Prose Miscellanies 
 
 FROM 
 
 HEINRICH HEINE, 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 S. L. FLEISHMAN. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO. 
 
 1876. 
 
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1875, by 
 
 J. 13. LII'IMNCOTT & CO., 
 In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 
 
 ,« • .•.••« 
 
AsFs 
 mA /a3 
 
 TO 
 
 MY BELOVED AUNT, 
 MRS. REGINA BIERMAN. 
 
 39644 7 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 Introductory Sketch— Biographical and Critical . 9 
 "The Salon" — The Exhibition of Paintings in Paris, 
 
 1831 .51 
 
 The Memoirs of Herr Von Schnabelewopski . . S^ 
 On the History of Religion and Philosophy in Ger- 
 many 106 
 
 The Romantic School 156 
 
 The Suabian School 206 
 
 The Gods in Exile 216 
 
 Confessions 245 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 In making a selection of Heine's prose writings 
 for publication, the translator has been bewildered 
 by an embarrassment of riches. To give only these 
 few pages, while so many delightful passages are 
 omitted, is like culling a flower here and there, 
 while a whole garden of fragrant blossoms is left 
 untouched. A more witty, poetic, and enjoy- 
 able style cannot be found in the literature of any 
 country; and it is a matter of surprise that so few 
 of Heine's prose writings have been translated into 
 the English language. So far as I know, the only 
 prose translations hitherto published are ** Pictures 
 of Travel," by Mr. Leland, and "Scintillations," 
 by Mr. Stern, — both excellent versions ; the latter 
 notably so. The plan I have followed differs ma- 
 terially from that of either. Mr. Leland has trans- 
 lated the " Pictures of Travel" entire, thereby 
 including much matter of little interest to the 
 American reader. On the other hand, by giving 
 brief excerpts, as Mr. Stern does in the latter part 
 of his volume, there is left on the reader's mind an 
 
 7 
 
S PREFACE. 
 
 impression of abruptness and forced wit, as if Heine 
 were constantly attempting to be epigrammatic; 
 whereas, part of the greatest charm of Heine's 
 style are the flashes of wit and humor, touches 
 of pathos, profound philosophical thoughts, beau- 
 tiful word-pictures, stinging sarcasms, — all linked 
 together by the most natural and ingenious gra- 
 dations. Of all writers, Heine most abounds in 
 startling surprises, paradoxes, and anticlimaxes; 
 yet such is his marvelous skill of combination that 
 amid all his extravagant fancies nothing seems 
 forced or unreal. No writer better bears being 
 quoted in brief, witty excerpts ; yet none loses 
 more by such treatment. To quote Heine's epi- 
 grams apart from their connections is like tearing 
 the jewel from its setting, the picture from its 
 frame. I have adopted a middle course between 
 the methods of Mr. Leland and Mr. Stern, and 
 shall therefore use Heine's own forms and ar- 
 rangement so far as may be necessary to enable 
 the readtr to follow his train of thought. About 
 twenty-five pages of my selections have already 
 appeared in the "Scintillations;" but I was com- 
 pelled to retain them in order to preserve an intel- 
 ligible connection. 
 
 Pittsburgh, September, 1875. 
 
INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL 
 
 HEINRICH HEINE* 
 
 For a correct understanding of the character and 
 influence of Heine's writings, a knowledge of his life 
 and surroundings is requisite. Heinrich Heine was 
 born in the city of Dusseldorf, on the 13th of De- 
 cember, 1799. Some biographers state the date to be 
 January i, 1800, probably misled by Heine's witticism 
 that he was born on the new year's eve of the year 
 1800, and was, therefore, "one of the first men of the 
 century." His name was originally Harry, which in 
 later years he changed to Heinrich. 
 
 His boyhood days were spent amid the tumults and 
 commotions of the Napoleonic wars. The rise and 
 progress of the French Revolution, the bloody excesses 
 of the Reign of Terror, the brilliant victories of the 
 
 * In compiling this sketch of Heine I have closely followed the ac- 
 count of Strodtmann, the able and sympathetic biographer of Heine. 
 In fact, the biographical and anecdotical portion of this sketch may be 
 considered as merely a translation and condensation of Strodtmann's 
 " Heine's Leben und Werken." — Translator. 
 
 2 9 
 
lO INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 young Napoleon, the establishment of the Directory, 
 the Empire,' — all these strange and startling events had 
 unsettled the minds of men ; none knew what to expect 
 next, and all were filled with the feverish unrest of ex- 
 pectation, either of hope or of dread. Then came wars 
 and invasions, victories and defeats, annexations and 
 abdications. The world seemed out of joint, and chaos 
 ruled supreme. 
 
 These stirring scenes must certainly have exercised 
 an important influence on Heine's after-years. Such 
 intimate intercourse as he had with the French, with 
 whom the country swarmed, together with his study of 
 the French language, must surely have impressed some- 
 thing of the lightness and grace of the French temper- 
 ament on the mind of the quick-witted lad, now in the 
 most impressible years of his youth. . Of his school- 
 days little is known save what may be gathered from the 
 recollections of his brother Max and from Heine's own 
 humorous account. He was first taught to read by his 
 mother, who seems to have been a woman of excellent 
 heart and sense, and of whom Heine always speaks with 
 great affection and respect. Next he attended a private 
 school, under the charge of a Jewish co-religionist. It 
 will be seen as we proceed in this sketch that Heine's 
 Jewish birth was a most potent influence in shaping his 
 career. In the parental home he was strictly required to 
 conform to the Jewish religious customs and laws. An 
 amusing story is told of the eight-year-old boy. One 
 S:itur(lay Heinrich was playing with several comrades 
 in the garden attached to a neighbor's dwelling; over 
 the garden-wall hung a vine, loaded down with luscious 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. u 
 
 grapes. The boys cast wistful glances towards them, 
 but, mindful of the Jewish prohibition, not to break 
 or tear anything on the Sabbath-day, they turned their 
 backs on the tempting fruit and continued their games. 
 But little Heinrich stood contemplatively gazing at the 
 purple bunches. Suddenly he approached quite near 
 to the wall, and with his mouth plucked off and ate the 
 grapes one by one. '* Oh, Heinrich !" cried his horri- 
 fied comrades, ''what have you done?" "Nothing 
 wrong," laughed the young rascal. "We are forbid- 
 den to pluck anything with the hand, but nothing is 
 said about the mouth." 
 
 All accounts agree that he was a wild, unruly boy, 
 and to manage him gave no little trouble to his parents. 
 As punishment, he was locked up in a hen-house ; but 
 this imprisonment soon failed to inspire fear, and Harry 
 managed to convert his place of confinement into a 
 place of amusement. He could imitate very naturally 
 the crowing of a cock, and was thus wont to set all the 
 poultry of the neighborhood in an uproar. The hen- 
 nery soon became a favorite resort for the children ; 
 and twenty years after, Heinrich dedicated to his sister 
 Charlotte the charming verses : 
 
 " My child, we once were children, 
 Two children gay and small ; 
 We crept into the hen-house, 
 And hid ourselves, heads and all. 
 
 " We clucked just like the poultry. 
 
 And when folks came by, you know — 
 Kickery-kee ! — they started, 
 And thought 'twas a real crow. 
 
12 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 " The chests which lay in our court-yard, 
 We papered so smooth and nice; 
 We thought they were splendid houses, 
 And lived in them, snug as mice. 
 
 " When the old cat of our neighbor 
 Dropped in for a social call, 
 We made her bows and courtesies, 
 And compliments and all. 
 
 "We asked of her health, and kindly 
 Inquired how all had sped : — 
 Since then, to many a tabby 
 The self-sajne things we've said. 
 
 •• And oft. like good old people. 
 We talked with sober tongue, 
 Declaring that all was better 
 
 In the days when we were young. 
 
 " How piety, faith, and true love 
 Had vanished quite away; 
 And how dear we found the coffee. 
 How scarce the money to-day. 
 
 " So all goes rolling onward, 
 The merry days of youth, — 
 Money, the world and its seasons, 
 And honesty, love, and truth."* 
 
 In his tenth year, he entered a school called the 
 Lyceum, and which was under the control of the Jesuits. 
 Heine always spoke kindly and gratefully of his Jesuit 
 teachers, espec ially of the rector Schallmeyer. It seems 
 that the latter urged Heine's mother to devote the 
 bright and promising lad to the service of the Catholic 
 Cluirch, which circumstance affords occasion to the 
 
 • From Leland's " Pictures of Travel." 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. j^ 
 
 poet, in his Confessions, for a highly humorous picture 
 of *'what might have been" had the rector Schall- 
 meyer's advice been adopted. In his *' Reisebilder" 
 he gives an equally amusing account of his school 
 studies : 
 
 '' The next day the world was again all in order, and 
 we had school as before, and things were got by heart 
 as before, — the Roman Emperors, chronology — the 
 nojnina in im, the verba irregularia — Greek, Hebrew, 
 geography, German, mental arithmetic — Lord ! my 
 head is still giddy with it ! — all must be thoroughly 
 learned. And much of it was eventually to my ad- 
 vantage. For had I not learned the Roman Emperors 
 by heart, it would subsequently have been a matter of 
 perfect indifference to me whether Niebuhr had or 
 had not proved that they never really existed. 
 
 '' But, oh ! the trouble I had at school with my learn- 
 ing to count ! — and it went even worse with the ready 
 reckoning. I understood best of all subtraction, and 
 for this I had a very practical rule, — 'Four can't be 
 taken from three, therefore I must borrow one;' — but I 
 advise all, in such a case, to borrow a few extra dollars, 
 for no one can tell what may happen. 
 
 '' But, oh ! the Latin ! — Madame, you can really have 
 no idea of what a mess it is. The Romans would never 
 have found time to conquer the world if they had been 
 obliged first to learn Latin. Lucky dogs ! they already 
 knew in their cradles the nouns ending in im, 
 
 *' The verba irregularia are distinguished from the 
 verbis regularibus by the fact that the boys in learning 
 them get more whippings. 
 
 2* 
 
14 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 " German I learned from Professor Schramm, a man 
 who had written a book on eternal peace, and in whose 
 class my school-fellows quarreled and fought with un- 
 usual vigor. 
 
 " I also did well in mythology, and took a real de- 
 light in the mob of gods and goddesses who ran so jolly 
 naked about the world. I do not believe that there was 
 a school-boy in ancient Rome who knew the principal 
 points of his catechism — that is, the loves of Venus — 
 better than I." 
 
 Maximilian Heine relates that their mother was de- 
 sirous that all her children should have a thorough 
 musical education, and selected the violin as Harry's 
 instrument. The tedious practicing required to master 
 this difficult instrument soon exhausted Harry's small 
 stock of patience, but he did not dare to gainsay his 
 mother's orders, and the latter, having no reason to 
 doubt Harry was making satisfactory progress, con- 
 tinued regularly to pay the teacher's monthly salary, and 
 so almost a year had elapsed, when it came to pass that 
 the mother was taking an airing in the garden just at the 
 hour of Harry's music-lesson. To her great satisfaction, 
 she heard the melodious tones of a well-played violin. 
 Delighted at the wonderful progress that her son had 
 made, the overjoyed mother hastened up-stairs to thank 
 the teacher for his great success. Imagine the mater- 
 nal dismay when she saw Harry comfortably stretched 
 on the sofa, while the teacher stood before the boy, 
 entertaining him by playing ! Then it came to light 
 that all the music-lessons had been of this nature, and 
 that Harry could not even play the scales correctly. 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 15 
 
 The unfaithful teacher was summarily dismissed, and 
 Harry was relieved from further musical instruction. 
 
 Among the first books read by Heine was a trans- 
 lation of ''Don Quixote." This book made a deep 
 impression on him, and he refers to it very often in 
 his various writings. 
 
 Swift's ''Gulliver's Travels" was also among his 
 favorite books, and "in after-years he discovered in 
 the fate of the giant, who caused so much trouble and 
 fear to the dwarfish inhabitants of Liliput, a picture of 
 the conflict which the banded coalitions of Europe 
 waged against the Corsican hero, who, even when a 
 prisoner on the rocky island of St. Helena, was a source 
 of continual anxiety to his conquerors." 
 
 In the year 181 1, and again in the month of May,- 
 181 2, Napoleon visited Dusseldorf; and never to be 
 forgotten was the impression which the sight of the 
 Emperor and his brilliant cortege made on the lad. 
 
 But the fortunes of the Emperor were soon to wane, 
 and finally to end sorrowfully and sadly in the dreary 
 solitude of St. Helena. The grand army was annihi- 
 lated amid the snow and ice of the Russian campaign. 
 Then Germany threw off the yoke which for so many 
 years had fretted the national pride and patriotism; 
 the war of liberation called into the ranks all the young 
 German manhood, and inspired them with a resistless 
 enthusiasm ; the bloody battles of Dresden and Leipsic 
 swept the tide of war across the Rhine, and over to 
 French soil, where the campaign of 18 14 sent the tot- 
 tering empire to the earth. The return from Elba 
 brought one brief flush of the olden glory, and then 
 
1 5 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 at Waterloo the sun of Napoleon set in a sea of red, 
 never to rise again. 
 
 For young Heine, whose boyish mind was filled with 
 romance-reading, these events possessed a thrilling and 
 sad interest, for he was an ardent admirer of Napoleon. 
 
 The Jews of Germany, as a class, were kindly dis- 
 posed towards Napoleon, for he had relieved their race 
 from the disabilities and unjust discriminations which 
 for centuries had weighed so heavily upon them. In 
 placing the Jews upon an equality with all others. Na- 
 poleon probably was not influenced by a sense of justice 
 alone, for he was in a chronic need of soldiers, and 
 by this politic measure of enfranchisement he gained 
 recruits for the conscription. 
 
 In the year 1S15, Heine was placed as clerk in the 
 office of a banker of Frankfort; but the position was 
 repugnant to him, and his stay in Frankfort lasted only 
 a few months. 
 
 From Frankfort Harry returned to the parental 
 home, where, after many family consultations, it was 
 decided, probably by the advice of his uncle, the rich 
 and benevolent banker, Solomon Heine, to send him 
 to Hamburg, to fit him for a mercantile career. This 
 was in 1817. In 1818 he opened a commission busi- 
 ness, of which little is known, save that the title was 
 "Harry Heine & Company," and that it went into 
 liciuidation in 1819. Heine seems to have formed a 
 most violent antipathy to the city of Hamburg, and he 
 lets no opportunity pass without launching at the de- 
 tested city and its inhabitants his fiercest shafts of scorn 
 and satire. This period of Heine's life seems to have 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. jy 
 
 been a very wretched one. Added to the annoyance 
 of an uncongenial occupation and money-troubles was 
 an unhappy love-affair, which inspired the poet's earli- 
 est published verses, all of which bear evidences of a 
 gloomy, despondent spirit. Little is known of Heine's 
 first love, as he was all his life studiously careful to 
 conceal her real name from even his most intimate 
 friends. That it was not a mere ephemeral affection, 
 invoked in after-years to kindle the flame of poetry, is 
 evidenced by the fervor and earnestness of those poems, 
 carrying conviction of their truth to every sympathetic 
 breast, and also by the deep emotion with which Heine 
 always mentions this sad episode of his youth. Even 
 during his last long illness, with the solemn shadow of 
 impending death upon him, the poet recurs to the love- 
 idyl of his boyhood's years. But he was soon to leave 
 the hated streets and domes of Hamburg. Harry's 
 family saw that he would accomplish no good in a 
 mercantile career, and his uncle, Solomon Heine, 
 agreed to defray the expense of a three-years course 
 at the university, stipulating, however, that Harry 
 should study jurisprudence. This involved the going 
 over to Christianity, for at that time the Jews were de-' 
 barred from all the liberal professions except medicine. 
 Late in the summer of 1S19 Heine commenced at- 
 tendance at the University of Bonn. During his stay 
 at Bonn Heine wrote many of the short poems and 
 sonnets afterwards gathered together in the "Book of 
 Songs." In fact, he paid more attention to the Muses 
 than to his law-studies; and it is supposed that this 
 circumstance, coming to the ears of his relatives, was 
 
1 8 INTR OD UC TOR V SKE TCH, 
 
 the cause of Harry's sudden retirement from Bonn and 
 transfer to the University of Gottingen. 
 
 At Gottingen, as at Bonn, Heine paid very little 
 attention to his law-studies, but he devoted himself with 
 enthusiasm to the study of German history and litera- 
 ture. But his sojourn at Gottingen was cut short by 
 a quarrel with a fellow-student, which nearly resulted 
 in a duel. The affair came to the knowledge of the 
 university authorities, and, as a punishment for send- 
 ing a challenge, Heine was suspended for six months. 
 
 In accordance with Heine's own wishes, his relatives 
 designated the university at Berlin as his next al?na 
 mater J and in February, 1821, he set out on his journey 
 to the Prussian capital. 
 
 To the young student, so suddenly transplanted from 
 the narrow domestic circle of his Jewish home and the 
 dry, pedantic life of a university town to the gayety 
 and terilliant display of a large city, it must have 
 seemed like the sudden transition of a fairy-tale; and 
 in his charming letters from Berlin he gives a naive 
 but interesting account of the impression made on him 
 by the constant succession of operas, concerts, theatres, 
 amateur theatricals, balls, masquerades, tea-parties, as- 
 semblies, etc. 
 
 He tells us that at this time all Berlin was wild with 
 enthusiiusm over the novels of Walter Scott: '*From 
 the countess down to the seamstress, from the count to 
 the errand-boy, — every one eagerly reads the romances 
 of the great Scottish novelist. Our tender-hearted 
 ladies in particular are quite enraptured over them : 
 they go to bed with Waverley and rise with Rob Roy." 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 19 
 
 Heine's favorite resort while in Berlin was the hos- 
 pitable mansion of Varnhagen von Ense and his gifted 
 wife Rahel. Their home in Berlin was the central 
 point where all the distinguished personages of the 
 day were wont to gather in pleasant literary and social 
 intercourse. Varnhagen and Rahel were the intimate 
 friends of Goethe, at that time the autocrat of German 
 literature ; at their house were to be met the Hum- 
 boldts, Friedrich von Schlegel, Ludwig Tieck, Fouque, 
 Schleiermacher, Fichte, Chamisso, and a host of other 
 celebrities. Rahel was quick to discern that Heine's 
 talents were of no ordinary kind, and with womanly 
 sympathy and excellent literary judgment she cheered 
 the young poet in the opening of his career, counseled 
 him wisely, and cleared many obstacles from his path. 
 
 Another favorite resort of the distinguished minds 
 of Berlin was the house of the poetess Elise von 
 Hohenstauffen, who hailed the youthful Heine as the 
 successor of Lord Byron, of whose genius she was an 
 enthusiastic admirer. 
 
 ''But not alone in the higher circles of Berlin so- 
 ciety did Heine learn the secrets of the world and life. 
 Other less formal gatherings had also their attractions 
 for him. Certain casinos and wine-cellars were at that 
 time the rendezvous for many young men of talent, 
 who there indulged in wild carouses. A pretty bru- 
 nette prepared and ladled out the punch, and was 
 rewarded with verses and kisses." 
 
 During this period Heine's law-studies were entirely 
 neglected, and he even pursued his poetical labors 
 rather desultorily. Strodtmann accounts for this as 
 
20 
 
 JNTR ODLCTORY SKE TCB, 
 
 follows: *'In the spring of 1821 Heine received the 
 tidings that she to whom his heart had clung with 
 such a passionate devotion through so many years of 
 changing hope and fear was now lost to him forever. 
 A wealthier suitor had won her hand." 
 
 It is perhaps not to be wondered at that a tempera- 
 ment such as Heine's should seek distraction wherever 
 it might, in social enjoyments and in mad revels and 
 excesses. But after a time poetry became again his 
 great consolation. From his wounded heart streamed 
 the most beautiful and touching love-poems the world 
 has ever known./ The savage irony with which he 
 seemed to mock at his own sufferings but added to the 
 effect. Were it unalloyed sentimentality, many a reader 
 would be tempted to make some cynic criticism ; but 
 the poet himself anticipates and disarms the critic. 
 Whether this ironic anticlimax be merely artistic de- 
 sign, or whether it be the savage irony of a deeply- 
 wounded and shamefully-betrayed heart, it were diffi- 
 cult to decide. Probably Heine himself did not know, 
 but wrote from an irresistible poetic impulse. 
 
 The almost constant burden of these early poems is 
 the sorrow of an unhappy love, told over and over 
 again, but always under new forms and robed in new 
 beauties. A lurid passion gleams through them which 
 every reader must perceive is beyond the power of mere 
 art. Every one must instinctively feel that the pen 
 which could infuse into the old and oft-repeated story 
 of unhappy love such irresistible pathos must have 
 been dijipcd in the author's own heart-blood. We feel 
 thai wc arc not being trifled with by some fanciful 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL, 2 1 
 
 coinage of the brain, but that these are verily the elo- 
 quent plaints of a poetic and suffering soul. These 
 pictures pf an intense, hopeless love are relieved from 
 their sombreness by their lovely frame-work of water, 
 earth, and sky, and, as we have already pointed out, 
 the sharp-pointed irony of the concluding lines pre- 
 vents the verses from degenerating into overdone sen- 
 timentality. Moreover, Heine had an excellent ear for 
 rhythm, and there is a charm in the harmonious metres 
 that strikes pleasantly on the cultured ear, like "sweet 
 bells played in tune." 
 
 In 1823, Heine's poems, which had hitherto only 
 appeared in magazines and literary journals, were first 
 published in book form, Heine receiving no pay, ex- 
 cept forty copies of the book. But, as Strodtmann says, 
 *' What young author would not joyfully and impa- 
 tiently have accepted such an opportunity to lead his 
 bark from the quiet inland waters and launch it upon 
 the broad ocean of immortality?" 
 
 The result of his first undertaking was very encour- 
 aging to the young poet, and he devoted himself with 
 renewed ardor and hopefulness to his career as author. 
 Poems, tragedies, critical articles, humorous sketches, 
 and letters followed one another in rapid succession. 
 Political questions were freely touched upon in the 
 various prose writings, some of them being woefully 
 mangled by the censor, a personage with whom Heine 
 was soon to come into frequent conflict. 
 
 A few words of explanation to the American reader 
 as to the nature of the censor's duties may not come 
 amiss, for in the history of German literature the 
 
 3 
 
22 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 censor plays a not unimportant role. We are told in 
 Spartan history that the midwives were instructed to 
 kill at birth all sickly and defornied infants, so that 
 the state should have only healthy men and women. 
 A similar office was in Germany assigned to the cen- 
 sors, who were to officiate as literary midwives at the 
 birth of printed thoughts, and to strangle such as the 
 governments might not wish to live. But the modern 
 German custom is generally the reverse of the Spartan, 
 and the weak and imbecile ideas were welcome to live, 
 while the strong virile thoughts, that might grow dan- 
 gerous to the rulers, were condemned to death. To 
 drop metaphor, all books, pamphlets, etc., were to be 
 submitted before publication to a censor appointed by 
 the state, and this censor was authorized to erase such 
 portions of a work as he in his sapiency might deem 
 unfit for publication. In some cases he might even 
 refuse the right of publication altogether. 
 
 The authors who, like Heine, were opposed to the 
 orthodox views in religion and to conservative opinions 
 in politics, were driven to their wits' end to frame their 
 language so as to convey directly or by implication 
 what they wished to say, and yet not fall within the 
 censor's interdict. Heine especially delighted in going 
 to the very border of the forbidden land; and the 
 public at large were highly amused at the ingenuity 
 and shrewdness by which the censor was outwitted. 
 
 In May, 1823, Heine paid a visit to Lilncburg, where 
 his parents were then residing. In the quiet of this 
 small town he expected to be able more calmly to ma- 
 ture the plans for his future, hoping also to gain respite 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 23 
 
 from the terrible nervous headaches with which he had 
 been afflicted for many years. Naturally of a very 
 excitable, nervous temperament, leading a wild and 
 dissipated life, with the wear and tear of literary pur- 
 suits, often harassed by money-troubles, all these made 
 their influences felt, and brought Heine often to the 
 very verge of distraction. About this period he wrote 
 to a frtend that he was '' troubled with headache eight 
 days out of the seven." 
 
 The quiet little city he describes as '* the home of 
 ennui." He also complains of the religious prejudice 
 existing almost everywhere against Jews: '* Even our 
 little dog is maltreated by the dogs of our Christian 
 neighbors," 
 
 For quite a while his headaches would not permit 
 him either to study or to compose ; but he paid much 
 attention to the studies of his sister and brothers. It 
 seems that Maximilian was quite expert in writing 
 verses in the hexameter metre, a form in which Harry 
 was never successful. He essayed it once, but, on scan- 
 ning a line, Max quickly detected that the hexameter 
 had only five feet. In vexation Harry threw the verses 
 aside. A few mornings afterwards he awakened Max 
 and related a wonderful dream that he had dreamed : 
 ''Just imagine what a horrible night I have passed! 
 Soon after midnight, just as I had fallen asleep, I felt a 
 weight on me as if the Alps were pressing me down : 
 that ill-fated hexameter, with five feet, came limping 
 to my bedside, and, with clamor and terrible threats, 
 demanded of me its sixth foot. Shylock himself did 
 not more obstinately exact his pound of flesh than did 
 
24 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 this impertinent hexameter insist upon its lacking foot. 
 It sustained its claim by quoting classic usage, and only 
 left upon condition that I should never more attempt 
 to write an hexameter." 
 
 In January, 1824, Heine returned to Gottingen, and 
 for over a year applied himself to his law-studies, passing 
 his examination in the spring of 1825. Before receiving 
 his final dij^loma, it was necessary that he should undergo 
 the ceremony of baptism. Concerning this step Heine 
 has freely expressed himself in his public writings and 
 private letters. He never concealed from himself the 
 full disgrace of his act, nor attempted to gloss over his 
 shame, as others in the same position sought to do. 
 Thus he writes to a friend : *' Do not try to view my 
 act in a favorable light. I assure you that the stealing 
 of silver spoons would have been less repugnant to me, 
 were not theft punishable by law." Then, in a more 
 cynic vein, he continues : " Last Saturday I visited the 
 synagogue, and had the pleasure of hearing an excel- 
 lent sermon preached against those mercenary Jews 
 who had permitted themselves to be baptized, forsaking 
 the religion of their fathers in the hope of office and 
 emolument." But although Heine spoke thus jestingly 
 of the public comments on his baptism, it is not to be 
 doubted that he felt the sting acutely. Nor did his 
 apostasy in the least benefit him financially or socially. 
 The Jews hated him as a mercenary apostate, and by 
 Christians he was still looked upon as one of that de- 
 spised race, — a Jew. He had sold himself, his honor, 
 his manhood, the respect of his friends and posterity, 
 and had been cheated out of the price ! All his bright 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 25 
 
 hopes of securing a fixed position and income turned 
 to Dead-Sea fruit. 
 
 With an apparent contradiction, which is neverthe- 
 less true to human nature, from this time Heine writes 
 in a more just and appreciative spirit of his fellow-Jews, 
 who have hitherto been so often the butt of his mock- 
 ery. He confesses that he has underrated and been 
 blind to many of the noble qualities of his race. ' ' How 
 deeply rooted is the legend of the 'Wandering Jew' ! 
 In the lonely forest-valley the mother tells the myste- 
 rious story to her awe-stricken children, and the fright- 
 ened little ones gather more closely around the hearth. 
 Without, all is darkness and night. Suddenly the sound 
 of the post-horn is heard, and Jewish peddlers ride by, 
 traveling to the Leipsic fair. But we, who are the 
 heroes of that fairy-tale, know it not." 
 
 In the fall of 1825 the *' Harz-Reise" was published. 
 Heine describes this work as a mixture of "word- 
 pictures of natural scenery, wit, poetry, and observa- 
 tions, after the manner of Washington Irving." The 
 "Harz-Reise" is generally considered one of Heine's 
 most successful works, and raised him high on the pin- 
 nacles of fame. 
 
 From this time forward his life was entirely devoted 
 to literary pursuits. In 1826 appeared his book " Le 
 Grand." 
 
 The eloquent praise of Napoleon, and the attacks on 
 the governments, the censors, the nobility, religion, 
 and the priesthood, all combined to make the book 
 very obnoxious to the rulers, and its sale and cir- 
 culation were forbidden in Hanover, Prussia, Austria, 
 3* 
 
26 INTRODUCTORY SA'ETCIT, 
 
 Mecklenburg, and many of the smaller of the German 
 States. All this only excited the curiosity of the pub- 
 lic, and, combined with the beauty and impassioned 
 fervor of Heine's poetical prose, the keen wit, the 
 droll humor, the touching pathos, insured for the book 
 wider attention, and for the author's talent a more 
 general recognition, than any of his previous works. 
 
 ** It was quite unnecessary for the governments to 
 place your book under the ban : it would have been 
 read without that," was the witty comment of Heine's 
 friend Moser. 
 
 His uncle, finding him determined to adopt a lite- 
 rary life, and no doubt gratified at his nephew's fame, 
 generously aided him, notwithstanding Heine's extrav- 
 agance and his insolent manner when called to account. 
 
 In the early part of 1827, Heine made a trip to 
 England, concerning which his brother Max relates 
 the following anecdote, which illustrates both Heine's 
 character and the relations which existed between him 
 and his uncle. The latter had already furnished him 
 with funds for his trip to England, when, before start- 
 ing, Heine suggested that, for appearance' sake, he 
 ouglit also to have a letter of credit on the Roth- 
 schilds. The good-natured uncle thought this not 
 amiss, and gave his nephew a letter of credit to the 
 amount of four hundred pounds, together with a letter 
 of introduction to Baron Rothschild. His last words 
 in parting were to caution his nephew not under any 
 circumstances to make use of the letter of credit, as it 
 was merely intended as a formality, to add weight to 
 the letter of introduction. But Heine was scarcely 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 V 
 
 twenty-four hours in London before he presented his 
 letter of credit and collected the four hundred pounds. 
 Then he accepted an invitation to dine with Baron 
 James Rothschild, the head of the firm. 
 
 The uncle, Solomon Heine, was one morning com- 
 placently sipping his coffee and smoking his long pipe, 
 meauAvhile reading the letters just received from Lon- 
 don. It was the first return mail since Heine's de- 
 parture, and contained a letter from Baron Rothschild, 
 speaking in very complimentary terms of his charming 
 nephew, whose acquaintance had afforded him much 
 pleasure, and also announcing that he had the honor 
 of paying to him the sum of four hundred pounds, as 
 per instructions. The pipe fell from Solomon Heine's 
 hand, and in a fury he excitedly paced the room, 
 inveighing against the spendthrift nephew, who was 
 ruining him by his extravagance. Heine's mother 
 wrote to her son, taking him severely to task for thus 
 abusing the confidence of his uncle and benefactor. 
 To this Heine replied, jestingly, ''All people are subject 
 to caprices. What my uncle gave while in good humor, 
 he might revoke in a fit of ill temper; he might have 
 taken it into his head to write by the next mail to 
 Rothschild that the letter of credit was only given for 
 form's sake, and was not to be cashed. The annals of 
 banking-houses are not without record of such cases. 
 As a prudent, provident man, it was my duty not to 
 run any risks. Verily, dear mother, my uncle himself 
 would never have become so rich had he not followed 
 the same rule." 
 
 On Heine's return there was a stormy scene, in 
 
28 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 which Heine haughtily told the astonished uncle that 
 "he ought to be proud of bearing the same name." 
 Notwithstanding his nephew's arrogance and extrava- 
 gance, Solomon Heine eventually forgave him, and 
 during his whole life generously furnished him with 
 money, and by his will secured to him a life pen- 
 sion. 
 
 In 1 82 7, Heine went to Munich as assistant editor 
 of the "Politische Annalen." Shortly after, he trav- 
 eled through Italy. In 1829 he returned to Germany, 
 and published his account of the trip from ''Munich 
 to Genoa," ''The Baths of Lucca," "The City of 
 Lucca," and "English Fragments." 
 
 His attacks on the various German governments had 
 for several years been growing more and more bitter; 
 so that towards the year 1830 he had good reason to 
 fear arrest and imprisonment for his political writings. 
 He was haunted with the idea that he was dogged by 
 spies. Then, too, his health, never very robust, seems 
 to have been still further undermined by the excite- 
 ments of such a life. All accounts agree that at this 
 period Heine was very wretched and low-spirited. 
 
 But an event was soon to take place that awoke him 
 from his lethargy and despondency. He was spending 
 the summer at Helgoland, when the news of the July 
 Revolution in France reached him. This event, which 
 startled Europe and made all the crowned heads trem- 
 ble on their thrones, exerted a most potent influence 
 on all of Heine's future career. In his Confessions 
 he gives a humorous account of his journey to Paris, 
 where he arrived on the 3d of May, 1831. In many 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 29 
 
 of his writings Heine has described in glowing terms 
 the wonderful impression made upon him by Paris and 
 the Parisians. Everything pleased him, and he was 
 soon as much at home in Paris as any born Parisian. 
 To one of his friends he writes, "If any one asks you 
 how I fare in Paris, tell the questioner that I feel like 
 a fish in water, or, rather, you may say that when one 
 fish meets another in the sea and inquires after its well- 
 being, the answer is, I feel like Heine in Paris." 
 
 Heine was amply provided with letters of introduc- 
 tion to the most distinguished literary men of Paris ; 
 but his fame had preceded him, and he was soon a 
 welcome guest in all the salons of Paris where wit and 
 genius were appreciated. He had made arrangements 
 with the publisher Cotta to be the Paris correspondent 
 of the •'* Augsburg Gazette." Soon after his arrival in 
 Paris he wrote a description of the Art Exhibition of 
 1 83 1, a great portion of which appears in this volume. 
 1832 was the terrible cholera year, when all who could 
 fled from the plague-stricken city. But in this period 
 which tried men's souls, a noble trait of Heine's char- 
 acter manifested itself. A son of his uncle and bene- 
 factor lay ill in Paris, and Heine remained faithfully 
 by his 'bedside, nursing and caring for him. With 
 dauntless composure he continued to write for the 
 "Augsburg Gazette" accounts of the terrible scenes 
 that were taking place around him. The horrors of that 
 period were never more eloquently or more touchingly 
 described. 
 
 His letters to the "Augsburg Gazette" attracted 
 much attention in Germany and in France, and the 
 
30 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 usual fate of him who strives to be fair and just towards 
 both parties now befell Heine. The conservatives 
 condemned him for his attacks on the monarchy and 
 for his praise of the virtue and integrity of many of 
 the republicans. On the other hand, the radicals were 
 wroth at him because he would not go full length with 
 them, and because he criticised severely many of their 
 extreme views. His moderation was misunderstood 
 and denounced. It was even charged that he was 
 secretly in the pay of the Austrian government. As 
 this charge was brought against him by a defaulting 
 Austrian merchant who had run away from his cred- 
 itors and who now came to Paris to play the role of a 
 political martyr, it evoked from Heine the witty retort, 
 **I am as little paid by the Austrians as the Austrians 
 are paid by you." 
 
 Gradually, however, Heine's letters became more 
 radical, and provoked the German governments to such 
 a degree that, on the 28th of June, 1S32, the German 
 Diet prohibited the circulation of all his past and future 
 writings, and issued warrants for his arrest should he 
 dare to set foot on German soil. This decree was 
 rigidly enforced, and Heine was compelled for a time 
 to abandon German journalism and to publish his 
 writings in France. 
 
 In 1833 appeared his work on "Religion and Phi- 
 losophy in Germany," and a review of " The Romantic 
 School." These two works together form what is 
 generally known as his book " De TAllemand." This 
 work was surreptitiously published and circulated in 
 Germany, and, we are told, "produced a perfect storm 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. ^I 
 
 of fury. Democrats, Pietists, Teutomaniacs, and state 
 officials united in denouncing it." 
 
 In swift succession followed letters to friends and to 
 newspapers, magazine articles, tales, essays, poems, art 
 criticisms, the most prominent of which are ''The 
 Florentine Nights;" ''The Memoirs of Herr von 
 Schnabelewopski ;" "The Rabbi of Bacharach ;" 
 " Elementargeister ;" " Ueber den Denunzianten ;" 
 " Der Schwaben-Spiegel ;" an article on Ludwig 
 Borne; a series of exquisite criticisms on French art, 
 drama, and literature, in the form of letters to August 
 Lewald ; " Shakspeare's Maids and Matrons ;" a criti- 
 cal article on "Don Quixote ;" and the poem of " Atta 
 Troll." 
 
 In 1840, Heine again became correspondent of the 
 "Augsburg Gazette," his various contributions to this 
 journal being afterwards collected under the title of 
 "Lutetia." The restrictions against his writings and 
 himself having been greatly relaxed, in 1843 ^"'^ made 
 a visit to Germany, chiefly for the purpose of visiting 
 his aged mother, for whom his affection seems never to 
 have wavered during his long and checkered career. 
 On his return to Paris he published a long poem en- 
 titled "Germany, a Winter's Tale." 
 
 We have in the earlier portion of this sketch spoken 
 of the headaches and terrible nervous attacks with 
 which Heine was so much troubled. He was never for 
 any long period free from his ailments. So early as 
 1833 he had a slight attack of paralysis in his hand, 
 and he frequently complained that his eyesight was fail- 
 ing. In 1847 ^^i*^ disease assailed him^n an aggravated 
 
32 
 
 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 form. Commencing with a paralysis of the left eye, it 
 extended presently to both eyes, and finally terminated 
 in paralysis and atrophy of the legs. One eye had lost 
 its sight entirely, and he was obliged to hold up the 
 eyelid of the other with his hand whenever he wished 
 to see. In 1848 he left the house for the last time. 
 His account of it is very pathetic: 
 
 ** It was in May, 1848, on the day when I last went 
 out, that I bade farewell to the sweet idol I had wor- 
 shiped in my happy days. With great labor I dragged 
 myself as far as the Louvre, and I nearly broke down 
 as I entered the lofty hall where the ever-blessed god- 
 dess of beauty, our beloved Lady of Milo, stands upon 
 her pedestal. I lay a long while at her feet, and wept 
 so bitterly that even the stone must have pitied me; and 
 the goddess did look compassionately down on me, but 
 with so little comfort that it seemed as if she would 
 say, * Dost thou not see that I have no arms, and there- 
 fore cannot help thee?' " 
 
 Now sadder and sadder grows our story. For eight 
 long years he was confined to his couch, scarcely able 
 to turn about, tortured by racking pains, with hardly 
 a breath of fresh air, with the constant hum of the busy 
 city torturing his sensitive nerves. Is it a wonder that 
 he longed for death to relieve him from his sorrows ? 
 Can anything be more touching than his account of his 
 long, weary waiting for death? 
 
 ** My body is so excessively shrunken that nothing 
 is left of me but mere voice, "and my bed reminds me 
 of the mcloilious grave of the enchanter Merlin, which 
 lies in the forc|»t of l-Jrozeliand, in Brittany, under- 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 33 
 
 neath high oaks, whose branches toss, like green flames, 
 towards heaven. x\h, I envy thee those trees and their 
 fresh waving, brother Merlin, for not one green leaf 
 rustles over my mattress-grave here in Paris, where 
 early and late I hear only the rumbling of carriages, 
 and a ceaseless hammering, scolding, and jingling of 
 pianos, — a grave without rest, death without the priv- 
 ilege of the dead, who have no bills to pay, no letters 
 and no books to write. This is a sorrowful case. My 
 measure was taken long ago for my coffin and for my 
 obituary, but I die so slowly that by this time it has 
 grown to be as tiresome to me as to my friends." 
 
 But in spite of his terrible sufferings, he bore them 
 with a courage and a cheerfulness which were truly 
 heroic. His wit and love of raillery seemed never to 
 forsake him, and between his writhings some jest or 
 bon-mot would flutter from his thin, bloodless lips. 
 During his long illness he was faithfully nursed by his 
 wife, Matilda. 
 
 "In his later years, Heine returned from unbounded 
 skepticism (if not to the evangelical faith, at least) to 
 theism. He had the Bible often read to him, and he 
 regarded it as a newly-discovered treasure. As he still 
 retained his love of paradox and mystification, the 
 real degree of his conversion became a subject of no 
 little controversy and comment," The Confessions, 
 which form part of this volume, and the following 
 quotation from the preface to " Romancero," will give 
 the reader some idea of Heine's manner of expressing 
 himself on this subject : 
 
 "When on his death-bed, one naturally becomes 
 4 
 
^. INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 tender-hearted and sentimental, and wishes to be at 
 peace with God and the world. I confess that many a 
 one have I scratched, many a one have I bitten, and I 
 was never a lamb. But, believe me, those lambs that 
 are so highly praised for their mildness and humility 
 would not bear themselves so meekly if they but pos- 
 sessed the tiger's teeth and claws. 
 ■ " I may take credit to myself for having seldom used 
 my natural weapons, and, since I myself need the mercy 
 of God, I have amnestied all my enemies. Many a 
 clever satire which I had directed against personages 
 of very high and of very low degree has been omitted 
 from this volume on that account, and poems that con- 
 tained the least irreverent allusion to the dear Lord 
 himself I have with anxious care committed to the 
 flames, for better that the verses should burn than their 
 author. 
 
 "Yes, I have made my peace alike with the Creator 
 and his creatures, to the great chagrin of my infidel 
 friends, who have reproached me for my backsliding 
 into the old superstitions, as they are pleased to call 
 my return to God. The whole priesthood of atheism 
 has anathematized me, and there are certain fanatical 
 priests of unbelief who would willingly have racked me 
 to make me confess my heresies. But, fortunately, they 
 can command no other instrument of torture than their 
 writings. 
 
 ''Yes, I have returned to God like the prodigal son, 
 after for a long time feeding swine with the Hegelians. 
 Was it my sufferings that led me back? Perhaps a less 
 paltry uiulivc. A divine homesickness fell upon me, 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 35 
 
 and impelled me onward, through the forests and ravines 
 and over the dizzy paths of dialectics. 
 
 *^ On the road I found the god of the pantheists, but 
 I had no use for him. This vague, mystical being, 
 which is interwoven and ingrown with the world itself, 
 is simply imprisoned therein, without power and with- 
 out volition. 
 
 ^'* * * When one yearns for a god that may be a 
 help and support, — and that is, after all, the main con- 
 sideration, — his personality, his existence as a some- 
 thing apart from and above the universe, his holy attri- 
 butes, his goodness, his omniscience, his justice, — all 
 these must be taken for granted. The immortality of the 
 soul, and the continuation of our existence after death, 
 are then thrown into the bargain, just as the butcher 
 gives gratis to his good customers a fine marrow-bone. 
 Such a marrow-bone is, in the French kitchen-language, 
 called la rejouissance, and it makes an excellent broth, 
 which to the poor languishing invalid is very palatable 
 and nourishing. • Surely every sympathetic person must 
 approve of my action in that I did not refuse such a 
 rejouissance, but that, on the contrary, I accepted it 
 with delight." 
 
 With the inevitable mixture of pathos and humor he 
 bids farewell to the world : "You seem to be grieved 
 that I must say to you, Vale. You are touched with 
 emotion, my dear reader, and precious pearls fall from 
 your little tear-sacks. But be comforted. We shall 
 meet again in a better world, where I hope to write 
 better books for you. * * * And now farewell. And 
 if I owe you anything, send me in your reckoning." 
 
36 
 
 INTRO DUCT OR V SKE TCH, 
 
 From the number of jests and bon-mots attributed to 
 Heine during his last illness, we cull a few of the most 
 striking. 
 
 A few days before his death, Berlioz called on him 
 just as a tiresome German professor was leaving his 
 room, after having bored Heine with his dull conver- 
 sation, on which Heine remarked to Berlioz, *'I am 
 afraid you will find me very stupid, my dear fellow. 
 The fact is, I have just been exchanging thoughts with 
 
 Dr. ." On being asked Avhy for so many years 
 
 he had continually made a certain Massmann the butt 
 of his ridicule, he replied, "Believe me, I am an old 
 man. I can no longer call up new fools at pleasure, 
 but must content myself with living on the old. Mass- 
 mann is a profitable fool for me, and out of his folly 
 I coin my revenue." Again he says, **I would have 
 liked to die in Germany, and would probably have had 
 myself transjjorted there, but what would my poor wife 
 do in Germany? It is very sad. I am not at home 
 here, nor would she be in Germany.* I know that I 
 shall never arise from this couch. The play is ended. 
 I am just at the age when a German author ought to 
 die. How they will ])raise me when they hear I am 
 dead ! Instead of the rotten apples with which they 
 have been pelting me all along, they will throw to me 
 nothing but bunches of flowers and wreaths of laurels. 
 My publisher will be glad, too, when he hears that 
 I have exchanged the painful grave of the Rue d'Am- 
 sterdam for that painless one in the church-yard at 
 Montmartre, for my death will profit him finan- 
 cially." 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 37 
 
 He read medical works relating to his disease, and 
 had acquired quite an extensive knowledge of med- 
 ical subjects. He was accustomed to remark, ironi- 
 cally, ^'that his studies would not be of much avail 
 to him, except that, perhaps, when he was translated 
 to the celestial regions, he might deliver lectures on 
 medicine, and explain to his audience how little earthly 
 physicians know of spinal diseases." 
 
 During his illness he wrote "The Gods in Exile," 
 ''The Faust Ballet," ''The Goddess Diana," "The 
 Confessions," his "Memoirs," and those wonderful 
 poems which form the "Romancero." 
 
 To the very last he kept his mother in ignorance of 
 his illness, and, althougli racked by tortures, all his 
 letters to her were written in a merry, cheerful vein, as 
 if naught existed to mar his happiness. He explained 
 that he had a slight weakness of the eyes, and that this 
 was his reason for employing an amanuensis. Surely 
 such a touching trait must show that Heine was not so 
 bad at heart as he has been represented. 
 
 On the 17th of February, 1856, death released him 
 from his sufferings. By his own desire, he was buried 
 in the Roman Catholic portion of the cemetery of 
 Montmartre, in order that his beloved wife might lie 
 by his side. He was buried early in the morning. 
 The weather was cold, damp, and foggy. The small- 
 ness of the attendance at his funeral would seem to 
 show that there was some truth in the saying that he 
 had "many admirers, but few friends." The only 
 persons of note who are recorded as having been 
 present are Mignet, Gautier, and Dumas. The at- 
 4* 
 
38 
 
 INTR OD UCTOR V SKE TCH, 
 
 tendance consisted chiefly of French and German 
 journalists and literary men. 
 
