to meet her train. In the evening we roamed through the streets to look at the various illuminated buildings, but especially the glowing spire of the minster, with which, both near and in the distance, we could not sufficiently feast our eyes.

The queen pursued her way; the country people dispersed, and the city was soon quiet as ever. Before the queen's arrival, the very rational regulation had been made, that no deformed persons, no cripples nor disgusting invalids, should show themselves on her route. People joked about this, and I made a little French poem in which I compared the advent of Christ, who seemed to wander upon the world particularly on account of the sick and the lame, with the arrival of the queen, who scared these unfortunates away. My friends let it pass; a Frenchman, on the contrary, who lived with us, criticised the language and metre very unmercifully, although, as it seemed, with too much foundation, and I do not remember that I ever made a French poem afterwards.

[Side-note: Dreadful Accident at Paris.]

Scarcely had the news of the queen's happy arrival rung from the capital, than it was followed by the horrible intelligence that, owing to an oversight of the police during the festal fireworks, an infinite number of persons, with horses and carriages, had been destroyed in a street obstructed by building materials, and that the city, in the midst of the nuptial solemnities, had been plunged into mourning and sorrow. They attempted to conceal the extent of the misfortune, both from the young royal pair and from the world, by burying the dead in secret, so that many families were convinced only by the ceaseless absence of their members that they, too, had been swept off by this awful event. That, on this occasion, those ghastly figures in the grand saloon again came vividly before my mind, I need scarcely mention; for every one knows how powerful certain moral impressions are, when they embody themselves, as it were, in those of the senses.

This occurrence was, however, destined moreover to place my friends in anxiety and trouble by means of a prank in which I indulged. Among us young people who had been at Leipzig, there had been maintained ever afterwards a certain itch for imposing on and in some way mystifying one another. With this wanton love of mischief I wrote to a friend in Frankfort (he was the one who had amplified my poem on the cake-baker Hendel, applied it to _Medon_, and caused its general circulation), a letter dated from Versailles, in which I informed him of my happy arrival there, my participation in the solemnities, and other things of the kind, but at the same time enjoined the strictest secrecy. I must here remark that, from the time of that trick which had caused us so much annoyance, our little Leipzig society had accustomed itself to persecute him from time to time with mystifications, and this especially as he was the drollest man in the world, and was never more amiable than when he was discovering the cheat into which he had deliberately been led. Shortly after I had written this letter, I went on a little journey and remained absent about a fortnight. Meanwhile the news of that disaster had reached Frankfort; my friend believed me in Paris, and his affection led him to apprehend that I might have been involved in the calamity. He inquired of my parents and other persons to whom I was accustomed to write, whether any letters had arrived, and as it was just at the time when my journey kept me from sending any, they were altogether wanting. He went about in the greatest uneasiness, and at last told the matter in confidence to our nearest friends, who were now in equal anxiety. Fortunately this conjecture did not reach my parents until a letter had arrived, announcing my return to Strasburg. My young friends were satisfied to learn that I was alive, but remained firmly convinced that I had been at Paris in the interim. The affectionate intelligence of the solicitude they had felt on my account affected me so much that I vowed to leave off such tricks for ever, but, unfortunately, I have often since allowed myself to be guilty of something similar. Real life frequently loses its brilliancy to such a degree, that one is many a time forced to polish it up again with the varnish of fiction.

This mighty stream of courtly magnificence had now flowed by, and had left in me no other longing than after those tapestries of Raffaelle, which I would willingly have gazed at, revered, nay, adored, every day and every hour. Fortunately, my passionate endeavours succeeded in interesting several persons of consequence in them, so that they were taken down and packed up as late as possible. We now gave ourselves up again to our quiet, easy routine of the university and society, and in the latter the Actuary Salzmann, president of our table, continued to be the general pedagogue. His intelligence, complaisance, and dignity, which he always contrived to maintain amid all the jests, and often even in the little extravagances which he allowed us, made him beloved and respected by the whole company, and I could mention but few instances where he showed his serious displeasure, or interposed with authority in little quarrels and disputes. Yet among them all I was the one who most attached myself to him, and he was not less inclined to converse with me, as he found me more variously accomplished than the others, and not so one-sided in judgment. I also followed his directions in external matters, so that he could, without hesitation, publicly acknowledge me as his companion and comrade: for although he only filled an office which seems to be of little influence, he administered it in a manner which redounded to his highest honour. He was actuary to the Court of Wards (_Pupillen-Collegium_), and there, indeed, like the perpetual secretary of an university, he had, properly speaking, the management of affairs in his own hands. Now as he had conducted this business with the greatest exactness for many years, there was no family, from the first to the last, which did not owe him its gratitude; as indeed scarcely any one in the whole administration of government can earn more blessings or more curses than one who takes charge of the orphans, or, on the contrary, squanders or suffers to be squandered their property and goods.