 There has been much speculation, and even angry 
 dispute, concerning the personal character of Heine. 
 According to Theophile Gautier, " Never was nature 
 composed of more varied elements. He was at once 
 gay and sad, skeptical and believing, tender and cruel, 
 sentimental and mocking, classic and romantic, Ger- 
 man and French, delicate and cynical, enthusiastic and 
 cold-blooded, — everything but tiresome." 
 
 These apparent contradictions in Heine's personal 
 character will help to explain the surprises, paradoxes, 
 and startling anticlimaxes with which his writings 
 abound, and which have been such a sore puzzle to 
 critics. His love of antithesis is one of the marked 
 features of his style. He delights in stirring the mind 
 of the reader with tragic emotion, deep pathos, beautiful 
 and elevated thoughts, simply to surprise him in the 
 concluding line with some terse cynic remark or quaint 
 humorous conceit totally out of harmony, as it would 
 seem at first thought, with what had preceded." ' Many 
 critics maintain that these anticlimaxes mar some of 
 his finest poems, and that they give the impression that 
 Heine is mocking both himself and his readers. 
 
 For the understanding of these apparent inconsist- 
 'encies, we must bear in mind that Heine was a man of 
 a most contradictory nature, — of two natures, so to say, 
 combined in one. His whole life is a record of seem- 
 ing contradictions. His fervid fancy and wild poetic 
 enthusiasm were tempered by sound practical common 
 sense. He has compared himself to Don Quixote. The 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 39 
 
 very fact that he could make such a comparison proves 
 that he was not a Don Quixote. True, he loved to 
 indulge in Utopian aspirations ; but none better than 
 he recognized the fact that many of the theories so 
 eloquently advocated by himself and other writers of 
 his school were impracticable in actual life ; and when 
 it came to putting these theories into practice, Heine 
 was among the first to expose with his wit and sar- 
 casm their inherent defects. We find him at times 
 an ardent democrat, inveighing bitterly and savagely 
 against kings and courts; then again directing his 
 keen ridicule against the rising democracy and social- 
 ism of France and Germany. We find him treating 
 of religious subjects with an irreverence and a levity 
 which, to the orthodox believer, are simply shocking; 
 then again we find in his writings passages which reveal 
 profound religious aspirations. At times he expresses 
 the most lofty views regarding life and duty; then 
 again he revels in a description of sensual pleasures. 
 Therefore, judged from the objective stand-point, the 
 charge of inconsistency seems well grounded ; but 
 when we remember that Heine was essentially a man 
 of moods, — a lyric poet giving expression to the emo- 
 tions and sentiments of the passing hour, — then we 
 shall recognize the fact that Heine was probably true 
 to himself, and expresses what were his real thoughts 
 at the time being. 
 
 His poetry has been compared to a beautiful rose 
 beneath which lurks the stinging thorn. None more 
 than Heine appreciated the beauty and the fragrance 
 of the rose, but he knew, alas, that the thorn also 
 
^O h\TRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 was there. His habit of looking at the two sides of 
 everything, — the bright and the dark, the poetical 
 and the prosaic, the strong voice and the weak echo, 
 the contrast between noble, exalted, ideal aspirations 
 and the disheartening shortcomings in actual life, — it 
 is this that embitters the life and writings of Heine. 
 The motto of his works might appropriately be, '^ Eat, 
 drink, and be merry, for to-morrow ye die." The 
 terrible "Thou shalt surely die," palls every pleasure. 
 
 For such a state of mind there is nothing but the 
 consolations of religion. Heine, with his poetic tem- 
 perament, keenly felt the need of religious belief. It 
 is a feeling of this need, and nothing but this, that 
 induces thousands, whose intellects revolt at theologi- 
 cal creeds, to cling to religion as does a drowning man 
 to a straw. Heine longed to believe, but could not. 
 Fortunate is he who has never experienced this feeling — 
 but he cannot understand Heine. He lacked faith, and 
 knew it. But his constant references to religious ques- 
 tions are evidence of a deep religious nature; they 
 show that he thought much on those subjects, and if 
 his course was an erroneous one, it was, at least, better 
 than indifference. Heine's course may be likened to 
 a destructive mountain-torrent, but indifference is a 
 stagnant, noxious pool. 
 
 It is difficult to convey to one not familiar with the 
 writings of Heine an adequate conception of his many- 
 sidedness. He has been compared to Aristophanes, 
 Rabelais, Cervantes, Voltaire, Beranger, Swift, Lau- 
 rence Sterne, Byron, Burns, and Jean Paul. This alone 
 will give an idea of his versatility. The resemblance 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. ^j 
 
 to Byron was pointed out early in Heine's career. The 
 likeness to Burns has not been so generally noticed. 
 
 The method of comparison is the most efficient yet 
 devised by critics; and by grouping this poetical trio 
 together we bring into clear relief certain of their 
 points of resemblance and of difference. Burns, By- ^ 
 ron, and Heine are the most eminent modern poets of 
 what we should call the egotistic or subjective school 
 as distinguished from the objective. These three are 
 the heroes, the central figures, of their own writings ; 
 their own lives and individual emotions form the bur- 
 den of their song. 
 
 Burns, from his early associations and natural tend- 
 encies, was the poet of the masses; in other words, 
 he was a democrat. This is evidenced by his choice 
 of topics, and by his sympathy with common folk, by ,Jl— 
 his wonderful insight into the natures of the poorer 
 and uncultured classes, and by his happy treatment of 
 the incidents of simple commonplace lives. Byron, 
 on the other hand, notwithstanding his eloquent rant- 
 ing in favor of freedom and equality, was essentially 
 an aristocratic poet. He studiously avoids the com- 
 monplace. In this respect Heine partakes of the 
 nature of both ; and notwithstanding his bitter diatribes 
 against Philistinism, he was yet essentially a representa- 
 tive of the middle classes, in so far that he steered a 
 middle course between the extremes of radicalism and 
 conservatism. His poetic and Utopian fancies were 
 generally moderated and held in check by that pru- 
 dence and practical common sense which is usually 
 considered the peculiar quality of the middle classes. 
 
A 2 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 Byron's Pegasus always gallops ; in sooth, it is some- 
 times a runaway steed. Burns's Pegasus ambles quietly 
 along, stopping to crop the fragrant grasses that grow 
 along the flower-decked roadside. But Heine's Pega- 
 sus goes through all the paces ; he can be as grand, 
 romantic, and picturesque as Byron, and as simple, un- 
 pretentious, and quaintly humorous as Burns. Heine's 
 sea-poems are as majestic as Byron's grand apostrophes 
 to the ocean, and yet in quite a different way. Byron's 
 magic pen brings before our mental vision nature in 
 its grandest and most awe-inspiring aspects, and makes 
 us recognize our own insignificance. Heine also im- 
 presses forcibly upon us a conception of the immen- 
 sity and grandeur of nature, but then the concluding 
 verse or line is always sure, by some droll anticlimax, 
 to wipe away the impression of awe. After portray- 
 ing Neptune, king of the waters, in all his wrath and 
 majesty, he steps up to him, as it were, and familiarly 
 places his hand on his shoulder, with a " hail fellow 
 well met." Byron gives us the impression of arti- 
 ficiality ; he is always either robed in picturesque garb 
 or is dressed for the parlor. Heine saunters by with 
 hands in pocket, or we see him in easy gown and 
 slippers. 
 
 The chief point of resemblance between Heine and 
 Burns is the easy and natural treatment of common- 
 place persons and things, investing them with poetic 
 grace and attractiveness, yet not lifting them out of the 
 realm of reality. This applies particularly to the man- 
 ner in which they picture the customs and religious 
 belief of the poor and lowly classes among whom they 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 43 
 
 had been reared. Burns did not share the religious 
 belief of the Scottish peasantry, nor Heine that of the 
 orthodox Israelites ; but with what true poetic insight 
 and touching fidelity have both Burns and Heine de- 
 scribed the homely piety and steadfast religious faith 
 of lowly humanity! What Burns's "Cotter's Satur- 
 day Night" has done for the Scottish peasantry, that 
 Heine has done for the humble and down-trodden of 
 his race, in the '' Princess Sabbath." In this beautiful 
 poem Heine describes the Jews' Friday night, their 
 Sabbath evening. During the whole week the poor 
 Jew has lived a dog's life, maltreated and despised by 
 all, subsisting on coarse food earned by the severest and 
 most degrading toil. But when Friday night comes 
 he lays aside the menial avocations of the week, the 
 filth and the dirt of his work-day life, and robes him- 
 self like a bridegroom to meet his bride. Then he 
 lights the lamps and candles, and chants the " Lecho 
 Dodee," and hails the Sabbath-day of rest as a beautiful 
 and beloved bride, — as the Princess Sabbath. 
 
 Heine's literary career may be divided into three 
 periods. The first extends from his boyhood and early 
 manhood to his removal to Paris in 1831 ; the second 
 extends from 1831 to 1848; the third, from the be- 
 ginning of his last illness to the time of his death in 
 1856. The fruits of the first period of his literary 
 activity comprise the '' Reisebilder," '' Buch der Lie- 
 der," ''Briefe aus Berlin," etc. The most marked 
 feature of the productions of this period is the lyric 
 and subjective character of the matter and treatment. 
 All seems to be the spontaneous expression of the poet's 
 
44 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH^ 
 
 nature. All is written without any particular aim or 
 purpose, just as the bird sings, — it knows not why; and 
 just as the bird's song pleases, just as the murmur of 
 the mountain-stream, the rustling of the wind among 
 the trees, make melodious music to the ear, just as a 
 beautiful landscape, a glowing sunset, give pleasure to 
 the eye, — so does the poetry of Heine's verse and prose 
 charm and fascinate. 
 
 But, after his removal to Paris, Heine took a warm 
 interest in the social and political questions of the day, 
 and by his bold and impartial criticism of the contend- 
 ing parties, each of which in turn felt the lash of his 
 stinging satire, he provoked general hostility, and was 
 almost incessantly engaged in bitter literary warfares. 
 He became a politician, a journalist, a polemic, an 
 art-critic, an historian ; but all that he wrote was for 
 a purpose. He wrote "for or against something; for 
 or against an idea\ for or against a party." 
 
 The writings of this period are the most poetical 
 prose in literature, but for the time he ceased to be 
 chiefly and pre-eminently a lyric poet. For lyric 
 poetry, such as we find in Heine's earlier productions, 
 this busy, bustling, disputatious life was uncongenial. 
 Heine felt this, and in his preface to "The Salon," 
 standing on the threshold of that life, he bids an elo- 
 quent "farewell to the novels and comedies which I 
 once so prettily began, but which will now scarcely 
 soon be completed." 
 
 Heine's earlier poetry is as the limpid waters of a 
 beautiful river, sliowing, it is true, signs of the angry 
 passions and strifes of men, but it is as the Rhine shows 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 45 
 
 mirrored in its bosom the ancient warlike castles. But 
 the life of Paris was as the vast and ever-changing sea, 
 — now and then tranquil and peaceful, but more often 
 agitated and stormy. 
 
 In Paris, Heine was a man of the world, taking part 
 in all its battles and strifes. But the time was to come 
 when, bankrupt in health and in purse, he was to quit 
 the gay and brilliant life of Paris. Although dwelling 
 in the very heart of the city, yet, shut up in his sick- 
 room, he no longer belonged to Paris or to the world. 
 Here, racked by pain, his chief consolations were *' his 
 French wife and his German muse." Poetry was again 
 his solace, and the beguiler of many sleepless nights. 
 
 When, twenty years before, he stood, young and 
 hopeful, at the threshold of that gay and busy Parisian 
 life, the coy lyric muse, affrighted at the tumult of the 
 noisy city, winged her flight to quieter scenes. But, lb ! 
 after many years, the world-famous author, the adored, 
 the supercilious, the reckless, is stricken down in the 
 midst of his glory. Paralysis stretches him low. On 
 a bed of pain and sickness he passes the weary hours, 
 longing, praying for death to relieve him from his ter- 
 rible agonies. Death comes not ; but the report of 
 the sufferings of her former favorite reaches the ears 
 of the lyric muse, and, lo ! what radiant figure stands 
 beside that humble bed? what gentle, loving form 
 bends over the pale, thin sleeper? It is the lyric 
 muse, — Heinrich Heine's first and only true love. 
 Sadly and pityingly she looks down upon the wasted 
 and prematurely aged features; tenderly she caresses 
 the white locks once so auburn ; with tear-dewed eyes 
 
 5 
 
46 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 she bends over the sleeper and impresses a loving kiss 
 upon his brow. The expression of pain disappears; a 
 smile, such as, alas ! had not for many a day been seen 
 there, plays over the sleeper's face. The walls of his 
 humble apartment in the Rue d' Amsterdam expand, 
 and disclose a verdant forest of German oaks. The 
 nightingales sing sweetly; he hears again the murmur 
 of his dear beloved Rhine ; he sees the romantic castles 
 silvered in the moonlight; he hears in the distance the 
 thunderous rolling of old ocean ; the scenes of home 
 again pass before the dreamer's vision ; he sees his 
 mother's aged form, who knows not that her son lies 
 ill and suffering; sadness mingles in his smile; he 
 awakes, and writes-ytthe Romancero. ' \ 
 
 How shall we describe that collection of wonderful 
 
 poems? *'It is the last free forest-song of Roman- 
 
 Viicism." 'And when tliat sweet, sad song ceases, and 
 
 ^ Vhe voice of the singer is mute in death, who that has 
 
 felt the charm of Heine's genius will refuse a kindly 
 
 *' Perturbed spirit, rest in peace" ? 
 
 Many and varied were his faults : we seek not to 
 palliate or defend them. Richly endowed by nature, 
 he did not always use his gifts wisely or well. This 
 perversion of his talents will always be a.bJot upon his 
 fame; his sin brings its own punishment. Gifted with 
 the most wonderful and versatile powers, — a clear insight 
 into men and things, a vivid imagination enabling \\\\\\ 
 to fill up the gaps of history and biography, a poetic 
 power and fervor that could clothe even the most hid- 
 j eons objects in robes of beauty and tenderness, a wjt 
 [ that fur sting has not its superior in any literature, 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. ^j 
 
 dramatic and descriptive powers of the very highest 
 order, — with such qualities he could not fail to acquire 
 a large circle of readersj And yet, although read with 
 delight by so many thousands, although his wit and 
 humor evoke laughter, and his pathos tears, at will, he 
 has failed to win a place in the world's affection or 
 respect like Lessing or Schiller. Nay, men of inferior 
 talent rank higher in this regard. 
 
 And we need not seek far for the reason : it is because 
 Heine lacks moral character. No amount of grace, or 
 talent, or genius will fill its place. Men require, nay, 
 long for noble teachings, for lofty and elevating 
 thoughts, such as they can feel are not cant, but the 
 sincere and earnest beliefs of truthful minds. We in- 
 stinctively feel that our passions and the multitudinous 
 temptations of life are sufficient to drag us down. In 
 our teachers we require the qualities that keep up the 
 average. We need no instructors to lower the standard : 
 the frailties of human nature suffice for that. In their 
 inmost hearts men want no easy religion ; and hence 
 fanaticism, no matter how severe the burden it lays on 
 the flesh, can command a sincere, unselfish following, 
 and the homage and respect of even unbelievers. 
 Hence the success of the self-sacrificing, self-denying 
 element of Christianity. With all his acuteness and 
 wonderful insight, Heine failed to recognize this phase 
 of Christianity. It succeeded, not, as Heine thought, 
 because it offered consolation and hope of future bliss 
 to suffering humanity, but because it said to debased, 
 sensual man, Come out of your self-indulgence and 
 debauchery. 
 
48 
 
 INTR OD UCTOR V SKE TCH, 
 
 Behind a lofty, self-denying doctrine put a loving 
 heart and a noble life, and you have the founder of 
 a successful religion. No religion that appeals to the 
 sensual and animal side of human nature can strike deep 
 root ; it may have many followers, but it will have few 
 real believers, and sooner or later men tire of playing the 
 hypocrite. Hence the doctrine of the enfranchisement 
 of the flesh, which was one of the cardinal points in the 
 new religion preached so eloquently, and with full sin- 
 cerity, by Heine and the Young Germany school, could 
 never have been more than temporarily successful. 
 
 The licentiousness of his writings is the chief reason 
 why Heine docs not hold the high rank in literature 
 to which his genius entitles him. In his Confessions 
 Heine says, *' Women should be trained to a religious 
 belief. Hence, freethinker as I was," he goes on to 
 say, "I never permitted irreligious or licentious con- 
 versation in the presence of my wife." In these words 
 Heine has spoken his own condemnation. His wit 
 and genius will always make him a welcome guest at 
 the social board, but he will never be received as a 
 trusty family friend into the sanctuary of heart and 
 home. 
 
 And yet, with all his faults, we cannot afford to miss 
 him from literature. While we have dwelt at some 
 length on the subject of the vital defect of his works, 
 — ''the worm i' the bud," — it would be doing Heine 
 gross injustice not to mention the manifold merits of 
 his writings, which, apart from their beauty of style and 
 fancy, entitle him to the praise of all liberal and cul- 
 tured minds. He, more than any of the other writers 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL. ^g 
 
 of that period, awoke the youth of Germany and 
 France to the dangers and ultramontane tendencies of 
 the reac tionary Romanticist school. He, more than 
 all otlTers, helped to overcome the baleful influence of 
 Goethe's example, and to shame the artists and poets 
 of that era from isolated art-lives and dreamy rhapso- 
 dies over the ancient rlas^ir^^ ii-ifo fnking p-'^r'' i^ the I 
 social and politTcar ag itations of their own times. ItJ 
 was Heine who first had the moraF courage^o tell the 
 truth concerni iig Germ an philosophy and its tenden- 
 cies, and to lay bare to criticism and light The secrets 
 which the philo sophe rs studiously draped in sc holastic 
 formulas a nd in an ambiguous coterie dialect^ It^was 
 Heine who first showed that art and music criticisms 
 might be made without using abstruse technical phrases, 
 and by his keen ridicule taught a wholesome lesson to 
 the critics whose explanations were less intelligible 
 than that which they sought to explain. It was Heine 
 who most loftily preached the doctrine of cosmopoli- 
 tanism, and who contributed so much to bring the 
 Germans and the French to a better understanding 
 and appreciation of each other. Other conspicuous 
 merits of Heine's writings are clearness of expression 
 and absence of mysticism, a wonderful insight with 
 regard to events of the past and of the future, beauti- 
 ful poetic fancies, apt and beautiful imagery. No poet 
 is more happy than he in the choice of similes; and 
 this is one of the first requisites of a popular writer. 
 The human mind demands both abstract and concrete 
 teachings, and that teaching is the most successful 
 which unites both. Hence the popular love, in all 
 
to INTRODUCTORY SKETCH. 
 
 ages, for poetry, the high office of which is to typify 
 exalted, elevating abstract thoughts in striking, pleas- 
 ing concrete images. All the great thinkers who have 
 had direct influence on the masses have had the power 
 of clothing their thoughts in appropriate imagery, so 
 as to bring them first to the physical eye of men, as it 
 were, and through that fix them more steadfastly on 
 the mind's eye. The vast influence which the Bible 
 has for so many centuries exerted on the public mind 
 is, to a great extent, the result of its intermingling and 
 interfusion of lofty moral teachings with pleasing para- 
 bles and symbols. \ 
 But why enumerate all Heine's claims to our admira- ^ ' 
 tion and gratitude ? ''A thing of beauty is a joy for- 
 ever;" and Heinrich Heine, who has given the world 
 so many beautiful thoughts, is entitled to ask that we 
 
 " Be to his virtues very kind, 
 And to his faults a httle bhnd." 
 
 In sooth, while often his deeds were inferior to his 
 words, yet not seldom he practiced better than he 
 preached. In judging him, we must remember that 
 the time and the circle into which he was thrown were 
 not a little to blame for the bent of his writings. We 
 must make allowance for the frailty of human nature, 
 and for the temptations which surround a young poet, 
 whose brain may be easily dazzled and turned by 
 sudden fame and success. 
 
PROSE MISCELLANIES, 
 
 FROM THE PREFACE TO "THE SALON." 
 
 * * * The sham pietists of all denominations 
 will heave many a piteous sigh over some of 
 the poems of this volume, but nothing can more 
 avail them. A new " rising generation" has com- 
 prehended that all my words and songs have 
 blossomed into life from a great, God-pleasing, 
 vernal thought, which, if not better, is at least as 
 respectable as that sombre, mouldy, Ash-Wednes- 
 day notion that has robbed our beautiful Europe 
 of its bloom and peopled it with spectres and 
 Tartuffes. 
 
 * * * People believe that our doing and striving 
 is mere idle caprice; that out of the store-house 
 of new ideas we select one for which to speak and 
 do, strive and suffer, somewhat as our linguists 
 formerly selected each his classic, to the com- 
 mentary of which he devoted his whole life. No; 
 we do not lay hold of the idea, but the idea lays 
 hold of us, and enslaves us, and lashes us into the 
 
 51 
 
52 
 
 FROM THE PREFACE TO 
 
 arena, that we, like captive gladiators, may battle 
 for it. We are not the masters, but the slaves, of 
 the word. 
 
 * * * It was not an idle whim of my heart 
 that I forsook all that was near and dear to me in 
 Germany, — for a few did love me, among them 
 my mother, — but I went, not knowing why. I 
 went because I must. 
 
 But after a while I grew weary and low-spirited. 
 Long before the revolution of July I had played 
 the role of prophet, until the internal flame had 
 almost consumed me, and my heart was faint with 
 the burden of its own mighty words. 
 
 And I thought, I am no longer needed, and 
 now I will live for myself, and write beautiful 
 poems, and will weave into comedies and novels 
 the pretty conceits and fantasies that have gath- 
 ered in my brain ; and I will quietly steal back 
 into the fairy-land of poesy, where I spent my 
 happy boyhood days. 
 
 I could not have selected a more suitable place 
 for carrying this resolution into effect. It was in 
 a small village of Normandy, situated on the sea- 
 coast near Havre-de-Grace. Wondrously lovely 
 was the spectacle of the mighty North Sea : ever 
 changing and yet ever simple was its aspect, — 
 to-day tempest-tossed, to-morrow tranquil and 
 peaceful. Overhead floated the white clouds, 
 weird and giant-like, as if they were the ghosts 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 53 
 
 of those ancient Normans who on these waters 
 had lived their wild and turbulent life. 
 
 * * * My surroundings were propitious. The 
 peaceful genius of poetry again began to hover 
 over me ; the noble, famihar forms and golden 
 pictures of long ago began again to dawn upon 
 me ; the olden magic, with its dreamy blissful- 
 ness, its fairy-like charm, began to work in me,' 
 and I needed but quietly to write down what I 
 felt and thought. 
 
 * * * But one day, on the road near Havre, 
 I suddenly came upon a passing train of country 
 wagons, loaded with all sorts of common trunks 
 and boxes, old-fashioned furniture, women and 
 children. The men walked alongside, and great 
 was my astonishment to hear them speak German. 
 I at once comprehended that they were emigrants, 
 and, as I observed them more closely, I felt a 
 sudden pang; for it was my fatherland itself that 
 thus confronted me. On those wagons sat blond 
 Germany, with its earnest blue eyes, its trustful, 
 too serious face. In former times I had often ridi- 
 culed and satirized the follies and philistinism of 
 my countrymen; but now, when I beheld them in 
 a foreign land, poverty-stricken and in misery, I 
 was touched by compassion, and I shook hands 
 with those German emigrants, as if in that hand- 
 clasp I made a new covenant of love with the 
 fatherland itself; and we conversed in our native 
 
54 
 
 FROM THE PREFACE TO 
 
 German tongue. They, too, were pleased to hear 
 the famih'ar sounds in a foreign land ; the shadow of 
 care disappeared from their features, and they almost 
 smiled. The women, among them some that were 
 quite pretty, called out a kindly "God be with 
 you!" the young lads, with bashful politeness, gave 
 their greetings; and even the little toothless babes 
 joined in the chorus. " And why have you left 
 Germany ?" I asked. " The land was goodly, and 
 we would gladly have stayed," they said ; " but the 
 oppressions of the rulers were too burdensome to 
 be lon":er borne." And the conclusion of their 
 recital was always, " What else could we do than 
 emigrate ? Should we begin a revolution ?" 
 
 A tenth part of what these people had borne in 
 Germany would, in France, have caused thirty-six 
 revolutions, and would have cost thirty-six kings 
 their crowns, together with their heads. 
 
 * * * The French cannot understand why the 
 Germans leave their fatherland ; for when the 
 French find the extortions of their rulers unendur- 
 able, perhaps only burdensome, they never think 
 of quitting the country, but they present their op- 
 pressors with their passports and chase them out 
 of the country, while they remain comfortably at 
 home. In a word, they begin a revolution. 
 
 * * * Patriotism is a very peculiar sentiment. 
 One may love his country and grow to four- 
 score without having been aware of that love; 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 55 
 
 but then we must have remained at home. Spring 
 is appreciated only in winter, and by the fireside 
 are written the best May songs. The love of lib- 
 erty is a flower of dungeon growth, and in cap- 
 tivity we first truly learn the blessings of freedom. 
 Thus a German's patriotism begins only when he 
 is across the German frontier, and particularly at 
 the sight of Germans in distress in a foreign land. 
 
 * * * Far into the depths of the night I stood 
 by the ocean and wept. I am not ashamed of those 
 tears. Achilles, too, wept by the ocean strand until 
 his silver-footed mother arose from the waves to 
 comfort him. I, too, heard a voice from among 
 the waters, but less consoling : on the contrary, it 
 was startling, imperious, and yet profoundly wise. 
 P'or the ocean knows everything : at night the 
 stars confide to it the most hidden secrets of the 
 firmament ; in its depths, among the fabulous long- 
 drowned empires, lie also the ancient long-for- 
 gotten lores of the earth ; at every coast it listens 
 with a thousand billowy eavesdropping ears ; and 
 the rivers that flow into it bring to it tidings gath- 
 ered in the most distant inland countries, even the 
 babble of the brooks and mountain-springs, which 
 they have overheard. 
 
 But when the ocean has revealed to you its 
 secrets, and has whispered into your heart the 
 mighty world-emancipating word, then farewell 
 repose ! farewell peaceful dreams ! 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 THE EXHIBITION OF PAINTINGS IN PARIS, 1831. 
 
 There they stood, side by side, in the picture- 
 gallery of the Louvre, about three thousand in 
 number, the beautiful pictures, the poor children 
 of art, on whom the multitude, busied with anxious 
 political and social cares, bestowed merely the alms 
 of hasty and indifferent glances. With silent sor- 
 row they pleaded for a little sympathy, and for a 
 nook in some small corner of the heart. But in 
 vain : each heart was filled with a brooding family 
 of its own thoughts, and had neither room nor 
 nourishment for these strangers. But that was 
 just what appealed so strongly to our sympathy. 
 The exposition of pictures resembled a foundling- 
 asylum, a collection of stray children, deserted 
 and thrown upon themselves, and none akin to 
 the others. It touched our soul like the sight of 
 youthful helplessness and unmerited misery. 
 
 * * * But how different was the emotion that 
 seized me at the very entrance of the gallery of 
 Italian paintings! These were not thrust out into 
 56 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 57 
 
 the cold world, like foundlings, but had been fos- 
 tered at the breast of one great, common mother, 
 and now, like one great family, spoke peacefully 
 and harmoniously, if not the same words, at least 
 the same language. 
 
 * * * The Catholic Church, which had once 
 been such a mother to all the arts, is herself now 
 poor and helpless. Now every painter paints each 
 for himself: the fashion of the day, the caprices 
 of the wealthy, his own whim and pleasure, sug- 
 gest the subject, the palette furnishes the most 
 gaudy colors, and the canvas is patient. In addi- 
 tion to this, the much-misunderstood Romanticism 
 is the rage, according to whose fundamental prin- 
 ciple each strives to paint totally different from the 
 rest, or, as it is called in the current phrase of the 
 day, " each gives vent to his individuality." What 
 pictures this style occasionally brings to light may 
 be easily surmised. 
 
 *• * * As the French certainly possess sound 
 judgment in matters of art, they have always been 
 quick to recognize that which has the merit of 
 true originality, as well as correct in detecting and 
 criticising defects. Out of the vast and varied 
 sea of pictures they could, therefore, with ease 
 select the genuine pearls. The painters whose 
 works were chiefly discussed and most extolled 
 were : A. Scheffer, H. Vernet, Delacroix, Decamps, 
 Lessore, Schnetz, Delarouche, and Robert. As a 
 
 6 
 
58 
 
 THE SALON. 
 
 conscientious art critic and correspondent, I shall 
 first notice the pictures of 
 
 A. SCHEFFER. 
 
 The Faust and Gretchen of this painter have 
 attracted general attention. One who has never 
 seen any o{ Scheffer's paintings will at once be 
 struck by his style, especially by the peculiarity 
 of his coloring. His enemies say that he paints 
 entirely with snuff and green soap. In how far 
 they wrong him, I am unable to say. His dark 
 colors are often an affectation, intended to produce 
 an effect after the manner of Rembrandt, in which, 
 however, they fail. His faces have generally that 
 dismal hue which sometimes makes our visages 
 hateful to ourselves when, after a sleepless and un- 
 comfortable night, we happen to see our reflection 
 in one of those green glass mirrors which are still 
 to be found in old inns. But the longer and more 
 closely we study Scheffer's pictures, the more do 
 they win on us. We find that his treatment of his 
 subject as a whole is very poetical, and we realize 
 that a genial temperament gleams through those 
 sombre shades, like the sun shining through the 
 clouds. 
 
 This gloomy coloring, these vague, weird out- 
 lines, produce an excellent effect in the pictures 
 of Faust and Gretchen. Faust is seated on an 
 antiquated red chair, such as were in use during 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 59 
 
 the Middle Ages ; by his side stands a table covered 
 with parchment; his left arm rests on the table, 
 and his hand supports his uncovered head. His 
 right hand, with the open palm outwards, rests 
 on his hip. His garments are of a dark greenish- 
 blue color. The face is given in profile, and is of 
 a pale and sallow complexion; the features are 
 regular and noble. Notwithstanding the sickly, 
 disagreeable color, the hollow cheeks, the thin lips, 
 the unmistakable signs of debility and decay, this 
 face still shows traces of its former beauty, and 
 when the sad, sweet glances of the eyes light up 
 the countenance, it looks like a lovely ruin illu- 
 mined by the moonlight. 
 
 Verily, this man is a beautiful human ruin. Be- 
 neath the wrinkled eyelids brood strange fancies, 
 learned and owl-like thoughts; and beneath that 
 brow lurk evil spirits. At midnight tlie graves 
 open, and pale spectres, the ghosts of dead pas- 
 sions, stalk forth, and through the desolate cham- 
 bers of his brain, with silent tread, steals the image 
 of Gretchen. 
 
 The painter's great merit consists just in this, 
 that he has painted a face the mere sight of which 
 reveals the thoughts and emotions that haunt the 
 owner's heart and brain. In the background, 
 scarcely visible, we recognize the hideous features 
 of Mephistopheles, the evil one, the father of lies. 
 
 Gretchen is a companion-piece of no less merit. 
 
5o THE SALON. 
 
 She too is seated on a red chair, less glaring in 
 color, however ; by her side stands the spinning- 
 wheel, the distaff full of wool ; in her hand she 
 holds a prayer-book, the open page revealing a 
 small, faded, motley-colored picture of the Ma- 
 donna. But Gretchen casts no glance into the 
 book. She sits with bowed head, in such a posi- 
 tion that almost the w^hole side of her face, which 
 is also shown in profile, is most strangely shaded. 
 It is as if Faust's dark soul were casting its shadow 
 over the face of the quiet maiden. The two pic- 
 tures were placed side by side, which made it the 
 more noticeable that all the effects of light and 
 shade were arranged around Faust's face, but in 
 the picture of Gretchen it was the figure and not 
 the face which was brought into relief Through 
 this Gretchen's form is endowed with an inde- 
 scribable charm. She wears a gown of dark green, 
 and on her head is a dainty black cap, from which 
 escapes her flaxen hair, its golden beauty enhanced 
 by the contrast. Her face is oval-shaped, and has 
 a sweet and noble expression, — a loveliness which 
 modestly shrinks from our gaze. For, with tliose 
 dear blue eyes of hers, she is modesty personified. 
 A tear-drop — grief's dumb pearl — trembles on that 
 lovely cheek. It is Wolfgang Goethe's Gretchen, 
 but she has read all of Frederick Schiller. She is 
 more sentimental than naive, more sad and ideal- 
 istic than merry and charming. It may be that 
 
THE SALON. 6 1 
 
 she is too earnest and true-hearted to be charming 
 and graceful, for gracefulness consists in sprightli- 
 ness and vivacity. 
 
 Withal, there is something about her so reliable, 
 so trust-inspiring, as suggestive of genuineness as 
 the substantial touch of a louis-d'or. In short, 
 she is a true German maiden ; and when we look 
 into her dreamy, violet-blue eyes, our thoughts 
 fly back to Germany, to the fragrant linden-trees ; 
 we hear the faint re-echo of German ballads in our 
 hearts, German scenes and landscapes flit before 
 our eyes ; we think of Holty's poems ; of the 
 stone ima^je of Roland standino: in front of the 
 old town-hall ; of the old parson and his rosy- 
 cheeked niece; of the forester's hut, with its ant- 
 lered walls ; of bad tobacco and good fellows ; of 
 grandmothers' ghost-stories ; of the faithful night- 
 watchmen ; of friendship, of love, and all sorts of 
 pleasant nonsense. Truly, Scheffer's Gretchen 
 cannot be described. We do not see Gretchen's 
 face merely, but her whole inner nature. Scheffer 
 has succeeded in painting a soul. Whenever I 
 passed the picture of Gretchen I involuntarily 
 addressed her with some loving phrase. 
 
 * * * Scheffer's Lenore is far more success- 
 ful, as regards the coloring, than any other of his 
 pictures. He has transposed the date of the story 
 to the period of the Crusades, by which he gains 
 an opportunity for the display of more picturesque 
 6* 
 
62 THE SALON. 
 
 costumes, and for more romantic coloring in gen- 
 eral. The returning host marches by, and poor 
 Lenore misses her lover from among them. A 
 subdued melancholy breathes from this picture. 
 Naught gives a foreboding of the ghostly horrors 
 of the coming night. But just because the painter 
 has laid the scene during the Crusades, that era of 
 profound religious relief, I do not believe that 
 the forlorn Lenore will blaspheme against the Al- 
 mighty, nor will her dead lover carry her off on a 
 ghostly ride. Burger's Lenore lived in a Protest- 
 ant, skeptical era, and her lover took part in the 
 Seven Years' War and helped to conquer Silesia 
 for the friend of Voltaire. But Scheffer's Lenore 
 lived in an age of faith and Catholicism, when 
 hundreds of thousands, inspired by religious zeal, 
 sewed a scarlet cross on their coats, and, as martial 
 pilgrims, marched to the land of the rising sun, 
 there to seek a grave. What a strange age it was! 
 But are not all human beings such crusading 
 knights, who, after all their arduous battles, win 
 only a grave ? Such is the thought that I read in 
 the noble face of that knight who, from his stately 
 steed, looks down so pityingly on sorrowing Le- 
 nore, who rests her head on her mother's shoulder. 
 She is a gentle flower, that will grieve and wilt, but 
 not blaspheme. Scheffer's picture is a beautiful 
 musical composition ; the colors ring out with a sub- 
 dued but sweet merriment, like a sad spring song. 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 63 
 
 Scheffer's other pictures were of inferior merit, 
 notwithstanding- which they were highly praised, 
 while many better works, by less distinguished ^ 
 artists, were passed by unnoticed. Such is the 
 power of an established reputation. If a prince 
 wears a ring set with Bohemian glass, it is sup- 
 posed to be a diamond ; but if a beggar should 
 wear a genuine diamond, it would be condemned 
 as a worthless crystal. 
 
 This observation leads me to 
 
 HORACE VERNET, 
 
 whose contributions to this year's Salon do also 
 not wholly consist of genuine gems. The best of 
 his pictures was a Judith, just as she is about to 
 slay Holofernes. She has just arisen from the 
 couch, a slender, blooming maiden. A violet-hued 
 garment, hastily girded around the waist, falls in 
 graceful folds to the feet; an under-garmcnt of a 
 pale-yellow shade covers the upper part of the 
 body, all but the bare right shoulder, from which 
 the sleeve falls loosely. With her left hand, in a 
 somewhat blood-thirsty manner, yet nevertheless 
 with a certain charming gracefulness, she tucks 
 up the drooping sleeve ; for in her right hand she 
 has just raised the curved sabre over the sleeping 
 Holofernes. There stands the graceful figure, pure 
 and chaste, yet with a stain upon her, — like a dese- 
 crated host. Her head is marvelously beautiful, and 
 
64 
 
 THE SALON. 
 
 there is a strange, mysterious fascination about 
 her, and in the face of the murderous beauty con- 
 flicting emotions are visible. Her eyes sparkle 
 with the fierce delight of vengeance, for she is 
 about to avenge her own insulted honor on the 
 hated heathen. The latter, it must be confessed, 
 is not very attractive in his personal appearance, 
 but nevertheless he seems to be a bon enfant at 
 heart. He appears to be enjoying a sound and 
 blissful sleep : perhaps he even snores, or, as Louise 
 calls it, sleeps audibly. His lips move as if kiss- 
 ing: perhaps he is dreaming of his bliss; and 
 now, drunk with wine and pleasure, without an 
 interlude of pain and sickness, Death, through 
 her loveliest angel, summons him into the white 
 night of eternal annihilation. What an enviable 
 ending ! Ye gods, when my time comes to die, let 
 me die like Holofcrnes! 
 
 Is it irony on the part of Horace Vernet that 
 the rays of the rising sun fall on the sleeper, 
 beautifying and transfiguring him, and that at 
 the same moment the light of the night-lamp 
 is quenched ? , 
 
 Another picture of Vernet, representing the 
 present pope, is noteworthy more for the free 
 bold style of its drawing and coloring than for 
 any merit of conception. With the golden triple- 
 crown upon his head, robed in a white garment 
 embroidered with gold, sitting on a golden throne, 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 65 
 
 he is borne in triumph into the Church of St. Peter. 
 The pope, although ruddy-cheeked, is made to 
 look pale and sickly by the background of white 
 vapors rising from the burning censers, and the 
 white feathery fans that are held over him. The 
 bearers of the papal throne are stalwart fellows in 
 crimson-colored liveries, their black hair falling 
 down over their brown faces. Only three of them 
 are visible in the picture, but they are excellently 
 painted. The same praise is due to the Capuchin 
 monks, whose bowed heads and broad tonsures 
 are prominent in the foreground. But just this 
 unimpressiveness of the chief personage, and the 
 undue conspicuousness of the others, is a mistake. 
 The ease and lightness with which the subordinate 
 figures are drawn, as well as the coloring, reminded 
 me of Paul Veronese. But there was lacking the 
 Venetian magic, that poetry of colors which, like 
 the shimmering glimpses of the lagunes of Venice, 
 is only superficial, but yet exercises such a won- 
 drous power over the soul. 
 
 A third painting of Horace Vernet received 
 much praise for its bold grouping and coloring. 
 It represents the arrest of the princes Conde, 
 Conti, and Longueville. The scene is laid on the 
 stairway of the Palais Royal, and the noble pris- 
 oners ^re just in the act of descending the steps, 
 after having surrendered their swords at command 
 of Anne of Austria. By the varying heights of 
 
66 THE SALOjV. 
 
 the stairs, almost every figure is presented with 
 distinctness. Conde is standing on the lowest 
 step : he toys with his mustache, as if absorbed 
 in reflection ; and I know his thought. From the 
 top of the stairs an officer is descending, carrying 
 under his arm the swords which he has just re- 
 ceived from the princes. The picture consists of 
 three groups, which have arisen naturally and 
 naturally belong together. Only one who has 
 attained to high rank in art is capable of con- 
 ceiving such an idea. 
 
 * * * Among the minor pictures of Horace 
 Vernct is one of Camille Desmoulins mounting 
 a bench in the garden of the Palais RoyaJ and 
 haranguing the populace. He is in the act of 
 tearing with his left hand a green leaf from a tree; 
 in his right hand he grasps a pistol. Poor Ca- 
 mille ! thy courage was not higher than that bench, 
 and there thou didst purpose to take thy stand and 
 look around thee. But " forward ! always forward !" 
 is the magic word that only can sustain revolu- 
 tionary spirits : if they falter and look back, they 
 are lost, like Eurydice, who, following the tones of 
 her husband's lyre, once only looked back at the 
 horrors of Hades. Poor Camille! poor lad ! those 
 were the merry days of freedom's thoughtless 
 youth, when thou didst throw stones at despotism's 
 glass house, and didst crack rude jokes; but the 
 frolic ended drearily, — the original leaders of the 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 67 
 
 Revolution became moss-covered fossils, who stood 
 aghast at their own work. Then didst thou hear 
 behind thee and on every side terrible tones, and 
 out of the realm of shadows the ghostly voices of 
 the Gironde did call unto thee, and thou didst 
 look back. 
 
 I shall pass the other minor pictures of Horace 
 Vernet, the versatile artist who paints everything, 
 — altar-pieces, battles, pictures of still life, animals, 
 landscapes, portraits, in rapid succession. I come 
 now to 
 
 DELACROIX, 
 
 who has contributed a picture, in front of which 
 I always see standing many groups, and which, 
 therefore, I include in my list of paintings that 
 have excited most attention. The sacredness of 
 the subject will not permit a severe criticism of 
 the coloring; otherwise it might not well stand 
 the ordeal. But in spite of certain artistic defects 
 a great thought breathes in this picture and casts 
 its spell upon us. It represents a group of the 
 populace during the July revolution : almost as 
 in an allegory, there is prominent in the fore- 
 ground a youthful female, a red Phrygian cap 
 upon her head ; in one hand she holds a musket, 
 and in the other the tri-color flag. She strides 
 over the dead bodies, as if leading on to battle. 
 It is a lithe and active figure, bare to the hips. 
 The face is in profile, and the expression of the 
 
68 THE SALON. 
 
 features is that of reckless grief; she is a curious 
 combination of Phryne, poissarde, and the goddess 
 of Liberty. It is not quite clearly expressed that 
 she is intended to represent the latter : she appears 
 rather to be intended as the personification of the 
 wild, fierce power of the people, freeing itself 
 from oppression. 
 
 I must confess that this figure reminds me of 
 those peripatetic nymphs who swarm along the 
 boulevards of an evening, and that the little, 
 sooty chimney-sweep of a Cupid, who, brandish- 
 ing a pistol in each hand, stands by the side of this 
 Venus of the streets, is not overly clean. I must 
 also admit that the candidate for the honors of the 
 Pantheon who lies dead on the ground looks like 
 a scamp ; and that the hero who, musket in hand, 
 is furiously charging on the foe, has a villainous, 
 galley look, and the vile odor of the jail undoubt- 
 edly clings to his shabby, tattered coat. But the 
 picture is intended to convey the impression that 
 a great idea has ennobled and sanctified this riff- 
 raff, these offscourings of humanity, and awakened 
 the latent greatness of their souls. 
 
 Sacred and memorable days of July! Ye shall 
 unto all times be a witness of mankind's innate 
 nobility, which can never be entirely destroyed. 
 He who has lived to see you will never more join 
 in sad lamenting o'er the buried hopes of the past, 
 but will joyfully believe in the resurrection of the 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 69 
 
 nations. Holy days of July! How brightly shone 
 the sun, and how grand was the populace of Paris! 
 The gods above looked down on the glorious com- 
 bat, and the heavens re-echoed with their admiring 
 shouts. Gladly would the immortals have left their 
 golden thrones, to descend on earth and become 
 citizens of Paris. 
 
 Among the spectators were several who had 
 fought in the various street-fights here pictured, 
 or had at least been lookers-on ; and they were 
 never tired of praising the painting. " Martin," 
 cried an cpicier, "those gamins fought like giants." 
 An old Alsatian corporal remarked in German to 
 his comrade, "What a great art painting is, after 
 all ! How exactly every tiling is pictured here ! Just 
 see that dead man ; he looks as natural as life." 
 
 " Papa," cried a young Carlist, "who is that dirty 
 woman with the red cap?" "Truly," said mock- 
 ingly the patrician papa, with ill-suppressed laugh- 
 ter, "truly, my child, she does not remind one of 
 the whiteness and purity of the lily. It is the god- 
 dess of Liberty." "But, papa, she has not even a 
 chemise on." "You must know, my dear child, 
 that a true goddess of Liberty seldom indulges in 
 such a luxury, and hence she is always very much 
 embittered against those who wear clean linen." 
 
 At these words the speaker drew his cuffs for- 
 ward, so as to cover more of his long, delicate 
 hands (which were evidently unused to work), and 
 7 
 
yo THE SALON. 
 
 remarked to his neighbor, "Your Eminence, if 
 to-day the republicans should be lucky enough to 
 have an old woman shot down by the National 
 Guards near the St. Denis gate, they would carry 
 the dead body in sacred procession through the 
 boulevards, all Paris would become excited to 
 frenzy, and we should then have a new revolu- 
 tion." "So much the better," whispered the slim, 
 tall man with closely-buttoned coat, — nearly all 
 priests in Paris now mask themselves in secular 
 garb, perhaps out of fear of popular insult, or, 
 mayhap, on account of an evil conscience, — "so 
 much the better, marquis. The more horrible the 
 excess, the more quickly will come the reaction ; 
 when that comes, the revolution will devour its 
 instigators, particularly those foolish bankers, who, 
 heaven be praised for it, have already ruined them- 
 selves." "True, your Eminence: they sought to 
 destroy us, a tout prix, because we would not re- 
 ceive them into our society: that is the secret 
 cause of the revolution of July, and to accomplish 
 it money was distributed among the rabble, and 
 the manufacturers gave a holiday to the workmen, 
 and the tavern-keepers were bribed to give away 
 their liquors gratis, after mixing powder therein, 
 in order to excite and madden the populace ; ct die 
 rcstc, c'etait le soldi ^ 
 
 The marquis was perhaps in the right: it was 
 the sun. When, in that memorable July, the 
 
THE SALON. 7 1 
 
 country's liberties were threatened, the sun shone 
 down its fiercest and most burning rays, until it 
 had inflamed the hearts of the Parisians; then the 
 populace of Paris arose against the rotten Bastilles 
 and ordonnances, and threw off the yoke of bond- 
 age. For well do sun and city understand and 
 love each other. At eve, ere the sun descends into 
 old ocean, his glances linger lovingly on beautiful 
 Paris, and his last rays kiss the tri-color banners 
 that flutter from her turrets. Quite appropriate 
 was the suggestion of a French poet, to celebrate 
 those glorious July days by a symbolic marriage; 
 and as the Doge of Venice yearly mounted the 
 golden Bucentaur to wed the lordly city of Venice 
 with the Adriatic, so should the site of the razed 
 Bastille witness the annual marriage-ceremony of 
 Paris and the sun. Casimir Perier did not incline 
 favorably to this proposition: he feared the tumults 
 of such a nuptial eve; he dreaded the too great 
 ardor of such a marriage, and, at most, he would 
 tolerate only a morganatic alliance between Paris 
 and the sun. 
 
 L. ROBERT. 
 
 * * * This painter, who in some of his pic- 
 tures has glorified and transfigured death itself, 
 has in his great work "The Reapers" still more 
 successfully and grandly portrayed life. This pic- 
 ture is the very apotheosis of life: looking on it, 
 
72 
 
 THE SALON. 
 
 we forget that there is a land of shadows, and we 
 doubt whether on earth there be a scene more 
 grand and beautiful than this. "Earth is heaven, 
 and men are holy and divine :" that is the great 
 revelation which so eloquently beams from the 
 glowing colors of this picture. 
 
 We see on the canvas, by the glimmer of a 
 lovely Italian twilight, a desolate region in the 
 Romagna. In the centre of the picture stands a 
 farmer's wagon, drawn by two steers, which arc 
 harnessed with heavy chains. The wagon is loaded 
 with a family of peasants, making a halt. To the 
 right, next to their sheaves, are seated female 
 reapers, resting from their labors, while a meriy 
 fellow is dancing to the lively music of the pipe. 
 We almost seem to hear the pleasant, inspiriting 
 melody, and the words, 
 
 " Damigella, tutta bella, 
 Versa, versa il be! vino." 
 
 To the left, carrying baskets of fruit, are young 
 and pretty women, crowned with flowers and 
 grasses. Coming from the same direction are 
 two young reapers, one of whom, with a some- 
 what voluptuous, languishing glance, is about 
 stretching himself on the sward ; the other, how- 
 ever, merrily swings the uplifted sickle. Between 
 the two steers stands a burly, brawny fellow, evi- 
 dently a serving-man, who takes his siesta stand- 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 71 
 
 ing. On the wag-on, softly bedded, reclines the 
 grandfather, a mild-looking, feeble old man ; seated 
 astride one of the steers we see his son, with a 
 quiet, manly look, holding in his hand a whip, — 
 emblem of authority ; on the wagon is seated his 
 young and beautiful wife, a child in her arms, — a 
 rose with its bud, — and by her side stands a hand- 
 some lad, probably her brother, who is just in the 
 act of raising the canvas cover. There are extant 
 copper engravings of this picture, but no engraving 
 and no description can denote truly the wondrous 
 charm of this painting, for that which constitutes 
 its magic is the coloring. The human figures are 
 all painted in darker colors than the sky which 
 forms the background, and this reflected radiance 
 of the sky invests the group with a peculiarly 
 light and cheerful aspect. 
 
 DELAROCHE. 
 
 Delaroche, the great historical painter, has four 
 pictures on exhibition this year. Two are taken 
 from French and two from English history. One 
 of the pictures represents Cardinal Richelieu, pale 
 and dying, sailing in a barge up the Rhone from 
 Tarascon. Behind the first boat, and attached to 
 it, glides a second boat, wherein are seated Cinq- 
 Mars and De Thou, whom Richelieu himself is 
 conducting to Lyons, there to have them beheaded. 
 Two boats, one following in the wake of the other, 
 
 7* 
 
y^ THE SALON. 
 
 is an unartistic conception ; but it is here executed 
 with much skill. The coloring is brilliant, even 
 dazzling, and the human forms are almost trans- 
 fic^ured in the cfolden radiance of the settincr sun. 
 The contrast between this beautiful scene and the 
 sad fate that awaits the three chief personages 
 makes a most mournful impression on the be- 
 holder. Imagine two striplings, in the bloom of 
 youth, being dragged to an ignominious death, 
 and that by a gray-haired, dying old man. Brightly 
 and picturesquely are the boats decked, but their 
 voyage leads to the shadowy realm of death. The 
 sun's glorious rays of molten gold are only a part- 
 ing greeting, for it is evening, and the sun must 
 also depart : one crimson streak of light gilds the 
 sky, — and then all is night. 
 
 * * * The other picture represents Cromwell 
 standing by the coffin of Charles the First. In 
 a half-darkened chamber of Whitehall, supported 
 on stools of dark-red velvet, rests the coffin of 
 the beheaded king ; and by it stands one who, 
 with untrcmbling hand, lifts the cover and calmly 
 looks down upon the corpse. He is all alone. His 
 figure is short and stout, his position careless, his 
 face somewhat boorish, but firm and honest. His 
 garb is that of a Puritanic warrior, — severely plain 
 and unadorned : a long, dark-brown velvet coat ; 
 under it a buff leathern vest; high-topped riding- 
 boots that leave but little of the black trowscrs 
 
THE SALON. 
 
 75 
 
 visible; over the breast hangs a soiled, yellow belt, 
 attached to which is a dagger with curious hilt. 
 The short hair is covered by a black hat with 
 turned-up rim and surmounted by a scarlet plume ; 
 around the neck a small turned-down collar, from 
 under which the armor peeps out ; dirty leathern 
 gloves ; in one hand he holds a cane, on which 
 he leans ; the other holds the cover of the coffin, 
 wherein lies the dead king. 
 
 The dead have in their features an expression 
 that makes the living, standing by their side, ap- 
 pear insignificant, for they excel in a certain calm 
 reserve and majestic freedom from passion. Men 
 feel this, and, out of respect for those who have 
 attained the high rank of death, the guard on 
 duty always salutes when a corpse is being carried 
 by, even if it be the corpse of the most pitiful of 
 mankind. 
 
 * * "^ It is not to be denied that Delaroche, 
 by this picture, has purposely sought to sug- 
 gest historical parallels. Comparisons were con- 
 stantly being instituted between Charles I. and 
 Louis XVI., between Cromwell and Napoleon. 
 But both of the latter were wronged by such a 
 comparison. Napoleon was guiltless of regicide ; 
 but, on the other hand, Cromwell never sank so 
 low as to permit himself to be anointed Emperor 
 by a priest, and, like a renegade son of the Revo- 
 lution, seek to wed himself to the blood of the 
 
76 
 
 THE SALON. 
 
 Caesars. On the fame of one is a blood-stain ; on 
 the other, the oil-stain of priestly anointing. And 
 both Napoleon and Cromwell felt the stings of 
 secret guilt. 
 
 Bonaparte, who might have been the Washing- 
 ton of Europe, and was only its Napoleon, never 
 felt at ease in his royal robes. Liberty haunted 
 him like the ghost of a murdered mother : even 
 at the dead of night he heard voices, frightening 
 him from his couch and from the arms of wedded 
 legitimacy. Then he might have been seen hastily 
 pacing the vaulted apartments of the Tuilleries, 
 fuming and raging; and when in the morning he 
 came, pale and wearied, into the council-chamber, 
 he bitterly inveighed against ideology, — that very 
 dangerous ideology, — ideology over and over 
 again. 
 
 * * * By the side of Delaroche's picture of 
 Cromwell was hung Robert's peaceful, tranquil- 
 lizing masterpiece. When from the dark back- 
 ground there appears the rude, coarse, warlike 
 Puritan, before him the royal head which this 
 terrible reaper has mown off, the spectator's heart 
 is deeply agitated, and his soul is convulsed and 
 stirred to its depths by the fierce contentions and 
 dissensions of politics. Then let his glance but 
 fall upon those other reapers, who, in the golden 
 sunshine, are homeward-bound to celebrate the 
 merry harvest-feast of love and peace: then the 
 
777^ SALON. 
 
 77 
 
 angry tumult of his soul is stilled by the soothing, 
 consoling magic of the painter's art. 
 
 In the presence 5f Delaroche's picture we feel 
 that the great conflict of ages is not yet ended ; 
 we feel the earth tremble beneath us ; we hear 
 the storm-blast's furious roar, threatening to over- 
 whelm the world with its destructive fury; blood 
 flows in torrents, and the yawning abyss thirstily 
 swallows up the gory stream ; awe and terror fill 
 our souls, and we fear for our own safety. But 
 when we look on Robert's picture we see that the 
 earth still stands secure and firm, bringing forth 
 its golden fruits to bless and gladden the heart of 
 man. If in the one picture we behold that strange 
 and bloody drama which is called history, in the 
 other picture we see a still greater and still grander 
 drama, which yet finds an ample stage in a country 
 wagon. It is a drama without a beginning and 
 without an end ; a story that is eternally repeat- 
 ing itself, and is yet as simple as the sea, as the 
 sky above us, as the seasons. It is a holy poem ; 
 it is a sacred history, whose archives are to be 
 found in every human heart; it is the history of 
 humanity. 
 
 * * * In criticising a work of art, reason is by 
 no means entitled to the leading part, for reason 
 plays quite a secondary role in its creation. The 
 conception of a work of art arises out of the tem- 
 perament, and to realize it the assistance of imagi- 
 
78 
 
 THE SALON. 
 
 nation is required. Imagination alone, however, 
 overwhelming and almost smothering the original 
 idea with its profusion of flowers, would cause death 
 rather than life, were it not for reason, which now 
 comes limping along, shoves aside the superfluous 
 flowers, or trims them into symmetry with its 
 pruning-knife. Reason simply maintains order, 
 and is, so to say, the police in the realms of art. 
 In actual life reason is generally a cold-blooded 
 calculator, who reckons up our follies. And some- 
 times, alas ! he is merely the book-keeper of a 
 broken, bankrupt heart, who calmly figures out 
 the amount of deficit. 
 
 The critic's chief error consists in asking. What 
 ought the artist to do ? Much more proper would 
 be the question. What docs the artist strive to do ? 
 or, better still. What must he do? The question, 
 What ought the artist to do ? arose through those 
 art-philosophers who, without being themselves 
 poetical, have made abstracts of the characteristics 
 of the various works of art, and from the existing 
 would deduce rules to govern all future produc- 
 tions, and for that purpose devised and invented 
 definitions, classifications, and axioms. They knew 
 not that such abstractions could only be useful 
 to measure imitators by, but that every artist of 
 originality, nay, even of talent, must be criticised 
 according to the a:sthctics introduced by himself. 
 Rules and antiquated erudite axioms are still less 
 
THE SALON. yg 
 
 applicable to men of genius. Menzel says truly 
 that for young giants there exist no rules of 
 fencing, for they beat down all parryings. Every 
 man of genius must be studied and criticised ac- 
 cording to his own aim. Here are permissible only 
 the questions, Has he the means to carry out his 
 aim ? Has he employed the proper means ? This 
 is safe- ground. Here we no longer attempt to 
 model each strange work according to our subject- 
 ive views, but we try to comprehend what God- 
 given powers are at the artist's command to realize 
 his aim. In the recitative arts these means consist 
 of tones and words. In the pictorial arts they 
 consist of colors and forms. Tones and words, 
 colors and forms, are, however, only synibols of 
 the thought, — symbols that arise in the mind of 
 the artist when the holy inspiration is upon him ; 
 his art-productions are only symbols through 
 which he communicates his own thought to other 
 minds. He who with the fewest and simplest 
 symbols can express the most profound and most 
 weighty thoughts is the greatest artist. To me 
 it seems worthy of the highest praise when the 
 symbols through which the artist expresses his 
 thoughts are, of themselves and apart from their 
 inner signification, pleasing to the senses ; like the 
 flowers of Sekam, which, apart from their hidden 
 meaning, are lovely and fragrant and harmonize 
 into a beautiful bouquet. But is such harmony 
 
3o THE SALON. 
 
 always possible? Is the artist entirely free of will 
 in the selection and combination of his mystical 
 flowers ? or does he merely select and combine 
 as he must? I affirm the existence of a myste- 
 rious compulsion: the artist resembles that som- 
 nambulistic princess who during the night plucked 
 tastefully the most beautiful flowers in the gardens 
 of Bagdad and bound them together in a sekam, 
 of whose signification, however, she herself was 
 entirely unconscious on waking. She sat in the 
 harem in the morning, pensively contemplating 
 the bouquet, musing over it as over a half-for- 
 gotten dream, and finally she sent it to her be- 
 loved caliph. The sleek eunuch who was the 
 messenger was highly delighted with the pretty 
 flowers, without, however, surmising their import. 
 But Haroun Alraschid, the ruler of the faithful, 
 the successor of the prophets, the possessor of 
 the ring of Solomon, — he immediately recognized 
 the meaning of the beautiful bouquet: his heart 
 leaped with joy, he kissed every flower, and he 
 laughed until the tears ran down his long beard. 
 
 * * * My old prophecy, that the art-period 
 which began at Goethe's cradle would end at his 
 coffin, seems to be near its fulfillment. The present 
 school of art is doomed to destruction, because its 
 underlying principle has its root in the dead past 
 of an antiquated era, that of the Holy Roman 
 Catholic empire. Therefore, like all other with- 
 
THE SALON. gl 
 
 ered remains of that past epoch, it is no longer in 
 harmony with the present. This want of harmony, 
 and not the stirring events of the times, is the 
 cause of the present dechne of art : on the con- 
 trary, these very agitations ought to favor the 
 prosperity of art, as was formerly the case in 
 Athens and Florence, where amidst wars and the 
 most violent strifes of factions art unfolded its 
 most beautiful blossoms. To be sure, those Greek 
 and Florentine artists lived no egotistic, isolated 
 art-lives; their souls, though open to poesy, were 
 not hermetically closed to the great joys and sor- 
 rows of their era. Their works were but dreamy 
 reflections of their times, and they themselves were 
 whole men, whose personality was as marked as 
 their plastic powers. Phidias and Michael Angelo 
 were men of the same material as the creations of 
 their imagination ; and just as the latter were in 
 unison with the Greek temples and Catholic cathe- 
 drals, so were these artists in divine harmony with 
 their surroundings. They did not separate their 
 art from the politics of the day ; they did not work 
 each with his own pitiful, private, mock enthusiasm, 
 which at will they could sham into all subjects. 
 iEschylus sang of the Persians with the same sin- 
 cerity as at Marathon he fought against them, and 
 Dante wrote his comedy, not to order, like a 
 modern commission-poet, but as a fugitive Guelf, 
 and in exile and misery he never sniveled about 
 
 8 
 
32 THE SALON. 
 
 the ruin of his poetic talents, but mourned o'er the 
 downfall of freedom. 
 
 But the new times will also give birth to a new 
 school of art, which shall be in sacred harmony 
 therewith, and which shall not need to borrow its 
 symbols from a perished past. 
 
FROM THE MEMOIRS OF HERR VON 
 SCHNABELEWOPSKI. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 My mother herself packed my trunk ; with 
 every shirt she also packed some good advice. 
 In later times the laundresses exchanged all these 
 shirts, together with the good advice. My father 
 was deeply moved, and gave me a long list of rules 
 how to demean myself in every possible contin- 
 gency that might occur in my life. The first rule 
 was, to turn each ducat ten times before spending 
 it. At first I did so; but I soon found the ever- 
 lasting turning too tedious. With the rules, my 
 father also gave me the ducats necessary for the 
 turning process. 
 
 * * * My first destination was Hamburg, where 
 I was to study theology, in conformity with the 
 wishes of my parents ; but I must confess that 
 during my stay I occupied myself more with 
 worldly than with divine matters. 
 
 * * * The city of Hamburg is one of the old 
 free cities of Germany; and, in fact, one finds there 
 
 83 
 
84 
 
 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 a remarkable degree of freedom. The citizens do 
 what they please, and the wise and august senate 
 does what it pleases. The customs of Hamburg 
 are English, and its eating is heavenly. In truth, 
 dishes are to be found there not dreamt of in our 
 philosophies. 
 
 * * * Concerning religion, politics, and science, 
 the people of Hamburg differ, but in regard to 
 gastronomy the most beautiful harmony prevails. 
 Let the Christian theologians bicker as they see 
 fit over the import of the sacramental Supper; as 
 regards what suppers in general ought to be, they 
 are a unit. Let there be among the Jews one 
 party that will have grace said in German, and 
 another faction that insists on chanting the grace 
 in Hebrew ; both parties eat, yea, and partake of 
 excellent fare, and are judges of good eating. The 
 military, I have no doubt, are quite Spartan in 
 their heroism, but of Spartan black broth they 
 desire to know nothing. 
 
 The physicians, who are so discordant among 
 themselves as to the treatment of diseases, and 
 who, if allopaths, prescribe smoked beef for the 
 national ailment, dyspepsia, and, if homoeopaths, 
 one-ten-thousandth of a drop ' of absinthe dis- 
 solved in a large bowl of turtle-soup, — all agree 
 in regard to the flavor of the smoked beef and 
 the seasoning of the turtle-soup. 
 
 Hamburg is, in sooth, the native city of smoked 
 
HERR VON SCHNABELEWOPSKL 9,c 
 
 /. 
 
 beeUand is prouder of it than Mayence is of her 
 Johann Faust, or Eisleben of her Luther; for what 
 are printing and the Reformation in comparison 
 with smoked beef? Whether the two first have 
 been a blessing or an evil, is still a matter of dis- 
 pute between two parties in Germany; but even 
 our most zealous Jesuits admit that smoked beef 
 is a beneficial invention. 
 
 * * * Among the remarkable places of the city 
 is the theatre, which merits special mention. Its 
 actors are good, orderly citizens, — respectable 
 patres-familiares, — who know nothing of dissem- 
 bling and dissimulation, and who deceive no one. 
 They are pious men, who convert the theatre into 
 a house of God, by convincing the skeptic who 
 has lost faith in mankind that there is at least one 
 spot free from hypocrisy and deceit. 
 
 * * * For the benefit of such readers as are 
 not familiar with the localities of Hamburg, — and 
 perhaps there are such in China or Upper Bava- 
 ria, — I would remark that one of the most popular 
 promenades of the sons and daughters of Ham- 
 monia is the beautiful and appropriately named 
 Maiden Lane. Here, fronting on a lakelet, and 
 under the shade of linden-trees, are cosy arbors, 
 in which it is pleasant to sit of a summer's after- 
 noon, when the sun shines not too fiercely, but 
 smiles genially down upon the linden-trees, and 
 the houses, and the people, and the swans floating 
 
 8* 
 
85 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 upon the silver bosom of the lakelet, until it almost 
 seems like a scene from fairy-land. There I sat 
 during many a pleasant summer afternoon, think- 
 ing of — what a young man generally does think 
 of, which is — nothing; watching — what a young 
 man generally does watch, which is — the young 
 misses promenading to and fro. Ah! those were 
 the halcyon days when Dame Fortune smiled upon 
 me; and Dame Fortune's name was then Helo'ise. 
 And Helo'ise smiled on mc often, for she had 
 beautiful teeth. 
 
 She was a sweet, pretty, bewitching little Dame 
 Fortune, with rosy cheeks, a delicately-formed 
 nose, skin white as a lily, eyes blue as a mountain- 
 lake. 
 
 * * * Methinks I still see her cherry-colored 
 striped dress, which cost me four marcs and three 
 shillings per yard, and Herr Seligmann warranted 
 the stripes to be fast colors. 
 
 If, gentle reader, I have led you into so-called 
 "bad company," console yourself with the reflec- 
 tion that it has not cost you so much as it did me. 
 
 * * * Often thus, lost in pleasant, idle reveries, 
 I sat contemplating the lasses, and the clear, serene 
 skies, and St. Peter's tower, with its slender steeple, 
 and the quiet blue Alster, on which the swans were 
 sailing in stately, graceful, and composed motion. 
 Oh, the swans! I could watch them for hours, 
 those lovely creatures, with their long, beautiful 
 
HERR VON SCHNABELEWOPSKI. 
 
 87 
 
 necks, voluptuously rocking themselves on the 
 limpid waves, at intervals joyously diving out of 
 sight, then reappearing, arrogantly splashing about 
 in the water, until the skies darkened, and the 
 stars came forth, — longing, consoling, marvelously 
 tender, transfigured. The stars ! are they golden 
 flowers decking the bridal bosom of the sky? or 
 are they the amorous glances of angels' eyes, that 
 yearningly mirror themselves in the waters of the 
 earth, and coquette with the swans? 
 
 Ah ! that was long, long ago. Then I was 
 young and foolish, — now I am old and foolish. 
 Since then many a flower has faded, and some 
 even have been crushed. Many a silken robe has 
 since then been torn into tatters ; and even Herr 
 Seligmann's cherry-striped chintz has lost its color. 
 And as for Hclo'ise herself, when next I met her 
 she looked like Solomon's Temple after it had been 
 razed by Nebuchadnezzar. 
 
 And the city itself, how changed ! and Maiden 
 Lane ! Snow lay on all the roofs, and it seemed as 
 if the houses had likewise whitened with age. The 
 lindens were dead trees, whose barren boughs 
 swayed like spectres in the cold wind. The sky 
 was of an ashy blue, and darkened rapidly. 
 
 * =;- * But more dismal, more mysterious than 
 these sights were the sounds that pierced my 
 ears from another quarter. They were hoarse, 
 snarling, metallic tones, a frantic screeching, a 
 
88 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 frightened splashing and despairing struggh"ng, a 
 gasping and wheezing, a gurgh'ng and groaning, 
 an indescribable blood-curdling shriek of pain and 
 terror. The basin of the Alster was frozen over. 
 A large, broad quadrangle had been cut into the 
 ice, and the horrible cries that I had just heard 
 came from the throats of the poor white creatures 
 that were swimming around therein, uttering those 
 terrible shrieks of death-agony ; and, alas ! they 
 were the same swans that had once so tenderly 
 and merrily moved my soul, Alas for the beau- 
 tiful white swans! their wings had been broken, 
 so that they could not in the autumn emigrate to 
 the warm South. And now the North held them 
 spell-bound in its dark ice-pits, and the keeper of 
 the pavilion opined that they were quite comfort- 
 able therein, and that the cold was healthy for 
 them. But that is not true : one is not comfort- 
 able when helplessly imprisoned, almost frozen in 
 a cold pool, and one's wings broken, so that it 
 is impossible to fly away to the beautiful South, 
 where dwell the loveliest flowers, and where the 
 sun shines brightly over the blue mountain-lakes. 
 Alas ! once I fared not much better, and hence I 
 understood the tortures of these poor swans ; and 
 as it darkened more and more, and the luminous 
 stars came forth, the same stars that once in lovely 
 summer nights so lovingly caressed the swans, 
 but now looked down upon them, cold as winter, 
 
HERR VON SCHNABELEWOPSKI. 
 
 89 
 
 frostily clear, almost mockingly, — well did I now 
 comprehend that the stars are no loving, sympa- 
 thetic beings, but only glittering illusions of night, 
 eternal phantoms in an imaginary sky, golden lies 
 on a dark-blue nothing. 
 
 * "^ * It was on a most lovely spring day 
 that I left Hamburg. Still can I see the golden 
 sunlight playing over the ships in the harbor; still 
 do I hear the merry, long-drawn-out chant, " Hoi- 
 ho!" of the sailors. Such a harbor in spring- 
 time has a most pleasing resemblance to the tem- 
 perament of one who in the first flush of youth 
 goes into the busy world and for the first time 
 ventures upon the broad ocean of life. As yet his 
 thoughts stream like variegated pennons ; enthu- 
 siasm swells the sails of his wishes, Hoi-ho ! but 
 soon storms arise, the horizon darkens, the winds 
 howl, the planks creak, the billows break the rud- 
 der, and the poor ship is dashed to pieces on some 
 romantic crag, or strands on some shallow prosaic 
 sand-bar, or, perhaps, worm-eaten and shattered, 
 with drooping masts, without a single anchor of 
 hope, it reaches again the old harbor, and there, 
 piteously dismantled, grows rotten with age, a 
 miserable wreck. 
 
 But there are, too, men who are not to be com- 
 pared to ordinary vessels, but who rather resemble 
 steamers. They carry in their breasts a dark, 
 smouldering fire, and they sail against wind and 
 
go FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 weather. Their smoke banners flutter like the 
 bkick plumes of a rider by night; the side-wheels 
 of the steamer are like colossal spurs, which they 
 strike into the wave-ribs of ocean, and the rebel- 
 lious, foaming element must obey their will, like 
 a steed its rider; but often the boiler bursts, and 
 then the internal flame consumes us. 
 
 * * * At Leyden I found the eating misera- 
 bly poor. ' The republic of Hamburg had spoiled 
 me. I cannot here omit an additional tribute of 
 praise for Hamburg's kitchen. Oh, ye gods ! how 
 did I the first four weeks yearn for the smoked 
 beef and mock-turtle of Hammonia! I languished 
 in heart and stomach ; and, had not my landlady 
 of " The Red Cow" fallen in love with me, I must 
 hav^e perished from longing. 
 
 Hail to thee, landlady of "The Red Cow"! 
 She was a plump little woman, with a remarkably 
 corpulent body, and a remarkably small, round 
 head, red checks, blue eyes, — roses and violets. 
 For hours we sat together in the garden, drinking 
 tea out of genuine Chinese porcelain cups. It 
 was a pretty garden, laid out in four- and three- 
 cornered beds, around which were symmetrically 
 strewed gold-sand, cinnabar, and small white shells. 
 The trunks of the trees were daintily painted red 
 and blue. Then there were copper cages filled \Vith 
 canary-birds, and onion-plants in variegated glazed 
 pots. The garden was also ornamented with little 
 
HERE VON SCHNABELEIVOPSKI. gj 
 
 wooden statuettes, representing obelisks, pyramids, 
 vases, and animals. My attention was particularly 
 attracted to a green ox, which glared at mC quite 
 jealously whenever I embraced her, the lovely 
 landlady of " The Red Cow." 
 
 Hail to thee, landlady of ''The Red Cow"! 
 When Myn Frow covered the upper part of her 
 head with plaits, and robed herself in a many- 
 colored, flowered damask dress, and heavily loaded 
 her arms with white Brabant lace, then she looked 
 for all the world like a fabulous Chinese doll, — 
 probably like the goddess of porcelain. When 
 then in my rapture I kissed her a loud smack' on 
 each cheek, she would stand as stiff as porcelain, 
 sighing, porcelain-like, "Myn Heer." Then all the 
 tulips of the garden seemed to be moved with sym- 
 pathy, apparently joining in the sigh, " Myn Hecr." 
 
 This amour procured me many a choice tid-bit. 
 For every such love-scene had an influence on the 
 contents of the victual-basket which the excellent 
 landlady daily sent to my apartment. My mess 
 companions, six other students who dined with 
 me in my room, could always tell from the flavor 
 of the roast veal or beef fillet how much she loved 
 me, Myn Frow the landlady of "The Red Cow." 
 If once in a while the eatables happened to be of 
 an inferior quality, I had to submit to many humil- 
 iating gibes, and it was then, — " See how poorly 
 Schnabelcwopski looks; how sallow is his com- 
 
Q2 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 plexion, how wrinkled his face, how sunken his 
 eyes: it is no wonder that our landlady has grown 
 tired of him, and now sends us such wretched 
 meals." Or else they would say, " Alas, Schnabe- 
 lewopski grows weaker and thinner each day, and 
 will perhaps finally lose entirely the favor of our 
 landlady, and then we shall always have poor din- 
 ners, like to-day: we must feed him well, so that 
 he may again present a more ardent exterior." 
 And then they would force the most unsavory 
 morsels into my mouth, compelling me to eat 
 particularly large quantities of celery. But if for 
 sevtral consecutive days the fare was meagre, I 
 was overwhelmed with the most earnest expostu- 
 lations and entreaties to procure better food, by 
 re-awakening the flames of love in our landlady's 
 breast; to redouble my attentions to her; in brief, 
 to sacrifice myself for the general good. In long 
 harangues it was then eloquently pictured to me 
 how grand it was to devote one's self heroically 
 to the welfare of one's fellow-citizens, like Regu- 
 lus, who permitted himself to be put into a cask 
 of sharp nails, or like Theseus, who voluntarily 
 ventured into the cave of the Minotaur; and then 
 Livy and Plutarch were cited, etc. They also 
 sought to spur me into emulation by drawing 
 on the wall pictorial illustrations of those great 
 deeds, and that, too, with grotesque allusions, for 
 the Minotaur resembled the red cow on the well- 
 
HERR VON SCHNABELEWOPSKL q^ 
 
 known inn-sign, and the Carthaginian cask full of 
 nails looked like our landlady herself In fact, 
 these ungrateful beings constantly made the out- 
 ward appearance of this excellent woman the butt 
 of their wit. Generally they constructed an effigy 
 of her figure with apples, or kneaded it out of 
 bread-crumbs. They took a very small apple to 
 represent the head, placed it on the top of a very 
 large apple, which was to represent the body, and 
 the latter was again supported by two tooth-picks, 
 for legs. 
 
 When the roast was particularly bad, we would 
 argue concerning the existence of God. The Lord 
 had, however, always a majority. Only three of our 
 mess were atheistically inclined ; and even they 
 would allow themselves to be convinced if we had 
 good cheese for dessert. The most zealous deist 
 was little Simson, who, when he debated with tall 
 Vanpitter, became occasionally quite violent, and 
 paced the room excitedly, saying, " By God, that 
 is beyond endurance!" 
 
 Vanpitter, a tall, lank Frieslander, whose tem- 
 perament was as phlegmatic as the waters in a 
 Dutch canal, drew his arguments from German 
 philosophy, which at that time was all the fashion 
 in Leyden. He ridiculed the narrow minds that 
 attributed to God a separate being, as a something 
 apart from the universe ; he even accused them of 
 blasphemy in endowing God with wisdom, justice, 
 
 9 
 
94 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 lov^e, and similar human qualities, which are not 
 at all appropriate for him, for these qualities are 
 merely the negation of corresponding human weak- 
 nesses. But when Vanpitter had unfolded his own 
 pantheistic views, a certain Dricksen,from Utrecht, 
 a fat disciple of Fichte, took the field against him, 
 and satirized keenly this vague, pantheistic deity. 
 He went so far as to assert that it was blas- 
 phemy even to speak of the existence of God, in- 
 asmuch as existence supposes space, or, in short, 
 matter. Yea, it would be blasphemous to say of 
 God, " He is ;" for the most spiritual being cannot 
 be conceived except through material limitations. 
 To conceive the idea of God, one must abstract 
 from it everything material, and think of him, not 
 as a form of space, but as the order of events. 
 
 These words would always set little Simson 
 raging, and he would pace the room more excitedly 
 than before, crying, in still louder tones, " Oh, God ! 
 Oh, God! By God! This is too much!" I believe 
 he would have beaten the fat Fichtean for the 
 honor of God, had he not been too small and 
 weak. Sometimes he did even spring at him ; but 
 the fat one, without once removing his pipe from 
 his mouth, quickly grasped little Simson's puny 
 arms, held them firmly, very composedly explained 
 to him the Fichtean system, and finally blew into 
 his face his thick tobacco-smoke together with his 
 flimsy arguments, so thnt little Simson, almost 
 
HERR VON SCHNABELEWOPSKL 
 
 95 
 
 choked with smoke and rage, could only whimper 
 beseechingly, scarce audibly, "Oh, God! oh, God!" 
 But He never assisted little Simson, although he 
 bravely fought His battles. 
 
 But, notwithstanding the divine indifference, and 
 notwithstanding the almost human ingratitude of 
 God, little Simson remained the steadfast cham- 
 pion of deism, and that, I believe, from an inborn 
 tendency. For his ancestors belonged to God's 
 chosen people, — a people whom God once favored 
 with an especial affection, and who consequently 
 unto this day cling with a certain attachment to 
 him. The Jews have always been the Swiss guard 
 of deism. In politics the Jews may be extreme 
 republicans ; they may even draggle in the mire 
 like true sans-culottes ; but when religious matters 
 are in question, they remain the submissive ser- 
 vants of their Jehovah, the old parvenu, who 
 wishes to know nothing more of the whole pack, 
 and has let himself be baptized into a pure divine 
 Spirit. 
 
 I believe that this pure divine Spirit, this par- 
 venu of heaven, who has now arrived at a state of 
 moral, cosmopolitan, and universal culture, has a 
 secret grudge against the poor Jews, who knew 
 him in his first crude form, and in their synagogues 
 daily remind him of his former obscure, merely 
 national rank. Perhaps the Lord dislikes to be 
 reminded of his humble origin in Palestine, and 
 
96 
 
 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 tliat he was once the God of Abraham, Isaac, and 
 Jacob, and was formerly called Jehovah. 
 
 * * * Durinf^ my stay in Leyden I spent 
 much time in the society of little Simson. One 
 of his peculiarities was that he could not endure 
 that the least article in his room should be dis- 
 placed : he became visibly fidgety when one took 
 the veriest trifle in hand, were it only a pair of 
 snuffers. Everything must remain just as it lay, for 
 his furniture and other effects served him as helps, 
 according to the rules of mnemonics, to fix in 
 memory all sorts of historical dates or philosoph- 
 ical propositions. When once, during his absence, 
 the chambermaid removed an old chest, and took 
 his shirts and stockings from the bureau and sent 
 them to the wash, he was inconsolable on his re- 
 turn, and asserted that now he knew nothing more 
 of Assyrian history, and that all his evidences for 
 the immprtality of the soul, which he had so care- 
 fully and systematically arranged in the various 
 bureau-drawers, were now in the wash. 
 
 * * * The proprietor of my lodging-house 
 was a man of about fifty, with pale, emaciated 
 features, and very small, green eyes, with which 
 he was continually blinking, like a sentinel with 
 the sun shining in his eyes. His wife was a tall, 
 gaunt woman, nothing but skin and bones. He 
 was a cobbler by trade, and a Baptist by faith. He 
 read the Bible diligently. These readings inter- 
 
HERK VON SCHNABELEWOPSKI. 
 
 97 
 
 wove themselves into his dreams, and at breakfast 
 he would relate to his wife how the most eminent 
 and pious personages of the Bible had honored 
 him with their conversation, and how all the 
 women of the Old Testament had lavished the 
 most friendly and tender attentions on him. The 
 latter circumstance did not altogether please his 
 wife, and not unfrequently did she betray her 
 jealousy of her husband's nightly meetings with 
 the women of the Old Testament. " If," said she, 
 " it were only the chaste Virgin Mary, or old 
 Martha, or even Mary Magdalene, who they say 
 has reformed ; — but the sottish daughters of old 
 Lot, and fine Madam Judith, and the strolling 
 Queen of Sheba, — such dubious creatures are not 
 to be tolerated." 
 
 But her fury was at its climax when one morn- 
 ing her husband, in the garrulousness of his 
 ecstasy, gave an enthusiastic description of the 
 beautiful Esther, who had requested him to assist 
 at her toilet, so that through the power of her 
 charms she might win King Ahasuerus over to 
 the good cause. In vain the poor man assured 
 her that Mordecai himself had introduced him to 
 his lovely foster-daughter, and that the latter's 
 toilet was already nearly complete, and that he 
 had only combed her long raven tresses ; in vain. 
 The infuriated woman beat him with his leathern 
 strap, and dashed the hot coffee in his face, and 
 
 9^ 
 
98 
 
 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 would most assuredly have put an end to him, 
 had he not faithfully promised to have nothing 
 more to do with the women of the Old Testament, 
 and in future to converse only with the patriarchs 
 and the male prophets. 
 
 The consequence of this maltreatment was that 
 thereafter Myn Heer carefully concealed his dreamy 
 bliss ; he became now a pious roue. As he him- 
 self confessed to me, he had the temerity to dream 
 himself into the harem of King Solomon and to 
 drink tea with his thousand wives. 
 
 * * * What is a dream ? What is death ? 
 Is the latter merely an interruption of life ? or is 
 it total extinction ? For those who only know a 
 past and a future, and who cannot live an eternity 
 in every moment of the present, — for such, death 
 must be terrible. WHien the two crutches, Time 
 and Space, slip from their grasp, then they sink 
 into the eternal Nothing. 
 
 And dreams ? Why do we not fear falling asleep 
 more than being buried? Is it not frightful that 
 during a whole night the body lies stretched dead 
 as a corpse, while the spirit in us lives a most varied 
 life, — a life filled with all the terrors of that separa- 
 tion between body and spirit which we ourselves 
 have created ? When once in the future both are 
 again united in our consciousness, then perhaps 
 there will be no more dreams, or only invalids, 
 whose harmony has been destroyed, will dream. 
 
HERR VON SCHNABELEWOPSKI. 
 
 99 
 
 The ancients dreamed lightly and but little ; 
 a profound, vivid dream was regarded by them 
 as a memorable event, and was recorded in the 
 books of history. Real dreaming begins only 
 with the Jews, a spiritual people, and reaches 
 its full bloom with the Christians, a people of 
 spirits. Our posterity will shudder when once 
 they read what a ghostly existence we have led, 
 and how the human nature in us was divided and 
 only the one-half really lived. Our era — and it 
 begins at the cross of Christ — will sometime be 
 regarded as humanity's great hypochondriacal 
 period. 
 
 And yet what sweet dreams have we not 
 dreamed ! Our healthy descendants will scarcely 
 be able to comprehend it. From around us van- 
 ished all the splendors of the universe, and we 
 found them again in our inmost consciousness ; 
 the fracrrance of the crushed rose and the sweetest 
 songs of the affrighted nightingale have fled for 
 refuge into our souls. 
 
 When at night I disrobe, and stretch myself in 
 bed, and cover myself with the white sheet, I 
 sometimes involuntarily shudder, and the thought 
 flashes o'er me that I am dead, and am burying 
 myself Then I hastily close my eyes, to escape 
 the horrible thought and to seek refuge in dream- 
 land. 
 
 * * * What strange creatures are mankind ! 
 
100 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 hovvstrange their lives! how tragic their fate! They 
 love one another, and most times they may not say 
 it, and even if they did say it they would seldom 
 understand each other. And yet they do not liv^e 
 forever; they are mortal; only a short space of 
 time is vouchsafed them in which to seek happi- 
 ness ; they must snatch it quickly, and press it 
 hastily to their hearts ere it flies: hence are their 
 love-songs so tender, so fervent, so sweetly timid, 
 so despairingly merry, a strange mixture of glad- 
 ness and sorrow. The thought of death casts its 
 melancholy shadow over their happiest hours, 
 and consoles them tenderly in misfortune. They 
 can weep ! what poetry is contained in a human 
 tear! 
 
 * * * The shrill voice of the landlord's wife 
 roused me from my slumbers. Without knowing 
 what she wanted, half asleep, I followed her to the 
 sleeping-apartment of her husband, and there lay 
 the poor man, his night-cap drawn over his eyes, 
 dreaming heavily. A smile was on his lips, and 
 he stammered, " Vashti ! Queen Vashti ! fear not 
 Ahasuerus, beloved Vashti !" 
 
 With fury in her eye, the enraged woman whis- 
 pered to me, "Arc you now convinced, Ilerr 
 Schnabelewopski ? He carries on love-intrigues 
 with Queen Vashti. He prefers even a heathen to 
 me ; but I am a wife and a Christian, and you shall 
 see how I avenge myself" 
 
HERR VON SCHNAbELEiVO'PS'KL jqI 
 
 With these words she snatched the bedclothes 
 from her husband, and began to lash him most 
 unmercifully with a leathern thong. He, so sud- 
 denly and disagreeably awakened from his Biblical 
 dream, shouted as loudly as if Susa were in flames 
 or Holland in water, so that the neighborhood 
 was soon in an uproar. The next day it was 
 rumored throughout all Leyden that the landlord 
 had found me at dead of night in company of his 
 wife. 
 
 Abominable jealousy ! through it one of my 
 most pleasant dreams was interrupted, and the life 
 of little Simson jeopardized. 
 
 Had the landlady of " The Red Cow" been an 
 Italian, she would probably have poisoned my food ; 
 but, being a Hollanderess, she only sent me most 
 wretched food. Already the very next day did we 
 suffer the consequences of her woman's anger. 
 The first dish was — no soup. This was dreadful, 
 especially to a well-bred person like myself, who 
 had been accustomed from youth to eat soup every 
 day, and who, until now, could not imagine a 
 world where in the morning the sun does not rise 
 in its course and where at noon soup is not served 
 in its course. The second dish consisted of beef, 
 which was as cold and tough as Myron's cow. 
 Next came a fish, of which the less said the better. 
 Last came a large fowl, which, far removed from 
 stilling hunger, looked lean and emaciated, as if it 
 
102 
 
 LRGM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 was itself hungry, so that out of compassion for it 
 we could not eat a bite. 
 
 " And now, little Simson," cried fat Drickscn, 
 "do you still believe in a God? Is this justice? 
 The landlord's wife visits Schnabelewopski at dead 
 of night, and here in broad daylight we must suffer 
 for it." 
 
 " Oh, God ! oh, God !" sighed the little one, vexed 
 at such atheistic outbreaks, and perhaps also at the 
 dinner. Embittered by such quizzing, he launched 
 into an enthusiastic defense of deism, concluding 
 as follows : " What the sun is to the flowers, 
 that is God to humanity. When the rays of that 
 heavenly luminary touch the flowers, they merrily 
 shoot upwards, and open their petals and unfold 
 their most varied and most beautiful colors. At 
 night, when their sun has departed, they stand 
 sorrowfully, with closed petals, sleeping, or dream- 
 ing of the kisses of those golden rays. Those 
 flowers that stand always in the shade become 
 stunted in growth, colorless, and deformed, and 
 fade away, cheerless and unhappy. But those 
 flowers which vegetate in darkness, in old sub- 
 terranean dungeons and convent ruins, become 
 hideous and poisonous; they creep on the earth 
 like serpents, and their breath is " 
 
 " You need not spin out your Biblical parables 
 any further," cried Drickscn. "You, little Simson, 
 arc a pious flower basking in the divine sunshine 
 
HERR VON SCHNABELEWOPSKI. 
 
 103 
 
 and drinking in the holy rays of virtue and love, 
 till your soul is as radiant as a rainbow; whereas 
 we, who are turned away from God, fade color- 
 less and hideous, perhaps even spread pestilential 
 vapors." 
 
 " At Frankfort I once saw a clock," said little 
 Simson, " that did not believe in a clock-maker. 
 It was made of pinchbeck, and kept time wretch- 
 edly." 
 
 ** I will show you that such a clock can at least 
 strike," answered Dricksen, threateningly. 
 
 And thus one word brought on another, finally 
 causing a duel, in which little Simson received a 
 dangerous wound. 
 
 This sad scene agitated me deeply. But my 
 whole fury was turned against the woman who 
 was indirectly the cause of the calamity. With 
 my heart full of rage and grief, I stormed in upon 
 the landlady of ** The Red Cow." 
 
 " Monster ! why didst thou send no soup ?" 
 These were the words with which I greeted my 
 landlady the moment I met her in the kitchen. 
 She turned pale ; even the porcelain on the mantel- 
 piece trembled at the tones of my voice. I was as 
 fierce as man can only be when he has missed his 
 daily soup and his best friend has received a thrust 
 in the lung. 
 
 '* Monster ! why didst thou send no soup ?" I 
 repeated, in thunder tones, while the woman, con- 
 
104 FROM THE MEMOIRS OF 
 
 scious of her guilt, stood speechless and motion- 
 less before me. But finally the tears streamed 
 from her eyes, as from open flood-gates. But even 
 this sight could not assuage my wrath, and with 
 increased bitterness I spoke : " O ye women ! I 
 know that ye can weep; but tears are not soup. Ye 
 are created for our injury; your glance is false- 
 hood, and your breath is deception. Who first ate 
 the apple that brought sin into the world? It is 
 true that geese saved the Capitol ; but a woman 
 caused the destruction of Troy. O Troy! Troy! 
 ye sacred strongholds of Priam! ye fell through 
 the fault of a woman. Who led Mark Antony to 
 his ruin ? Who demanded the head of John the 
 Baptist ? Who was the cause of Abelard's misfor- 
 tunes ? A woman. History is full of examples 
 how ye have undone us. All ye do is folly, all 
 ye think is ingratitude. We give you our best, — 
 the holiest flame of our hearts, — our love. What 
 do ye give us in return ? Meat, wretched beef, 
 and still more wretched fowl. Monster, why didst 
 thou send no soup?" 
 
 In vain did Myn Frow stammer forth excuses ; 
 in vain did she conjure me by our past love to 
 forgive her this once. She promised henceforth 
 to send better food and still charge only six 
 florins, notwithstanding that the landlord of" The 
 Jackdaw" asks eight florins for his ordinary fare. 
 She went so far as to promise me oystcr-patty for 
 
I 
 
 HERR VON SCHNABELEVVOPSKl. 
 
 105 
 
 the following day ; yea, verily, in the tender tones 
 of her voice methought I heard the fragrant word 
 ''truffles." 
 
 But I remained steadfast ; I was determined to 
 break with her forever, and left the kitchen with 
 the tragic words, " Adieu ! in this life you shall 
 cook for me no more." 
 
FROM THE PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION OF 
 "THE HISTORY OF RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY 
 IN GERMANY." 
 
 * * * The book which lies before you is a 
 fragment, and shall remain a fragment. To be 
 candid, I would prefer to leave the book wholly 
 unprinted; for since its first publication my views 
 concerning many subjects, particularly those which 
 relate to religious questions, have undergone a 
 marked change, and much that I then asserted is 
 now in opposition to my better convictions. But 
 the arrow belongs not to the archer when once it 
 has left the bow, and the word no longer belongs 
 to the speaker when once it has passed his lips, 
 especially when it has been multiplied by the 
 press. 
 
 * * * At that time I was yet well and hearty ; 
 I was in the zenith of my prime, and as arrogant 
 as Nebuchadnezzar before his downfall. 
 
 Alas ! a few years later, a physical and spiritual 
 change occurred. How often since then have I 
 mused over the history of that Babylonian king 
 who thought himself a god, but who was miserably 
 hurled from the summit of his self-conceit, and 
 compelled to crawl on the earth like a beast, and 
 
 lOO 
 
RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 107 
 
 to eat grass (probably it was only salad). This 
 legend is contained in the grand and magnificent 
 book of Daniel ; and I recommend all godless 
 self- worshipers to lay it devoutly to heart. There 
 are, in fact, in the Bible many other beautiful and 
 wonderful narrations, well deserving their con- 
 sideration ; for instance, the story of the forbidden 
 fruit in Paradise, and the serpent which already 
 six thousand years before Hegel's birth promul- 
 gated the whole Hegelian philosophy. This 
 footless blue-stocking demonstrates very saga- 
 ciously how the absolute consists in the identity of 
 being and consciousness ; how man becomes God 
 through knowledge, or, what amounts to the same 
 thing", how God arrives at the consciousness of 
 himself through man. To be sure, this formality 
 is not so clear as in the original words : " If ye 
 eat of the tree of knowledge, ye shall be as gods, 
 knowing good and evil." Dame Eve understood 
 of the whole demonstration only this, — that the 
 fruit was forbidden ; and because it was forbidden 
 she ate of it. But no sooner had she eaten of the 
 tempting apple than she lost her innocence, her 
 naive guilelessness, and discovered that she was 
 far too scantily dressed for a person of her quality, 
 the mother of so many future kings and em- 
 perors, and she asked for a dress, — truly, only a 
 dress of fig-leaves, because at that time there were 
 as yet no Lyons silk fabrics in existence, and be- 
 
I08 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 cause there were in Paradise no dressmakers or 
 milliners. Oh, Paradise! How strange that as 
 soon as a woman arrives at self-consciousness her 
 first thought is of — a new dress ! 
 