[Side-note: Strasburg Manners.]

The Strasburgers are passionate walkers, and they have a good right to be so. Let one turn one's steps as one will, one finds pleasure-grounds, partly natural, partly adorned by art in ancient and modern times, all of them visited and enjoyed by a cheerful, merry little people. But what made the sight of a great number of pedestrians still more agreeable here than in other places, was the various costume of the fair sex. The middle class of city girls yet retained the hair twisted up and secured by a large pin; as well as a certain close style of dress, in which anything like a train would have been unbecoming; and the pleasant part of it was, that this costume did not differ violently according to the rank of the wearer; for there were still some families of opulence and distinction, who would not permit their daughters to deviate from this costume. The rest followed the French fashion, and this party made some proselytes every year. Salzmann had many acquaintances and an entrance everywhere; a very pleasant circumstance for his companion, especially in summer, for good company and refreshment were found in all the public gardens far and near, and more than one invitation for this or that pleasant day was received. On one such occasion I found an opportunity to recommend myself very rapidly to a family which I was visiting for only the second time. We were invited, and arrived at the appointed hour. The company was not large; some played and some walked as usual. Afterwards, when they were to go to supper, I saw our hostess and her sister speaking to each other with animation, and as if in a peculiar embarrassment. I accosted them and said: "I have indeed no right, ladies, to force myself into your secrets; but perhaps I may be able to give you good council, or even to serve you." Upon this they disclosed to me their painful dilemma: namely, that they had invited twelve persons to table, and that just at that moment a relation had returned from a journey, who now, as the thirteenth, would be a fatal _memento mori_, if not for himself, yet certainly for some of the guests. "The case is very easily mended," replied I; "permit me to take my leave, and stipulate for indemnification." As they were persons of consequence and good-breeding, they would by no means allow this, but sent about in the neighbourhood to find a fourteenth. I suffered them to do so, yet when I saw the servant coming in at the garden-gate without having effected his errand, I stole away and spent my evening pleasantly under the old linden-trees of the Wanzenau. That this self-denial was richly repaid me was a very natural consequence.

A certain kind of general society is not to be thought of without card-playing. Salzmann renewed the good instructions of Madame Böhme, and I was the more docile as I had really seen that by this little sacrifice, if it be one, one may procure oneself much pleasure, and even a greater freedom in society than one would otherwise enjoy. The old piquet, which had gone to sleep, was again looked out; I learned whist; I made myself, according to the directions of my Mentor, a card-purse, which was to remain untouched under all circumstances; and I now found opportunity to spend most of my evenings with my friend in the best circles, where, for the most part, they wished me well, and pardoned many a little irregularity, to which, nevertheless, my friend, though kindly enough, used to call my attention.

But that I might experience symbolically how much one, even in externals, has to adapt oneself to society, and direct oneself according to it, I was compelled to something which seemed to me the most disagreeable thing in the world. I had really very fine hair, but my Strasburg hair-dresser at once assured me that it was cut much too short behind, and that it would be impossible to make a _frizure_ of it in which I could show myself, since nothing but a few short curls in front were decreed lawful, and all the rest, from the crown, must be tied up in a queue or a hair-bag. Nothing was left but to put up with false hair till the natural growth was again restored according to the demands of the time. He promised me that nobody should ever remark this innocent cheat (against which I objected at first very earnestly), if I could resolve upon it immediately. He kept his word, and I was always looked upon as the young man who had the best and the best-dressed head of hair. But as I was obliged to remain thus propped up and powdered from early in the morning, and at the same time to take care not to betray my false ornament by heating myself or by violent motions, this restraint in fact contributed much to my behaving for a time more quietly and politely, and accustomed me to going with my hat under my arm, and consequently in shoes and stockings also; however I did not venture to neglect wearing understockings of fine leather, as a defence against the Rhine gnats, which, on the fine summer evenings, generally spread themselves over the meadows and gardens. If now, under these circumstances, a violent bodily motion was denied me, our social conversations certainly became more and more animated and impassioned; indeed they were the most interesting in which I had hitherto ever borne part.