 * * * Officious, pious Christian souls seem 
 very anxious to know how my conversion was 
 brought about, and seem desirous that I should 
 impose upon them an account of some wonderful 
 miracle. With true Christian importunity, they 
 inquire if I did not, like Saul, behold a light 
 while on the way to Damascus ; or if, like Balaam 
 the son of Beor, I was not riding a restive ass, 
 which suddenly oped its mouth and discoursed 
 like a human being. No, ye credulous souls, I 
 never journeyed to Damascus. Even the name 
 would be unknown to me had I not read an ac- 
 count in " Solomon's Song," wherein he com- 
 pares the nose of his beloved to a tower, pointing 
 towards Damascus. Nor have I ever seen an ass 
 — that is, no four-footed one — that spoke like a 
 human being; whereas I have met human beings 
 in plenty that every time they opened their mouths 
 spoke like asses. In fact, it was neither a vision, 
 nor a seraphic ecstasy, nor a voice from heaven, 
 nor a remarkable dream, nor any miraculous ap- 
 parition, that brought me to the path of saK^ation. 
 I owe my enlightenment simply to the reading of 
 a book ! one book ! yea, it is a plain old book, 
 as modest as nature, and as simple ; a book that 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. iqq 
 
 appears as workday-like and as unpretentious as 
 the sun that warms, as the bread that nourishes 
 us ; a book that looks on us as kindly and be- 
 nignly as an old grandmother, who, with her dear 
 tremulous lips, and spectacles on nose, reads in it 
 daily: this book is briefly called tlie book, — the 
 Bible. With good reason it is also called the 
 Holy Scriptures : he that has lost his God can find 
 him again in this book, and towards him who has 
 never known him it wafts the breath of the divine 
 word. The Jews, who are connoisseurs of precious 
 things, well knew what they were about when, at 
 the burning of the second temple, they left in the 
 lurch the gold and silver sacrificial vessels, the 
 candlesticks and lamps, and even the richly-jeweled 
 breast-plate of the high-priest, to rescue only the 
 Bible. 
 
 lO* 
 
ON THE HISTORY OF RF.LIGION AND 
 PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY.* 
 
 * * * Distinguished German philosophers who 
 may accidentally cast a glance over these pages 
 will superciliously shrug their shoulders at the 
 meagreness and incompleteness of all that which 
 I here offer. But they will be kind enough to bear 
 in mind that the little which I say is expressed 
 clearly and intelligibly, whereas their own works, 
 although very profound, unfathomably profound, 
 — very deep, stupendously deep, — are in the same 
 degree unintelligible. Of what benefit to the 
 people is the grain locked away in the granaries 
 to which they have no key? The masses are 
 famishing for knowledge, and will thank me for 
 the portion of intellectual bread, small though it 
 be, which I honestly share with them. I believe 
 it is not lack of ability that holds back the ma- 
 jority of German scholars from discussing religion 
 and philosophy in popular language. I believe it 
 
 * This work was originally published in France. 
 no 
 
RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 1 1 j 
 
 is a fear of the results of their own studies, which 
 they dare not communicate to the masses. I do, 
 not share this fear, for I am not a learned scholar,/ 
 I, myself, am of the people. I am not one of the 
 seven hundred wise men of Germany. I stand with 
 the great masses at the portals of their wisdom. 
 And if a truth slips through, and if this truth falls 
 in my way, then I write it with pretty letters on 
 paper, and give it to the compositor, who sets it 
 in leaden type and gives it to the printer; the latter 
 prints it, and then it belongs to the whole world. 
 
 The religion of Germany is Christianity. There- 
 fore I shall have to relate what Christianity is, how 
 it became Roman Catholicism, how out of this 
 sprang Protestantism, and out of the latter German 
 philosophy. Inasmuch as I am about to speak of 
 religion, I beg beforehand of all pious souls not 
 to be uneasy. Fear naught, ye pious ones ! No 
 profane witticisms shall offend your ears. It is 
 true that these are yet necessary in Germany, 
 where, at this juncture, it is important to neutralize 
 ecclesiastical power. For there we are now in the 
 same situation that you in France were before the 
 Revolution, when Christianity was yet in the closest 
 union with the old regime. The latter could not 
 be overthrown so long as the former maintained 
 its sway over the masses. Voltaire's keen ridicule 
 was needed ere Samson could let his ax descend. 
 But neither the ridicule nor the ax proved any- 
 
112 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 thing; they only effected something. Voltaire 
 could only wound the body of Christianity. All 
 his jests gathered from the annals of the Church, 
 all his witticisms against the doctrines and public 
 worship of the Church, against the Bible, this 
 holiest book of humanity, against the Virgin Mary, 
 that loveliest flower of poesy, the whole encyclo- 
 paedia of philosophical shafts which he launched 
 against the clergy and priesthood, wounded only 
 the outward, mortal body of Christianity, not its 
 inner being, not its profound spirit, not its eternal 
 soul. 
 
 For Christianity is an idea, and as such is inde- 
 structible and immortal, like every idea. But what 
 is this idea? 
 
 Just because this idea has not yet been clearly 
 comprehended, and because the essential has been 
 mistaken for the fundamental, there is as yet no 
 history of the Church. Two antagonistic factions 
 write the history of the Church, and contradict 
 each other incessantly. But the one as little as 
 the other will ever distinctly state what that idea 
 really is which is the underlying principle of Chris- 
 tianity, of its symbolism, of its dogma, of its public 
 worship, and which strives to reveal itself through- 
 out its whole history, and has manifested itself in 
 the actual life of Christian nations. 
 
 * * * Mow this idea was historically evolved, 
 and disclosed itself in the world of phenomena, 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 113 
 
 may be discovered as early as the first centuries 
 after the birth of Christ, if we study impartially 
 the history of the Manicheans and the Gnostics. 
 Although the first were branded as heretics, and 
 the latter defamed, and both anathematized, by the 
 Church, yet their influence on the doctrines of 
 the Church was lasting. Out of their symbolism, 
 Catholic art was developed, and their modes of 
 thought penetrated the whole life of Christendom. 
 The First Cause of the Manicheans does not differ 
 much from that of the Gnostics. The doctrine of 
 the two principles, the good and the evil, constantly 
 opposing each other, is common to both. The 
 Manicheans derived this doctrine from the ancient 
 Persian religion, in which Ormuz, the light, is at 
 enmity with Ahriman, the darkness. The others, 
 the real Gnostics, believed in the pre-existence of 
 the good principle, and accounted for the rise of 
 the evil through emanation, through the genera- 
 tion of ^ons, which, the farther they are removed 
 from their origin, the more vicious and evil do 
 they become. 
 
 * * * This Gnostic theory of the universe origi- 
 nated in ancient India, and brought with it the 
 doctrine of the incarnation of God, of the morti- 
 fication of the flesh, of spiritual introspection and 
 self-absorption. It gave birth to the ascetic, con- 
 templative, monkish life, which is the most logical 
 outgrowth of the Christian principle. This prin- 
 
114 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 \ 
 
 ciple has become entangled among the dogmas of 
 the Church, and has been able to express itself but 
 very obscurely in the public worship. But every- 
 where we find the doctrine of the two principles 
 prominent; the wicked Satan is always contrasted 
 with the good Christ. Christ represents the spir- 
 itual world, Satan the material ; to the former be- 
 long our souls, to the latter our bodies. Accord- 
 ingly, the whole visible world, which constitutes 
 nature, is originally evil, and Satan, the prince 
 of darkness, through it seeks to lure us to ruin. 
 Therefore it behooves us to renounce all the sen- 
 suous joys of life, to torture the body, which is 
 Satan's portion, in order that the soul may the 
 more majestically soar aloft to the bright heavens, 
 to the radiant kingdom of Christ. 
 ' This theory of the universe, which is the true, 
 ( fundamental idea of Christianity, spread itself 
 with incredible rapidity, like a contagious dis- 
 I ease, over the whole Roman empire. These suf- 
 ferings, at times strung to fever-pitch, then again 
 relaxing into exhaustion, lasted all through the 
 Middle Ages; and we moderns still feel in our 
 limbs those convulsions and that debility. And 
 if among us, here and there, there be one who is 
 already convalescent, he cannot flee from the uni- 
 versal hospital, and feels himself unhappy as the 
 only healthy person among invalids. 
 
 When once mankind shall have recovered its 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 115 
 
 perfect life, when peace shall again be restored 
 between body and soul, and they shall again inter- 
 penetrate each other with their original haimony, 
 then it will be scarcely possible to comprehend 
 the factitious feud which Christianity has insti- 
 gated between them. Happier and more perfect 
 generations, begot in free and voluntary embraces, 
 blossoming forth in a religion of joy, will then 
 smile sadly at their poor ancestors, who held them- 
 selves gloomily aloof from all the pleasures of 
 this beautiful world, and through the deadening 
 of a warm, cheerful sensuousness almost paled 
 into cold spectres. Yes, I say it confidently, our 
 descendants will.be more beautiful, more happy, 
 than we ; for I have faith in progress ; mankind is 
 destined to be happy, and I have a more favorable 
 opinion of the Divinity than those pious souls who 
 imagine that He created mankind only to suffer. 
 Already here on earth, through the blessings of 
 free political and industrial institutions, would I 
 seek to found that millennium which, according to 
 the belief of the pious, is not to be until the day 
 of judgment. The one is perhaps as visionary a 
 hope as the other, and possibly there will be no 
 resurrection of humanity, either in the politico- 
 moral or in the apostolic-Catholic sense. 
 
 Perhaps mankind is doomed to eternal misery:^\^ 
 the masses are perhaps condemned to be forever 
 trodden undej^jbot by despots, to be plundered by 
 
Il6 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 their accomplices, and to be jeered at by their 
 lackeys. 
 
 Alas ! in that case we must seek to maintain 
 Christianity, even if we recognize it to be an error. 
 Barefoot, and clad in monkish cowls, we must trav- 
 erse Europe, preaching the vanity of all earthly 
 good, and inculcating resignation. We must hold 
 up the consoling crucifix before scourged and de- 
 rided humanity, and promise, after death, all the 
 seven heavens above. 
 
 * * * The final fate of Christianity is dependent 
 upon our need of it. This religion has for eigh- 
 teen centuries been a blessing to suffering human- 
 ity: it was providential, divine, holy. All that it 
 has benefited civilization by taming the strong and 
 strengthening the weak, by uniting the nations 
 through like emotions and a like language, by all 
 that its panegyrists extol, — all these are insignifi- 
 cant in comparison with that great consolation 
 which in itself it bestowed upon mankind. Eter- 
 nal praise is due to that symbol of a suffering God, 
 the Saviour with the crown of thorns, the Christ 
 crucified, whose blood was a soothing balsam 
 dripping into humanity's wounds. The poet, in 
 particular, will reverently recognize the solemn 
 grandeur of that symbol. The whole system of 
 allegory, as expressed in the life and art of the 
 Middle Ages, will in all times excite the admira- 
 tion of poets. What colossal consistency in tJie 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. j jn 
 
 Christian art! — that is, in architecture ! How har- 
 moniously those Gothic cathedrals are adapted to 
 the religious services of the Church, and how the 
 fundamental idea of the Church itself is revealed 
 in them ! Everything towers upward ; everything 
 transubstantiates itself; the stone blossoms into 
 branches and foliage and becomes a tree ; the 
 fruits of the vine and of the wheat-stalk become 
 blood and flesh ; man becomes God, and God 
 becomes a pure, abstract spirit. The Christian 
 life during the Middle Ages is for the poet a rich, 
 inexhaustible store-house of precious materials. 
 Only through Christianity could, in this world, 
 such varied phases arise, — contrasts so striking, 
 sorrows so diverse, beauties so strange, that one 
 is inclined to believe that they never did exist in 
 reality, and that all was but a colossal fever-dream, 
 a delirious fantasy of an insane God. Nature 
 herself appeared in those times fantastically dis- 
 guised ; but notwithstanding that man, occupied 
 with abstract metaphysical speculations, turned 
 peevishly away from her, yet at times she awoke 
 him with a voice so solemnly sweet, so deliciously 
 terrible, so enchanting, that he involuntarily lis- 
 tened and smiled, then shrank back with terror, 
 and sickened even unto death. The story of the 
 nightingale of Basle here comes to my mind, and, 
 as it is probably unknown to you, I will relate it. 
 In May, 1433, at the time of the Ecumenical 
 II 
 
Il8 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 Council, a party of ecclesiastics, prelates, learned 
 scholars, and monks of every shade, took a walk 
 in a grove near Basle, wrangling over theological 
 disputations, drawing hair-splitting distinctions, or 
 arguing concerning the annats, the expectatives, 
 and the reservations, debating whether Thomas of 
 Aquinas was a greater philosopher than Bonaven- 
 tura, and what not ! But suddenly, in the midst 
 of their abstract and dogmatical discussions they 
 paused, transfixed, before a blooming linden-tree, 
 on which sat a nightingale, trilling and trolling the 
 sweetest and tenderest strains. The learned men 
 were ravished with delight. The glowing melo- 
 dies of spring penetrated to their scholastic, musty, 
 book-worm hearts, their souls awoke from the 
 mouldy, wintry sleep, they looked at one another 
 in astonished ecstasy. But finally one of them 
 made the sagacious remark that such things could 
 not come of good, that the nightingale might be a 
 devil, and that this devil might be seeking through 
 its sweet music to decoy them from their pious 
 conversations and to lure them to voluptuousness 
 and similar pleasant sins ; and then he began to 
 exorcise, probably with the usual formula: "Ad- 
 juro te per eum, qui venturus est, judicarc \nvos 
 ct mortuos," etc. It is said that at this conjura- 
 tion the bird replied, "Yes, I am an evil spirit!" 
 and flew away, laughing. But those who heard its 
 song sickened that very day, and soon after died. 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 119 
 
 This legend needs no commentary. It bears 
 distinctly the horrible impress of a time when all 
 that was sweet and lovely was denounced as dia- 
 bolical. Even the nightingale was slandered, and 
 it was customary to make the sign of the cross 
 when she sang. The pious Christian, like an ab- 
 stract spectre, walked timorously, with closed eyes, 
 through the beauties of nature. 
 
 * * * As regards the good principle, the same 
 conception prevailed over all the Christian coun- 
 tries of Europe. The Roman Catholic Church 
 took care of that, and whoever deviated from the 
 prescribed faith was a heretic. But in relation to 
 the evil principle and the empire of Satan, differ- 
 ent views were held in different countries, and the 
 Germanic North had quite different conceptions 
 from the Latin South. This was caused by the 
 fact that the Christian priesthood did not reject 
 the previously existing national gods as baseless 
 fantasies of the brain, but conceded to them an 
 actual existence ; asserting, however, that all these 
 gods were nothing but male and female devils, 
 who through the victory of Christ had lost their 
 power over mankind, and now sought through 
 wiles and stratagems to lure them to sin. All 
 Olympus was now transformed into an airy hell ; 
 and if a poet of the Middle Ages sang of Grecian 
 mythology ever so beautifully, the pious Christian 
 would persist in seeing therein only devils and 
 
I20 ^^ ^^^^ HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 hobgoblins. The gloomy fanaticism of the monks 
 alighted with special severity on poor Venus : she 
 was considered a daughter of Beelzebub, and the 
 good knight Tannhauser tells her to her face, — 
 
 " O Venus, lovely wife of mine. 
 You are a very devil !" 
 
 Tannhauser had been enticed by her into that 
 wondrous mountain-cavern called the Venusberg, 
 where, according to tradition, dwelt the beautiful 
 goddess with her nymphs and her paramours, be- 
 guiling the hours with the most wanton carousings 
 and dancing. Even poor Diana was not spared, 
 and, notwithstanding her previous reputation for 
 chastity, similar scandals were fastened on her 
 good name. It was said that she, together with 
 her nymphs, indulged in nightly rides through the 
 forest: hence the legend of a strange midnight 
 chase by wild and furious hunters. This legend 
 reveals clearly the then pervading Gnostic theory 
 of the degeneration of the former divinities. In 
 this transmogrification of the ancient national re- 
 ligion the uncferlying principle of Christianity is 
 most suggestively indicated. The national religion 
 of Europe, which, however, prevailed more de- 
 cidedly in the North than in the South, was^antjie-^ 
 ism. All the mysteries and symbols of that religion 
 were founded on and had reference to a worship 
 of nature; each of the elements was regarded as 
 
 f 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 121 
 
 the embodiment of some mysterious being, and as 
 such was revered and worshiped ; in every tree 
 dwelt a divinity, and all nature swarmed with gods 
 and goddesses. Christianity exactly reversed this, 
 and in place of gods it substituted devils and de- 
 mons. The cheerful figures of Grecian mythology, 
 beautified as they were by art, had taken root in 
 the South along with Roman civilization, and were 
 not so easily to be displaced by the hideous, weird, 
 and Satanic divinities of the German North. The 
 latter seem to have been fashioned without any 
 particular artistic design, and even before the ad- 
 vent of Christianity they were as sombre and as 
 gloomy as the North itself Hence there could 
 not arise in France so frightful a devildom as among 
 us in Germany, and even the witchcraft and sorcery 
 of the former assumed a cheerful guise. How 
 lovely, fair, and picturesque are the popular super- 
 stitions of France as compared with the bloody, 
 hazy, and misshapen monsters which loom gloom- 
 ily and savagely from out the mists of German 
 legendary lore ! 
 
 Those German poets of the Middle Ages who 
 chose such themes as had originated or been first 
 treated in Brittany and Normandy thereby invested 
 their poems with somewhat of the cheerfulness of 
 the French temperament. But the old Northern 
 sombreness, of whose gloom we can now scarcely 
 form any idea, exercised full sway over such of our 
 II* 
 
122 0^ ^^^^ HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 literature as was distinctly national, and over such 
 popular traditions as have been orally transmitted. 
 The superstitions of the two countries offer as 
 striking a contrast as that which exists between a 
 Frenchman and a German. The supernatural be- 
 ings that fifjure in old French romances and wonder- 
 tales are bright and cheerful creations, and remark- 
 able for a cleanliness which is noticeably lacking 
 in our filthy rabble of German hobgoblins. French 
 fairies and sprites are as distinguishable from Ger- 
 man spectres as a spruce and daintily-gloved dandy, 
 jauntily promenading the Boulevard Coblence, is 
 different from a burly German porter, carrying a 
 heavy load upon his shoulders. A French nixen, 
 such as Melusina, is to a German elf as a princess 
 to a washerwoman. The fairy Morgana Avould 
 stand aghast at sight of a German witch, her body 
 naked and besmeared with salves and ointments, 
 riding on a broom-stick to the Brocken. The 
 Brocken is no merry Avalon, but a rendezvous for 
 all that is weird and hideous. On the vciy summit 
 of the mountain sits Satan, in the shape of a black 
 goat. The infamous sisterhood form a circle around 
 him, and dance, and sing, " Donderemus ! Don- 
 dcremus!" Mingled in the infernal din are heard 
 the bleating of the goat and the shouting of the 
 demoniac crew. If, during the dance, a witch hap- 
 pens to drop a shoe, it is an evil omen, and portends 
 that she will be burned at tlie stake ere the year 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 123 
 
 ends. But all the terror which such a portent in- 
 spires is forgotten amid the wild and maddening 
 Berlioz-like music of the witches' sabbath ; and 
 when in the morning the poor witch awakens from 
 her delirium, she finds herself lying, stark naked 
 and tired, by the glimmering embers of her hearth. 
 The most complete account of witches we find 
 in the learned Dr. Nicolai Remigius's " Demon- 
 ology." This sagacious man had the best oppor- 
 tunity to learn the tricks of witches, as he officiated 
 at their trials, and during his time, in Lotharingia 
 alone, eight hundred women were burned at the 
 stake, after trial and conviction. The trial was gen- 
 erally as follows. Their hands and feet were tied 
 together, and then they were thrown into the water. 
 If they went under and were drowned, it was a proof 
 that they were innocent; but if they floated on the 
 surface, they were recognized as guilty and burned. 
 Such was the logic of those times. 
 
 * * * When the learned Doctor Remigius 
 had completed his great work on witchcraft, he 
 deemed himself so master of his subject as to be 
 able to work magic, and, conscientious man that 
 he was, did not fail to accuse himself before the 
 courts as a sorcerer ; in consequence of which ac- 
 cusation he was duly burned. 
 
 * * * I must confess that Luther did not un- 
 derstand the real nature of Catholicism. He did 
 not comprehend that the jundamental idea of 
 
124 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 Christianity, the deadening of the senses, was too 
 antagonistic to human nature to be ever entirely 
 practicable in life ; he did not comprehend that 
 I Catholicism was a concordat between God and the 
 ^;^ devil, — that is to say, between the spirit and the 
 senses, in which the absolute reign of the spirit 
 was promulgated in theory, but in which the senses 
 were nevertheless practically reinstated in the en- 
 joyment of their rights. Hence a wise system of 
 concessions allowed by the Church to the senses, 
 always, however, under formalities which cast a 
 slur on every act of the senses, and maintained the 
 sham usurpation of the senses. You might yield 
 to the tender impulses of your heart and embrace 
 a pretty girl, but you must confess that it was a 
 flagrant sin, and for this sin you must make atone- 
 ment. That this atonement might be made with 
 money was as beneficial to humanity as useful to 
 the Church. The Church imposed fines, so to say, 
 for every indulgence of the flesh : hence there 
 arose taxes on all sorts of sins, and there were 
 pious colporteurs who, in the name of the Roman 
 Catholic Church, hawked for sale through the land 
 absolutions for every taxable sin. Such a one was 
 that Tctzel against whom Luther first entered the 
 field. 
 
 * * * Leo of Medici must have smiled at the 
 ])oor, chaste, simple-minded monk who imagined 
 that the evangelic gospels were the chart of Chris- 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 125 
 
 tianity, and that this chart must be a truth ! Per- 
 haps he never comprehended what Luther was 
 aiming at, for at that time he was busily occupied 
 with the building of St. Peter's Cathedral, the cost 
 of which was defrayed by the money derived from 
 these sales of absolutions, so that sin actually fur- 
 nished the means wherewith to build this church, 
 which became thereby, as it were, a monument to 
 the lusts of the flesh. Of this house of God it per- 
 haps might be said more truly than of the cathedral 
 at Cologne that it was built by the devil. This tri- 
 umph of spiritualism, compelling sensualism itself 
 to build its most beautiful temple, this reaping 
 from the multitude, by concessions made to the 
 flesh, the means wherewith to beautify spiritualism, 
 was not understood in the German North. For 
 there, more easily than under the burning skies 
 of Italy, was it possible to practice a Christianity 
 that should make the fewest concessions to the 
 senses. We Northerners are cold-blooded, and 
 needed not so many price-lists of absolution for 
 sins of the flesh as the fatherly Leo sent us. The 
 climate, too, makes the exercise of Christian vir- 
 tues easier for us; and when, on the 31st of Oc- 
 tober, 1 5 16, Luther nailed to the gate of the St. 
 Augustine Church his thesis against indulgences, 
 the city moat of Wittenburg was, perhaps, already 
 frozen over with ice thick enough for skating, which 
 is a chilly pleasure, and therefore no sin. 
 
126 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 * * * In Germany the battle against Catholi- 
 cism was nothing else than a war begun by spiritual- 
 ism when it perceived that it only reigned nominally 
 and de jure ; whereas sensualism, through conven- 
 tional subterfuges, exercised the real sovereignty 
 and ruled dc facto. When this was perceived, the 
 hawkers of indulgences were chased off, the pretty 
 concubines of the priests were exchanged for plain 
 but honest wedded wives, the charming Madonna 
 pictures were demolished, and there reigned in 
 certain localities a puritanism inimical to every 
 gratification of the senses. 
 
 In France, on the contrary, during the seven- 
 teenth and eighteenth centuries, the war was begun 
 by sensualism against Catholicism, when it saw 
 that while it, sensualism, reigned dc facto, yet 
 every exercise of its sovereignty was restrained in 
 the most aggravating manner by spiritualism, and 
 stigmatized as illegitimate. While in Germany 
 the battle was fought with chaste earnestness, in 
 France it was waged with licentious witticisms; 
 and while there theological disputations were in 
 vogue, here merry satires were the fashion. 
 
 * * * Truly, Jansenism had much more cause 
 than Jesuitism to feel aggrieved at the delineation 
 of Tartuffe, and Moliere would be as obnoxious 
 to the Methodists of to-day as to the Catholic devo- 
 tees of his own time. It is just because of this 
 that Moliere is so great, for, like Aristophanes and 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 127 
 
 Cervantes, he leveled his persiflage not only at 
 temporary follies, but also against that which is 
 ever ridiculous, — the inherent frailties of mankind. 
 Voltaire, wh6 always attacked only the temporary 
 and the unessential, is in this respect inferior to 
 Moliere. 
 
 * * * Then why my aversion to spiritualism ? 
 Is it something so evil ? By no means. Attar of 
 roses is a precious article, and a small vial of it is 
 refreshing when one is doomed to pass one's days 
 in the closely-locked apartments of the harem. 
 But yet we would not have all the roses of life 
 crushed and bruised in order to gain a few drops 
 of the attar of roses, be they ever so consoling. 
 We are like the nightingales, that delight in the 
 rose itself, and derive as delicious a pleasure from 
 the sight of the blushing, blooming flower as from 
 its invisible fragrance. 
 
 * * * But there was one man at the Diet of 
 Worms who, I am convinced, thought not of him- 
 self, but only of the sacred interests which he was 
 there to champion. That man was Martin Luther, 
 the poor monk whom Providence had selected to 
 shatter the world-controlling power of the Roman 
 Catholic Church, against which the mightiest em- 
 perors and most intrepid scholars had striven in 
 vain. But Providence knows well on whose shoul- 
 ders to impose its tasks: here, not only intellec- 
 tual but also physical strength was required. It 
 
128 0:V THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 needed a body steeled from youth through chastity 
 and monkish discipline to bear the vexations and 
 laboriousness of such an office. 
 
 * * * Luther was not only the greatest, but also 
 the most thoroughly German hero of our history. 
 In his character are combined, on the grandest 
 scale, all the virtues and all the faults of the Ger- 
 mans, so that he, in his own person, was the repre- 
 sentative of that wonderful Germany. For he pos- 
 sessed qualities which we seldom find united, and 
 which even we usually consider to be irreconcilably 
 antagonistic. He was simultaneously a dreamy 
 mystic and a practical man of action. His thoughts 
 possessed not only wings, but also hands; he could 
 speak and could act. He was not only the tongue, 
 but also the sword of his time. He was both a cold, 
 scholastic word-caviler, and an enthusiastic, God- 
 inspired prophet. When during the day he had 
 wearily toiled over his dogmatic distinctions and 
 definitions, then in the evening he took his lute, 
 looked up to the stars, and melted into melody 
 and devotion. The same man who could scold 
 like a fish-wife could be as gentle as a tender 
 maiden. At times he was fierce as the storm that 
 uproots oaks ; and then again he was mild as the 
 zephyr caressing the violets. He was filled with a 
 reverential awe of God. He was full of the spirit 
 of self-sacrifice for the honor of the Deity; he 
 could sink his whole personality in the most ab- 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 129 
 
 stract Spirituality, and yet he could well appreciate 
 the good things of this earth, and from his mouth 
 blossomed forth the famous saying, — 
 
 " Who loves not wine, women, and song 
 Will be a fool all his life long." 
 
 He was, I might say, a complete man, — a perfect 
 man, in whom spirit and matter were not antago- 
 nistic. To call him a spiritualist would, therefore, 
 be as erroneous as to call him a sensualist. How 
 shall I describe him ? He had in him something 
 original, incomprehensible, wonderful, — ^just as we 
 find it to be the case with all providential men. 
 
 * * * All praise to Luther ! Eternal honor to 
 the blessed man to whom we owe the salvation of 
 our most precious possessions, and whose benefac- 
 tions we still enjoy. It ill becomes us to complain 
 of the narrowness of his views. The dwarf, stand- 
 ing on the shoulders of the giant, particularly if 
 he puts on spectacles, can, it is true, see farther 
 than the giant himself; but for noble thoughts 
 and exalted sentiments a giant heart is necessary. 
 It were still more unseemly of us to pass a harsh 
 judgment on his faults, for those very faults have 
 benefited us more than the virtues of thousands of 
 other men. The refinement of Erasmus, the mild- 
 ness of Melanchthon, could never have brought us 
 so far as the godlike brutality of Brother Martin. 
 
 * * * From the day on which Luther denied the 
 
I30 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 authority of the Pope, and publicly declared in 
 the Diet "that his teachings must be controverted 
 through the words of the Bible itself, or with sen- 
 sible reasons," there begins a new era in Germany. 
 The fetters with which Saint Boniface had chained 
 the German Church to Rome are broken. This 
 Church, which has hitherto formed an integral 
 part of the great hierarchy, now splits into re- 
 ligious democracies. The character of the religion 
 itself is essentially changed : the Hindoo-Gnostic 
 element disappears from it, and the Judaic-deistic 
 element again becomes prominent. We behold 
 the rise of evangelical Christianity. By recogniz- 
 ing and legitimizing the most importunate claims 
 of the senses, religion becomes once more a reality. 
 The priest becomes man, takes to himself a wife, 
 and begets children, as God commands. 
 
 ****** 
 If in Germany we lost through Protestantism, 
 along with the ancient miracles, much other poesy, 
 we gained manifold compensations. Men became 
 nobler and more virtuous. Protestantism was very 
 successful in effecting that purity of morals and 
 that strictness in the fulfillment of duty which is 
 generally called morality. In certain communities 
 Protestantism assumed a tendency which in the 
 end became quite identical with morality, and the 
 evangelic gospels remained as a beautiful parable 
 only. Particularly in the lives of the ecclesiastics 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 131 
 
 is a pleasing change now noticeable. With celi- 
 bacy disappeared also monkish obscenities and 
 vices. Among the Protestant clergy are frequently 
 to be found the noblest and most virtuous of men, 
 such as would have won respect from even the 
 ancient Stoics. One must have wandered on foot, 
 as a poor student, through Northern Germany, in 
 order to learn how much virtue — and, in order to 
 give virtue a complimentary adjective, how much 
 evangelical virtue — is to be found in an unpreten- 
 tious-looking parsonage. How often of a winter's 
 evening have I found in them a hospitable wel- 
 come, — I, a stranger, who brought with me no other 
 recommendation save that I was hungry and tired! 
 When I had partaken of a hearty meal, and, after 
 a night's good rest, was ready in the morning to 
 continue my journey, then came the old pastor in 
 his dressing-gown, and gave me a blessing on the 
 way, — and it never brought me misfortune ; and 
 his good-hearted, gossipy wife placed several slices 
 of bread-and-butter in my pocket, which I found 
 not less refreshing; and silent in the distance stood 
 the pastor's pretty daughters, with blushing cheeks 
 and violet-blue eyes, whose modest fire in the 
 mere recollection warmed my heart for many a 
 whole winter's day. 
 
 * * * How strange ! We Germans are the 
 strongest and wisest of nations ; our royal races 
 furnish princes for all the thrones of Europe; our 
 
122 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 Rothschilds rule all the Bourses of the world; our 
 learned men are pre-eminent in all the sciences ; 
 we invented gunpowder and printing ; — and yet 
 if one of us fires a pistol he must pay a fine of 
 three thalers ; and if we wish to insert in a news- 
 paper, " My dear wife has given birth to a little 
 daughter, beautiful as Liberty," then the censor 
 grasps his red pencil and strikes out the word 
 " Liberty." 
 
 * * * Luther gave us not only freedom of dis- 
 cussion, but also the instrument of discussion ; to 
 the spirit he gave a body ; to the thought he gave 
 words. He created the German language. 
 
 This he did by his translation of the Bible. 
 
 In fact, the divine author of that book seems to 
 have known, as well as we others, that the choice 
 of a translator is by no means a matter of indif- 
 ference ; and so He himself selected his translator, 
 and bestowed on him the wonderful gift to trans- 
 late from a language which was dead and already 
 buried, into another language that did not even yet 
 exist. 
 
 * * * The knowledge of the HcbrcAV language 
 had entirely disappeared from the Christian world. 
 Only the Jews, who kept themselves hidden here 
 and there in stray corners of the world, yet pre- 
 served the traditions of this lanfrua^xe. Like a 
 ghost keeping watch over a treasure which had 
 been confided to it during life, so in its dark and 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 33 
 
 gloomy ghettos sat this murdered nation, this 
 spectre-people, guarding the Hebrew Bible. 
 
 * * * Luther's Bible is an enduring spring of 
 rejuvenation for our language. All the expressions 
 and phrases contained therein are German, and 
 are still in use by writers. As this book is in the 
 hands of even the poorest people, they require no 
 special learned education in order to be able to 
 express themselves in literary forms. 
 
 When our political revolution breaks out, this 
 circumstance will have remarkable results. Liberty 
 will everywhere be gifted with the power of speech, 
 and her speech will be biblical^ 
 
 * * * More noteworthy and of more importance 
 than his prose writings are Luther's poems, the 
 songs which in battle and in trouble blossomed 
 forth from his heart. Sometimes they resemble a 
 floweret that grows on a rocky crag, then again 
 a ray of moonlight trembling over a restless sea. 
 Luther loved music, and even wrote a treatise on 
 the art: hence his songs are particularly melo- 
 dious. In this respect he merits the name, the 
 Swan of Eisleben. But he is nothing less than 
 a mild swan in those songs wherein he stimulates 
 the courage of his followers and inflames himself 
 to the fiercest rage of battle. A true battle-song 
 was that martial strain with which he and his com- 
 panions marched into Worms. The old cathedral 
 trembled at those unwonted tones, and the ravens, 
 
 12* 
 
134 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 in their dark nests in the steeple, startlecj with 
 affright That song, the Marseilles Hymn of the 
 Reformation, preserves to this day its inspiriting 
 power. 
 
 * * * The expressions " classic" and " roman- 
 tic" refer only to the spirit and the manner of the 
 treatment. The treatment is classic when the form 
 of that which is portrayed is quite identical with 
 the idea of the portrayer, as is the case with the 
 art-works of the Greeks, in which, owing to this 
 identity, the greatest harmony is found to exist be- 
 tween the idea and its form, between the meaning 
 and its embodiment. The treatment is romantic 
 when the form does not reveal the idea through 
 this identity, but lets this idea or meaning be sur- 
 mised parabolically. The Greek mythology had 
 an array of god-figures, each of which, in addition 
 to the identity of form and idea, was also suscep- 
 tible of a symbolic meaning. But in this Greek 
 religion only the figures of the gods were clearly 
 defined ; all else, their lives and deeds, was left to 
 the arbitrary treatment of the poet's fancy. In the 
 Christian religion, on the contrary, there are no 
 such clearly-defined figures or shapes, but stated 
 facts, — certain definite holy events and deeds, 
 which the poetical faculty of man was permitted to 
 invest with parabolic significations. It is said that 
 Homer invented the Greek gods and goddesses. 
 That is not true. They existed previously in 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 135 
 
 clearly-defined outlines ; but he invented their his- 
 tories. The artists of the Middle Ages, on the 
 other hand, never ventured the least addition to 
 the historical part of their religion. The fall of 
 man, the incarnation, baptism, the crucifixion, and 
 the like, were matters of fact, which were not to be 
 intermeddled with, and which it was not permis- 
 sible to remodel in the least, but to which, as said 
 before, poetry might attach a symbolic meaning. 
 All the arts during the Middle Ages were treated 
 in this parabolic spirit, and this treatment is ro- 
 mantic. Hence we find in the poesy of the Middle 
 Ages a mystic universality ; the forms are all so 
 shadowy, what they do is so vaguely indicated, 
 all therein is as if seen through a hazy twilight 
 intermittently illumined by the moonlight. The 
 idea is merely hinted at in the form, as in a riddle; 
 and we dimly see a vague, indefinite figure, just as 
 is appropriate to such a spiritual literature. There 
 is not, as among the Greeks, a harmony, clear as 
 the sun, between form and meaning, but occasion- 
 ally the meaning overtops the given form, and the 
 latter strives desperately to reach the former, and 
 then we behold bizarre, fantastic sublimity. Then, 
 again, the form has overgrown itself, and is out 
 of all proportion to the meaning. A silly, pitiful 
 thought trails itself along in some colossal form, 
 and we witness a grotesque farce. Misshapenness 
 is nearly always the result. 
 
■36 
 
 O.y THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 k 
 
 The universal characteristic of that Hterature 
 was that in all its productions it manifested the 
 same firm, unshaken faith which in that period 
 reigned over all worldly and spiritual matters. All 
 the opinions of that time were based on authori- 
 ties. The poet journeyed along the abysses of 
 doubt as free from apprehension as a mule, and 
 there prevailed in the literature of that period a 
 dauntless composure and blissful self-confidence 
 such as became impossible in after-times, when the 
 influence of the Papacy, the chief of those authori- 
 ties, was shattered, and with it all the others were 
 overthrown. Hence the poems of the Middle Ages 
 have all the same characteristics, as if composed 
 not by single individuals, but by the whole people 
 cii masse : they are objective, epic, naive. 
 
 In the literature that blossomed into life with 
 Luther we find quite opposite tendencies. 
 
 Its material, its subject, is the conflict between 
 the interests and views of the Reformation and 
 the old order of things. To the new spirit of 
 the times, that hodge-podge religion which arose 
 from the two elements already referred to — Ger- 
 manic nationality and the Hindoo-Gnostic Chris- 
 tendom — was altogether repugnant. The latter was 
 considered heathen idol-worship, which was to be^ 
 replaced by the true religion of the Judaic-deistic- 
 cvangelic gospels. New views prevail, which are 
 less inimical to the gratification of the senses. 
 
AiXn PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 137 
 
 Through industrial progress and the dissemination 
 of philosophical theories, spiritualism becomes dis- 
 credited in popular opinion. The tiers-etat begins 
 to rise; the Revolution already rumbles in the 
 hearts and brains of men, and what the era feels, 
 thinks, needs, and wills is openly proclaimed ; and 
 that constitutes the subject-matter of modern lit- 
 erature. 
 
 * * * The universal characteristic of modern 
 literature consists in this: that now individuality 
 and skepticism predominate. Authorities are over- 
 thrown ; reason is now man's sole lamp, and con- 
 science his only staff in the dark mazes of life. 
 Man now stands alone, face to face with his Cre- 
 ator, and chants his song to Him. Hence this 
 literary epoch opens with hymns. And even later, 
 when it becomes secular, the most devout self- 
 consciousness, the sense of individuality, reigns 
 therein. Poesy is no longer objective, epic, and 
 naive, but subjective, lyric, and introspective. 
 
 * * * The God of the pantheists differs from 
 the God of the deists in so far that the former is 
 in the world itself, while the latter is external to, 
 or, in other words, is over, the world. The God of 
 the deists rules the world from above downwards, 
 as a something separate and distinct from himself 
 Only in regard to the manner and nature of that 
 rule do the deists differ among themselves. The 
 Hebrews picture God as a thunder-hurling tyrant ; 
 
138 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 the Christians regard him as a lovnng father; the 
 disciples of Rousseau and the whole Genevese 
 school portray him as a skillful artist, who has 
 made the whole world s'omewhat in the same 
 manner as their papas manufacture watches ; and, 
 as art-connoisseurs, they admire the work and 
 praise the maker above. 
 
 * * * When religion can no longer burn us at 
 the stake, she comes to us begging. But all our 
 gifts bring only evil. 
 
 * * * From the moment religion seeks assist- 
 ance from philosophy her downfall is unavoid- 
 able. She -strives to defend herself, and always 
 talks herself deeper into ruin. Religion, like all 
 other absolutisms, may not justify herself Pro- 
 metheus is bound to the rock by a silejit power, 
 -^schylus represents the personification of brute 
 force as not speaking a single word. It must be 
 dumb. 
 
 * * * Moses Mendelssohn was the reformer of 
 the German Israelites, his companions in faith. 
 He overthrew the prestige of Talmudism, and 
 founded a pure Mosaism. This man, whom his 
 cotemporaries called the German Socrates, and 
 whose nobleness of soul and intellectual powers 
 they so admired, was the son of a poor sexton of 
 the synagogue at Dessau. Besides this curse of 
 birth, Providence made him a hunchback, in order 
 to teach the rabble in a very striking manner that 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. / j ^q 
 
 men are to be judged not by outward appearance 
 but by inner worth. 
 
 * * * As Luther overthrew the Papacy, so Men- 
 delssohn overthrew the Tahnud ; and that, too, by 
 a similar process. He discarded tradition, declared 
 the Bible to be the well-spring of religion, and 
 translated the most important parts of it. By so 
 doing he destroyed Jewish Catholicism, for such 
 is the Talmud. It is a Gothic dome which, al- 
 though overladen with fanciful, childish ornamen- 
 tation, yet amazes us by the immensity of its 
 heaven-aspiring proportions. 
 
 * '^ * No German can pronounce the name of 
 Lessing without its finding a responsive echo in 
 his breast. Since Luther, Germany has produced 
 no greater and better man than Gotthold Ephraim 
 Lessing. These two are our pride and joy. 
 
 Like Luther, Lessing's achievements consisted 
 not only in effecting something definite, but in 
 agitating the German people to its depths, and in 
 awakening through his critiques and polemics a 
 wholesome intellectual activity. He was the vivi- 
 fying critique of his time, and his whole life was 
 a polemic. His critical insight made itself felt 
 throughout the widest range of thought and feel- 
 ing, — in religion, in science, and in art. His pole- 
 mics vanquished every opponent and grew stronger 
 with every victory. Lessing, as he himself con- 
 fessed, needed conflict for the full development of 
 
I40 ON THE ins TORY OF RELIGION 
 
 his povvers> He resembled that fabulous Norman 
 who inherited the skill, knowledge, and strength 
 of those whom he slew in single combat, and in 
 this manner became finally endowed with all pos- 
 sible excellences and perfections. It is easily 
 conceivable that such a contentious champion 
 should stir up not a little commotion in Germany, 
 — in that peaceful Germany which was then even 
 more sabbatically quiet than at present. The 
 majority were stupefied at his literary audacity. 
 But just this was of the greatest assistance to him, 
 for oscrf is the secret of success in li_terature, as 
 it is in revolutions, — and in love. £ All trembled 
 before the sword of Lessing. No nead was safe 
 from him. Yea, some craniums he struck off from 
 mere wantonness, and was moreover so spiteful as 
 to lift them up from the ground and show to the 
 public that they were hollow inside. Those whom 
 his sword could not reach he slew with his shafts 
 of wit. His friends admired the pretty variegated 
 feathers of his winged arrows ; his enemies felt 
 their sting in their hea rts. 3 Lessing's wit does not 
 resemble that cnjoucvicnt, that gciite, those lively 
 sallies, which are so well known here in France. 
 His wit was no petty French greyhound chasing 
 its own shadow: it was rather a German cat play- 
 ing with a mouse before strangling it. 
 
 Tolcmics were Lessing's delight, and hence he 
 never reflected long whether an opponent was 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 14 j 
 
 worthy of him ; and thus through his contro- 
 versial writings he has saved many a name from 
 well-merited oblivion. Around many a pitiful 
 authorling he has spun a web of the wittiest sar- 
 casm, the most charming humor; and thus they 
 are preserved for all time in Lessing's works, like 
 insects caught in a piece of amber. In slaying 
 his enemies he made them immortal. Who of us 
 would have ever heard of that Klotz on whom 
 Lessing wasted so much wit and scorn ? The 
 huge masses of rock which he hurled at, and with 
 which he crushed, that poor antiquarian, are now 
 the latter's indestructible monument. 
 
 It is noteworthy that this wittiest man of all 
 Germany was also the most honorable. There is 
 nothing to which his love of truth may be com- 
 pared. Lessing made not the least concession 
 to falsehood, even if thereby he could, after the 
 manner of the worldly-wise, advance the victory 
 of truth itself. He would do everything for truth 
 except lie for it. 
 
 * * * It is heart-rending to read in his biog- 
 raphy how fate denied this man every joy, and 
 how it did not even vouchsafe to him to rest in the 
 bosom of his family from his daily struggles. Once 
 only fortune seemed inclined to smile on him ; he 
 was blessed with a beloved wife and child. But 
 this happiness was like the rays of the sun gilding 
 the wings of a swift-flying bird : it vanished as 
 
 13 
 
142 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 quickly. His wife died in consequence of her 
 confinement, and the child soon after. Concerning 
 the latter, he wrote to a friend the horribly-witty 
 words, ** My joy was brief And I lost him so 
 unwillingly, this son of mine ! for he was so wise, 
 so wise ! Think not that the few hours of my 
 fatherhood have already made a doting parent of 
 me. I know what I say. Was it not wisdom 
 that he came so reluctantly into the world, and 
 that he so soon noticed its folly ? Was it not wis- 
 dom that he seized the first opportunity to leave 
 it ? For once I have sought to be happy like other 
 men ; but I have made a miserable failure of it." 
 
 * * * Lessing was only the prophet who from 
 the second Testament pointed over into the third. 
 I have called him the successor of Luther; and it 
 is from this point of view that I propose to discuss 
 him here. Of his influence on German art I shall 
 speak hereafter. In the latter he effected a whole- 
 some reform, not only through his critiques, but 
 also through his example; and this latter phase 
 of his activity is generally made the most prom- 
 inent, and is the most discussed. But, viewed 
 from our present stand-point, his philosophical 
 and theological battles are to us more important 
 than all his dramatic works and all his writings on 
 dramaturgy. His dramas, however, like all his 
 writings, have a social import, and " Nathan the 
 Wise" is in reality not only a good play, but also 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 143 
 
 a philosophical, theological treatise in support of 
 the doctrine of a pure deism. For Lessing, art 
 was a tribune, and when he was thrust from the 
 pulpit or the professor's chair he retreated to the 
 stage, gaining thereby a more numerous audience 
 and speaking out more boldly than before. 
 
 I claim that Lessing continued the work of 
 Luther. After Luther had freed us from the yoke 
 of tradition and had exalted the Bible as the only 
 well-spring of Christianity, there ensued a rigid 
 word-service, and the letter of the Bible ruled just 
 as tyrannically as once did tradition. Lessing 
 contributed the most to the emancipation from 
 the tyranny of the letter. 
 
 * * * *' The letter," said Lessing, "is the last 
 veil of Christianity, and only after the removal 
 of that veil will its spirit appear." This spirit, 
 however, is nothing else than what the Wolfians 
 thought they had demonstrated ; what the philan- 
 thropists felt in their hearts; what Mendelssohn 
 discovered in Mosaism ; what the freemasons 
 chanted; what the poets sang; what at that time 
 held sway in Germany under all forms, — pure 
 deism. 
 
 'Xessing died at Brunswick, in the year 178 1, 
 misunderstood, hated, and denounced. In the 
 same year there was published at Konigsberg 
 the "Critique of Pure Reason," by Immanuel 
 Kant. With this book there begins in Germany 
 
144 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 an intellectual revolution, which offers the most 
 wonderful analogies to the material revolution in 
 France, and which to the profound thinker must 
 appear equally important.. It develops the same 
 phases, and between the two there exists a very 
 remarkable parallelism. On both sides of the 
 Rhine we behold the same rupture with the past : 
 it is loudly proclaimed that all reverence for tra- 
 dition is at an end. As in France no privilege, 
 so in Germany no thought is tolerated without 
 proving its right to exist: nothing is taken for 
 granted. And as in France fell the monarchy, 
 the keystone of the old social system, so in Ger- 
 many fell deism, the keystone of the intellectual 
 ancie7i regime. 
 
 5jC 5fC 5fl ^ 5}J ^ 
 
 It is horrible when the bodies which we have 
 created ask of us a soul. But it is still more 
 horrible, more terrible, more uncanny, to create 
 a soul, which craves a body and pursues us with 
 that demand. The idea which we have thought 
 is such a soul, and it allows us no peace until we 
 have given it a body, until we have brought it into 
 actual being. The thought seeks to become deed; 
 the word, flesh. And, strange! man, like the God 
 of the Bible, needs but to speak his thought, and 
 the world shapes itself accordingly : light dawns, 
 or darkness descends ; the waters separate them- 
 selves from the dry land, and even wild beasts 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 145 
 
 appear. The universe is but the signature of the 
 word. 
 
 Mark this, ye haughty men of action. Ye are 
 naught but the unconscious servants of the men of 
 thought, who, ofttimes in the humblest obscurity, 
 have marked out your tasks for you with the utmost 
 exactitude. Maximilian Robespierre was only the 
 hand of Jean Jacques Rousseau, — the bloody hand 
 that from the womb of time drew forth the body 
 whose soul Rousseau had created. Did the rest- 
 less anxiety that embittered the life of Jean Jacques 
 arise from a foreboding that his thoughts would 
 require such an obstetrician to bring them bodily 
 to life? 
 
 Old Fontenelle was perhaps in the right when 
 he declared, '*If I carried all the ideas of this world 
 in my closed hand, I should take good heed not 
 to open it." For my part, I think differently. If 
 I held all the ideas of the world in my hand, I 
 might perhaps implore you to hew off my hand at 
 once, but in no case would I long keep it closed. 
 I am ill adapted to be a jailer of thoughts. By 
 heaven ! I would set them free, — yea, even should 
 they assume the most threatening shapes and 
 sweep through all lands like a train of mad Bac- 
 chantes ; even if with their thyrsus staffs they 
 should strike down our most innocent flowers, 
 break into our hospitals and chase the sick, de- 
 crepit old world from its bed. Truly, it would 
 
46 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 grieve me sadly, and I myself would come to harm. 
 For, alas ! I too belong to this diseased and super- 
 annuated world ; and the poet says rightly that 
 scoffing at our crutches does not enable us to walk 
 any the better. I am the most sick among you all, 
 and the most to be pitied, for I know what health 
 is. But ye know it not, ye enviable ones. Ye can 
 die without noticing it yourselves. Verily, many 
 of ye have already been dead for these many years, 
 and yet ye assert that now only does the true life 
 begin. When I contradict such madness, then they 
 become enraged against me, and rail at me, and, 
 horrible ! the corpses spring on me and reproach 
 me ; and more even than their revilings does their 
 mouldy odor oppress me. Avaunt, ye spectres ! 
 I shall speak of one whose very name possesses 
 an exorcising power: I speak of Immanuel Kant. 
 
 It is said that the spirits of darkness tremble 
 with affright when they behold the sword of an 
 executioner. How, then, must they stand aghast 
 when confronted with Kant's "Critique of Pure 
 Reason"! This book is the sword with which, in 
 Germany, deism was decapitated. 
 
 To be candid, ye French are tame and moderate 
 compared with us Germans. At the most, you 
 have slain a king ; and he had already lost his head 
 before he was beheaded. Meanwhile, ye beat the 
 drums, and shouted, and stamped with your feet, 
 so that the whole world was shaken with the 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 147 
 
 tumult. It is really awarding Maximilian Robes- 
 pierre too much honor to compare him with Im- 
 manuel Kant. Maximilian Robespierre, the great 
 exemplar of the staid, practical, prosaic citizen 
 class, did truly have attacks of destructive fury 
 when the monarchy was concerned, and he writhed 
 terribly enough in his regicidal epilepsy; but as 
 soon as the Supreme Being was mentioned, he 
 wiped the white foam from his mouth and the 
 blood from his hands, put on his blue Sunday coat 
 with the glass buttons, and attached a bouquet of 
 flowerets to his broad coat-lapel. 
 
 It is difficult to write the biography of Immanuel 
 Kant, for he had neither a career nor a history. He 
 was a bachelor, and lived a mechanical, orderly, 
 almost abstract life, in a quiet little side-street of 
 Konigsberg, an old city near the northeast bound- 
 ary of Germany. I believe that the great clock of 
 the cathedral did not perform its daily work more 
 dispassionately, more regularly, than its country- 
 man Immanuel Kant. Rising, coffee-drinking, 
 writing, collegiate lectures, dining, walking, — each 
 had its set time. And when Immanuel Kant, in 
 his gray coat, cane in hand, appeared at the door 
 of his house and strolled towards the small linden 
 avenue which is still called " the philosopher's 
 walk," the neighbors knew it was exactly half-past 
 three by the clock. Eight times he promenaded 
 up and down, during all seasons; and when the 
 
148 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 weather was gloomy, or the gray clouds threatened 
 rain, his old servant Lampe was seen plodding 
 anxiously after, with a large umbrella under his 
 arm, like a symbol of Providence. 
 
 What a strange contrast between the outer life 
 of the man and his destructive, world-convulsing 
 thoughts ! Had the citizens of Konigsberg sur- 
 mised the whole significance of those thoughts, 
 they would have felt a more profound awe in the 
 presence of this man than in that of an execu- 
 tioner, who merely slays human beings. But the 
 good people saw in him nothing but a professor 
 of philosophy ; and when at the fixed hour he 
 sauntered by, they nodded a friendly greeting and 
 regulated their watches. 
 
 But if Immanuel Kant, that arch-destroyer in 
 the realms of thought, far surpassed Maximilian 
 Robespierre in terrorism, yet he had certain points 
 of resemblance to the latter that invite a compar- 
 ison of the two men. In both we find the same 
 inflexible, rigid, prosaic integrity. Then we find 
 in both the same instinct of distrust, — only that 
 the one exercises it against ideas, and names it 
 a critique, while the other applies it to men, and 
 calls it republican virtue. In both, however, the 
 narrow-minded shopkeeper type is markedly man- 
 ifest. Nature had intended them to weigh out 
 sugar and coffee, but fate willed it otherwise, and 
 int(^ the scales of the one it laid a king, into those 
 
 i 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 149 
 
 of the other, a God. And they both weighed cor- 
 rectly. 
 
 * * "^ It is a pecuhar circumstance that the 
 Fichtean philosophy has always been subjected to 
 much ridicule. I once saw a caricature represent- 
 ing a Fichtean goose, which had so large a liver 
 that it no longer knew whether it was a goose or 
 a liver. On its belly was inscribed " 1=1." 
 
 * * * We burlesqued cleverly the Fichtean 
 " I," which claimed that the whole world of phe- 
 nomena was produced merely by its thinking. A 
 droll misunderstanding which arose and was widely 
 circulated came timely to the aid of the mockers. 
 The public at large believed that the Fichtean 
 " I" meant " I, Johann Gottlieb Fichte," and that 
 this individual " I" denied all other existences. 
 " What impudence !" cried the good people ; " this 
 person does not believe that we exist! — we who 
 are more corpulent than he, and who, as aldermen 
 and state officials, are even his superiors !" The 
 ladies asked, " Does he not even believe in the 
 existence of his wife ? No ? And Madame Fichte . 
 permits that?" ^, 
 
 * * * Pantheism had already in Fichte's time 
 interpenetrated German art; even the Catholic 
 Romanticists unconsciously followed this current, 
 and Goethe expressed it most unmistakably. This 
 he already does in *' Werther." In " Faust" he 
 seeks to establish an affinity between man and 
 
ISO 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 nature by a bold, direct, mystic method, and con- 
 jures the secret forces of nature through the magic 
 formula of the powers of hell. But this Goethean 
 pantheism is the most clearly and most charm- 
 ingly disclosed in his short ballads. The early 
 philosophy of Spinoza has shed its mathematical 
 shell, and now flutters about us as Goethean poesy. 
 Hence the wrath of our pietists, and of orthodoxy 
 in general, against the Goethean ballads. With 
 their pious bear-paws they clumsily strike at this 
 butterfly, which is so daintily ethereal, so hazy 
 and light of wing, that it always flits out of reach. 
 
 These Goethean ballads have a tantalizing charm 
 that is indescribable. The harmonious verses cap- 
 tivate the heart like the tenderness of a loving 
 maiden ; the words embrace, while the thought 
 kisses. 
 
 * * * This giant was minister in a liliputian 
 German state, in which he could never move at 
 ease. It was said of Phidias's Jupiter seated in 
 Olympus, that were he ever to stand erect the 
 sudden uprising would rend asunder the vaulted 
 roof This was exactly Goethe's situation at 
 Weimar: had he suddenly lifted himself up from 
 his peaceful, sitting posture, he would have shat- 
 tered the gabled canopy of state, or, more proba- 
 bly, he would have bruised his own head. But 
 the German Jupiter remained quietly seated, and 
 composedly accepted homage and incense. 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 151 
 
 * * * When it was seen that such saddening 
 follies were budding out of philosophy and ripen- 
 ing into a baleful maturity, — when it was observed 
 that the German youth were generally absorbed in 
 metaphysical abstractions, thereby neglecting the 
 most important questions of the time and unfit- 
 ting themselves for practical life, — it was quite 
 natural that patriots and lovers of liberty should 
 be led to conceive a justifiable dislike to phi- 
 losophy ; and a few went so far as to condemn it 
 utterly and entirely, as idle, useless, chimerical 
 theorizing. 
 
 We shall not be so foolish as to attempt seriously 
 to refute these malcontents. German philosophy 
 is a matter of great weight and importance, and 
 concerns the whole human race. Only our most 
 remote descendants will be able to decide whether 
 we deserve blame or praise for completing first 
 our philosophy and afterwards our revolution. To 
 me it seems that a methodical people, such as we 
 Germans are, must necessarily have commenced 
 with the Reformation, could only after that pro- 
 ceed to occupy ourselves with philosophy, and not 
 until the completion of the latter could we pass on 
 to the political revolution. pThis order I find quite 
 sensible. The heads which philosophy has used 
 for thinking, the revolution can afterwards, for its 
 purposes, cut off. But philosophy would never 
 have been able to use the heads which had been 
 
52 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 decapitated by the revolution, if the latter had 
 preceded. 
 
 * * * Christianity has to a certain degree mod- 
 erated that brutal lust of battle, such as we find it 
 among the ancient Germanic races, who fought, 
 not to destroy, nor yet to conquer, but merely 
 from a fierce, demoniac love of battle itself; but it 
 could not altogether eradicate it. And when once 
 that restraining talisman, the cross, is broken, then 
 the smouldering ferocity of those ancient warriors 
 will again blaze up ; then will again be heard the 
 deadly clang of that frantic Berserkir wrath, of 
 which the Norse poets say and sing so much. 
 That talisman is rotten with decay, and the day 
 will surely come when it will crumble and fall. 
 Then the ancient stone gods will arise from out the 
 ashes of dismantled ruins, and rub the dust of a 
 thousand years from their eyes ; and finally Thor, 
 with his colossal hammer, will leap up, and with it 
 shatter into fragments the Gothic domes. . 
 
 And when ye hear the rumbling and the crum- 
 bling, take heed, ye neighbors of France, and meddle 
 not with what we do in Germany. It might bring 
 harm on you. Take heed not to kindle the fire; 
 take heed not to quench it. Ye might easily burn 
 your fingers in the flame. Smile not at my advice 
 as the counsel of a visionary warning you against 
 Kantians, Fichteans, and natural philosophers. 
 Scoff not at the dreamer who expects in the 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. jr-^ 
 
 material world a revolution similar to that which 
 has already taken place in the domains of thought. 
 The thought goes before the deed, as the lightning 
 precedes the thunder. True, the German thunder 
 is German, and is rather awkward, and comes roll- 
 ing along rather tardily; but come it surely will, 
 and when ye once hear a crash the like of which 
 in the world's history was never heard before, then 
 know that the German thunderbolt has reached its 
 mark. At this crash the eagles will fall dead in 
 mid air, and the lions in Afric's most distant deserts 
 will cower and sneak into their most royal dens. 
 A drama will be enacted in Germany in compari- 
 son with which the French Revolution will appear 
 a harmless idyl. To be sure, matters are at present 
 rather quiet, and if occasionally this one or the 
 other rants and gesticulates somewhat violently, do 
 not believe that these will ever appear as the real 
 actors. These are only little puppies, that run 
 around in the empty arena, barking and snarling 
 at one another, until the hour shall arrive when 
 appear the gladiators, who are to battle unto 
 death. 
 
 And that hour will come. As on the raised 
 benches of an amphitheatre the nations will group 
 themselves around Germany to behold the great 
 tournament. I advise you, ye French, keep very 
 quiet then : on your souls take heed that ye ap- 
 plaud not. We might easily misunderstand you, 
 
 14 
 
154 
 
 ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGION 
 
 and in our blunt manner roughly quiet and rebuke 
 you; for if in our former servile condition we could 
 sometimes overcome you, much more easily can 
 we do so in the wantonness and delirious intoxi- 
 cation of freedom. Ye yourselves know what one 
 can do in such a condition, and ye are no longer 
 in that condition. Beware ! I mean it well with 
 you, therefore I tell you the bitter truth. Ye have 
 more to fear from emancipated Germany than 
 from the whole Holy Alliance, with all its Croats 
 and Cossacks. For, in the first place, ye are not 
 loved in Germany, — which is almost incomprehen- 
 sible, for ye are so very amiable, and during your 
 sojourn in Germany took much pains to please 
 the better and lovelier half of the Germans. But 
 even if that half should love you, it is, however, 
 just the half that does not bear arms, and whose 
 friendship would therefore avail you but little. 
 
 What they really have against you, I never could 
 comprehend. Once in a beer-cellar at Gottingen 
 a young Teuton expressed himself that revenge 
 must be had on the French for Conrad von Stauf- 
 fen, whom they beheaded at Naples. You have 
 surely long since forgotten that. But we forget 
 nothing. So you see that if we should once be 
 inclined to quarrel with you, good reasons will not 
 be wanting. At all events, I advise you to be on 
 your guard. Let in Germany happen what will, 
 whether the crown prince of Prussia or Dr. Wirth 
 
AND PHILOSOPHY IN GERMANY. 
 
 155 
 
 hold sway, be ye always armed, remain quietly 
 at your post, musket in hand. I mean it well with 
 you ; and I almost stood aghast when I learned 
 lately that your ministry propose to disarm France. 
 
 As, notwithstanding your present Romanticism, 
 ye are inborn classics, ye know Olympus. Among 
 the naked gods and goddesses who there merrily 
 regale themselves with nectar and ambrosia, ye 
 behold one goddess who, although surrounded by 
 mirth and sport, yet wears always a coat of mail, 
 and keeps helm on head and spear in hand. 
 
 It. is thg^ goddess of wisdom. 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 Madame de Stael's work, "De rAllemagne," 
 is the only comprehensive account of the intel- 
 lectual life of Germany which has been accessible 
 to the French ; and yet since her book appeared 
 a considerable period has elapsed, and an entirely 
 new school of literature has arisen in Germany. 
 Is it only a transitional literature? Has it already 
 reached its zenith? Has it already begun to de- 
 cline? Opinions are divided concerning it. The 
 majority believe that with the death of Goethe a 
 new literary era begins in Germany; that with him 
 the old Germany also descended to its grave ; that 
 the aristocratic period of literature was ended, and 
 the democratic just beginning; or, as a French 
 journal recently phrased it, "the intellectual do- 
 minion of the individual has ceased, — the intel- 
 lectual rule of the many has commenced." 
 
 So far as I am concerned, I do not venture to 
 pass so decided an opinion as to the future evolu- 
 tions of German intellect. I had already prophe- 
 156 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. iq^ 
 
 sied many years in advance the end of the Goethean 
 art-period, by which name I was the first to desig- 
 nate that era. I could safely venture the prophecy, 
 for I knew very well the ways and the means of 
 those malcontents who sought to overthrow the 
 Goethean art-empire, and it is even claimed that 
 I took part in those seditious outbreaks against 
 Goethe. Now that Goethe is dead, the thought 
 of it fills me with an overpowering sorrow. 
 
 While I announce this book as a sequel to 
 Madame de Stael's " De I'Allemagne," ^nd extol 
 her work very highly as being replete with in- 
 formation, I must yet recommend a certain caution 
 in the acceptance of the views enunciated in that 
 book, which I am compelled to characterize as a 
 coterie-book. Madame de Stael, of glorious mem- 
 ory, has here, in the form of a book, opened a 
 salon, in which she received German authors and 
 gave them an opportunity to make themselves 
 known to the French civilized world. But above 
 the din of the most diverse voices, confusedly dis- 
 coursing therein, the most audibje is the delicate 
 treble of Herr A. W. Schlegel. Where the large- 
 hearted woman is wholly herself, — where she is 
 uninfluenced by others, and expresses the thoughts 
 of her own radiant soul, displaying all her intel- 
 lectual fireworks and brilliant follies, — there the 
 book is good, even excellent. But as soon as 
 she yields to foreign influences, as soon as she 
 14* 
 
158 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 begins to glorify a school whose spirit is wholly 
 unfamiliar and incomprehensible to her, as soon as 
 through the commendation of this school she fur- 
 thers certain ultramontane tendencies which are in 
 direct opposition to her own Protestant clearness, 
 just so soon her book becomes wretched and un- 
 enjoyable. To this unconscious partisanship she 
 adds the evident purpose, through praise of the 
 intellectual activity, the idealism, of Germany, to 
 rebuke the realism then existing among the French, 
 and the materialistic splendors of the Empire. Her 
 book " De I'Allemagne" resembles in this respect 
 the " Germania" of Tacitus, who perhaps likewise 
 designed his eulogy of the Germans as an indirect 
 satire against his countrymen. 
 
 The school which Madame de Stael glorified, and 
 whose tendencies she furthered, was the Romantic 
 school, which was naught else than the re-awaken- 
 ing of the poetry of the Middle Ages as it mani- 
 fested itself in the poems, paintings, and sculptures, 
 in the art and life, of those times. This poetry, 
 however, had been developed out of Christianity: 
 it was a passion-flower which had blossomed from 
 the blood of Christ. The passion-flower is that 
 motley-colored, melancholy flower in whose calyx 
 one may behold a counterfeit presentment of the 
 tools used at the crucifixion of Christ, — namely, 
 hammer, pincers, and nails. This flower is by no 
 means unsightly, but only spectral : its aspect fills 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 159 
 
 our souls with a dread pleasure, like those convul- 
 sive, sweet emotions that arise from grief. In this 
 respect the passion-flower would be the fittest 
 symbol of Christianity itself, whose most awe- 
 inspiring charm consists in the voluptuousness 
 of pain. 
 
 * * * Every epoch is a Sphinx, which plunges 
 into the abyss as soon as its problem is solved. 
 
 * * * We by no means deny the benefits which 
 the Christian-Catholic theory of the universe ef- 
 fected. in Europe. It was needed as a wholesome 
 reaction against the terrible, colossal materialism 
 which was developed in the Roman empire and 
 threatened the annihilation of all the intellectual 
 grandeur of mankind. 
 
 * * * The flesh had become so insolent in this 
 Roman world that Christian discipline was needed 
 to chasten it. After the banquet of a Trimalkion, 
 a hunger-cure, such as Christianity, was required. 
 
 Or did perhaps the hoary sensualists seek by 
 scourgings to stimulate the cloyed flesh to renewed 
 capacity for enjoyment? Did aging Rome sub- 
 mit to monkish flagellations in order to discover 
 exquisite pleasure in torture itself, voluptuous bliss 
 in pain ? 
 
 Unfortunate excess ! It robbed the Roman body- 
 politic of its last energies. Rome was not de- 
 stroyed by the division into two empires. On 
 the Bosphorus, as on the Tiber, Rome was eaten 
 
l6o ^'-^^^ ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 up by the same Judaic spiritualism, and in both, 
 Roman history became the record of a slow dying- 
 away, a death-agony that lasted for centuries. Did 
 perhaps murdered Judea, by bequeathing its spir- 
 itualism to the Romans, seek to avencre itself on 
 the victorious foe, as did the dying Centaur, who so 
 cunningly wheedled the son of Jupiter into wear- 
 ing the deadly vestment poisoned with his own 
 blood? In sooth, Rome, the Hercules among 
 nations, was so effectively consumed by the Judaic 
 poison that helm and armor fell from its decaying 
 limbs, and its imperious battle-tones degenerated 
 into the prayers of sniveling priests and the trilling 
 of eunuchs. 
 
 But that which enfeebles the aged strengthens the 
 young. That spiritualism had a wholesome effect 
 on the over-robust races of the North ; the full- 
 blooded barbarians became spiritualized through 
 Christianity; European civilization began. This 
 is a praiseworthy and sacred phase of Christianity. 
 The Catholic Church earned, in this regard, the 
 highest title to our respect and admiration. 
 Through grand, genial institutions it controlled 
 the bestiality of the barbarian hordes of the North, 
 and tamed their brutal materialism. 
 
 The works of art in the Middle Ages give evi- 
 dence of this mastery of matter by the spirit ; and 
 that is often their whole purpose. The epic poems 
 of that time I'nay be easily classified according to 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. i6i 
 
 the degree in which they show that mastery. Of 
 lyric and dramatic poems nothing is here to be 
 said ; for the latter do not exist, and the former 
 are comparatively as much alike in all ages as are 
 the songs of the nightingales in each succeeding 
 spring. 
 
 * >K * ^\\ |-]^g poetry of the Middle Ages has a 
 certain definite character, through which it differs 
 from the poetry of the Greeks and Romans. In 
 reference to this difference, the former is called 
 Romantic, the latter classic. These names, how- 
 ever, are misleading, and have hitherto caused the 
 most vexatious confusion, which is even increased 
 when we call the antique poetry plastic as well as 
 classic. In this, particularly, lay the germ of mis- 
 understandings; for artists ought always to treat 
 their subject-matter plastically. Whether it be 
 Christian or pagan, the subject ought to be por- 
 trayed in clear contours. In short, plastic configu- 
 ration should be the main requisite in the modern 
 Romantic as well as in antique art. And, in fact, 
 are not the figures in Dante's " Divine Comedy" 
 or in the paintings of Raphael just as plastic as 
 those in Virgil or on the walls of Herculaneum ? 
 The difference consists in this, — that the plastic 
 figures in antique art are identical with the thing 
 represented, with the idea which the artist seeks 
 to communicate. Thus, for example, the wander- 
 ings of the Odyssey mean nothing else than the 
 
1 62 THE ROMAXT/C SCHOOL. 
 
 wanderings of the man who was a son of Laertes 
 and the husband of Penelope and was called 
 Ulysses. Thus, again, the Bacchus which is to 
 be seen in the Louvre is nothing more than the 
 charming son of Semele, with a daring melancholy 
 look in his eyes, and an inspired voluptuousness 
 on the soft arched lips. It is otherwise in Romantic 
 art : here the wanderings of a knight have an 
 esoteric signification ; they typify, perhaps, the 
 mazes of life in general. The dragon that is van- 
 quished is sin ; the almond-tree that from afar so 
 encouragingly wafts its fragrance to the hero is 
 the Trinity, the God-Father, God-Son, and God- 
 Holy-Ghost, who together constitute one, just as 
 nut, shell, and kernel together constitute the 
 almond. When Homer describes the armor of a 
 hero, it is naught else than a good armor, which 
 is worth so many oxen ; but when a monk of the 
 Middle Ages describes in his poem the garments 
 of the Mother of God, you may depend upon it 
 that by each fold of those garments he typifies 
 some special virtue, and that a peculiar meaning 
 lies hidden in the sacred robes of the Immaculate 
 Virgin Mary; and as her Son is the kernel of the 
 almond-nut, she is quite appropriately described 
 in the poem as an almond-blossom. Such is the 
 character of that poesy of the Middle Ages which 
 we designate " Romantic." Classic art had to por- 
 trav onl\' tiie finite, and its forms could be idcn- 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 163 
 
 tical with the artist's idea. Romantic art had to 
 represent, or rather to typify, the infinite and the 
 spiritual, and therefore was compelled to have 
 recourse to a system of traditional, or rather 
 parabolic, symbols, just as Christ himself had en- 
 deavored to explain and make clear his spiritual 
 meanings through beautiful parables. Hence the 
 mystic, enigmatical character of the art-produc- 
 tions of the Middle Ages. Fancy strives fran- 
 tically to portray through concrete images that 
 which is purely spiritual, and in the vain endeavor 
 invents the most colossal absurdities: it piles Ossa 
 on Pelion to reach heaven. 
 
 Similar monstrous abortions of imafjination have 
 been produced by the Scandinavians, the Hindoos, 
 and the other races which likewise strive through 
 poetry to represent the infinite; among them also 
 do we find poems which may be regarded as Ro- 
 mantic. 
 
 * * * But human genius can transfigure de- 
 formity itself, and many painters succeeded in 
 accomplishing the unnatural task beautifully and 
 sublimely. The Italians, in particular, glorified 
 beauty, — it is true, somewhat at the expense of 
 spirituality, — and raised themselves aloft to an 
 ideality which reached its perfection in the many 
 representations of the Madonna. Where it con- 
 cerned the Madonna, the Catholic clergy always 
 made some concessions to sensuality. This image 
 
64 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 of an immaculate beauty, transfigured by motherly 
 love and sorrow, was privileged to receive the 
 homage of poet and painter, and to be decked 
 with all the charms that could allure the senses. 
 For this image was a magnet, which was to draw 
 the great masses into the pale of Christianity. 
 Madonna Maria was the pretty daine-du-coinptoir oi 
 the Catholic Church, whose customers, especially 
 the barbarians of the North, she attracted and held 
 fast by her celestial smiles. 
 
 During the Middle Ages architecture was of the 
 same character as the other arts ; for, indeed, at 
 that period all manifestations of life harmonized 
 most wonderfully. In architecture, as in poetry, 
 the parabolizing tendency was evident. Now, when 
 we enter an old cathedral, we have scarcely a hint 
 of the esoteric meaning of its stony symbolism. 
 Only the general impression forces itself on our 
 mind. We feel the exaltation of the spirit and 
 the' abasement of the flesh. The interior of the 
 cathedral is a hollow cross, and we walk here amid 
 the instruments of martyrdom itself The varie- 
 gated windows cast on us their red and green 
 lights, like drops of blood and ichor; requiems 
 for the dead resound through the aisles ; under our 
 feet are grave-stones and decay; in harmony with 
 the colossal pillars the soul soars aloft, painfully 
 tearing itself away from the body, which sinks to 
 the ground like a cast-off garment. When one 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 165 
 
 views from without these Gothic cathedrals, these 
 immense structures, that are built so airily, so 
 delicately, so daintily, as transparent as if carved, 
 like Brabant laces made of marble, then only does 
 one realize the might of that age which could 
 achieve a mastery over stone, so that even this 
 stubborn substance should appear spectrally ethe- 
 realized and be an exponent of Christian spiritual- 
 ism. 
 
 But the arts are only the mirror of life ; and when 
 Catholicism disappeared from daily life, so also it 
 faded and vanished out of the arts. At the time 
 of the Reformation, Catholic poetry was gradually 
 dying out in Europe, and in its place we behold 
 the long-buried Grecian style of poetry again re- 
 viving. It was, in sooth, only an artificial spring, 
 the work of the gardener, and not of the sun : the 
 trees and flowers were stuck in narrow pots, and 
 a glass sky protected them from wind and cold 
 weather. 
 
 In the world's history every event is not the 
 direct consequence of another, but all events mutu- 
 ally act and react on one another. It was not alone 
 through the Greek scholars who, after the con- 
 quest of Constantinople, immigrated over to us, that 
 the taste for Grecian art, and the striving to imitate 
 it, became universal among us ; but in art, as in 
 life, there was stirring a cotemporary Protestant- 
 ism. Leo X., the magnificent Medici, was just as 
 
1 66 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 zealous a Protestant as Luther; and as in Wit- 
 tenburg protest was offered in Latin prose, so in 
 Rome the protest was made in stone, colors, and 
 ottava rhymes. For do not the vigorous marble 
 statues of Michael Angelo, Giulio Romano's laugh- 
 ing nymph-faces, and the life-intoxicated merri- 
 ment in the verses of Master Ludovico, offer a 
 protesting contrast to the old, gloomy, withered 
 Catholicism ? The painters of Italy combated 
 priestdom more effectively, perhaps, than did the 
 Saxon theologians. The glowing flesh in the 
 paintings of Titian, — all that is simple Protestant- 
 ism. 
 
 Titian's Venus is a much more forcible and 
 better-grounded treatise than that which the Ger- 
 man monk nailed to the church- door of Witten- 
 burg. Mankind felt itself suddenly liberated, as it 
 were, from the thraldom of a thousand years ; the 
 artists, in particular, breathed freely again when 
 the Alp-like burden of Christianity was rolled from 
 off their breasts; they plunged enthusiastically 
 into the sea of Grecian mirthfulness, from whose 
 foam the goddess of beauty again rose to meet 
 them ; again did the painters depict the ambrosial 
 joys of Olympus ; once more did the sculptors, with 
 the olden love, chisel the heroes of antiquity from 
 out the marble blocks ; again did the poets sing 
 of the house of Atreus and of Laius ; a new era 
 of classic poetry arose. 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 167 
 
 In France, under Louis XIV., this new-classic 
 poetry exhibited a polished finish, and, to a certain 
 extent, even originality. Through the political 
 influence of the Grand Monarque, this new-classic 
 poetry spread over the rest of Europe. In Italy, 
 where it was already at home, it received a French 
 coloring; the Anjous brought with them to Spain 
 the heroes of French tragedy ; they accompanied 
 Madame Henriette to England; and, as a matter of 
 course, we Germans modeled our clumsy temple 
 of art after the Olympus of Versailles, even going 
 so far in our servile imitations as to adopt the 
 powdered wigs. 
 
 * * * Lessing was the literary Arminius who 
 emancipated our theatre from that foreign rule. 
 He showed us the vapidness, the ridiculousness, 
 the tastelessness, of those apings of the French 
 stage, which itself was but an imitation of the 
 Greek. But not only by his critiques, but also 
 through his own works of art, did he become 
 the founder of modern German original literature. 
 All the paths of the intellect, all the phases of life, 
 did this man pursue with disinterested enthusiasm. 
 Art, theology, antiquarianism, poetry, dramatic 
 criticism, history, — he studied these all with the 
 same zeal and with the same aim. In all his 
 works breathes the same grand social idea, the 
 same progressive humanity, the same religion of 
 reason, whose John he was, and whose Messiah we 
 
1 58 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 yet await. This religion he preached always, but, 
 alas ! often quite alone and in the desert. More- 
 over, he lacked the skill to transmute stones into 
 bread. The greater portion of his life was spent in 
 poverty and misery, — a curse which rests on almost 
 all the great minds of Germany. 
 
 * * * Lessing was a whole man, who, while with 
 his polemics waging destructive battle against the 
 old, at the same time created something newer 
 and better. *' He resembled," says a German 
 author, " those pious Jews who, at the second 
 building of the temple, were often disturbed by 
 the attacks of their enemies, and with one hand 
 would fight against the foe while with the other 
 hand they continued to work at the house of 
 God." In the whole range of literary history, 
 Lessing is the author whom I most love. 
 
 * * * The history of literature is a great morgue, 
 wherein each seeks the dead who are near or dear 
 to him. And when among the corpses of so many 
 petty men I behold the noble features of a Les- 
 sing or a Herder, my heart throbs with emotion. 
 How could I pass you without pressing a hasty 
 kiss on your pale lips ? 
 
 * * * But if Lessing effectually put an end to 
 the servile apings of Franco-Grecian art, yet, by 
 directing attention to the true art-works of Grecian 
 antiquity, he gave an impetus to a new and equally 
 silly species of imitation. 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL, 
 
 169 
 
 The most wretched mediocrity began again to 
 raise its head, more disgustingly than ever. Im- 
 becility, vapidity, and the commonplace distended 
 themselves like the frog in the fable. 
 
 * '^ * It was against this literature that, in the 
 closing years of the last century, there arose in 
 Germany a new school, which we have designated 
 the Romantic school. At the head of this school 
 stand the brothers August William and Frederic 
 Schlegel. Jena was the central point from which 
 the new aesthetic dogma radiated. I advisedly say 
 dogma, for this school began with a criticism of 
 the art-productions of the past and with recipes 
 for the art-works of the future. In the first re- 
 spect, the Schlegelian school has rendered great 
 service to aesthetic criticism ; but its recipes for the 
 production of future masterpieces of art were an 
 utter failure. 
 
 * * * But if the Schlegels could give no definite, 
 reliable theory for the masterpieces which they 
 bespoke of the poets of their school, they atoned 
 for these shortcomings by commending as models 
 the best works of art of the past, and by making 
 them accessible to their disciples. These were 
 chiefly the Christian-Catholic productions of the 
 Middle Ages. The translation of Shakspeare, who 
 stands at the frontier of this art and with Protest- 
 ant clearness smiles over into our modern era, was 
 undertaken by A. VV. Schlegel at a time when the 
 
 15* 
 
70 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 enthusiasm for the Middle Ages had not yet reached 
 its most extravagant height. Later, when this did 
 occur, Caldcron was translated, and ranked far 
 above Shakspeare. For the works of Calderon bear 
 most distinctly the impress of the poetry of the 
 Middle Ages, — particularly of the two principal 
 epochs, knight-errantry and monkdom. The pious 
 comedies of the Castilian priest-poet, whose poet- 
 ical flowers had been besprinkled with holy water 
 and canonical perfumes, with all their pious gran- 
 dezza, with all their sacerdotal splendor, with all 
 their sanctimonious balderdash, were now set up 
 as models, and Germany swarmed with fantastically 
 pious, insanely profound poems, over which it was 
 the fashion to work one's self into a mystic ecstasy 
 of admiration, resembling the devotion to the cross 
 or to the Madonna. Zacharias Werner carried the 
 nonsense as far as it might be safely done without 
 being imprisoned by the authorities in a lunatic- 
 asylum. Our poetry, said the Schlegels, is super- 
 annuated ; our muse is an old and wrinkled hag; 
 our Cupid is no fair youth, but a shrunken, gray- 
 haired dwarf Our emotions are withered; our 
 imagination is dried up : we must re-invigorate our- 
 selves. We must seek again the choked-up springs 
 of the naive, simple poetry of the Middle Ages, 
 where bubbles the elixir of youth. When the 
 parched, thirsty multitude heard this, they did not 
 long delay. They were eager to be again young 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 171 
 
 and blooming, and, hastening to those miraculous 
 waters, quaffed and gulped with intemperate greedi- 
 ness. But the same fate befell them as happened 
 to the aged waiting-maid who noticed that her 
 mistress possessed a magic elixir which restored 
 youth. During her lady's absence she took from 
 the toilette drawer the small flagon which con- 
 tained the elixir, but, instead of drinking only a 
 few drops, she took a long deep draught, so that 
 through the magic power of the rejuvenating bev- 
 erage she became not only young again, but even 
 a puny, puling babe. 
 
 * * */ The political condition of Germany was 
 particularly favorable to the tendencies of the Ro- 
 mantic school, which sought to introduce a national- 
 religious literature, similar to that which had pre- 
 vailed in Germany during the Middle Ages. " Need 
 teaches prayer," says the proverb ; and truly never 
 was the need greater in Germany. Hence the 
 masses were more than ever inclined to prayer, 
 to religion, to Christianity. No people is more at- 
 tached to its rulers than are the Germans. And 
 more even than the sorrowful condition to which 
 the country was reduced through war and foreign 
 rule did the mournful spectacle of their vanquished 
 princes, creeping at the feet of Napoleon, afflict 
 and grieve the Germans, The whole nation resem- 
 bled those faithful old servants in once great but 
 now reduced families, who feel more keenly than 
 
1/2 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 even their masters all the humiliations to which 
 the latter are exposed, and who in secret weep most 
 bitterly when the family silver is to be sold, and 
 who clandestinely contribute their pitiful savings, so 
 that patrician wax candles and not plebeian tallow 
 dips shall grace the family tabic; — just as we see 
 it so touchingly depicted in the old plays. The 
 universal sadness found consolation in religion, 
 and there ensued a pious resignation to the will of 
 God, from whom alone help could come. And, in 
 fact, against Napoleon none could help but God 
 himself. No reliance could be placed on the 
 earthly legions : hence all eyes were religiously 
 turned to heaven. 
 
 At a period when the crusade against Napo- 
 leon was forming, a school which was inimical to 
 everything French, and which exalted everything 
 in art and life that was Teutonic, could not help 
 achieving great popularity. The Romantic school 
 at that time went hand in hand with the machina- 
 tions of the government and the secret societies, 
 and A. W. Schlcgel conspired against Racine with 
 the same aim that Minister Stein plotted against 
 Napoleon. This school of literature floated with 
 the stream of the times; that is to say, with the 
 stream that flowed backwards to its source. When 
 finally German patriotism and nationality were vic- 
 torious, the popular Tcutonic-Christian-Romantic 
 school, "The New- German -Religious -Patriotic 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 173 
 
 Art-School," triumphed also. Napoleon, the great 
 classic, who was as classic as Alexander or Caesar, 
 was overthrown, and August William and Fred- 
 eric Schlegel, the petty Romanticists, who were 
 as romantic as Tom Thumb and Puss in Boots, 
 strutted about as victors. 
 
 But the reaction which always follows excess 
 was in this case not long in coming. As the spir- 
 itualism of Christianity was a reaction against the 
 brutal, despotic, imperial Roman materialism ; as 
 the revival of the love for Grecian art and science 
 is to be regarded as a reaction against the extrava- 
 gances of Christian spiritualism ; as the Roman- 
 ticism of the Middle Ages may also be considered 
 as a reaction against the vapid apings of antique 
 classic art ; so also do we now behold a reaction 
 against the re-introduction of that Catholic, feudal 
 mode of thought, of that knight-errantry and priest- 
 dom, which were being inculcated through litera- 
 ture and the pictorial arts, under such strange and 
 bewildering circumstances. 
 
 For when the artists of the Middle Ages were 
 recommended as models, and were so highly 
 praised and admired, the only explanation of their 
 superiority that could be given was that these men 
 believed in that which they depicted, and that, 
 therefore, with their artless conceptions the}' could 
 accomplish more than the later skeptical artists, 
 notwithstanding that the latter excelled in techni- 
 
174 
 
 THE ROMAXTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 cal skill. In short, it was claimed that faith worked 
 wonders. Hence the artists who were honest in 
 their devotion to art, and who sought to imitate 
 the pious distortions of those miraculous pictures, 
 the sacred uncouthness of those marvel-abounding 
 poems, and the inexplicable mysticisms of those 
 olden works, — these artists determined to wander 
 to the same Hippocrene whence the old masters 
 had derived their supernatural inspiration. They 
 made a pilgrimage to Rome, where the vicegerent 
 of Christ was to re-invigorate consumptive German 
 art with asses' milk. In brief, they betook them- 
 selves to the lap of the Roman-Catholic-Apostolic 
 Church, where alone, according to their doctrine, 
 salvation was to be secured. 
 
 * * * While the Romantic school was severely 
 damaged in public opinion by the discovery of 
 its Catholic tendencies, about the same time it re- 
 ceived an utterly crushing blow in its own temple, 
 and that, too, from one of those gods whom itself 
 had enshrined there. For it was Wolfgang Goethe 
 who descended from his pedestal to pronounce the 
 doom of the Schlegels, the very high-priests who 
 had offered him so much incense. That voice an- 
 nihilated the whole pack of hobgoblins ; the spec- 
 tres of the Middle Ages fled; the owls crept again 
 into their obscure castle ruins, and the ravens flut- 
 tered back to their old church-steeples. Frederic 
 Schlegel went to V^ienna, where he attended mass 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 175 
 
 daily and ate broiled fowl ; August William Schle- 
 gel withdrew into the pagoda of Brahma. 
 
 * * * Perhaps Goethe, with his clear insight, 
 was vexed that the Schlegels should seek to use 
 him as an instrument to accomplish their projects. 
 Perhaps those projects threatened to compromise 
 him as the minister of a Protestant state. Per- 
 haps it was the ancient pagan godlike wVath that 
 awoke in him at sight of the mouldy Catholic 
 follies. For as Voss resembled the stalwart one- 
 eyed Odin, so did Goethe, in form and figure, re- 
 semble great Jupiter. The former was compelled 
 to pound long and vigorously with his Thor's 
 hammer; the latter needed but angrily to shake 
 his majestic head, with its ambrosial locks, and 
 the Schlegels trembled and crept out of sight. 
 
 A public statement of Goethe's opposition to the 
 Romantic school appeared in his journal, " Kunst 
 und Alterthum." With this article Goethe made 
 his Eighteenth Brumaire in German literature, for 
 by chasing the Schlegels so summarily out of the 
 temple, and attaching to himself so many of their 
 young and zealous disciples, and being hailed with 
 acclamation by the public, to whom the Schlegclian 
 Directory had long been obnoxious, Goethe estab- 
 lished his autocratic sovereignty in German liter- 
 ature. From that hour nothing more was heard 
 of the Schlegels. Only now and then their names 
 were mentioned, just as one sometimes casually 
 
76 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 speaks of Barras or of Gohier, Neither Romantic 
 nor classic poetry was henceforth spoken of: it 
 was nothing but Goethe here, Goethe there, and 
 Goethe everywhere. It is true that several, other 
 poets arose in the mean time who in power and 
 imagination were but little inferior to Goethe. 
 But out of courtesy they acknowledged him as 
 their chief; they paid homage to him, they kissed 
 his hand, they knelt before him. These grandees 
 of Parnassus differed from the common multitude 
 in being permitted to wear their laurel-wreaths in 
 Goethe's presence. Sometimes they even attacked 
 him ; but they were always vexed when one of the 
 lesser ones ventured to assail him. No matter 
 how angry aristocrats are with their sovereign, 
 they are always displeased when the plebeians 
 also dare to revolt. And in truth the aristocrats 
 of intellect had, during the last twenty years, very 
 good reasons to be irritated against Goethe. As 
 I myself unreservedly remarked at the time, not 
 without bitterness, " Goethe resembled Louis XI. of 
 France, who abased the powerful nobility and ex- 
 alted the tiers-etat." That was despicable. Goethe 
 feared every writer of independence and original- 
 ity, but glorified and praised all the petty author- 
 lings. He carried this so far that to be praised by 
 Goethe came at last to be considered a brevet of 
 mediocrity. 
 
 Later I shall speak of the new poets who grew 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. iy>j 
 
 up during the Goethean imperialism. They con- 
 stitute a forest of young trees, whose true magni- 
 tude has become perceptible only since the fall of 
 that century-old oak by whose branches they had 
 been so completely overtopped and overshadowed. 
 As already stated, there was not lacking a bitter 
 and zealous opposition against Goethe, that giant 
 oak. Men of the most diverse opinions were 
 banded together in this opposition. The orthodox 
 were vexed that in the trunk of this great tree 
 there was no niche provided for the statuettes of 
 the saints, but that, on the contrary, even the 
 nude dryads of heathendom were permitted to 
 carry on their witchery beneath it. The pietists 
 would gladly have imitated St. Boniface, and with 
 consecrated ax have felled this magic oak. The 
 liberals, on the other hand, were indignant that 
 they could not use it as a liberty-tree and as a 
 barricade. But, in truth, the tree was too lofty 
 to have a red cap placed on its top, or to have a 
 Carmagnole danced under it. But the public at 
 large honored it just because it was so stately and 
 independent; because it filled the whole world 
 with its delicious fragrance ; because its branches 
 towered majestically to the heavens, so that the 
 stars seemed to be merely the golden fruit of the 
 great and beautiful tree. 
 
 * * * The Goetheans viewed art as a separate, 
 independent world, which they would rank so high 
 
 i6 
 
1/8 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 that all the changing and changeable doings of 
 mankind should surge far below it. I cannot un- 
 conditionally indorse this view; but the Goetheans 
 were led so far astray by it as to proclaim art in 
 and of itself as the highest good. Thus they were 
 induced to hold themselves aloof from the claims 
 of the world of reality, which, after all, is entitled 
 to precedence. 
 
 Schiller united himself to the world of reality 
 much more decidedly than did Goethe; and he 
 deserves praise for this. The living spirit of the 
 times thrilled through Frederic Schiller ; it 
 wrestled with him ; it vanquished him ; he fol- 
 lowed it to battle ; he bore its banner, and, lo ! it 
 was the same banner under which the conflict was 
 being enthusiastically waged across the Rhine, 
 and for which we are always ready to shed our 
 hearts* best blood. Schiller wrote for the grand 
 ideas of the Revolution; he razed the Bastilles of 
 the intellect ; he helped to erect the temple of 
 freedom, that colossal temple which shelters all 
 nations like a single congregation of brothers : in 
 brief, he was a cosmopolitan. 
 