[Side-note: Jung-Stilling]

With my way of feeling and thinking, it cost me nothing to let every one 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, everything 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 ardour was roused, which was very easily done. On learning to know him better, 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 an 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 the 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 he would do so. But because in his way of expressing himself he was like a somnambulist, whom one dare not call, lest he** should fall from his elevation, or like a gentle stream, to which one dare oppose nothing, lest it should foam, so was often constrained to feel uncomfortable in a more numerous company. His faith tolerated no doubt, and his conviction no jest. And if in friendly communication he was inexhaustible, everything came to a standstill with him when he suffered 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, and his faith in miracles, which was so useful to him, I left unmolested. Salzmann likewise behaved towards him with forbearance,--I say with forbearance, for Salzmann, in conformity with his character, his natural disposition, his age and 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 anything 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 honour and capacity understood each other, and were of the like persuasion, as well as of the same mode of life.

[Side-note: Lerse.]

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 dressed himself the neatest of us all, and yet always appeared in the same clothes; but he managed his wardrobe with the greatest care, kept everything 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 it always went ill with the maid 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 honourable 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.

[Side-note: Subjugation of Natural Antipathies.]

While now, by his constant humorous dryness, he continued always to remind us of what one owed to oneself 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 found myself 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 by a giddiness which came over me every time that 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 everything upon and above which one stands. It is exactly as if one saw oneself 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 tolerate the most repulsive sights, while I satisfied my thirst for knowledge. And thus I attended, also, the clinical course of the elder Doctor 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 sought to steel 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 scarcely force this, in any degree, by the strangest and most fearful images which I called up.

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 failings, 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 recognise 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-favourites. These were new subjects for my love of instructing myself, and very welcome ones to my pertness and youthful conceit. I observed everything 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 rumours, 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 neighbour; 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 anything 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.

[Side-note: Expulsion of the Jesuits.]

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 Prætor 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 favour 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.

[Side-note: The Knight of St. Louis.]

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 suffered myself to go on 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 used bitterly to 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, everything can be maintained when one permits oneself 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 blunted itself 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 favourite 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 humour, 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: "O 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 cannot 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 recognise her, but insult her in return for her favours! 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.

[Side-note: The Knight of St. Louis.]

Now before I could suspect anything, 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 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 connexion, 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.

[Side-note: Strasburg Minster.]

First of all, without thinking of the towers, we devote our 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 gaze on it by day, and by the power of the mind abstract from the details, we recognise the front of a building which not only incloses 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 one cannot deny to 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.

But if we keep to our abstraction, and imagine to ourselves this immense wall without ornaments, with firm buttresses, with the necessary openings in it, but only so far as necessity requires them, we even then must allow that these chief divisions are in good proportion: thus the whole will appear solemn and noble indeed, but always heavily unpleasant, and, being without ornament, unartistical. For a work of art, the whole of which is conceived in great, simple, harmonious parts, makes indeed a noble and dignified impression, but the peculiar enjoyment which the pleasing produces can only find place in the consonance of all developed details.

And it is precisely here that the building which we are examining satisfies us in the highest degree: for we see all the ornaments fully suited to every part which they adorn; they are subordinate to it, they seem to have grown out of it. Such a manifoldness always gives great pleasure, since it flows of its own accord from the suitable, and therefore at the same time awakens the feeling of unity. It is only in such cases that the execution is prized as the summit of art.

By such means, now, was a solid piece of masonry, an impenetrable wall, which had moreover to announce itself as the base of two heaven-high towers, made to appear to the eye as if resting on itself, consisting in itself, but at the same time light and adorned, and, though pierced through in a thousand places, to give the idea of indestructible firmness.