 He began his career with that hate of the past 
 which we behold in " The Robbers." In this 
 work he resembles a diminutive Titan who has 
 run away from school, got tipsy with schnapps, 
 and throws stones at Jupiter's windows. He ended 
 with that love for the future which already in his 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. jyg 
 
 "Don Carlos" blossoms forth like a field of flow- 
 ers. Schiller is himself that Marquis Posa who is 
 simultaneously prophet and soldier, and battles for 
 that which he foretells. Under that Spanish cloak 
 throbs the noblest heart that ever loved and suf- 
 fered in Germany. 
 
 The poet is, on a small scale, but the imitator of 
 the Creator, and also resembles God in creating ^ 
 his characters after his own image. If, therefore, 
 Carl Moor and the Marquis Posa are wholly Schiller 
 himself, so in like manner does Goethe resemble 
 his Werther, his Wilhelm Meister, and his Faust, 
 in whom the different phases of his intellect can 
 be studied. While Schiller devotes himself to the 
 history of the race, and becomes an enthusiast for 
 the social progress of mankind, Goethe, on the 
 other hand, applies himself to the study of the 
 individual, to nature and to art. The physical 
 sciences must of necessity have finally become a 
 leading branch of study with Goethe the pantheist, 
 and in his poems, as well as in his scientific works, 
 he gave us the result of his researches. His in- 
 differentism was to a certain extent the result of 
 his pantheistic views. But God does not manifest 
 himself in all things equally, as Wolfgang Goethe 
 believed, who through such a belief became an 
 indifferentist, and, instead of devoting himself to 
 the highest interests of humanity, occupied him- 
 self with art, anatomy, theories of color, botanical 
 
( 
 
 I So ^'-^-^^ ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 studies, and observations of the clouds. No, God 
 is manifest in some things to a greater degree than 
 in others. He h'vcs in motion, in action, in time. 
 His holy breath is wafted through the pages of 
 history, which is God's true record-book. Fred- 
 eric Schiller felt this, and became an historian, a 
 " prophet of the past," and wrote the *' Revolt of 
 the Netherlands," the "Thirty Years' War," the 
 " Maid of Orleans," and " William Tell." 
 
 It is true Goethe also depicted a few of the 
 great struggles of freedom, but he portrayed them 
 as an artist. He became the greatest artist of our 
 literature, and all that he WTote was a finished work 
 of art. 
 
 The example of the master misled the youth, 
 and there arose in Germany that literary epoch 
 which I once designated as the " Art Period," and 
 which, as I then showed, had a most disastrous 
 influence on the political development of the Ger- 
 man people. At the same time, I by no means 
 deny the intrinsic worth of the Goethean master- 
 pieces. They adorn our beloved fatherland, just 
 as beautiful statues embellish a garden ; but they 
 are only statues, after all. One may fall in love 
 with them, but they are barren. Goethe's poems 
 do not, like Schiller's, beget deeds. Deeds are the 
 offspring of words ; but Goethe's pretty words are 
 childless. That is the curse of all that which has 
 originated in mere art. The statue which Pyg- 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. jgi 
 
 malion wrought was a beautiful woman, and even 
 the sculptor fell in love with her. His kisses 
 warmed her into life, but, so far as we know, she 
 never bore children. This thought came into my 
 mind while wandering through the Louvre, as my 
 glance alighted on the statues of the ancient gods. 
 There they stood, with their white, expression- 
 less eyes, a mysterious melancholy in their stony 
 smiles. Perhaps they are haunted by sad memo- 
 ries of Egypt, that land of the dead from which 
 they came ; or perhaps it is a mournful longing for 
 the life from which other divinities have expelled 
 them, or a grieving over their immortality of death. 
 They seem to be awaiting the word that shall lib- 
 erate them from their cold, motionless rigidity 
 and bring them back to life. How strange that 
 these antique statues should remind me of the 
 Goethean creations, which are likewise so perfect, 
 so beautiful, so motionless! and which also seem 
 oppressed with a dumb grieving that their rigidity 
 and coldness separate them from our present warm, 
 restless life, — that they cannot speak and rejoice 
 with us, and that they are not human beings, but 
 unhappy mixtures of divinity and stone. 
 
 "^ "=' "^^ I assailed in Goethe only the man, never 
 the poet. Unlike those critics who with their 
 finely-polished glasses claim to have also detected 
 spots upon the moon, I could never discern blem- 
 ishes in Goethe's works. What these sharp-sighted 
 1 6* 
 
1 82 'THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 people consider spots are blooming forests, silvery- 
 streams, lofty mountains, and smiling valleys. 
 
 Nothing is more foolish than to depreciate 
 Goethe in order thereby to exalt Schiller. Do 
 such critics really not know that those highly 
 extolled, highly idealized figures, those sacred pic- 
 tures of virtue and morality which Schiller pro- 
 duced were much easier to construct than those 
 frail worldly beings of whom Goethe gives us a 
 glimpse in his works? Do they not know that 
 mediocre painters generally select sacred subjects, 
 which they daub in life-size on the canvas? But 
 it requires a great master to paint with life-like 
 fidelity and technical perfection a Spanish beggar- 
 boy scratching himself, or a Netherlandish peasant 
 having a tooth extracted, or some hideous old 
 woman such as we see in Dutch cabinet pictures. 
 In art, it is much easier to picture large tragic 
 subjects than those which are small and droll. The 
 Egyptian sorcerers could imitate Moses in many 
 of his magic feats : they could make serpents, 
 and blood, and frogs; but when Moses created 
 vermin, which would seemingly be less difficult 
 to copy, then they confessed their impotence, and 
 said, *' That is the finger of God." 
 
 Rail as ye will at the coarseness of certain por- 
 tions of ** Faust," at the scenes on the Brocken 
 and in Auerbach's cellar, inveigh against the licen- 
 tiousness in " Wilhclni Meister." it is nevertheless 
 
THE JfO-VANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 183 
 
 more than ye can do ; that is the finger of Goethe! 
 But I hear you say, " We do not wish to create 
 such things. We are no sorcerers ; we are good 
 Christians." That ye are no sorcerers I know full 
 well. 
 
 Goethe's greatest merit consists in the perfect ^ 
 finish of all his works. Here are no portions that 
 are strong while others are weak ; here no one 
 part is painted in detail while another is merely 
 slurred over ; here is no confusion, nor any of the 
 customary padding, nor any undue partiality for 
 certain special characters. Goethe treats every 
 person that appears in his romances and dramas 
 as if he or she were the leading character. So it 
 is with Homer, so with Shakspeare. Such poets 
 are absolute monarchs, and resemble the Emperor 
 Paul of Russia, who, when the French ambassador 
 remarked that a man of importance in his empire 
 was interested in a certain matter, sharply inter- 
 rupted the speaker with the memorable words, "In ^ 
 my empire there is no man of importance except 
 he to whom I may happen to be speaking; and he 
 is of importance only so long as I address him." 
 An absolute poet, who also holds power by the 
 grace of God, in like manner views that person in 
 his intellectual realm as the most important who 
 at that particular moment is speaking through his 
 pen. From this art-despotism arises that wonder- 
 ful perfection of the most trivial and unimportant 
 
1 84 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 figures which we find in the works of Homer, 
 Shakspeare, and Goethe. 
 
 * * * That harmony of personal appearance with 
 genius which we demand in eminent men existed 
 in its fullest degree in Goethe. His outward ap- 
 pearance was as impressive as the thoughts that 
 live in his writings. His figure was symmetrical 
 and majestic, and in that noble form Grecian art 
 might be studied as in an ancient statue. His 
 eyes had a godlike steadfastness, for it is in general 
 the distinctive mark of a god that his look is un- 
 moved. Napoleon's eyes possessed this trait, and 
 hence I am convinced that he also was a god. 
 Goethe's eyes, even at an advanced age, remained 
 just as godlike as in his youth, and although time 
 could whiten it could not bow that noble head. 
 He always bore himself proudly and majestically, 
 and when he spoke he seenied to grow statelier 
 stUl, and when he stretched out his hand it seemed 
 as though he could prescribe to the stars the paths 
 they should traverse. It is said that a cold, egotis- 
 tic twitching might be observed around the corners 
 of his mouth. But this trait is also peculiar to the 
 eternal gods, and especially to the father of gods, 
 great Jupiter, to whom I have already likened 
 Goethe. When I visited him at Weimar, I in- 
 voluntarily glanced around, to see if I might not 
 behold at his side the eagle with the thunderbolt 
 in its beak. I was about to address him in Greek, 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 85 
 
 but, as I noticed that he understood German, I told 
 him in the latter language that the plums along 
 the roadside from Jena to Weimar were excellent. 
 Many a long winter's night I had pondered on the 
 exalted and profound remarks I should make to 
 Goethe if I should ever see him. And now that 
 I did at last see him face to face, I told him that 
 the plums of Saxony were delicious. And Goethe 
 smiled. He smiled with the same lips with which 
 he had once kissed the beautiful Leda, Europa, 
 Danae, Semele, and many another princess or 
 ordinary nymph. 
 
 Lcs dicux s' en vont. Goethe is dead. He died 
 on March 22, 1832, that memorable year in which 
 the world lost its greatest celebrities. It is as if 
 death had become suddenly aristocratic, and sought 
 to designate particularly the great ones of this earth 
 by sending them cotemporaneously to the grave. 
 
 * * * There is extant a little book called "The 
 Magic Horn." It is a collection of popular bal- 
 lads which I cannot sufficiently extol. It contains 
 the sweetest flowers of German poesy; and he who 
 would know the German people in one of its most 
 lovable aspects should read these folk-songs. The 
 book lies open before me as I write, and from it I 
 inhale, as it were, the fragrant odor of a linden- 
 tree. For the linden-tree plays a leading role in 
 these ballads. Under its shadows the young men 
 and maidens are wont to sit of an evening, for the 
 
1 86 THE ROMAXT/C SCHOOL. 
 
 linden-tree is the favorite trysting-place of lovers ; 
 perhaps because a linden-leaf is the shape of a 
 human heart. This observation was once made by 
 a German poet who to me is the dearest of all, — 
 that is, myself On the title-page of the book is 
 the picture of a lad blowing a horn; and when a 
 German in a foreign land views this picture he 
 almost seems to hear the old familiar strains, and 
 home-sickness steals over him as it did o'er the 
 Swiss peasant who, while standing guard on the 
 Strasburg bastion, heard the cow-bells in the dis- 
 tance, threw away his musket, and swam across the 
 Rhine, but was soon afterwards captured and shot 
 as a deserter. " The Magic Horn" contains the fol- 
 lowing touching ballad concerning this occurrence : 
 
 " At Strasburg's stony ramparts, 
 My sorrows there began. 
 
 Across the Rhine I heard the Alp-horn sweetly sounding, 
 Ilome-sickness filled my breast, I could no more resist; 
 That might not be. 
 
 "One hour in the night 
 Brought me to this sad plight. 
 
 Oh, God ! they caught me swimming in the stream, 
 And to the barracks dragged me, — 'twas like a dream. 
 With me all's o'er. 
 
 " To-morrow's early dawn 
 Will see the troops in line updrawn : 
 There I must meekly pardon crave, 
 And yet my life that will not save : 
 Mv fate I know. 
 
18; 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 " Ye brothers, one and all, 
 Take your last look ere dead I fall ; 
 * The peasant lad, his was the blame. 
 
 The Alp-horn's tone has wrought my shame, — 
 That do I blame." 
 
 What a beautiful poem ! There is a wonderful 
 magic in these folk-ballads. The poet-artists strive 
 to imitate these artless productions of nature, after 
 the manner in which artificial mineral waters are 
 prepared. But even if by chemical processes they 
 succeed in combining the component elements, yet 
 the most important part, the indecomposable, sym- 
 pathetic forces of nature, eludes their skill. In these 
 ballads one feels the throbbing of the German popu- 
 lar heart. Here is revealed all its sombre merri- 
 ment, all its droll wit. Here German wrath beats 
 furiously the drum ; here German satire stings ; 
 here German love kisses. 
 
 But moonlight, moonlight streaming over and 
 flooding the soul with its beauty, gleams from the 
 following pretty ballad : 
 
 " Were I a birdie bright. 
 With winglets swift and light, 
 To thee I'd fly ; 
 But, as that may not be, 
 Here I must bide. 
 
 " But, though I'm far from thee. 
 In dreams I commune with thee 
 Right merrily. 
 
 Waking, my dreams have flown, 
 Then I'm alone. 
 
1 88 7'-^^^ ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 " All through the long, dark night, 
 My heart sees thine image bright, 
 And thinks of thee, — 
 Dreams thousand times o'er and o'er 
 That thou lovest me." 
 
 And if, enraptured, we ask who is the author 
 of this charming ballad, the concluding lines give 
 the answer : 
 
 "And who the pretty song has wrought? 
 Three geese it o'er the waters brought, 
 Two gray geese and one white." 
 
 Generally such songs are composed by strolling 
 folk, — tramps, soldiers, traveling scholars, or jour- 
 neymen ; particularly the latter. Often during my 
 trips afoot I became acquainted with such jour- 
 neymen, and noticed that when excited by some 
 unusual event they improvised a fragment of a 
 folk-song, or whistled the melody in the air. The 
 birds perched on the branches of the trees heard 
 this, and if afterwards another such a Bursch came 
 sauntering along with knapsack and wanderer's 
 staff, then they chirped what they had heard, he 
 added the lacking verses, and the song was com- 
 plete. 
 
 Like the dew from heaven, so drop the words 
 of these songs on the lips of such strolling folk, 
 and they need but utter them, and, lo! they con- 
 tain more true poesy than all the elegant poetical 
 phrases that we so laboriously evolve from the 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 189 
 
 depths of our souls. These songs reveal most 
 vividly and picturesquely the life and character of 
 those itinerant journeymen with whom Germany 
 abounds. They are a very curious class. With- 
 out a penny in their pockets, these fellows travel 
 over all Germany, harmless, light-hearted, and free 
 from care. I have observed that generally they 
 travel by threes. Of this trio one is always a con- 
 firmed grumbler. Not without touches of humor, 
 he will grumble at everything that befalls them, at 
 every bird that flies in the air, at every traveler that 
 rides across their path ; and if they happen to stray 
 into a barren region, where the habitations are 
 wretched huts and the people poverty-stricken, he 
 will remark, ironically, " It is true the good Lord 
 created the world in the short space of six days, 
 but just see what a botch he has made of the job!" 
 The second of the trio is a morose, surly fellow, who 
 seldom speaks except to break out into the most 
 violent swearing and cursing. Almost every word 
 is an oath ; he swears furiously at all the employers 
 for whom he has ever worked, and his constant 
 refrain is that he regrets having neglected to give 
 a sound drubbing to the landlady who keeps the 
 inn at Halberstadt, because she had daily set be- 
 fore him nothing but cabbages and turnips. At 
 mention of the word Halberstadt, the third of the 
 travelers heaves a deep sigh. He is the youngest 
 of the three, and has left his home for the first 
 
 17 
 
1 90 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 time to try his fortunes in the wide, wide world: 
 he is thinking of his pretty sweetheart's dark- 
 brown eyes, and he lets his head sink on his breast 
 and speaks not a word. 
 
 * * * Mankind forgets its benefactors only too 
 easily. The names of the good and the noble who 
 have toiled for the welfare of their fellow-men are 
 seldom heard on the tongues of the multitude, 
 whose thick skulls have room only for the names 
 of their cruel oppressors and martial heroes. The 
 tree, humanity, forgets the peaceful gardener who 
 fostered it in cold, watered it in drouth, and pro- 
 tected it from unfriendly beasts ; but it faithfully 
 preserves the names which have been mercilessly 
 cut into its bark with sharp steel, and hands them 
 down in ever-growing greatness to the latest gen- 
 erations. 
 
 * * * You Frenchmen ought at least to recog- 
 nize the fact that depicting the horrible is not your 
 forte, and that France is not a suitable country for 
 ghosts. When you conjure up spectres, we Ger- 
 mans laugh. Yes, we Germans, who can remain 
 quite sober and serious at your merriest witticisms, 
 we laugh so much the more heartily at your ghost- 
 stories; for your ghosts are always French; and 
 French ghosts, — what a contradiction in the very 
 words ! In the word " ghost" there is implied some- 
 thing so solitary, so surly, so German, so taciturn ; 
 and, on the other hand, in the word " French" there 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. jgi 
 
 lies something so social, so polite, so French, so 
 gossipy! How could a Frenchman be a ghost, 
 or how could ghosts exist in Paris ? — in Paris, the 
 foyer of European society ! Between twelve and 
 one, the hour which from time immemorial has 
 been apportioned to ghosts, the liveliest bustle and 
 stir still rustles and surges in the streets of Paris. 
 Just then is to be heard the last triumphant swell 
 of the Opera ; out of the Varietes and the Gym- 
 nase stream jocund groups ; and on the boulevards 
 there is a crowding, and dancing, and laughing, 
 and jesting; and the soirees are just beginning. 
 How unhappy must a poor ghost feel itself amid 
 this mirth and hilarity ! And how could a French- 
 man, even though dead, preserve the gravity requi- 
 site for a ghost, when surrounded on all sides by 
 jubilant, motley crowds ? Should I be doomed to 
 haunt the streets of Paris, although myself a Ger- 
 man, I should certainly not be able to preserve my 
 ghostly dignity if at the street-corner there should 
 happen to jostle against me one of those goddesses 
 of pleasure who greet the passers-by with such be- 
 witching smiles. The French are so social that if 
 ghosts could exist in Paris I am convinced that 
 they would even as ghosts associate companion- 
 ably. They would soon organize ghost reunions; 
 they would establish a cafe for the dead ; they 
 would publish a phantom newspaper, a Parisian 
 spectre review ; there would soon be hobgoblin 
 
192 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 soirees, oic Vonfcra dc la inusiqiic. I am convinced 
 that the ghosts in Paris would amuse themselves 
 better than the living in Germany. 
 
 So far as I am concerned, if I knew that my 
 ghost could exist in this manner in Paris, I should 
 no longer fear death. I would only take precaution 
 to insure my burial in the Pere Lachaise, so that my 
 ghost could haunt Paris between twelve and one. 
 What a delightful hour! Ye German countrymen, 
 if after my death you come to Paris and here be- 
 hold my spectre, be not affrighted. I do not play 
 the ghost in the dismal unhappy German fashion, 
 but have left my grave for my own amusement. 
 
 Since, in all the ghost-stories that I have ever 
 read, ghosts generally haunt the spot where they 
 have buried money, I shall, out of precaution, en- 
 tomb a few sous somewhere along the boulevards. 
 For, although in my time I have made way with 
 much money, I have never buried any. 
 
 O ye poor French authors, ye ought to com- 
 prehend that solemn hobgoblin romances and 
 ghost-stories are quite unsuitable for a country 
 where there exist no spectres, or where the spec- 
 tres are as merry and social as with us Germans 
 they are earnest and unsocial. Ye appear to me 
 like children who hold masks before their faces 
 to frighten one another. They are terrible, awe- 
 inspiring masks, but through the eye-holes peep 
 the laughing glances of children. We Germans, 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. jq^ 
 
 on the contrary, wear at times pleasant youthful \ 
 masks, but out of the eyes glares grim death. — -* 
 
 * * * It is as difficult to write a history of litera- 
 ture as natural history. In the former, as in the 
 latter, attention is chiefly directed to the more con- 
 spicuous phenomena. But as a small glass of water 
 contains a whole world of wonderfully minute ani- 
 mals in whom the power of the Creator is just as 
 manifest as in creatures of a larger size, so also the 
 pettiest poetical almanac contains a swarm of poet- 
 lings who to the studious searcher appear just as 
 interesting as the great elephants of literature. 
 God is great ! 
 
 In fact, most of the historians of literature do 
 really picture literary history like a well-arranged 
 menagerie, and they show us in separate compart- 
 ments epic mammal-poets, lyric air-poets, dramatic 
 water-poets, prose amphibians who write land and 
 sea romances, humorous mollusks, etc. Others, 
 on the contrary, write literary history pragmatic- 
 ally, beginning with the primitive human emo- 
 tions which have been developed during the various 
 epochs and have finally assumed the form of art. 
 They commence ab ovo, like the historians who 
 began the narration of the Trojan war with an 
 account of the egg of Leda; and both alike pur- 
 sue a foolish course. I am convinced that if the "^ 
 egg of Leda had been used for an omelet, Hector 
 and Achilles would nevertheless have met at the 
 17* 
 
IQ4 THE ROMA i\ TIC SCHOOL. 
 
 Sc?ean gate and have battled heroically. Great 
 events and great books do not spring from trivial 
 causes, but they arise because they are needed. 
 
 Or, is the rise of certain ideas merely the ex- 
 pression of the temporary needs of mankind? Do 
 men frame theories merely to legitimize the grati- 
 fication of their desires? In their inmost souls 
 mankind are all doctrinaires. They can always 
 trump up some theory to justify their self-indul- 
 gences and their renunciations. On evil meagre- 
 days, when pleasure is unattainable, they glorify 
 the dogma of abstinence, and assert that earthly 
 grapes are sour. But if the times become more 
 prosperous, and the beautiful fruits of this earth 
 come within reach, then a more cheerful doctrine 
 arises, which justifies the inalienable right of en- 
 joying all of life's pleasures. 
 
 Are we nearing the end of the Christian fast- 
 day era, and do we already behold the golden 
 dawning of the rosy age of joy? What form will 
 that cheerful creed of the future assume ? 
 
 In the breasts of a nation's authors there already 
 lies the image of its future, and the critic who with 
 a knife of sufficient keenness dissects a new poet 
 can easily prophesy, as from the entrails of a sacri- 
 ficial animal, what shape matters will assume in 
 Germany. With the heartiest pleasure would I 
 officiate as a literary Calchas and critically slaughter 
 a few of our latest poets for the purpose of divina- 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 195 
 
 tion, did I not fear to behold things concerning 
 which I would not be allowed to speak. For one 
 cannot discuss our latest German literature without 
 drifting into the profoundest depths of politics. In 
 France the authors of belles-lettres seek to with- 
 draw themselves from political agitations, more 
 even than is praiseworthy : hence in France the 
 great lights of the day may be criticised, and yet 
 the day itself be left undiscussed. But on the 
 German side of the Rhine the writers of polite 
 literature now plunge zealously into the agitations 
 of the times, from which they had so long kept 
 aloof Ye French have for the last fifty years been 
 incessantly in motion, and are now fatigued ; but 
 we Germans have until now sat at our study-tables, 
 writing commentaries on the ancient classics, and 
 now begin to feel the want of a little exercise. 
 
 * * * Jean Paul Richter has been called " the 
 Only." This is a particularly fitting appellation, 
 which I failed to comprehend fully until I had 
 pondered in vain how to designate his place in 
 literature. He appeared almost cotemporaneously 
 with the Romantic school, without, however, being 
 in the least degree connected with it. At a later 
 period he had just as little in common with the 
 Goethean Art school. He stands quite isolated, be- 
 cause, in striking contrast to both of these schools, 
 he was entirely devoted to his epoch, and his heart 
 and mind were wholly filled with it. He wrote 
 
196 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 just as he felt; and this characteristic, this com- 
 pleteness, is also to be found among the authors 
 of the present Young Germany school. They 
 likewise draw no line between practical life and 
 
 / authorship, and are simultaneously artists, tribunes, 
 
 V and apostles. 
 
 I repeat the word apostles, for I know no more 
 appropriate word. A new religion thrills them 
 with a fervor of which the authors of an earlier 
 period had no conception. It is the faith in prog- 
 ress, — a faith founded on knowledge. - We have 
 measured the land, estimated the forces of nature, 
 computed the resources of industry, and, lo ! we 
 have discovered that this world is large enough, 
 that it affords to every one sufficient space to 
 
 1 build thereon a happy home. We have learned 
 >j that the earth can support us all comfortably, if 
 / all will only work, and not one live at the cost 
 
 ( of another ; we have learned that the poorer and 
 I more numerous classes need not be relegated to 
 heaven. It is true that the number of those who 
 know and believe is, as yet, very limited; but 
 the time has come when nations are no longer 
 counted according to heads, but according to 
 hearts. 
 
 * * * I have intimated that Jean Paul Richter 
 anticipated the Young Germany school in its most 
 marked tendency. But the latter, occupied with 
 practical questions, avoided the abstract intrica- 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. igy 
 
 cies, the abrupt mannerisms, and the unenjoyable 
 style of Jean Paul Richter. No Frenchman with 
 a clear well-regulated mind can form a concep- 
 tion of that peculiar style. No German author is 
 so rich as Jean Paul in ideas and in emotions; but 
 he never permits them to ripen ; and, notwithstand- 
 ing his wealth of mind and heart, he excites more 
 astonishment than pleasure. Thoughts and senti- 
 ments which would grow into colossal trees, if per- 
 mitted to strike root properly and develop all their 
 branches, blossoms, and leaves, — these he uproots 
 while they are still insignificant shrubs, mere 
 sprouts even ; and whole intellectual forests are 
 thus served up to us as an ordinary dish. Now, 
 although curious, this is decidedly unpalatable fare, 
 for not every stomach can digest such a mess of 
 young oaks, cedars, palms, and banana-trees. Jean 
 Paul is a great poet and philosopher; but no one 
 can be more inartistic than he in his modes of 
 thought and work. In his romances he has brought 
 to light some truly poetical creations; but instead 
 of thought he gives us his thinking itself We 
 see the material activity of his brain; he gives 
 us, as it were, more brain than thought. He is 
 the merriest and, at the same time, the most senti^ 
 mental of authors. In fact, sentimentality always 
 finally overcomes him, and his laughter abruptly 
 turns into tears. He sometimes disguises himself 
 as a gross, beggarly fellow ; but then, hke stage- 
 
98 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 princes, he suddenly unbuttons the coarse overcoat 
 and reveals the glitterinc^ insignia of his rank. 
 
 In this respect Jean Paul resembles Laurence 
 Sterne, with whom he has been often compared. 
 The author of" Tristram Shandy," when apparently 
 sunk in the most vulgar trivialities, possesses the 
 art of rising by sudden transitions to the sublime, 
 reminding us that he is of princely rank and the 
 countryman of Shakspeare. Jean Paul, like Lau- 
 rence Sterne, reveals in his writings his own per- 
 sonality and lays bare his own human frailties ; but 
 yet with a certain awkward bashful ness, especially 
 in sexual matters. Laurence Sterne parades be- 
 fore the public entirely unrobed, quite naked; but 
 Jean Paul has only holes in his trowsers. A few 
 critics erroneously believe that Jean Paul possessed 
 more true feeling than Sterne, because the latter, 
 whenever the subject under treatment reaches a 
 tragic elevation, suddenly assumes a merry, jest- 
 ing tone. Jean Paul, on the contrary, if the subject 
 verges in the least towards the serious, gradually 
 becomes lachrymose, and composedly lets his tears 
 trickle. Sterne probably felt more deeply than 
 Jean Paul, for he is a greater poet. Laurence 
 Sterne, like Shakspeare, was fostered by the Muses 
 in Parnassus. After the manner of women, they 
 early spoiled him with their caresses. He was the 
 especial pet of the pale goddess of tragedy. Once, 
 in a paroxysm of fierce tenderness, she kissed him 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. iqq 
 
 SO passionately, with such fervor, with so ardent a 
 pressure of her hps, that his young heart began to 
 bleed, and at once understood all earthly sorrows 
 and was filled with a boundless compassion. Poor 
 young poet heart ! But the younger sister, the 
 rosy goddess of mirth, sprang quickly to his side, 
 took the suffering lad into her arms, and sought 
 to cheer him with song and merriment. She gave 
 him as playthings the mask of comedy and the 
 jingling bells, and pressed a soothing kiss upon his 
 lips; and with that kiss she imbued him with all 
 her levity, all her frolicsome mirth, all her sportive 
 wit. And since then Sterne's heart and Sterne's 
 lips have drifted into a strange contradiction. 
 Sometimes, when his soul is most deeply agitated 
 with tragic emotion, and he seeks to give utter- 
 ance to the profound sorrows of his bleeding heart, 
 then, to his own astonishment, the merriest, most 
 mirth-provoking words will flutter from his lips. 
 
 * * * Ludwig Tieck was accustomed to declaim 
 his dramas before a select parlor audience, on whose 
 applause he could safely depend. While the Baron 
 de la Motte-Fouque was being read with equal en- 
 thusiasm by duchess and by laundress, and shone 
 resplendently as the sun of circulating libraries, 
 Ludwig Tieck was only the astral lamp of those 
 social tea-gatherings. During the reading of his 
 poems, the audience, inspired by his poetic genius, 
 sipped tea with the utmost composure of soul. 
 
200 ^-^^^ ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 The force of this poetry must have been the more 
 marked in contrast with the weakness of the tea; 
 and in Bcrh'n, where the weakest tea is drunk, Lud- 
 wig Tieck must certainly have passed for a power- 
 ful poet. While the ballads of our excellent Uhland 
 were re-echoing through the forests and the valleys, 
 and are even yet bellowed by wild students or 
 lisped by tender maidens, not a single song of 
 Herr Ludwig Tieck has imprinted itself on our 
 souls, not a single song of Herr Ludwig Tieck has 
 clung to our memory; the public at large knows 
 not a single ballad of this great l}Tic poet ! 
 
 * * * The Baron de la Motte-Fouque was for- 
 merly a major in the Prussian military service, 
 and is one of the most conspicuous of those poet- 
 heroes, or hero-poets, whose lyre and sword won 
 renown during the so-called war of liberation. 
 
 His laurels are of the genuine kind. He is a 
 true poet, and the inspiration of poetry is on his 
 brow. Few authors receive such universal homage 
 as did our good Fouque. Now his readers consist 
 only of the patrons of the circulating libraries. 
 But that public is still large enough, and Fouque 
 may boast that he was the only one of the Roman- 
 tic school who was received with favor by the 
 lower as well as by the higher classes. At the 
 time when in the aesthetic tea-gatherings in Berlin 
 it was the fashion to sneer at the fallen knight, in 
 a little Hartz village I became acquainted with a 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 2OI 
 
 lovely maiden who spoke of Fouque with a charm- 
 ing enthusiasm, and blushingly confessed that she 
 would gladly give a year of her life if she might 
 but once kiss the author of "Undine," — and this 
 maiden had the prettiest lips that I have ever seen. 
 
 "Undine" is indeed a charming poem. This 
 poem is itself a kiss ! The genius of poetry kissed 
 the sleeping spring, and as it oped its laughing 
 eyes all the roses exhaled their sweetest perfumes, 
 and all the nightingales sang; and the fragrance of 
 the roses and the songs of the nightingales, all 
 this did our good Fouque clothe in words, and 
 called it " Undine." 
 
 I know not if this novel has been translated into 
 French. It is the story of a lovely water-fairy 
 who has no soul, and who only acquires one by 
 falling in love with an earthly knight. But, alas ! 
 with this soul she also learns human sorrows. Her 
 knightly spouse becomes faithless, and she kisses 
 him dead. For in this book death also is only a 
 kiss. 
 
 This "Undine" may be regarded as the muse of 
 Fouque's poetry. Although she is indescribably 
 beautiful, although she suffers as we do, and earthly 
 sorrows weigh full heavily upon her, she is yet no 
 real human being. But our time turns away from 
 all fairy-pictures, no matter how beautiful. It de- 
 mands the figures of actual life ; and least of all 
 will it tolerate nixens who fall in love with noble 
 
 18 
 
202 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 knights. This reactionary tendcncv', this continual 
 praise of the nobihty, this incessant glorification of 
 the feudal system, this everiasting knight-errantry 
 balderdash, became at last (Jj^tasteful to the educated 
 portion of the German middle classes, and they 
 turned their backs on the minstrel who sang so out 
 of time. In fact, this everlasting sing-song of ar- 
 mors, battle-steeds, high-born virgins, honest guild- 
 masters, dwarfs, squires, castles, chapels, minne- 
 singers, faith, and whatever else that rubbish of 
 the Middle Ages may be called, wearied us ; and as 
 the ingenious hidalgo Friedrich de la Motte-Fouque 
 became more and more immersed in his books of 
 chivalry, and, wrapped up in reveries of the past, 
 ceased to understand the present, then even his 
 best friends were compelled to turn away from him 
 with dubious head-shakings. 
 
 * * * Fouque was a Don Quixote from head to 
 foot, and in reading his works one is compelled to 
 admire Cervantes. 
 
 * * * The hero of one of Fouque's dramas, 
 "Sigurd, the serpent-slayer," is an immense con- 
 ception. He is as strong as the rocky crags of 
 Norway, and as violent as the sea that roars around 
 their base. He has as much courage as a hun- 
 dred lions, and as much sense as two asses. 
 
 Uhland's tragedy, " Duke Ernest of Suabia," 
 contains many beauties, and pleases by its noble 
 and exalted sentiments. It is fragrant with the 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 203 
 
 sweet breath of poetry, such as we fail to find in 
 the pieces that reap so much applause on the stage 
 at the present day. German fidelity is the theme 
 of the drama, and we see it here strong as an oak, 
 defying all storms. German love blossoms, scarcely 
 visible, in the far distance, but its violet-perfume 
 appeals the more touchingly to our hearts. This 
 drama, or rather this poem, contains passages which 
 are among the most precious pearls of our liter- 
 ature; notwithstanding which, the theatre-going 
 public received, or rather rejected, the piece with 
 indifference. I will not censure the good people of 
 the parterre too severely for that. These people 
 have certain needs, which they demand that the 
 poet shall gratify. The poet's productions must 
 not merely express the sympathies of his own 
 heart, but must accord with the desires of the au- 
 dience. The latter resembles the hungry Bedouin 
 in the desert, who thinks he has found a sack of 
 peas, and opens it eagerly, but, alas! they are only 
 pearls. The public devour with delight Herr Rau- 
 pach's dry peas and Madame Birch-Pfeifer's sour 
 beans, but Uhland's pearls it finds unpalatable. 
 
 * * * As in all probability the French do not 
 know who Madame Birch-Pfeifer and Herr Rau- 
 pach are, I must premise that this celestial pair, 
 standing side by side, like Apollo and Diana, 
 are now the most honored in German temples of 
 dramatic art! Verily, Herr Raupach is as like 
 
204 
 
 THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 to Apollo as Madame Birch-Pfeifer is to Diana. 
 This lady has already written a multitude of dramas, 
 in which she herself plays. In fact, many of our 
 actors are also dramatists, and write their own 
 plays. It is said that Ludwig Tieck, through 
 a thoughtless remark, has been the cause of this 
 misfortune. In his critical writings he stated that 
 actors can always play better in a poor than in a 
 good play. Basing themselves on this axiom, the 
 actors in swarms grasped their pens, wrote trage- 
 dies and comedies in lavish profusion, and it was 
 sometimes difficult to decide whether a vain actor 
 purposely made his play wretched in order to act 
 well in it, or whether he acted badly in a play of 
 his own writing in order to make us believe that 
 the play was good. The actor and the poet, who 
 until now had co-operated as colleagues (somewhat 
 like the executioner and the poor culprit), now 
 declared open war. 
 
 * * * The actors in Germany have succeeded 
 in emancipating themselves from the poets, and 
 also from poetry itself Only mediocrity is now 
 permitted to exhibit its productions in their fields. 
 But they are vigilantly on the alert that no true 
 poet shall slip in among them under the cloak of 
 mediocrity. Herr Raupach was subjected to many 
 trials before he could gain a foothold in the thea- 
 tre; and they still keep a watchful eye on him ; and 
 if once he happens to write a play which is not 
 
THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. 
 
 205 
 
 entirely and totally wretched, out of fear of being 
 ostracized by the actors, he immediately patches 
 together a dozen of the most utterly miserable, 
 trashy pieces. The reader is perhaps surprised at 
 the word " dozen." I have not exaggerated the 
 number. This man really manufactures a dozen 
 dramas every year, and people admire his pro- 
 ductivity. " But it is not magic," says the pres- 
 tidigitator, when we stare in astonishment at his 
 feats ; " it is not magic, but only nimbleness of the 
 fingers." 
 
 18* 
 
THE SUABIAN SCHOOL. 
 
 The idea of ornamenting this book with the 
 counterfeit presentment of my features did not 
 originate with me. The portrait of an author as 
 a frontispiece to his book involuntarily reminds me 
 of the Asylum for the Insane at Genoa, in front of 
 which is erected the statue of its founder. It was 
 my publisher who conceived the idea of prefacing 
 with my portrait my " Book of Songs," that printed 
 lunatic-asylum wherein my mad conceits are im- 
 prisoned. 
 
 My friend Julius Campe is a wag, and surely 
 wanted to quiz the dear little poetlings of the Sua- 
 bian school, who have conspired against my face. 
 When now they carp and cavil at my poems and 
 count the tear-drops in them, they cannot help 
 sometimes beholding my features. But why are 
 ye so implacably enraged against me, ye good 
 people ? Why do ye attack me in long-winded 
 articles, tedious enough to bore me to death if I 
 read them ? What have ye against my face ? 
 206 
 
THE SUAE IAN SCHOOL. 207 
 
 Incidentally, I must remark that my picture is not 
 a good likeness; the lower part of the face is alto- 
 gether too lean in the portrait ; for within a short 
 time I have become quite stout and corpulent, and 
 I fear that I shall soon look like an alderman. 
 Alas ! the Suabian school causes me so much 
 sorrow. 
 
 I behold thee, gentle reader, with questioning 
 look, asking what I mean by the phrase " Suabian 
 school." It is not long since I directed the same 
 question to several traveling Suabians. For a 
 long time they evaded answering, and smiled 
 very strangely, just about as apothecaries smile 
 when, at early morn on the first of April, a credu- 
 lous servant-maid asks for two-pennyworth of the 
 honey of flies. In my innocence I at first thought 
 that by the name " Suabian school" was meant 
 that blooming forest of great men who had sprung 
 from the soil of Suabia, — those giant oaks whose 
 roots extend to the centre of the earth and whose 
 branches tower to the stars. And I inquired, " Is 
 it not true that Schiller, the wild poet who wrote 
 * The Robbers,' belongs to that school ?" " No," 
 was the answer ; " we have naught to do with such 
 as he: such robber-stories are not permitted in the 
 Suabian school. With us everything must be 
 quiet and orderly, and Schiller was early chased 
 out of the country." 
 
 " Docs Schelling belong to the Suabian school, 
 
2o8 ^-^^^ SUAE IAN SCHOOL. 
 
 — Schelling, the erring thinker, the King Arthur 
 of philosophy, who in vain seeks the pliilosopher's 
 stone, and meanwhile languishes in the wilderness 
 of mysticism ?" " We do not exactly understand 
 that," was the answer; "but we can assure you 
 that Schelling does not belong to the Suabian 
 school." 
 
 "Does Hegel belong to it, — Hegel, the intel- 
 lectual world-navigator, who has fearlessly pene- 
 trated to the north pole of thought, where one's 
 brain freezes amid abstract ice ? Does David 
 Strauss belong to it, the David with the deadly 
 sling ?" " God preserve us from such as he ! him 
 we have even excommunicated ; and should he 
 desire to enter the Suabian school he would cer- 
 tainly be unanimously blackballed." 
 
 " But, in the name of heaven," cried I, after I 
 had enumerated nearly all the great names of 
 Suabia, including even the Hohenstaufifens, and 
 going so far back as to Kepler, the great star who 
 understood the whole firmament, " who, then, does 
 belong to the Suabian school ?" " Well, then," they 
 answered, "we will be candid with you: The celeb- 
 rities whom you have just enumerated are much 
 more European than Suabian; they emigrated, as 
 it were, and made their impress on the world ; 
 whereas the celebrities of the Suabian school de- 
 spise such cosmopolitanism, and stay patriotically 
 and comfortably at home, among the buttercups 
 
THE SUAE IAN SCHOOL, 
 
 209 
 
 and meat-broth of their beloved Suabia." And 
 thus I finally learned the modest greatness of those 
 celebrities who, since they have appeared as the 
 Suabian school, strut about in the same circle of 
 thoughts, deck themselves with the same senti- 
 ments, and even entwine their pipes with tassels of 
 a uniform color. 
 
 The most prominent among them is the pastor 
 Gustav Schwab. He is a herring in comparison 
 with the others, who are only sardines, — be it 
 understood, sardines without salt. Gustav Schwab 
 has written a few beautiful poems ; also several 
 pretty ballads. But, of course, he is not to be 
 compared to a Schiller, to a great whale. After 
 him ranks Doctor Justinus Kerner, who sees spirits 
 and poisoned sausages, and once most seriously 
 assured the public that a pair of shoes, all of them- 
 selves, without human agency, went slowly tramp- 
 incf throuo;h the room to the bed of the sorceress 
 of Prevorst. A pretty state of affairs we have 
 come to, when one must fasten his boots at retiring, 
 so that during the night they do not come tramp, 
 tramp, to one's bedside, and in a leathern, ghostly 
 voice declaim the poems of Hcrr Justinus Kerner! 
 
 The latter are not altogether bad. The man is 
 not without merit, and I may apply to him what 
 Napoleon once said of Murat : " He is a great 
 fool, — nevertheless, an excellent general of cav- 
 alry." I already see the collective inhabitants of 
 
2IO THE SCAB IAN SCHOOL. 
 
 Weinsberg dubiously shake their heads at this 
 opinion, and hear them say, with a puzzled air, " It 
 is true that our dear countryman Herr Justinus 
 Kerner is a great fool ; but he is by no means an 
 excellent general of cavalry." Well, have it your 
 own way. I am willing to concede to you that he 
 is not a good general. 
 
 Herr Carl Mayer, which in Latin is Caroliis Mag- 
 nus, is another poet of the Suabian school, and it 
 is said that he most faithfully reveals its spirit and 
 character: he is a dull, insipid gnat, and sings of 
 beetles and buttercups. He is said to be very 
 famous in the whole vicinity of Waiblingen, in 
 front of whose gates it is proposed to erect a statue 
 of him — a wooden statue — life-size. This wooden 
 image of the poet is to be freshly painted in oil 
 colors every year, — every year in the spring-time, 
 when the air is redolent of buttercups and the 
 hum of the beetle is heard o'er the land. 
 
 I am assured that Herr is one of the most 
 
 excellent poets of the Suabian school, and has only 
 lately come to consciousness, but has not yet made 
 his debut. In other words, he has not yet pub- 
 lished his poems. I am told that he sings not only 
 about June bugs and beetles, but also of larks and 
 quails, which is certainly very praiseworthy of him. 
 Larks and quails deserve indeed to be celebrated 
 in song, — when they are broiled. As to the char- 
 acter and worth of Herr 's poems, which have 
 
THE SUABIAN SCHOOL. 2II 
 
 not yet appeared in print, I can form no opinion ; 
 which is also the case with regard to the master- 
 pieces of so many other great unknowns of the 
 Suabian school. 
 
 The Suabian school must have become con- 
 scious that it would not harm them if, in addition 
 to their great unknowns, who are only visible 
 when placed under a microscope, they could count 
 among their number a few petty celebrities who 
 had achieved some little reputation, not only in 
 the peaceful precincts of the Suabian provinces^ 
 but also in the rest of Germany. They therefore 
 addressed themselves to King Ludwig of Bavaria, 
 the crowned singer, who, however, declined. But 
 he returned a friendly greeting, and sent them a 
 magnificent copy of his poems, gilt-edged and 
 bound in red morocco. After this they betook 
 themselves to Court Counsellor Winkler, who also 
 declined, as he himself was about founding a Saxon 
 school, for which undertaking he had already en- 
 gaged a considerable number of his poetical coun- 
 trymen. 
 
 They next applied to the Hungarian Lenau. The 
 Hungarians have certainly lost much by their 
 countrymen joining the Suabians ; but so long 
 as they retain their Tokay wine they may console 
 themselves. 
 
 The next acquisition of the Suabian school 
 was less brilliant, for it consisted of Wolfgang 
 
212 THE SUAE IAN SCHOOL. 
 
 Menzel, the devourer of Frenchmen, as Borne calls 
 him. 
 
 Once when I stripped from his body, piece by- 
 piece, the tatters of his false patriotism and hypo- 
 critical morality, he raised a terrible clamor that 
 religion was in danger; that the pillars of the 
 Church were being shattered ; that Heinrich Heine 
 was destroying Christianity ! It made me laugh 
 heartily; for this loud outcry reminded me of 
 another wretched sinner, who in the market-place 
 of Liibeck was being flogged and branded. As 
 soon as the fiery iron touched his back, he set up 
 a terrible shouting and hullabaloo: "Fire! fire! it 
 burns ! it burns ! the church is in flames !" The 
 old women were frightened at this alarm of fire, 
 but sensible people only laughed, and said, " The 
 miserable rascal ! it is only his own back that 
 burns. The church stands safely on its old place. 
 But, for fear of incendiarism, the police has provided 
 for a few extra fire-engines, and now, out of pious 
 precaution, not even the smoking of a cigar shall 
 be permitted in the vicinity of religion." 
 
 I must avail myself of this opportunity to con- 
 tradict the reports that Herr Wolfgang Menzel, 
 through the pressure of his colleagues, had at last 
 determined to make use of the magnanimity with 
 which I offered him an occasion to free himself 
 from the charge of personal cowardice. I will 
 confess honestly that I always expected that I 
 
THE SUAE IAN SCHOOL. 213 
 
 would be notified of the time and place when 
 and where the champion of patriotism and of re- 
 ligion would show himself in all his manhood. 
 But, alas! until this hour I have waited in vain; 
 and the witlings of the German press have ban- 
 tered me not a little on my credulity. Wags 
 have even carried the jest so far as to write me a 
 letter in the name of the unhappy wife of Menzel, 
 wherein the poor woman is made to complain 
 bitterly of her domestic troubles since the appear- 
 ance of my article against her husbancf, who now 
 seeks to play the hero at home. At the mere 
 mention of the word "cowardice" he flies into a 
 rage. One evening he spanked his little child for 
 innocently drawing on the wall the picture of a 
 trembling hare. At another time he wept bitterly 
 because he had been taunted with showing the 
 "white feather." And at night his sighings and 
 moanings were enough to melt the heart of a 
 stone. *' Such a state of affairs is not to be longer 
 endured," so ran the pretended letter, and, in order 
 to put an end to it, she herself offered to fight with 
 me, in the place of her timorous husband. 
 
 Not at first noticing the transparent hoax, I ex- 
 claimed, enthusiastically, "Noble woman! worthy 
 Suabian !" 
 
 * * * The only thing new and original that I 
 found in the treatise of Gustav Pfizer was, here 
 and there, a forgery of my very words. This is 
 
 19 
 
214 
 
 THE SUAE IAN SCHOOL. 
 
 new, this is original. He is a new beginner, but 
 his talent is indisputable. He deserves that Wolf- 
 gang Menzel, the valiant, should crown him with 
 his mustiest laurel-wreath. 
 
 But I advise him not to cultivate his talent any- 
 further. He might otherwise be led some time 
 to exercise his noble talent of forgery in matters 
 not literary; and there are countries where such 
 things are rewarded with a hempen collar. At 
 the Old Bailey, in London, I once saw a man hung 
 for having Torged a draft; and the poor rascal may 
 perhaps have been forced to it by hunger, and not 
 out of knavery, or for mere glory, or even for a 
 little praise in the journals of Stuttgart, or to earn 
 a small literary trinkgeld. 
 
 On this account I pitied the poor wretch, at 
 whose execution there were many delays. It is an 
 error to believe that hanging is expeditiously done 
 in England. The preparations lasted almost a 
 quarter of an hour. It vexes me to this day when 
 I think with what tardiness the noose was placed 
 around his neck and the white cap drawn over 
 his eyes. By his side stood his friends, probably 
 the associates of the school to which he belonged, 
 awaiting the moment when they might render him 
 the last act of love. This last act of love consists 
 in clinging with their utmost weight to the legs 
 of their struggling, strangling friend, in order to 
 shorten the death-agonies. 
 
THE SUAE IAN SCHOOL. 21$ 
 
 I have spoken of Herr Gustav Pfizer because I 
 could not altogether skip him in a review of the 
 Suabian school. I may safely say, however, that, 
 in the good nature of my heart, I do not bear the 
 least malice against Herr Pfizer. On the contrary, 
 should I ever be in a position to render him an act 
 of kindness, depend upon it, I shall not long let 
 him kick. 
 
 r 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 Already in my earliest writings I broached the 
 idea from whicji the following narrative has sprung. 
 I refer to that metamorphosis into demons which 
 the Greek-Roman gods underwent when Chris- 
 tianity achieved supreme control of the world. 
 The superstition of the people ascribed to those 
 gods a real but cursed existence, coinciding en- 
 tirely in this respect with the teachings of the 
 Church. The latter by no means declared the 
 ancient gods to be myths, inventions of falsehood 
 and error, as did the philosophers, but held them 
 to be evil spirits, who through the victory of 
 Christ had been hurled from the summit of their 
 power, and now dragged along their miserable 
 existences in the obscurity of dismantled temples 
 or in enchanted groves, and by their diabolic arts, 
 through lust and beauty, particularly through 
 dancing and singing, lured to apostasy unstead- 
 fast Christians who had lost their way in the forest. 
 I desire briefly to remind the reader that the per- 
 216 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 217 
 
 plexities into which the ancient gods fell at the 
 time of the final triumph of Christendom — that 
 is, in the third century — offer striking analogies to 
 former sorrowful events in their god-lives ; for they 
 found themselves plunged into the same sad pre- 
 dicament in which they had once before been placed 
 in that most ancient time, in that revolutionary 
 epoch when the Titans broke loose from their con- 
 finement in Orcus and, piling Pelion on Ossa, scaled 
 high Olympus. At that time the poor gods were 
 compelled to flee ignominiously and conceal them- 
 selves under various disguises on earth. ]\Iost of 
 them repaired to Egypt, where, as is well known, 
 for greater safety they assumed the forms of animals. 
 And in a like manner, when the true Lord of the 
 universe planted the banner of the cross on the 
 heavenly heights, and those iconoclastic zealots, 
 the monks, hunted down the gods with fire and 
 malediction and razed their temples, then these 
 unfortunate heathen divinities were again com- 
 pelled to take to flight, seeking safety under the 
 most varied disguises and in the most retired 
 hiding-places. Many of these poor refugees, de- 
 prived of shelter and ambrosia, were now forced 
 to work at some plebeian trade in order to earn 
 a livelihood. Under these circumstances several, 
 whose shrines had been confiscated, became wood- 
 choppers and day-laborers in Germany, and were 
 compelled to drink beer instead of nectar. It ap- 
 19* 
 
2i8 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 pears that Apollo was reduced to this dire plight, 
 and stooped so low as to accept service with cattle- 
 breeders, and as once before he had tended the 
 cows of Admetus so lived he now as a shepherd 
 in Lower Austria.' Here, however, he aroused 
 suspicion through the marvelous sweetness of his 
 singing, and, being recognized by a learned monk 
 as one of the ancient magic-working heathen gods, 
 he was delivered over to the ecclesiastical courts. 
 On the rack he confessed that he was the god 
 Apollo. Before his execution he begged that he 
 might be permitted for the last time to play the 
 zither and sing to its accompaniment. But he 
 played so touchingly and sang so enchantingly, 
 and was so handsome in face and form, that all 
 the women wept ; yea, many of them afterwards 
 sickened from excess of emotion ; and, under the 
 impression that he was a vampire, it was, after 
 some lapse of time, decided to remove his body 
 from the grave and impale it on a stake, this being 
 considered an approved recipe, certain to effect 
 the cure of the invalid women; but the grave was 
 found empty ! 
 
 I have but little to communicate concerning the 
 fate of Mars, the ancient god of war. I am not 
 disinclined to believe that during the feudal ages 
 he availed himself of the then prevailing doctrine 
 that might makes right. Lank Schimmelpennig, 
 nephew of the executioner of Miinster, once met 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 219 
 
 Mars at Bologna and conversed with him. Shortly 
 before, he had served as a peasant under Fronds- 
 berg, and was present at the storming of Rome. 
 Bitter thoughts must have filled his breast when 
 he saw his ancient, favorite city, and the temples 
 wherein he and his brother gods had been so re- 
 vered, now ignominiously laid waste. 
 
 Better than either Mars or Apollo fared the god 
 Bacchus at the great stampede, and the legends 
 relate the following. Tyrol aboTinds with large 
 lakes, which are surrounded by dense forests, whose 
 magnificent proportions and lofty branches are 
 mirrored in the blue waters. The waters murmur 
 and the trees rustle so mysteriously that a strange 
 sensation of awe steals over the solitary wanderer. 
 On the bank of such a lake stood the hut of a 
 young fisherman, who earned his livelihood by 
 fishing and by ferrying travelers across the lake. 
 He had a large boat, that was fastened to the trunk 
 of an old tree not far distant from his dwelling. 
 Here he lived all alone. Once, about the time of 
 the autumnal equinoxes, verging towards mid- 
 night, he heard a knock at his window, and on 
 opening the door he beheld three monks, who had 
 their faces muffled in their cowls and seemed to 
 be in great haste. One of them hurriedly asked 
 for the loan of the boat, promising to return it 
 within a few hours. As they were three to one, a 
 refusal was out of the question : so he unfastened 
 
220 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 the boat, and, while the monks embarked and 
 sailed away, he returned to his hut and retired 
 to rest. With the facility of youth, he soon fell 
 asleep; but after a few hours he was awakened by 
 the return of the monks. As he approached them, 
 one of them pressed a silver coin into his hand 
 in payment of the fare, and then all three hurried 
 hastily away. At the touch of the monk's hand 
 the fisherman shivered as with cold ; but this was 
 not caused by the night-air. A peculiarly chilling 
 sensation passed through his limbs, and his heart 
 seemed almost frozen : the fingers of the monk 
 were cold as ice. For a few days this circumstance 
 constantly haunted the fisherman's mind ; but youth 
 will eventually shake off the influence of the mys- 
 terious, and the fisherman thought no more of the 
 occurrence until the following year, when, again 
 just at the time of the autumnal equinoxes, again 
 at midnight, there was a knock at the window of 
 the hut, and again the three monks appeared, de- 
 manding the boat. The fisherman delivered up his 
 boat with less anxiety than on the previous occa- 
 sion; but when after a few hours they returned, 
 and the one monk again hastily pressed a coin 
 into his hand, shuddering, he again felt the touch 
 of the icy cold fingers. This occurrence was re- 
 peated every year at the same period and in the 
 s'ame manner; and finally, as the seventh anni- 
 versary drew near, an irresistible curiosity seized 
 

 7 HE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 221 
 
 upon the fisherman to learn, at all costs, the secret 
 that was concealed under the three cowls. He 
 piled a mass of nets into the boat, so as to form 
 a hiding-place into which he could slip while the 
 monks were preparing to embark. The myste- 
 rious monks came at the accustomed time, and the 
 fisherman succeeded in hiding himself under the 
 nets unobserved. To his astonishment, the voyage 
 lasted but a few minutes, whereas it usually took 
 him over an hour to reach the opposite shore. 
 And greater yet was his surprise when here, in 
 a locality with which he had been quite familiar, 
 he beheld a wide forest-glade which he had never 
 before seen, and which was covered with flowers 
 that, to him, were of an entirely new species. The 
 trees were decorated with innumerable lamps, and 
 vases filled with blazing rosin stood on high ped- 
 estals; these, combined with the light of the moon, 
 which shone brightly over all, enabled the fisher- 
 man to see all that took place as distinctly as if it 
 had been mid-day. The glade swarmed with many 
 hundreds of young men and women, most of them 
 beautiful as pictures, although their faces were all 
 as white as marble, and this circumstance, together 
 with their apparel, which consisted of girded tunics 
 trimmed with purple cord, gave them the appear- 
 ance of wandering statues. The women wore on 
 their heads wreaths of vine-leaves, either naturally 
 or artificially wrought of gold and silver, and their 
 
222 ^-^-^ GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 hair was partly plaited over the brow into the 
 shape of a crown, and partly fell in disheveled 
 ringlets down the back. The young men also 
 wore on their heads wreaths of vine-leaves. Both 
 men and women, swinging in their hands golden 
 staffs covered with the foliage of the vine, hastened 
 jubilantly to greet the new-comers. One of the 
 latter threw aside his monkish garb, revealing a 
 repulsive, libidinous face, with pointed goat-ears. 
 He was an impertinent-looking fellow, and the 
 nude exterior was a most disgusting exhibition. 
 The second monk also disrobed, and there came 
 to view a stark-naked, big-bellied fellow, whose 
 bald pate the mischievous women crowned with 
 a wreath of roses. The faces of the two monks, 
 like those of the rest of the assemblage, were white 
 as snow ; and white as snow was also the face of 
 the third monk, who laughingly brushed the cowl 
 from his head. As he unbound the girdle of his 
 monkish dress, and with a gesture of disgust flung 
 off from him the sacred but dirty garment, together 
 with crucifix and rosary, lo ! there stood a mar- 
 velously beautiful youth, robed in a radiant, dia- 
 mond-spangled tunic. Naught marred the perfect 
 symmetry of his figure, save that the rounded hips 
 and slender waist were almost feminine in their 
 proportions. Then, too, his delicately-curved lips 
 and soft, mobile features gave him a somewhat 
 effeminate appearance; but all this was redeemed 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 223 
 
 by a certain daring, heroic, almost reckless ex- 
 pression of his countenance. The women caressed 
 him with wild enthusiasm, placed an ivy-wreath 
 upon his head, and threw a magnificent leopard- 
 skin over his shoulders. At this moment came 
 swiftly dashing along, drawn by two lions, a golden 
 two-wheeled triumphal chariot. Majestically, yet 
 with a merry glance, the youth leaped on the 
 chariot, guiding the wild steeds with purple reins. 
 At the right of the chariot strode one of his un- 
 cassocked companions, whose lewd gestures and 
 unseemly contortions seemed to fill the audience 
 with an ecstasy of delight. The second com- 
 rade, the one with the bald pate and fat paunch,' 
 had been placed on an ass by the jocund women, 
 and rode at the left of the chariot, carrying in 
 his hand a golden drinking-cup, which the attend- 
 ants were constantly replenishing with wine. On 
 moved the chariot, and behind it whirled the romp- 
 ing, dancing, frolicsome, vine-crowned men and 
 women. At the head of the triumphal proces- 
 sion marched the orchestra: first came a pretty, 
 chubby-cheeked youth, playing the double flute; 
 next followed a beautiful nymph, clad in a high- 
 girded tunic, strumming the jingling tambourine; 
 then an equally-bewitching beauty, with a triangle ; 
 next came goat-footed fellows with handsome but 
 lascivious faces, — these were the trumpeters, who 
 blew their fanfares on curious sea-shells and fan- 
 
224 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 tastically-shaped horns ; then followed the lute- 
 players. 
 
 But, dear reader, I forget that you are a cultured 
 and well-informed reader, and have long ere this 
 comprehended that I have been describing a Bac- 
 chanalian rout, a Dionysian orgy. You have often 
 seen on ancient bas-reliefs, or in the copper en- 
 gravings of archaeological works, pictures of the 
 triumphal processions held in honor of the god 
 Bacchus; artd surely, with your cultivated and 
 classic tastes, you would not be frightened even if 
 at dead of night, in the depths of a lonely forest, 
 the lovely spectres of such a Bacchanalian proces- 
 sion, together with the customary tipsy on-hangers, 
 should appear bodily before your eyes. At the 
 most you would only give way to a slight volup- 
 tuous creeping of the flesh, to an aesthetic shudder, 
 at sight of this pale assemblage of graceful phan- 
 toms, who have risen from their monumental 
 crypts and sarcophaguses, and from their hiding- 
 places amid the ruins of ancient temples, to cele- 
 brate once more, with sport and merry-making, 
 the triumphal march of the godlike Bacchus, the 
 Saviour of sensuousness ; to dance once more the 
 merry dance of heathendom, the can-can of an- 
 tiquity; yea, to dance it without a vestige of 
 hypocritical drapery; to dance it without fear of 
 the interference of the sergent-de-ville of a spiritu- 
 alistic morality; to dance it with the wild abandon 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE, 
 
 225 
 
 of the olden time, exulting, boisterous, uproari- 
 ously jubilant. Evoe Bacche ! 
 
 But oh, dear reader, the poor fisherman was 
 not, like yourself, versed in mythology ; he had 
 never made archaeological studies; and terror and 
 fear seized upon him when he beheld the Trium- 
 phatorand his two grotesque acolytes emerge from 
 their monks'-apparel. He shuddered at the lewd 
 gestures and contortions of the Bacchantes, Fauns, 
 and Satyrs. The latter, with their goats' feet and 
 horns, impressed him as particularly diabolical, 
 and he regarded the whole assemblage as a con- 
 gress of spectres and demons, who were seeking 
 by their mysterious rites to bring ruin on all Chris- 
 tians. His hair stood on end at sight of the reck- 
 less distortions of a Maenad, who, with disheveled 
 hair and head thrown back, balanced herself by 
 the thyrsus. His own brain seemed to reel as he 
 saw the Corybantes in mad frenzy piercing their 
 own bodies with short swords, seeking voluptuous- 
 ness in pain itself The soft and tender yet so ter- 
 rible tones of the music seemed to penetrate to 
 his very soul, like a burning, consuming, excru- 
 ciating flame. 
 
 Then sight and hearing forsook the poor fisher- 
 man. He darted back to the boat, and crept under 
 the nets, with chattering teeth and trembling in all 
 his limbs as if Satan already held him fast in his 
 clutches. Soon after, the monks also returned to 
 20 
 
226 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 the boat and shoved off. When they had reached 
 and disembarked at the original starting-place, the 
 fisherman managed to escape unobserved from his 
 hiding-place, so that the monks supposed he had 
 merely been behind the willows awaiting their 
 return. One of the monks, as usual, with icy-cold 
 fingers pressed the ferriage into the fisherman's 
 hand, then all three hurried away. 
 
 For the salvation of his own soul, which he be- 
 lieved to be endangered, and also to guard other 
 good Christians from ruin, the fisherman held him- 
 self in duty bound to communicate a full account 
 of the mysterious occurrence to the Church author- 
 ities; and as the superior of a neighboring Fran- 
 ciscan monastery was in great repute as a learned 
 exorcist, the fisherman determined to go to him 
 without delay. The rising sun found him on his 
 way to the monastery, where with modest demeanor 
 he soon stood before his excellency the superior, 
 who received him seated in an easy-chair in the 
 hbrary, and, with hood drawn closely over his face, 
 hstened meditatively while the fisherman told his 
 tale of horror. When the recital was finished, the 
 superior raised his head, and, as the hood fell back, 
 the fisherman, to his great consternation and dis- 
 may, recognized in the superior one of the monks 
 who annually sailed over the lake, — the very one, 
 in fact, whom he had the previous night seen as a 
 heathen demon riding in the golden chariot drawn 
 
THE GODS I AT EXILE. 
 
 227 
 
 by lions. It was the same marble-white face, the 
 same regular, beautiful features, the same mouth 
 with its delicately-curved lips. And those lips 
 now wore a kindly smile, and from that mouth 
 now issued the gracious and melodious words, 
 " Beloved son in Christ, we willingly believe that 
 you have spent the night in company of the god 
 Bacchus. Your fantastic ghost-story gives ample 
 proof of that. Not that we would say aught de- 
 rogatory of this god : at times he is undoubtedly 
 a care-dispeller, and gladdens the heart of man. 
 But he is very dangerous for those who cannot 
 bear much; and to this class you seem to belong. 
 We advise you to partake in future very sparingly 
 of the golden juice of the grape, and not again to 
 trouble the Church authorities with the fantasies 
 of a drunken brain. Concerning this last vision of 
 yours you had better keep a very quiet tongue in 
 your head ; otherwise the strong arm of our lay 
 brother the beadle shall measure out to you twenty- 
 five lashes. And now, beloved son in Christ, go to 
 the monastery kitchen, where brother butler and 
 brother cook will regale you with a light repast." 
 
 With this, the reverend father bestowed the cus-^^ 
 tomary benediction on the fisherman, and the latter, 
 dumfounded and bewildered, marched off to the 
 kitchen. But he almost fell to the earth in affright 
 when here he suddenly came face to face with 
 brother cook and brother butler, for, lo ! they were 
 
228 TJ^^ GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 the same monks who had accompanied the supe- 
 rior on his midnight excursions across the lake. 
 He recognized one by his fat paunch and bald head, 
 and the other by his lascivious grin and goat-ears. 
 But, mindful of the warning he had received, he 
 kept quite mum; and only in later years did he 
 relate this strange story. 
 
 Several old chronicles which contain similar 
 legends locate the scene near the city of Speyer, 
 on the Rhine. 
 
 An analogous tradition is extant along the coast 
 of East Friesland. In the latter legend, the ancient 
 conception of the transportation of the dead to the 
 realm of Hades is distinctly recognizable. In fact, 
 it underlies all those legends. It is true that none 
 of them contain any mention of Charon, the steers- 
 man of the boat: this old fellow seems to have 
 entirely disappeared from the folk-lore, and is to 
 be met with only in puppet-shows. But a far more 
 notable mythological personage is to be recognized 
 in the so-called forwarding agent, or dispatcher, 
 who makes arrangements for the transportation of 
 the dead and pays the customary passage-money 
 into the hands of the boatman : the latter is gen- 
 erally a common fisherman, who officiates as a 
 substitute for Charon. Notwithstanding his quaint 
 disguise, the true name of this dispatcher may 
 readily be guessed; and I shall therefore relate 
 the legend as faithfully as possible. 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 229 
 
 The shores of East Friesland that border on the 
 North Sea abound with bays, which are used as 
 harbors and are called fiords. On the farthest 
 projecting promontory of land generally stands the 
 solitary hut of some fisherman, who lives here 
 with his family, peacefully and contentedly. Here 
 nature wears a sad and melancholy aspect. Not 
 even the chirping of a bird is to be heard, save now 
 and then the shrill screech of a sea-gull flying up 
 from its nest among the sand-hills, — an omen of 
 the coming storm. The monotonous plashings of 
 the restless sea harmonize with the sombre, shift- 
 ing shadows of the passing clouds. 
 
 Song is hushed on the lips of the human in- 
 habitants of these desolate regions, and the strain 
 of a volkslied is never heard. The people who 
 live here are an earnest, honest, matter-of-fact race, 
 proud of their bold spirit and of the liberties 
 which they have inherited from their ancestors. 
 Such a people are not imaginative, and are little 
 given to metaphysical speculations. Fishing is 
 their principal support, added to which is an occa- 
 sional pittance of passage-money for transporting 
 some traveler to one of the adjacent islands. 
 
 It is said that at a certain period of the year, 
 just at mid-day, when the fisherman and his family 
 are seated at table eating their noonday meal, a 
 traveler enters and asks the master of the house 
 to vouchsafe him an audience for a few minutes to 
 20* 
 
230 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 speak with him on a matter of business. The fish- 
 erman, after vainly inviting the stranger to dine, 
 grants his request, and they both step aside to a 
 Httle table. I shall not describe the personal ap- 
 pearance of the stranger in detail, after the tedious 
 manner of novel-writers : a brief enumeration of 
 the salient points will suffice. He is a little man, 
 advanced in years, but well preserved. He is, so 
 to say, a youthful graybeard : plump, but not cor- 
 pulent ; cheeks ruddy as an apple ; small eyes, 
 which blink merrily and continually. On his pow- 
 dered little head he wears a three-cornered little 
 hat. Under his flaming yellow cloak, with its 
 many collars, he wears the old-fashioned dress of 
 a well-to-do Holland merchant, such as we see de- 
 picted in old portraits, — namely, a short silk coat 
 of a parrot-green color, a vest embroidered with 
 flowers, short black trowsers, striped stockings, and 
 shoes ornamented with buckles. The latter are so 
 brightly polished that it is hard to understand how 
 the wearer could trudge afoot through the slimy 
 mud of the coast and yet keep them so clean. 
 His voice is a thin, asthmatic treble, sometimes 
 inclining to be rather lachrymose; but the address 
 and bearing of the little man are as grave and 
 measured as beseem a Holland merchant. This 
 gravity, however, appears to be more assumed 
 than natural, and is in marked contrast with the 
 searching, roving, swift-darting glances of the eyes, 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 23 1 
 
 and with the ill-repressed fidgetiness of the legs 
 and arms. That the stranger is a Holland merchant 
 is evidenced not only by his apparel, but also by 
 the mercantile exactitude and caution with which 
 he endeavors to effect as favorable a bargain as 
 possible for his employers. He claims to be a for- 
 warding agent, and to have received from some of 
 his mercantile friends a commission to transport a 
 certain number of souls, as many as can find room 
 in an ordinary boat, from the coast of East Fries- 
 land to the White Island. In fulfillment of this 
 commission, he adds, he wishes to know if the 
 fisherman will this night convey in his boat the 
 aforesaid cargo to the aforesaid island ; in which 
 case he is authorized to pay the passage-money in 
 advance, confidently hoping that in Christian fair- 
 ness the fisherman will make his price very mod- 
 erate. The Holland merchant (which term is in 
 fact a pleonasm, since every Hollander is a mer- 
 chant) makes this proposition with the utmost 
 nonchalance, as if it referred to a cargo of cheese, 
 and not to the souls of the dead. The fisherman 
 is startled at the word " souls," and a cold chill 
 creeps down his back, for he immediately com- 
 prehends that the souls of the dead are here meant, 
 and that the stranger is none other than the phan- 
 tom Dutchman, who has already intrusted several 
 of his fellow-fishermen with the transportation of 
 the souls of the dead, and paid them well for it, too. 
 
232 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 These East Frieslanders are, as I have already 
 remarked, a brave, healthy, practical people ; in 
 them is lacking that morbid imagination which 
 makes us so impressible to the ghostly and super- 
 natural. Our fisherman's weird dismay lasts but 
 a moment ; suppressing the uncanny sensation that 
 is stealing over him, he soon regains his com- 
 posure, and, intent on securing as high a sum as 
 possible, he assumes an air of supreme indiffer- 
 ence. But after a little chaffering the two come 
 to an understanding, and shake hands to seal the 
 bargain. The Hollander draws forth a dirty leather 
 pouch, filled entirely with little silver pennies of 
 the smallest denomination ever coined in Holland, 
 and in these tiny coins counts out the whole amount 
 of the fare. With instructions to the fisherman 
 to be ready with his boat at the appointed place 
 about the midnight hour when the moon shall 
 become visible, the Hollander takes leave of the 
 whole family, and, declining their repeated invita- 
 tions to dine, the grave little figure, dignified as 
 ever, trips lightly away. 
 
 At the time agreed upon, the fisherman appears 
 at the appointed place. At first the boat is rocked 
 lightly to and fro by the waves ; but by the time 
 the full moon has risen above the horizon the fish- 
 erman notices that his bark is less easily swayed, 
 and so it gradually sinks deeper and deeper in 
 the stream, until finally the water comes within a 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 233 
 
 hand's-breadth of the boat's bow. This circum- 
 stance apprises him that his passengers, the souls, 
 are now aboard, and he pushes off from shore 
 with his cargo. Although he strains his eyes to 
 the utmost, he can distinguish nothing- but a few 
 vapory streaks that seem to be swayed hither and 
 thither and to intermingle with one another, but as- 
 sume no definite forms. Listen intently as he may, 
 he hears nothing but an indescribably-faint chirp- 
 ing and rustling. Only now and then a sea-gull 
 with a shrill scream flies swiftly over his head ; or 
 near him a fish leaps up from out the stream, and 
 for a moment stares at him with a vacuous look. 
 The night-winds sigh, and the sea-breezes grow 
 more chilly. Everywhere only water, moonlight, 
 and silence! and silent as all around him is the 
 fisherman, who finally reaches the White Island 
 and moors his boat. He sees no one on the strand, 
 but he hears a shrill, asthmatic, wheezy, lachry- 
 mose voice, which he recognizes as that of the 
 Hollander. The latter seems to be reading off a 
 list of proper names, with a peculiar, monotonous 
 intonation, as if rehearsing a roll-call. Among the 
 names are some which are known to the fisherman 
 as belonging to persons who have died that year. 
 During the reading of the list, the boat is evidently 
 being gradually lightened of its load, and as soon 
 as the last name is called it rises suddenly and 
 floats freely, although but a moment before it was 
 
234 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE, 
 
 deeply imbedded in the sand of the sea-shore. To 
 the fisherman this is a token that his cargo has 
 been properly delivered, and he rows composedly 
 back to his wife and child, to his beloved home on 
 the fiord. 
 
 * * * Notwithstanding the clever disguise, I 
 have ventured to guess who the important mytho- 
 logical personage is that figures in this tradition. 
 It is none other than the god Mercury, Hermes 
 Psychopompos, the whilom conductor of the dead 
 to Hades, Verily, under the shabby and prosaic 
 garb of a tradesman is concealed the youthful 
 and most accomplished god of heathendom, the 
 cunning son of Maia. On his little three-cornered 
 hat not the slightest tuft of a feather is to be seen 
 which might remind the beholder of the winged 
 cap, and the clumsy shoes with steel buckles fail 
 to give the least hint of the winged sandals. This 
 grave and heavy Dutch lead is quite different from 
 the mobile quicksilver, from which the god de- 
 rived his very name. But the contrast is so ex- 
 tremely striking as to betray his design, which is 
 the more effectually to disguise himself Perhaps 
 this mask was not chosen out of mere caprice. 
 Mercury was, as is well known, the patron god 
 of thieves and merchants, and, in all probability, in 
 choosing a disguise that should conceal him, and 
 a trade by which to earn his livelihood, he took 
 into consideration his talents and antecedents. 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 235 
 
 * * * And thus it came to pass that the shrewd- 
 est and most cunning of the gods became a mer- 
 chant, and, to adapt himself most thoroughly to 
 his role, became the ne phis iiltra of merchants, 
 — a Holland merchant. His long practice in the 
 olden time as Psychopompos, as conveyer of the 
 dead to Hades, marks him out as particularly fitted 
 to conduct the transportation of the souls of the 
 dead to the White Island, in the manner just de- 
 scribed. 
 
 The White Island is occasionally also called 
 Brea, or Britannia. Does this perhaps refer to 
 white Albion, to the chalky cliffs of the English 
 coast ? It were a very humorous idea to designate 
 England as the land of the dead, as the Plutonian 
 realm, as hell. In sooth, by many a traveler Eng- 
 land is so regarded. 
 
 In my essay on the P'aust legend I discussed 
 at full length the popular superstition concerning 
 Pluto and his dominion. I showed how the realm 
 of shadows was transmogrified into hell, and how 
 its sable ruler became more and more diabolical 
 and finally came to be Satan. Neither Pluto, 
 god of the nether regions, nor his brother, Nep- 
 tune, god of the sea, emigrated like the other 
 gods. Even after the final triumph of Christendom 
 they remained in their domains, their respective 
 elements. No matter what silly fables concern- 
 ing him were invented here above on earth, old 
 
236 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 Pluto sat by his Proserpine, warm and cozy down 
 below. 
 
 But Neptune underwent less of a metamorphosis 
 than did his brother Pluto, and neither church-bell 
 chimes nor organ-strains could offend his ears in 
 the depths of old ocean, where he sat contentedly 
 by the side of his white-bosomed wife, Amphitrite, 
 surrounded by his court of dripping nereids and 
 tritons. Only now and then, when a young sailor 
 crossed the equator, he would dart up from the 
 briny deep, in his hand brandishing the trident, 
 his head crowned with sea-weed, and his flowing, 
 silvery beard reaching down to the navel. Then 
 he would confer on the neophyte the terrible sea- 
 water baptism, accompanying it with a long unc- 
 tuous harangue, interspersed with coarse sailor 
 jests, to the great delight of the jolly tars. The 
 harangue was frequently interrupted by the spitting 
 of amber quids of chewed tobacco, which Neptune 
 so freely scattered around him. A friend, who 
 gave me a detailed description of the manner in 
 which such a sea miracle-play is performed, assured 
 me that the very sailors that laughed most heartily 
 at the droll antics of Neptune never for a moment 
 doubted the existence of such a god, and some- 
 times when in great danger they even prayed to 
 him. 
 
 Neptune, as we have seen, remained monarch of 
 the watery realm; and Pluto, notwithstanding his 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE, 23/ 
 
 metamorphosis into Satan, still continued to be 
 prince of the lower regions. They fared better 
 than did their brother Jupiter, who, after the over- 
 throw of their father, Saturn, became ruler of 
 heaven, and as sovereign of the universe resided 
 in Olympus, where, surrounded by his merry troop 
 of gods, goddesses, and nymphs-of-honor, he lived 
 a joyous, ambrosial life, free from all care. But 
 when the great catastrophe occurred, when the 
 supremacy of the cross, that symbol of suffering, 
 was proclaimed, then the great Kronides fled, and 
 disappeared amid the tumults and confusion of 
 the transmigration of races. All traces of him 
 were lost, and I have in vain consulted ancient 
 chronicles and old women : none could give me 
 the least information concerning his fate. With 
 the same purpose in view, I have ransacked many 
 libraries, where I was shown the magnificent codi- 
 ces ornamented with gold and precious stones, 
 true odalisques in the harem of literature. To the 
 learned eunuchs who with such affability unlocked 
 for me those brilliant treasures, I here return the 
 customary thanks. It appears as if no popular 
 tradition of Jupiter has survived through the Mid- 
 dle Ages ; and all that I could gather concerning 
 him consists of a story told me by my friend 
 Niels Andersen. 
 
 * * * The events that I am about to relate, said 
 Niels Andersen, occurred on an island, the exact 
 
 21 
 
238 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 situation of which I cannot tell. Since its discov- 
 ery no one has been able again to reach it, being 
 prevented by the immense icebergs that tower like 
 a high wall around the island and seldom permit 
 a near approach. Only the crew of a Russian 
 whaling-vessel, which a storm had driven so far 
 to the north, ever trod its soil; and since then over 
 a hundred years have elapsed. When the sailors 
 had, by means of a small boat, effected a landing, 
 they found the island to be wild and desolate. 
 Sadly waved the blades of tall sedgy grass over 
 the quicksands ; here and there grew a few stunted 
 fir-trees, or a little barren shrubbery. They saw a 
 multitude of rabbits springing around, on which 
 account they named it the Island of Rabbits. Only 
 one miserable hut gave evidence that a human be- 
 ing dwelt there. As the sailors entered the hut, 
 they saw an old, very old man, wretchedly clad in 
 a garment of rabbit-skins rudely stitched together. 
 He was seated in a stone chair in front of the 
 hearth, trying to warm his emaciated hands and 
 trembling knees by the flaring brushwood fire. 
 At his right side stood an immense bird, evidently 
 an eagle, but which had been roughly treated by 
 time and shorn of all its plumage; the long bristly 
 quills of its wings gave the bird a highly grotesque 
 and, at the same time, a horribly hideous appear- 
 ance. At the old man's left, squatted on the earth, 
 was an extraordinarily large hairless goat, which 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 239 
 
 seemed to be very old ; although its udders were 
 full of milk, and the nipples had a fresh, rosy, milk- 
 giving appearance. 
 
 Among the sailors were several Greeks, one of 
 whom, not thinking that his words would be un- 
 derstood by the aged inhabitant of the hut, re- 
 marked in the Greek language to a comrade, "This 
 old fellow is either a spectre or an evil demon." 
 But at these words the old man suddenly arose 
 from his seat, and to their great surprise the sailors 
 beheld a stately figure, which, in spite of its ad- 
 vanced a<^e, raised itself erect with commandincr, 
 yea, with majestic dignity, his head almost touch- 
 ing the rafters of the roof The features, too, al- 
 though rugged and weather-beaten, showed traces 
 of original beauty, they were so noble and well 
 proportioned. A few silvery locks fell over his 
 brow, which was furrowed by pride and age. His 
 eyes had a dim and fixed look, but occasionally 
 they would still gleam piercingly ; and from his 
 mouth were heard in the melodious and sonorous 
 words of the ancient Greek language, " You are 
 mistaken, young man ; I am neither a spectre nor 
 an evil demon ; I am an unhappy old man, who 
 once knew better days. But who are ye ?" 
 
 The sailors explained the accident which had 
 befallen them, and then inquired concerning all on 
 the island. The information, however, was very 
 meagre. The old man told them that since time 
 
240 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 immemorial he had inhabited this island, whose 
 bulwarks of ice served him as a secure asylum 
 against his inexorable foes. He subsisted prin- 
 cipally by catching rabbits, and every year, when 
 the floating icebergs had settled, a few bands of 
 savages crossed over on sleds, and to them he sold 
 rabbit-skins, receiving in exchange the articles of 
 indispensable necessity. The whales, which some- 
 times came swimming close to the island, were his 
 favorite company. But it gave him pleasure to 
 hear again his native tongue, for he too was a 
 Greek. He entreated his countrymen to give him 
 an account of the present condition of Greece. 
 That the cross had been torn down from the bat- 
 tlements of Grecian cities apparently caused the 
 old man a malicious satisfaction ; but it did not 
 altogether please him when he heard that the 
 crescent had been planted there instead. It was 
 strange that none of the sailors knew the names 
 of the cities concerning which the old man in- 
 quired, and which, as he assured them, had in his 
 time been in their full glory. In like manner the 
 names of the present cities and villages of Greece, 
 which were mentioned by the sailors, were un- 
 known to him ; at this the old man would shake his 
 head sadly, and the sailors looked at one another 
 quite perplexed. They noticed that he knew ex- 
 actly all the localities and geographical peculiari- 
 ties of Greece ; and he described so accurately and 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 24 1 
 
 vividly the bays, the peninsulas, the mountain- 
 ridges, even the knolls and most trifling rocky ele- 
 vations, that his ignorance of the common names of 
 these localities was all the more surprising. With 
 especial interest, with a certain anxiety even, he 
 questioned them concerning an ancient temple 
 which in his time, he assured them, had been the 
 most beautiful in all Greece ; but none of his hear- 
 ers knew the name, which he pronounced with a 
 loving tenderness. But finally, when the old man 
 had again described the site of the temple with the 
 utmost particularity, a young sailor recognized the 
 place by the description. 
 
 The village wherein he was born, said the young 
 man, was situated hard by, and when a boy he had 
 often tended his father's swine at the very place 
 where there had been found ruins of an ancient 
 structure, indicating a magnificent grandeur in 
 the past. Now, only a few large marble pillars 
 remained standing: some were plain, unadorned 
 columns, others were surmounted by the square 
 stones of a gable. From the cracks of the ma- 
 sonry the blooming honeysuckle-vines and red 
 bell-shaped flowers trailed downwards. Other 
 pillars — among the number some of rose-colored 
 marble — lay shattered on the ground, and the costly 
 marble head-pieces, ornamented with beautiful 
 sculpture representing foliage and flowers, were 
 overgrown by rank creepers and grasses. Half 
 21* 
 
242 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE, 
 
 buried in the earth lay huge marble blocks, some 
 of which were squares, such as were used for the 
 walls ; others were three-cornered slabs for roof- 
 pieces. Over them waved a large, wild fig-tree, 
 which had grown up out of the ruins. Under the 
 shadow of that tree, continued the young man, he 
 had passed whole hours in examining the strange 
 figures carved on the large marble blocks : they 
 seemed to be pictorial representations of all sorts 
 of sports and combats, and were quite pleasing to 
 look at, but, alas ! much injured by exposure and 
 overgrown with moss and ivy. His father, whom 
 he had questioned in regard to the mysterious 
 signification of those pillars and sculptures, told 
 him that these were the ruins of an ancient pagan 
 temple, and had once been the abode of a wicked, 
 heathen god, who had here wantoned in lewd 
 debauchery and unnatural vices and had estab- 
 lished a worship consisting of the most bloody and 
 terrible rites. Notwithstanding all this, the unen- 
 lightened heathen were accustomed to slaughter, 
 in his honor, a hundred oxen at a time, and the 
 hollowed marble block into which was gathered 
 the blood of the sacrifices was yet in existence. 
 It was, in fact, the very stone trough which they 
 were in the habit of using as a receptacle for slop 
 wherewith to feed the swine. 
 
 As the young sailor spoke these words, the old 
 man heaved a sigh that betrayed the most terrible 
 
THE GODS IN EXILE. 243 
 
 anguish. Tottering-, he sank into his stone chair, 
 covered his face with his hands, and wept Hke 
 a child. The great, gaunt bird, with a shrill 
 screech, flapped its immense wings, and menaced 
 the strangers with claws and beak. But the old 
 goat licked its master's hand, and bleated mourn- 
 fully and consolingly. 
 
 At this strange sight, an uncanny terror seized 
 upon the sailors: they hurriedly left the hut, and 
 were ill at ease until they could no longer hear the 
 sobbing of the old man, the screaming of the bird, 
 and the bleating of the goat. When they were 
 safely aboard the boat, they narrated their adven- 
 ture. Among the crew was a learned Russian, 
 Professor of Philosophy among the faculty at 
 Kazan; and he declared the matter to be highly 
 important. With his forefinger held knowingly to 
 the side of his nose, he assured the sailors that the 
 old man of the island was undoubtedly the former 
 king of gods, the ancient god Jupiter, son of Saturn 
 and Rhea. The bird at his side was clearly the 
 eagle that once carried in its claws the terrible 
 thunderbolts. And the old goat was, in all prob- 
 ability, none other than Althea, Jupiter's old nurse, 
 who had suckled him in Crete, and now in exile 
 again nourished him with her milk. 
 
 This is the story as toid to me by Niels Ander- 
 sen; and I must confess that it filled my soul with 
 a profound melancholy. Decay is secretly under- 
 
244 
 
 THE GODS IN EXILE. 
 
 mining all that is great in the universe, and the 
 gods themselves must finally succumb to the same 
 miserable destiny. The iron law of fate so wills 
 it, and even the greatest of the immortals must 
 submissively bow his head. He of whom Homer 
 sang, and whom Phidias sculptured in gold and 
 ivory, he at whose glance earth trembled, he, the 
 lover of Leda, Alcmena, Semele, Danae, Callisto, 
 lo, Europa, etc., — even he is compelled to hide 
 himself behind the icebergs of the North Pole, 
 and in order to prolong his wretched existence 
 must deal in rabbit-skins, like a shabby Savoyard ! 
 I do not doubt that there are people who will 
 derive a malicious pleasure from such a specta- 
 cle. They are, perhaps, the descendants of those 
 unfortunate oxen who, in hecatombs, were slaugh- 
 tered on the altars of Jupiter. Rejoice! avenged 
 is the blood of your ancestors, those poor martyrs 
 of superstition. But we, who have no hereditary 
 grudge rankling in us, we are touched at the sight 
 of fallen greatness, and withhold not our holiest 
 compassion. 
 
FROM THE PREFACE TO "CONFESSIONS." 
 
 A CERTAIN characteristic sentimentality always 
 clings to our German rascals. They are no cold, 
 unfeeling rogues, but tender-hearted scoundrels. 
 They have emotional natures ; they take a warm 
 interest in the fate of those whom they rob, and 
 they are not to be got rid of Even our noble 
 light-fingered gentry are not mere egotists, who 
 steal only for themselves, but they seek to acquire 
 filthy lucre in order that they may do good there- 
 with. Such a one was the nimble-fingered clieva- 
 Her iVindustrie who sought to forestall the German 
 edition of my "Gods in Exile" by a hurried trans- 
 lation from the French, in which language it origi- 
 nally appeared. Owing to the imperfection of the 
 laws relating to copyright, such thievish rascals 
 may with impunity rob the poor author of his 
 hard-earned and pitiful support. The so-called 
 translation of my " Gods in Exile" was accom- 
 panied by a compilation of various newspaper 
 articles, giving a very touching account of my 
 present miserable condition, and the senti'mental 
 scoundrel of a translator even goes so far as to 
 
 245 
 
246 
 
 FROM THE PREFACE TO ''CONFESSIONS. 
 
 express his great sorrow at the sad state of my 
 health. The sketch contained a minute descrip- 
 tion of my person, from head to foot, which elicited 
 from a witty friend the remark, "Truly, we live in 
 a topsy-turvy world, and nowadays it is the thief 
 who publishes a description of the honest man 
 whom he has robbed." 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 A WITTY Frenchman — a few years ago these 
 words would have been a pleonasm — once dubbed 
 me an unfrocked Romanticist. I have a weakness 
 for all that is witty; and, spiteful as was this appel- 
 lation, it nevertheless delighted me highly. Not- 
 withstanding the war of extermination that I had 
 waged against Romanticism, I always remained a 
 Romanticist at heart, and that in a higher degree 
 than I myself realized. After I had delivered the 
 most deadly blows against the taste for the poetry 
 of the Romantic school, there stole over me an 
 inexpressible yearning for the blue flower in the 
 fairy-land of Romanticism, and I grasped the magic 
 lyre and sang a song wherein I gave full sway to 
 all the sweet extravagances, to all the intoxication 
 of moonlight, to all the blooming, nightingale-like 
 fancies, once so fondly loved. I know it was "the 
 last free forest-song of Romanticism," and I am 
 its last poet. With me the old German lyric 
 school ends; with me the modern lyric school 
 
 247 
 
248 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 of Germany begins. Writers on German literature 
 will assign to me this double role. It would be 
 unseemly for me to speak at length on this subject, 
 but I may with justice claim a liberal space in the 
 history of German Romanticism. For this reason 
 I ought to hav^e included in my account of the 
 Romantic school a review of my own writings. 
 By my omission to do this, a gap has been left 
 which I cannot easily fill. To write a criticism of 
 one's self is an embarrassing and impossible task. 
 I should be a conceited coxcomb to obtrude the 
 good I might be able to say of myself, and I should 
 be a great fool to proclaim to the whole world the 
 defects of which I might also be conscious. Even 
 with the most honest desire to be sincere, no one 
 has as yet succeeded in doing it, — neither Saint 
 Augustine, the pious bishop of Hippo, nor the 
 Genevese Jean Jacques Rousseau, — least of all 
 the latter, who proclaimed himself the man of 
 truth and nature, but was really more untruthful 
 and unnatural than his cotemporaries. 
 
 * * * Rousseau, who in his own person also 
 slandered human nature, was yet true to it in 
 respect to our primitive weakness, which consists 
 in always wishing to appear in the eyes of the 
 world as something different from what we really 
 are. His self-portraiture is a lie, admirably exe- 
 cuted, but still only a brilliant lie. 
 
 I recently read an anecdote concerning the King 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 249 
 
 of Ashantee which illustrates in a very amusing 
 manner this weakness of human nature. When 
 Major Bowditch was despatched as resident am- 
 bassador to the court of that powerful African 
 monarch, he sought to ingratiate himself with the 
 courtiers, especially with the court-ladies, by taking 
 their portraits. The king, who was astonished at 
 the accuracy of the likenesses, requested that he 
 also might be painted, and had already had sev- 
 eral sittings, when the artist noticed in the features 
 of the king, who had often sprung up to observe 
 the progress of the picture, the peculiar restless- 
 ness and embarrassment of one who has a request 
 on the tip of his tongue and yet hesitates to ex- 
 press it. The painter pressed his majesty to tell 
 his wish, until at last the poor African king in- 
 quired in a low voice if he could not be painted 
 white. And so it is. The swarthy negro king 
 wish'es to be painted white. But do not laugh 
 at the poor African : every human being is such 
 another neg-ro kincf and all of us would like to 
 appear before the public in a different color from 
 that which fate has given us. Fully realizing this, 
 I took heed not to draw my own portrait in my 
 review of the Romantic school. But in the follow- 
 ing pages I shall have ample occasion to speak of 
 myself, and this will to a certain extent fill up the 
 gap caused by the lacking portrait; for I have 
 here undertaken to describe for the reader's benefit 
 
250 . CONFESSIONS. 
 
 and enlightenment the philosophical and religious 
 changes which have taken place in the author's 
 mind since my book " De TAllemagne" was written. 
 
 Fear not that I shall paint myself too white, and 
 my fellows-beings too black. I shall always give 
 my own colors with exact fidelity, so that it may 
 be known how far my judgment is to be trusted 
 when I draw the portraits of others. 
 
 * * * IMadame de Stael's hate of the Emperor 
 is the soul of her book " De I'Allemagne," and, 
 although his name is not mentioned therein, it is 
 noticeable how at every line the authoress squints 
 at the Tuileries. I doubt not that the book an- 
 noyed the Emperor more than the most direct 
 attack ; for nothing so much irritates a man as a 
 woman's petty needle-pricks. We are prepared 
 against sabre-strokes, but the needles pierce the 
 most vulnerable part. 
 
 Oh, the women ! we must forgive them much, 
 for they love much, — and man)'. Their hate is, 
 in fact, only love turned the wrong way. At times 
 they try to injure us, but only because they hope 
 thereby to please some other man. When they 
 write, one eye is on the paper and the other on 
 some man. This rule applies to all authoresses, 
 with the exception of Countess Hahn-Hahn, who 
 has only one eye. We male authors have also our 
 prejudices. We write for or against something, 
 for or against an idea, for or against a party ; but 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 25 
 
 women always write for or against some particular 
 man, or, to express it more correctly, on account 
 of some particular man. We men will sometimes 
 lie outright; women, like all passive creatures, 
 seldom invent, but can so distort a fact that they 
 can thereby injure us more surely than by a down- 
 right lie. 
 