This riddle is solved in the happiest manner. The openings in the wall, its solid parts, the pillars, everything has its peculiar character, which proceeds from its particular destination; this communicates itself by degrees to the subdivisions; hence everything is adorned in proportionate taste, the great as well as the small is in the right place, and can be easily comprehended, and thus the pleasing presents itself in the vast. I would refer only to the doors sinking in perspective into the thickness of the wall, and adorned without end in their columns and pointed arches; to the window with its rose springing out of the round form, to the outline of its frame-work, as well as to the slender reedlike pillars of the perpendicular compartments. Let one represent to himself the pillars retreating step by step, accompanied by little, slender, light-pillared, pointed structures, likewise striving upwards, and furnished with canopies to shelter the images of the saints, and how at last every rib, every boss, seems like a flower-head and row of leaves, or some other natural object transformed into stone. One may compare, if not the building itself, yet representations of the whole and of its parts, for the purpose of reviewing and giving life to what I have said. It may seem exaggerated to many, for I myself, though transported into love for this work at first sight, required a long time to make myself intimately acquainted with its value.

Having grown up among those who found fault with Gothic architecture, I cherished my aversion from the abundantly overloaded,complicated ornaments which, by their capriciousness, made a religious, gloomy character highly adverse. I strengthened myself in this repugnance, since I had only met with spiritless works of this kind, in which one could perceive neither good proportions nor a pure consistency. But here I thought I saw a new revelation of it, since what was objectionable by no means appeared, but the contrary opinion rather forced itself upon my mind.

[Side-note: Strasburg Minster.]

But the longer I looked and considered, I all the while thought I discovered yet greater merits beyond that which I have already mentioned. The right proportion of the larger divisions, the ornamental, as judicious as rich, even to the minutest, were found out; but now I recognised the connexion of these manifold ornaments amongst each other, the transition from one leading part to another, the enclosing of details, homogeneous indeed, but yet greatly varying in form, from the saint to the monster, from the leaf to the dental. The more I investigated, the more I was astonished; the more I amused and wearied myself with measuring and drawing, so much the more did my attachment increase, so that I spent much time, partly in studying what actually existed, partly in restoring, in my mind and on paper, what was wanting and unfinished, especially in the towers.

Since now I found that this building had been based on old German ground, and grown thus far in genuine German times, and that the name of the master, on his modest gravestone, was likewise of native sound and origin, I ventured, being incited by the worth of this work of art, to change the hitherto decried appellation of "Gothic architecture," and to claim it for our nation as "German architecture;" nor did I fail to bring my patriotic views to light, first orally, and afterwards in a little treatise, dedicated to the memory of Ervinus a Steinbach.

If my biographical narrative should come down to the epoch when the said sheet appeared in print, which Herder afterwards inserted in his pamphlet: _Von Deutscher Art und Kunst_, (_Of German Manner and Art_,) much more will be said on this weighty subject. But before I turn myself away from it this time, I will take the opportunity to vindicate the motto prefixed to the present volume, with those who may have entertained some doubt about it. I know indeed very well, that in opposition to this honest, hopeful old German saying: "Whatever one wishes in youth, one has abundance in old age!" many would quote contrary experience, and many trifling comments might be made; but much also is to be said in its favour, and I will explain my own thoughts on the matter.

Our wishes are presentiments of the capabilities which lie within us, and harbingers of that which we shall be in a condition to perform. Whatever we are able and would like to do, presents itself to our imagination, as without us and in the future; we feel a longing after that which we already possess in secret. Thus a passionate anticipating grasp changes the truly possible into a dreamed reality. Now if such a bias lies decidedly in our nature, then, with every step of our development will a part of the first wish be fulfilled--under favourable circumstances in the direct way, under unfavourable in the circuitous way, from which we always come back again to the other. Thus we see men by perseverance attain to earthly wealth; they surround themselves with riches, splendour, and external honour. Others strive yet more certainly after intellectual advantages, acquire for themselves a clear survey of things, a peacefulness of mind, and a certainty for the present and the future.