 Yes, women are dangerous; but I must admit 
 that beautiful women are not so dangerous as those 
 who have more intellectual than physical attrac- 
 tions ; for the former are accustomed to have men 
 pay court to them, while the latter meet the vanity 
 of men half-way, and through the bait of flattery 
 acquire a more powerful influence than is possible 
 to those endowed' merely with beauty. 
 
 I by no means intend to insinuate that Madame 
 de Stael was ugly ; but beauty is something quite 
 different. She had single points which were pleas- 
 ing; but the effect as a whole was anything but 
 enchanting. 
 
 To nervous persons, like the sainted Schiller, 
 her custom of continually twirling between her 
 fingers some small article was particularly annoy- 
 ing. This habit made poor Schiller dizzy, and in 
 desperation he grasped her pretty hand to hold it 
 quiet. This innocent action led Madame de Stael 
 to believe that the tender-hearted poet was over- 
 powered by the magic of her personal charms. I 
 am told that she really had very pretty hands 
 
252 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 and beautiful arms, which she always managed 
 to display. Surely the Venus of Milo could not 
 show such beautiful arms ! Her teeth surpassed 
 in whiteness those of the finest steed of Araby. 
 She had very large, beautiful eyes, a dozen amo- 
 rets would have found room on her lips, and her 
 smile is said to have been very sweet : therefore 
 slie could not have been ugly, — no woman is ugly. 
 But I venture to say that had fair Helen of Sparta 
 looked so, the Trojan war would not have occurred, 
 the strongholds of Priam would not have been 
 burned, and Homer would never have sung of the 
 wrath of Pelidean Achilles. 
 
 * * * In my Memoirs I relate with more detail 
 than is admissible here how after the French Rev- 
 olution of July, 1830, I emigrated to Paris, where 
 I have ever since lived peacefully and contentedly. 
 What I did and suffered during the Restoration will 
 be communicated at a time when the disinterested- 
 ness of such a publication will no longer be liable 
 to doubt or suspicion. I worked much and suf- 
 fered much ; and about the time that the sun of the 
 July revolution arose in France I had gradually 
 become very weary, and needed recreation. More- 
 over, the air of my native land was daily becoming 
 more unwholesome for me, and I was compelled 
 to contemplate seriously a change of climate. I 
 had visions: in the clouds I saw all sorts of hor- 
 rible, grotesque faces, that annoyed me with their 
 
CONFESSIONS. 253 
 
 grimaces. It sometimes appeared to me as if the 
 sun were a Prussian cockade. At night I dreamed 
 of a hideous black vulture that preyed on my 
 liver; and I was becoming very melancholy. In 
 addition to all this, I had become acquainted with 
 an old magistrate from Berlin who had spent many 
 years in the fortress of Spandau, and who described 
 to me how unpleasant it was in winter to wear iron 
 manacles. I thought it very unchristian-like not 
 to warm the irons in winter, for if our chains were 
 only warmed somewhat they would not seem so 
 very unpleasant, and even sensitive natures could 
 well endure them. The chains ought also to be 
 perfumed with the essences of roses and laurels, as 
 is the custom in France. I inquired of my friend 
 the magistrate if oysters were often served at 
 Spandau. He answered, no; Spandau was too far 
 distant from the sea. Meat also, he said, was sel- 
 dom to be had, and the only fowls were the flies 
 which fell into one's soup. About the same time 
 I became acquainted with a commercial traveler of 
 a French wine establishment, who was never tired 
 of praising the merry life of Paris, — how the air 
 was full of music, how from morning until night 
 might be heard the singing of the Marseillaise and 
 other patriotic songs. He told me that on every 
 street-corner was the inscription "liberty, equality, 
 and fraternity." He likewise recommended the 
 champagne of his firm, and gave me a large num- 
 
254 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 ber of Its business-cards. He also promised to 
 furnish me with letters of introduction to the best 
 Parisian restaurants, in case I should visit Paris. 
 As I really did need recreation, and as Spandau 
 was at too great a distance from the sea to procure 
 oysters, and as the fowl soup of Spandau was not 
 to my taste, and as, moreover, the Prussian chains 
 were too cold in winter and might not be con- 
 ducive to my good health, for these reasons I 
 determined to go to Paris and to drink champagne 
 and hear the strains of the Marseillaise in their 
 native country. 
 
 I crossed the Rhine on May ist, 1831. I did 
 not see the old river-god, father Rhine, so I con- 
 tented myself with dropping my visiting-card into 
 the water. I am told that he was sitting down 
 below, conning his French grammar. For during 
 the Prussian rule his French had grown rusty from 
 long disuse, and now he wished to practice it anew, 
 in order to be prepared for contingencies. 
 
 Methought I could hear him below, conjugating: 
 "J'aime, tu aimes, il aime; nous aimons" — but what 
 does he love? Surely not the Prussians! 
 
 I awoke at St. Denis from a refreshing morning 
 slumber, and heard for the first time the shout of 
 the driver, " Paris ! Paris !" Here we already inhaled 
 the atmosphere of the capital, now visible on the 
 horizon. A rascally lackey tried to persuade me 
 to visit the royal sepulchre at St. Denis; but I had 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 255 
 
 not come to France to see dead kings. I soon 
 reached Paris, and entered through the triumphal 
 arch of the Boulevard St. Denis, which was origi- 
 nally erected in honor of Louis XV., but now 
 served to grace my entry into Paris. I was sur- 
 prised at meeting such multitudes of well-dressed 
 people, tastefully arrayed like the pictures of a 
 fashion-journal. I was also impressed by the fact 
 that they all spoke French, which in Germany is 
 the distinguishing mark of the higher classes. Ac- 
 cording to this, the French common people are as 
 noble as are our German nobility. The men were 
 all polite, and the pretty women all smiled graci- 
 ously. If some one accidentally jostled me with- 
 out immediately asking pardon, it was safe to wager 
 that it was a fellow-countryman. And if a pretty 
 woman looked glum, she had either eaten sour- 
 krout or could read Klopstock in the original. I 
 found everything quite charming. The skies were 
 so blue, the air so balmy, and here and there the 
 rays of the "sun of July" were still glimmering. 
 The cheeks of the beauteous Lutece were still 
 flushed from the burning kisses of that sun, and the 
 bridal flowers on her bosom were not yet wilted. 
 But at the street-corners the words "liberte, egalite, 
 fraternite" had already been erased. 
 
 I immediately visited the restaurants to which I 
 had letters of introduction. The landlords assured 
 me that they would have made me welcome even 
 
256 CONFESSION'S. 
 
 without letters of introduction, for I had an hon- 
 est and distinguished appearance, which in itself 
 was a sufficient recommendation. Never did a 
 German landlord so address me, even if he thought 
 it Such a churlish fellow feels himself in duty 
 bound to suppress all pleasant speeches, and thinks 
 that German bluntness demands that he shall tell 
 us the most disagreeable things to our very faces. 
 In the manner, and even in the language, of the 
 French, there is so much delicious flattery, which 
 costs so little, and is yet so gratifying. My poor 
 sensitive soul, which had shrunk with shyness from 
 the rudeness of the fatherland, again expanded 
 under the genial influence of French urbanity. 
 God has given us tongues that we may say pleasant 
 things to our friends and bitter truths to our ene- 
 mies. My French had grown rusty since the battle 
 of Waterloo, but after half an hour's conversation 
 with a pretty flower-girl in the corridor of L'Opera 
 it soon flowed fluently again. I managed to stam- 
 mer forth gallant phrases in broken French, and 
 explained to the little charmer the Linnaean system, 
 in which flowers are classified according to their 
 stamens. The little one practiced a different 
 .system, and divided flowers into those which are 
 pleasing and those which are unpleasing. I be- 
 lieve that she applied a similar classification to 
 men. She was surprised that, notwithstanding 
 my youth, I was so learned, and spread the fame 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 257 
 
 of my erudition through the whole passage de 
 r Opera. I inhaled with rapturous delight the 
 delicious aroma of flattery, and amused myself 
 charmingly. I walked on flowers, and many a 
 roasted pigeon came flying into my gaping mouth. 
 * * * Among the notabilities whom I met soon 
 after my arrival in Paris was Victor Bohain; and I 
 love to recall to memory the jovial, intellectual 
 form of him who did so much to dispel the clouds 
 from the brow of the German dreamer, and to in- 
 itiate his sorrow-laden heart into the gayeties of 
 French life. He had at that time already founded 
 the "Europe Litteraire," and as editor solicited me 
 to write for his journal several articles on Germany, 
 after the genre of Madame de Stael. I promised 
 to furnish the articles, particularly mentioning, 
 however, that I should write them in a style quite 
 different from the genre of Madame de Stael. 
 "That is a matter of indifference to me," was the 
 laughing answer: "like Voltaire, I tolerate every 
 genre, excepting only the genre ennuyeux." And 
 in order that I, poor German, should not fall into 
 the genre ennuyeux, friend Bohain often invited me 
 to dine with him, and stimulated my brain with 
 champagne. No one knew better than he how to 
 arrange a dinner at which one should not only 
 enjoy the best cuisine, but be most pleasantly en- 
 tertained. No one could do the honors of host 
 so well as he; and he was certainly justified in 
 
258 
 
 CONFESSIOXS. 
 
 charging the stockholders of the " Europe Litte- 
 raire" with one hundred thousand francs, as the 
 expense of these banquets. Even his wooden leg 
 contributed to the humor of the man, and when he 
 hobbled around the table, serving out champagne 
 to his guests, he resembled Vulcan performing the 
 duties of Hebe's office amidst the uproarious mirth 
 of the assembled gods. Where is Victor Bohain 
 now ? I have heard nothing of him for a long 
 period. The last I saw of him was about ten 
 years ago, at an inn at Granville, a little seaport 
 town of Normandy. He had just come over from 
 England, where he had been studying the colossal 
 national debt of that country, in this occupation 
 smothering the recollection of his own little per- 
 sonal debts. He was seated at a table, with a bot- 
 tle of chan>pagne and glasses before him, earnestly 
 explaining to an open-mouthed, stupid-looking 
 citizen a business project by which, as Bohain elo- 
 quently demonstrated, a million could be realized. 
 Bohain always had a great fondness for specula- 
 tions, and in all his projects there was always a 
 million in prospect, — never less than a million. 
 His friends nicknamed him, on this account. Mon- 
 sieur Million. 
 
 * * * The founding of the " Europe Litteraire" 
 was an excellent idea. Its success seemed assured, 
 and I have never been able to understand why it 
 failed. Only one evening before the day on which 
 
CONFESSWA'S. 259 
 
 the suspension occurred, Victor Bohain gave a 
 brilliant ball in the editorial salons of the journal, 
 at which he danced with his three-hundred stock- 
 holders, just like Leonidas with his three hundred 
 Spartans the day before the battle of Thermopylae. 
 Every time that I behold in the gallery of the 
 Louvre the painting by David which portrays that 
 scene of antique heroism, I am reminded of the 
 last ball of Victor Bohain. Just like the death- 
 braving king in David's picture, so stood Victor 
 Bohain on his solitary leg ; it was the same classic 
 pose. Stranger, when thou strollest in Paris 
 through the Chaussee d'Antin towards the Boule- 
 vards and findest thyself in the low-lying, filthy 
 street that was once called the Rue Passe du Rem- 
 part, know that thou standest here at the Ther- 
 mopylae of the "Europe Litteraire," where Victor 
 Bohain with his three hundred stockholders so 
 heroically fell. 
 
 * * * In my articles on German philosophy I 
 blabbed without reserve the secrets of the schools, 
 which, draped in scholastic formulas, were pre- 
 viously known only to the initiated. My revela- 
 tions excited the greatest surprise in France, and 
 I remember that leading French thinkers naively 
 confessed to me that they had always believed 
 German philosophy to be a peculiar mystic fog, 
 behind which divinity lay hidden as in a cloud, 
 and that German philosophers were ecstatic seers, 
 
26o CONFESSIONS. 
 
 filled with piety and the fear of God. It is not 
 my fault that German philosophy is just the re- 
 verse of that which until now we have called 
 piety and fear of God, and that our latest phi- 
 losophers have proclaimed downright atheism to 
 be the last word of German philosophy. Relent- 
 lessly and with bacchantic recklessness they tore 
 aside the blue curtain from the German heavens, 
 and cried, " Lo and behold! all the gods have 
 flown, and there above sits only an old spinster 
 with leaden hands and sorrowful heart, — Neces- 
 sity." 
 
 Alas ! what then sounded so strange is now 
 being preached from all the house-tops in Ger- 
 many, and the fanatic zeal of some of these prop- 
 agandists is terrible! We have now bigoted monks 
 of atheism, grand-inquisitors of infidelity, who 
 would burn Voltaire at the stake because he was 
 at heart an inflexible deist. So long as such doc- 
 trines remained the secret possession of an intel- 
 lectual aristocracy and were discussed in a select 
 coterie-dialect which was incomprehensible to the 
 lackeys in attendance while we at our philosoph- 
 ical petits-soiipcrs were blaspheming, so long did 
 I continue to be one of the thoughtless free- 
 thinkers, of whom the majority resembled those 
 grand-seigneurs who, shortly before the Revolu- 
 tion, sought by means of the new revolutionary 
 ideas to dispel the tedium of their indolent court- 
 
 J 
 
CONFESSIONS. 2 6 1 
 
 life. But as soon as I saw that the rabble began 
 to discuss the same themes at their unclean sym- 
 posiums, where instead of wax candles and chan- 
 deliers gleamed tallow dips and oil-lamps ; when I 
 perceived that greasy cobblers and tailors presumed 
 in their blunt mechanics' speech to deny the exist- 
 ence of God ; when atheism began to smell strongly 
 of cheese, brandy, and tobacco, — then my eyes were 
 suddenly opened, and that which I had not com- 
 prehended through reason I now learned through 
 my olfactory organs and through my loathing and 
 disgust. Heaven be praised ! my atheism was at 
 an end. To be candid, it was perhaps not alone 
 disgust that made the principles of the godless 
 obnoxious to me and induced me to abandon their 
 ranks. I was oppressed by a certain worldly ap- 
 prehension which I could not overcome, for I saw 
 that atheism had entered iiito a more or less secret 
 compact with the most terrible, repulsive, undis- 
 guised, communistic communism. My dread of 
 the latter has nothing in common with the terror 
 of the parvenu, who trembles for his wealth, or 
 with that of well-to-do tradesmen, who fear an in- 
 terruption of their profitable business. No : that 
 which disquiets me is the secret dread of the artist 
 and scholar, who sees our whole modern civiliza- 
 tion, the laboriously-achieved product of so many 
 centuries of effort, and the fruit of the noblest 
 works of our ancestors, jeopardized by the triumph 
 23 
 
262 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 of communism. Swept along by the resistless 
 current of generous emotions, we may perhaps 
 sacrifice the cause of art and science, even all our 
 own individual interests, for the general welfare of 
 the suffering and oppressed masses. But we can 
 no longer disguise from ourselves what we have 
 to expect when the great, rude masses, which by 
 some are called the people, by others the rabble, 
 and whose legitimate sovereignty was proclaimed 
 long ago, shall obtain actual dominion. The poet, 
 in particular, experiences a mysterious dread in 
 contemplating the advent to power of this uncouth 
 sovereign. We will gladly sacrifice ourselves for 
 the people, for self-sacrifice constitutes one of our 
 most exquisite enjoyments. The emancipation of 
 the masses has been the great task of our liv^es ; 
 we have toiled for it, and in its cause endured in- 
 describable misery, in the fatherland as well as in 
 exile. But the poet's refined and sensitive nature 
 revolts at every near personal contact with the 
 masses, and still more repugnant is the mere 
 thought of their caresses, from which may Heaven 
 preserve us ! A great democrat once remarked 
 that if a king had taken him by the hand he would 
 immediately have thrust it into the fire to purify it. 
 After the same manner I say, had the sovereign 
 masses vouchsafed to press my hand I should 
 have hastened to wash it. 
 
 * * * It required no great foresight to foretell 
 
CONFESSIOiVS. 
 
 263 
 
 these terrible events so long before their occur- 
 rence. I could easily prophesy what songs would 
 one day be whistled and chirped in Germany, for I 
 saw the birds hatching that in after-days gave tone 
 to the new school of song. I saw Hegel, with 
 serio-comic visage, like a setting hen, brooding 
 over the fatal eggs ; and I heard his cackling. I 
 will confess honestly that I seldom understood 
 Hegel, and only through later reflection did I 
 arrive at an understanding of his words. It is my 
 conviction that he did not wish to be understood, 
 and that he was purposely obscure. 
 
 * * * One beautiful starlight night, Hegel stood 
 with me at an open window. I, being a young man 
 of twenty-two, and having just partaken of a good 
 dinner and coffee, naturally spoke with enthusiasm 
 of the stars, and called them abodes of the blest. 
 But Hegel muttered to himself, "The stars! Hm ! 
 hm ! the stars are only a shining excrescence on 
 the firmament." "What!" cried I, "then there 
 is no blissful spot above, where after death virtue 
 is rewarded?" But he, glaring at me with his 
 dim eyes, remarked, sneeringly, "So you want a 
 recompense because you have supported your sick 
 mother and have not poisoned your brother?" At 
 these words he looked anxiously around, but was 
 reassured when he saw no one near. 
 
 **"*"! was never an abstract thinker, and I 
 accepted the synthesis of the Hegelian philosophy 
 
264 
 
 CO.VFESSIOiVS. 
 
 without examination, because its deductions flat- 
 tered my vanity. I was younc^ and arrogant, and 
 it gratified my self-conceit wlien I was informed by 
 Hegel that not, as my grandmother had supposed, 
 He who dwelt in the heavens, but I myself, here 
 on earth, was God. This silly pride had, however, 
 by no means an evil influence on me. On the 
 contrary, it awoke in me the heroic spirit, and at 
 that period I practiced a generosity and self-sacri- 
 fice which completely cast into the shade the most 
 virtuous and distinguished deeds of those virtuous 
 but narrow-minded people who did good merely 
 from a sense of duty and in obedience to the laws 
 of morality. For surely I was myself the embodi- 
 ment of the moral law, and the fountain-head of 
 all right and authority. I myself was morality 
 personified, I was sinless, I was purity incarnate. 
 * * * I was all love, and incapable of hate. I 
 no longer revenged myself on my enemies ; for, 
 rightly considered, I had no enemies; at least, I 
 recognized none as such. For me there now ex- 
 isted only unbelievers who questioned my divinity. 
 Every indignity that they offered me was a sacri- 
 lege, and their contumely was blasphemy. Such 
 godlessness, of course, I could not always let pass 
 unpunished; but in those cases it was not human 
 revenge, but divine judgment upon sinners. Ab- 
 sorbed in this exalted practice of justice, I would 
 repress with more or less difficulty all ordinary 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 265 
 
 pity. As I had no enemies, so also there existed 
 for me no friends, but only worshipers, who be- 
 lieved in my greatness, and adored me, and praised 
 my works, those written in verse as well as those 
 in prose. Towards this congregation of truly de- 
 vout and pious ones I was particularly gracious, 
 especially towards the young-lady devotees. But 
 the expense of playing the role of a God, for whom 
 it were unseemly to go in tatters, and who is sparing 
 neither of body nor of purse, is immense. To play 
 such a role respectably, two things are above all 
 requisite, much money and robust health. Alas! 
 it happened that one day, in February, 1848, both 
 these essentials failed me, and my divinity was at 
 an end. Luckily, the highly-respected public was 
 at that time occupied with events so dramatic, so 
 grand, so fabulous and unprecedented, that the 
 change in the affairs of so unimportant a personage 
 as myself attracted but little attention. U«nprece- 
 dented and fabulous were indeed the events of 
 those crazy February days, when the wisdom of 
 the wisest was brought to naught, and the chosen 
 ones of imbecility were raised aloft in triumph. 
 The last became the first, and the lowliest became 
 the highest. Matter, like thought, was turned upside 
 down, and the world was topsy-turvy. If in those 
 mad days I had been sane, those events would 
 surely have cost me my wits; but, lunatic as I then 
 was, the contrary necessarily came to pass, and. 
 
266 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 strange to say, just in the days of universal madness 
 I regained my reason ! Like many other divinities 
 of that rcvolu-tionary period, I was compelled to 
 abdicate ignominiously, and to return to the lowly 
 life of humanity. I came back into the humble 
 fold of God's creatures. I again bowed in homage 
 to the almighty power of a Supreme Being, who 
 directs the destinies of this world, and who for the 
 future shall also regulate my earthly affairs. The 
 latter, during the time I had been my own Provi- 
 dence, had drifted into sad confusion, and I was 
 glad to turn them over to a celestial superintendent, 
 who with his omniscience really manages them 
 much better. The belief in God has since then 
 been to me not only a source of happiness, but it 
 has also relieved me from all those annoying busi- 
 ness cares which are so distasteful to me. This 
 belief has also enabled me to practice great econo- 
 mies; for I need no longer provide either for my- 
 self or for others, and since I have joined the ranks 
 of the pious I contribute almost nothing to the sup- 
 port of the poor. I am too modest to meddle as 
 formerly with the business of Divine Providence. 
 I am no longer a provider for the general good ; I 
 no longer ape the Deity; and with pious humility 
 I have notified my former dependants that I am 
 only a miserable human being, a wretched creature 
 that has naught more to do with governing the 
 universe, and that in future when in need and afflic- 
 
CONFESSIONS. 267 
 
 tion they must apply to the Supreme Ruler, who 
 dwells in heaven, and whose budget is as inexhaust- 
 ible as his goodness, — whereas I, a poor ex-god, 
 was often compelled even in the days of my god- 
 hood to seek the assistance of the devil. It was 
 certainly very humiliating for a god to have to ap- 
 ply to the devil for aid, and I am heartily thankful 
 to be relieved from my usurped glory. No phi- 
 losopher shall ever again persuade me that I am 
 a god. I am only a poor human creature, that is 
 not overly well ; yea, that is even very ill. In this 
 pitiable condition it is a true comfort to me that 
 there is some one in the heavens above to whom I 
 can incessantly wail out the litany of my suffer- 
 ings, especially after midnight, when my wife has 
 sought the repose that she oft so sadly needs, 
 God be praised ! in such hours I am not all alone, 
 and I can freely pray, and weep without restraint; 
 I can pour out my whole heart before the Almighty, 
 and confide to him some things which one is wont 
 to conceal even from his own wife. 
 
 * * * After the above confession, the kindly- 
 disposed reader will easily understand why I no 
 longer found pleasure in my work on the Hege- 
 lian philosophy. I saw clearly that its publication 
 would benefit neither the public nor the author. 
 I comprehended that there is more nourishment 
 for famishing humanity in the most watery and 
 insipid broth of Christian charity than in the dry 
 
268 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 and musty spider-web of the Hegelian philosophy. 
 I will confess all. Of a sudden I was seized with 
 a mortal terror of the eternal flames. I know it 
 is a mere superstition; but I was frightened. And 
 so, on a quiet winter's night, when a glowing fire 
 was burning on my hearth, I availed myself of the 
 good opportunity and cast the manuscript of my 
 work on the Plegelian philosophy into the flames. 
 The burning leaves flew up the chimney with a 
 strange, hissing sound. 
 
 Heaven be praised ! I was rid of it ! Alas ! 
 would that I could destroy in the same manner 
 all that I have ever published concerning German 
 philosophy! But, as the copyright of those books 
 has been sold, I cannot prevent their republication, 
 as I lately learned to my great regret. No other 
 course therefore remains but to confess publicly 
 that my dissertation on German Philosophy con- 
 tains the most erroneous and pernicious doctrines. 
 In order to spare myself the sorrowful task of ex- 
 plaining anew my change of views, I shall here 
 transcribe an extract from a preface which I wrote 
 for a recent German edition of that work. It reads 
 as follows : 
 
 " I will honestly confess that I would gladly 
 leave the whole book unpublished if I could ; for 
 since its first appearance my views concerning 
 many subjects, especially those which relate to 
 religious questions, have undergone a marked 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 269 
 
 change, and much that I then asserted is now at 
 variance with my better convictions. But as soon 
 as the arrow flies from the bow it is no longer the 
 archer's, and the word ceases to belong to the 
 speaker when once it has passed his lips, especially 
 when it has been multiplied by the press. More- 
 over, others, who have legal rights in the matter, 
 would effectually restrain any attempt on my part 
 to withdraw this book from print. True, I might 
 tone down my words and veil my meaning in vague 
 language, as some authors do in such cases ; but 
 in the very depths of my soul I hate ambiguous 
 phrases, hypocritical flowers, and cowardly fig- 
 leaves. Under all circumstances, however, an hon- 
 est man retains the inalienable right candidly to 
 confess his errors, and that right I shall now fear- 
 lessly exercise. I frankly confess that everything 
 in this book that relates to the great question of 
 the Deity is both false and ill considered. 
 
 ***** At that time I was still well and hearty; 
 I was in the zenith of my prime, and as arrogant 
 as Nebuchadnezzar before his downfall. 
 
 "Alas! a few years later a physical and spiritual 
 change occurred. How often since then have I 
 mused over the history of that Babylonian king 
 who thought himself a god, but who was misera- 
 bly hurled from the summit of his self-conceit and 
 compelled to crawl on the earth like a beast and 
 eat grass (probably it was only salad) ! This legend 
 
±^0 CONFESSIONS. J / 
 
 is contained in the grand and magnificent book 
 of Daniel; and I recommend all godless self-wor- 
 shipers to lay it devoutly to heart. The Bible 
 contains many other beautiful and wonderful nar- 
 ratives well worthy their consideration. Among 
 the number is the story of the forbidden fruit 
 in the garden of Eden, and of the serpent, that 
 little private lecturer, which already six thousand 
 years before Hegel's birth enunciated the whole 
 Hegelian philosophy. This footless blue-stocking 
 demonstrates very sagaciously how the absolute 
 consists in the identity of being and knowing, — 
 how man becomes God through knowledge, — in 
 other words, how God in man attains self-con- 
 sciousness. This formula is not so clear as in the 
 original words: 'If ye eat of the tree of knowledge, 
 ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.' 
 
 " Dame Eve understood of the whole demon- 
 stration only this, — that the fruit was forbidden; 
 and because it was forbidden the good dame ate 
 thereof But no sooner had she eaten of the tempt- 
 ing fruit than she lost her innocence, her naive 
 guilelessness, and discovered that she was far too 
 scantily dressed for a person of her quality, the 
 mother of so many future emperors and kings, 
 and she asked for a dress, — trul\', only a dress of 
 fig-leaves, because at that time the silk-manufac- 
 turers of Lyons were not yet in existence, and 
 because there were in Paradise no milliners and 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 271 
 
 dressmakers. Oh, Paradise ! Strange that as soon 
 as woman arrives at reasoning self-consciousness 
 her first thought is of — a new dress !" 
 
 How strange ! during my whole life I have been 
 strolling through the various festive halls of phi- 
 losophy, I have participated in all the orgies of 
 the intellect, I have coquetted with each and every 
 system, without finding content ; and now, after 
 all this, I suddenly find myself on the same plat- 
 form whereon stands Uncle Tom. That platform 
 is the Bible, and I kneel by the side of my dusky 
 brother in faith with a devotion like to his. What 
 humiliation ! With all my learning, I have pene- 
 trated no farther than the poor ignorant negro who 
 can scarcely spell ! It is even true that poor Uncle 
 Tom appears to see in the holy book more pro- 
 found things than I, who am not yet quite clear in 
 regard to the last part. 
 
 * * * But, on the other hand, I think I may flatter 
 myself that I can better comprehend the character 
 of Moses, whose grand figure has impressed me 
 most profoundly. What a colossal form ! I can- 
 not imagine that Og, King of Bashan, could have 
 looked more giant-like. How insignificant does 
 Sinai appear when Moses stands thereon ! The 
 mountain seems merely a pedestal for the feet of 
 him whose head towers into the heavens and 
 there holds converse with God. May Heaven for- 
 give the sacrilegious thought! but sometimes it 
 
272 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 appears to me as if this Mosaic God were only the 
 reflected radiance of Moses himself, whom he so 
 strongly resembles in wrath and in love. It were 
 a sin, it were anthropomorphism, to assume such 
 an identity of God and his prophet; but the re- 
 semblance is most striking. 
 
 Heretofore I had not particularly admired the 
 character of Moses, probably because the Hellenic 
 spirit was predominant in me, and I could not par- 
 don the law-giver of the Jews for his hate of all 
 that constitutes art. I failed to perceive that Moses, 
 notwithstanding his enmity to art, was nevertheless 
 himself a great artist and possessed the true artistic 
 spirit. Only, this artistic spirit with him, as with 
 his Egyptian countrymen, was applied to the colos- 
 sal and the imperishable. But not, like the Egyp- 
 tians, did he construct his works of art from bricks 
 and granite, but he built human pyramids and 
 carved human obelisks. He took a poor shepherd 
 tribe and from it created a nation which should 
 defy centuries ; a great, an immortal, a consecrated 
 race, a God-serving people, who to all other nations 
 should be as a model and prototype : he created 
 Israel. 
 
 I have never spoken with proper reverence either 
 of the artist or of his work, the Jews; and for the 
 same reason, — namely, my Hellenic temperament. 
 My prejudice in favor of Hellas has declined since 
 then. I see now that the Greeks were only beau- 
 
CONFESSIONS. 2/3 
 
 tiful youths, but that the Jews were always men, 
 stron^^, unyielding men, not only in the past, but 
 to this very day, in spite of eighteen centuries of 
 persecution and suffering. Since that time I have 
 learned to appreciate them better ; and, were not all 
 pride of ancestry a silly inconsistency in a cham- 
 pion of the revolution and its democratic princi- 
 ples, the writer of these pages would be proud that 
 his ancestors belonged to the noble house of Israel, 
 that he is a descendant of those martyrs who gave 
 the world a God and a system of morality, and who 
 have fought and suffered on all the battle-fields of 
 thought. 
 
 The histories of the Middle Ages, and even 
 those of modern times, have seldom enrolled on 
 their records the names of such knights of the Holy 
 Spirit, for they generally fought with closed visors. 
 The deeds of the Jews are just as little known to 
 the world as is their real character. Some think 
 they know the Jews because they can recognize 
 their beards, which is all they have ever revealed 
 of themselves. Now, as during the Middle Ages, 
 they remain a wandering mystery, a mystery that 
 may perhaps be solved on the day which the 
 prophet foretells, when there shall be but one 
 shepherd and one flock, and the righteous who 
 have suffered for the good of humanity shall then 
 receive a glorious reward. 
 
 I, who in the past was wont to cite Homer, now 
 24 
 
2/4 
 
 COXFESSIOiVS. 
 
 quote from the Bible, like Uncle Tom. In truth, 
 I owe it much. It again awoke in me the religious 
 feeling ; and this new birth of religious emotion 
 suffices for the poet, for he far more easily than 
 other mortals can dispense with positive religious 
 dogmas. 
 
 * * * The silliest and most contradictory reports 
 are in circulation concerning me. Very pious 
 but not very wise men of Protestant Germany have 
 urgently inquired if, now that I am ill and in a 
 religious frame of mind, I cling with more devo- 
 tion than heretofore to the Lutheran evangelic 
 faith, which until now I have only professed after 
 a lukewarm, formal fashion. No, ye dear friends, 
 in that respect no change has taken place in me, 
 and if I continue to adhere to the evangelic faith 
 at all, it is because now, as in the past, that faith 
 does not at all inconvenience me. I will frankly 
 avow that when I resided in Berlin, like several 
 of my friends, I would have preferred to separate 
 myself from the bonds of all denominations, had 
 not the rulers there refused a residence in Prussia, 
 and especially in Berlin, to any one who did not 
 profess one of the positive religions recognized by 
 the State. As Henry IV. once laughingly said, 
 *' Paris vaut bicn une messe," so could I say, with 
 equal justice, Berlin is well worth a sermon. Both 
 before and after, I could easily tolerate the ration- 
 alistic Christianity which at that time was preached 
 
CONFESSIONS. 275 
 
 in some of the churches of Berh'n. It was a 
 Christianity purged from all superstition, and from 
 which even the doctrine of the divinity of Christ 
 had been eliminated, like mock-turtle soup with- 
 out turtle. At that time I myself was still a god, 
 and no one of the positive religions had more 
 value for me than another. I could wear any of 
 their uniforms out of courtesy, after the manner of 
 the Russian Emperor, who, when he vouchsafes 
 the King of Prussia the honor to attend a review 
 at Potsdam, appears uniformed as a Prussian officer 
 of the guard. 
 
 Now, when my physical sufferings and the re- 
 awakening of my religious nature have effected in 
 me many changes, does the uniform of Luther- 
 anism in some measure express my true senti- 
 ments? How far has the formal profession become 
 a reality? I do not propose to give direct answers 
 to these questions, but I shall avail myself of the 
 opportunity to explain the services which, accord- 
 ing to my present views, Protestantism has ren- 
 dered to civilization. From this may be inferred 
 how much more I am now in sympathy with this 
 creed. 
 
 At an earlier period, when philosophy possessed 
 for me a paramount interest, I prized Protestant- 
 ism only for its services in winning freedom of 
 thought, which, after all, is the foundation on which 
 in later times Leibnitz, Kant, and Hegel could 
 
276 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 build. Luther, the strong man with the ax, must, 
 in the very nature of thinj^s, have preceded these 
 warriors to open a path for them. For this service 
 I have honored the Reformation as being the be- 
 ginning of German philosophy, which justified my 
 polemical defense of Protestantism. Now, in my 
 later and more mature days, when the religious 
 feeling surges so overpoweringly in me, — now,when 
 the shipwrecked metaphysician clings fast to the 
 Bible, — now I chiefly honor Protestantism for its 
 agency in rediscovering and circulating the Holy 
 Scriptures. I advisedly use the word rediscover- 
 ing; for the Jews, who had preserved the Bible from 
 the great conflagration of the second temple, and 
 all through the Middle Ages carried it around 
 with them like a portable fatherland, kept their 
 treasure carefully concealed in their ghettos. Here 
 came by stealth German scholars, the predecessors 
 and originators of the Reformation, to study the 
 Hebrew language and thus acquire the key to the 
 casket wherein the precious treasure was inclosed. 
 Such a scholar was the worthy Reuchlinus ; and 
 his enemies the Hochstraatens and consorts in 
 Cologne, who are represented as the party of dark- 
 ness and ignorance, were by no means such sim- 
 pletons. On the contrary, they were far-sighted 
 Inquisitors, who foresaw clearly the disasters which 
 a familiar acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures 
 would bring on the Church. Hence the perse- 
 
CONFESSION'S. 277 
 
 cuting zeal with which they sought to destroy the 
 Hebrew writings, at the same time inciting the 
 rabble to exterminate the Jews, the interpreters of 
 those writings. Now that the motives of their 
 actions are known, we see that, properly consid- 
 ered, each was in the right. This reactionary party 
 believed that the spiritual salvation of the world 
 was endangered, and that all means, falsehood as 
 well as murder, were justifiable, especially against 
 the Jews. The lower classes, pinched by poverty, 
 and heirs of the primeval curse, were embittered 
 against the Jews because of the wealth they had 
 amassed ; and what to-day is called the hate of the 
 proletarians against the rich was then called hate 
 of the Jews. In fact, as the latter were excluded 
 from all ownership of land and from every trade, 
 and relegated to dealing in money and merchan- 
 dise, they were condemned by law to be rich, hated, 
 and murdered. Such murders, it is true, were in 
 those days committed under the mantle of religion, 
 and the cry was, " We must kill those who cru- 
 cified our God." How strange! The very people 
 who had given the world a God, and whose whole 
 life was redolent of the worship of God, were stig- 
 matized as deicides ! The bloody parody of such 
 madness was witnessed at the outbreak of the 
 revolution in San Domingo, where a negro mob 
 devastated the plantations with murder and fire, 
 led by a negro fanatic who carried an immense 
 24* 
 
278 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 crucifix, amid bloodthirsty cries of, "The whites 
 killed Christ ; let us slay all whites !" 
 
 To the Jews the world is indebted for its God 
 and his word. They rescued the Bible from the 
 bankruptcy of the Roman empire, and preserved 
 the precious volume intact during all the wild 
 tumults and lawlessness of the transmigration of 
 races until Protestantism came to seek it and trans- 
 lated it into the language of the land and spread 
 it broadcast over the whole world. This extensive 
 circulation of the Bible has produced the most 
 beneficent fruits, and continues to do so to this 
 very day. The prgpaganda of the Bible Society 
 have fulfilled a providential mission, which is more 
 important and will bring forth quite different re- 
 sults from those anticipated by the pious gentle- 
 men of the British-Christian-Missionary-Society. 
 They expect to elevate a petty, narrow dogma to 
 supremacy, and to monopolize heaven as they do 
 the sea, making it a British church domain. And, 
 lo ! without being aware of what they do, they 
 hasten the overthrow of all Protestant sects; for, 
 as they all draw their life from the Bible, when 
 the knowledge of the Bible becomes universal, all 
 sectarian distinctions will be obliterated. 
 
 By tricks of trade, smuggling, and commerce, 
 the British gain footholds in many lands. With 
 them they bring the Bible, and by spreading the 
 knowledge of its truths they hasten the coming of 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 279 
 
 that grand democracy wherein each man shall not 
 only be king in his own house, but also bishop. 
 By teaching the right of individual interpretation 
 of God's word, they found the empire of intellect 
 combined with religion, and inculcate the love of 
 humanity, purity, and true morality. These can- 
 not be taught by the dogmatic formulas of creeds, 
 but by parable and example, such as are contained 
 in that beautiful, sacred, and instructive book for 
 young and old, the Bible. 
 
 To the observant thinker it is a wonderful spec- 
 tacle to view the countries where the Bible, since 
 the Reformation, has been exerting its elevating 
 influence on the inhabitants, and has impressed on 
 them the customs, modes of thought, and temper- 
 aments which formerly prevailed in Palestine, as por- 
 trayed both in the Old and in the New Testament. 
 In the Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon sections of 
 Europe and America, among all the Germanic 
 races, and also to a certain extent in Celtic coun- 
 tries, the customs of Palestine have been repro- 
 duced in so marked a degree that we seem to be 
 in the midst of the ancient Judean life. Take, for 
 example, the Scotch Protestants : are not they He- 
 brews, whose names even are biblical, whose very 
 cant smacks of the Phariseeism of ancient Jerusa- 
 lem, and whose religion is naught else than a pork- 
 eating Judaism? It is the same in Denmark and 
 in certain provinces of North Germany, not to 
 
2 go CO XFESSIONS. 
 
 mention the majority of the new sects of the United 
 States, among whom the Hfe depicted in the Old 
 Testanient is pedantically aped. In the latter, 
 that life appears as if daguerreotyped: the outlines 
 are studiously correct, but all is depicted in sad, 
 sombre colors ; the golden tints and harmonizing 
 colors of the promised land are lacking. But the 
 caricature will disappear sooner or later. The real, 
 the imperishable, and the true — that is to say, the 
 morality — of ancient Judaism will in those coun- 
 tries bloom forth just as acceptably to God as in 
 the olden time it blossomed on the banks of Jordan 
 and on the heights of Lebanon. One needs neither 
 palm-trees nor camels to be virtuous; and virtue 
 is better than beauty. The readiness with which 
 these races have adopted the Judaic life, customs, 
 and modes of thought is perhaps not entirely at- 
 tributable to their susceptibility of culture. The 
 cause of this phenomenon is perhaps to be sought 
 in the character of the Jewish people, which always 
 had a marked elective affinity with the character 
 of the Germanic, and also to a certain extent with 
 that of the Celtic, races. Judea has always seemed 
 to me like a fragment of the Occident misplaced 
 in the Orient. In fact, with its spiritual faith, its 
 severe, chaste, even ascetic customs, — in short, 
 with its abstract inner life, — this land and its people 
 always offered the most marked contrasts to the 
 population of neighboring countries, who were 
 
CONFESSIONS. 28.1 
 
 wholly given up to a degrading, sensual worship 
 of nature. 
 
 At a time when in the temples of Babylon, Nin- 
 eveh, Sidon, and Tyre, bloody and lecherous rites 
 were celebrated, at the mere mention of which, 
 even now, we stand aghast, Israel sat under its 
 fig-trees, piously chanting the praises of the in- 
 visible God. If these surroundings be considered, 
 the early greatness of Israel must awaken the high- 
 est surprise and admiration. Of Israel's love of 
 liberty at a time when not only in its immediate 
 vicinity but also among all the nations of antiquity, 
 even among the philosophical Greeks, the practice 
 of slavery was justified and in full sway, — of this I 
 will not speak, for fear of compromising the Bible 
 in the eyes of the present powers that be. No 
 socialist can be more radical than was our Lord 
 and Saviour. Even Moses was such a socialist; 
 although he, like a practical man, attempted only 
 to reform existing usages concerning property. In- 
 stead of striving to effect the impossible and rashly 
 decreeing the abolition of private property, he 
 sought to bring the rights of property into har- 
 mony with the laws sanctioned by morality and 
 reason. This he accomplished by instituting the 
 jubilee, at which period every alienated heritage, 
 whick among an agricultural people always con- 
 sisted of land, would revert to the original owner, 
 no matter in what manner it had been alienated. 
 
282 COA'FESS/ONS. 
 
 This institution offers the most marked contrast to 
 the Roman statute of limitations, by which after 
 the expiration of a certain period the actual holder 
 of an estate could no longer be compelled to re- 
 store the estate to the true owner, unless the latter 
 should be able to show that within the prescribed 
 time he had, with all the prescribed formalities, 
 demanded restitution. This last condition opened 
 wide the door for chicanery, particularly in a state 
 where despotism and jurisprudence were at their 
 zenith, and where the unjust possessor had at com- 
 mand all means of intimidation, especially against 
 the poor who might be unable to defray the cost 
 of litigation. The Roman was both soldier and 
 lawyer, and that which he conquered with the 
 strong arm he knew how to defend by the tricks 
 of law. Only a nation of robbers and casuists 
 could have invented the law of prescription, the 
 statute of limitations, and consecrated it in that 
 detestable book which may be called the bible of 
 the devil : I mean the codex of Roman civil law, 
 which, alas ! still holds sway. 
 
 I have often spoken of the affinity which exists 
 between the Jews and the Germans, whom I once 
 designated as the two pre-eminently moral nations. 
 While on this subject, I desire to direct attention 
 to the ethical disapprobation with which the aiicient 
 German law stigmatizes the statute of limitations: 
 this I consider a noteworthy fact. To this very 
 
CONFESSIOA'S. 
 
 283 
 
 day the Saxon peasant uses the beautiful and touch- 
 ing aphorism, "A hundred years of wrong do not 
 make a single year of right." 
 
 The Mosaic law, through the institution of the 
 jubilee year, protests still more decidedly. Moses 
 did not seek to abolish the right of property; on 
 the contrary, it was his wish that every one should 
 possess property, so that no one might be tempted 
 by poverty to become a bondsman and thus acquire 
 slavish propensities. Liberty was always the great 
 emancipator's leading thought, and it breathes and 
 glows in all his statutes concerning pauperism. 
 Slavery itself he bitterly, almost fiercely, hated; 
 but even this barbarous institution he could not 
 entirely destroy. It was rooted so deeply in the 
 customs of that ancient time that he was compelled 
 to confine his efforts to ameliorating by law the 
 condition of the slaves, rendering self-purchase by 
 the bondsman less difficult, and shortening the 
 period of bondage. 
 
 But if a slave thus eventually freed by process of 
 law declined to depart from the house of bondage, 
 then, according to the command of Moses, the in- 
 corrigibly servile, worthless scamp was to be nailed 
 by the ear to the gate of his master's house, and, 
 after being thus publicly exposed in this disgrace- 
 ful manner, he was condemned to life-long slavery. 
 Oh, Moses! our teacher, Rabbi Moses ^. exalted 
 foe of all slavishness ! Give me hammer and nails. 
 
284 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 that I may nail to the gate of Brandenburg our 
 complacent, long-eared slaves in liv^eries of black- 
 red-and-gold. 
 
 I leave the ocean of universal religious, moral, 
 and historical reflections, and modestly guide my 
 bark of thought back again into the quiet inland 
 waters of autobiography, in which the author's 
 features are so faithfully reflected. 
 
 In the preceding pages I have mentioned how 
 Protestant voices from home, in the very indiscreet 
 questions put to me, have taken for granted that 
 with the re-awakening in me of the religious feel- 
 ing my sympathy for the Church had also grown 
 stronger. I know not how clearly I have shown 
 that I am not particularly enthusiastic for any 
 dogma or any creed ; and in this respect I have 
 remained the same that I always was. I repeat 
 this statement in order to remove an error in 
 regard to my present views, into which several of 
 my friends who are zealous Catholics have fallen. 
 How strange ! at the same time that in Germany 
 Protestantism bestowed on me the undeserved 
 honor of crediting me with a conversion to the 
 evangelic faith, another report was circulating that 
 I had gone over to Catholicism. Some good souls 
 went so far as to assert that this latter conver- 
 sion had occurred many years ago, and they sup- 
 ported this statement by definitely naming time 
 and place. They even mentioned the exact date; 
 
COA'FESSIONS. 
 
 285 
 
 they designated by name the church in which 
 I had abjured the heresy of Protestantism and 
 adopted the only true and saving faith, that of the 
 Roman Cathohc ApostoHc Church. The only 
 detail that was lacking was how many peals of the 
 bell had been sounded at this ceremony. 
 
 From the newspapers and letters that reach me 
 I learn how widely this report has won credence; 
 and I fall into a painful embarrassment when I 
 think of the sincere, loving joy which is so touch- 
 ingly expressed in some of these epistles. Trav- 
 elers tell me that the salvation of my soul has even 
 furnished a theme for pulpit eloquence. Young 
 Catholic priests seek permission to dedicate to me 
 the first-fruits of their pen. I am regarded as a 
 shining light — that is to be — of the Church. This 
 pious folly is so well meant and sincere that I can- 
 not laugh at it. Whatever may be said of the 
 zealots of Catholicism, one thing is certain : they 
 are no egotists ; they take a warm interest in their 
 fellow-men, — alas ! often a little too warm an in- 
 terest. I cannot ascribe that false report to malice, 
 but only to mistake. The innocent facts were in 
 this case surely distorted by accident only. The 
 statement of time and place is quite correct. I 
 was really in the designated church on the desig- 
 nated day, and I did there undergo a religious 
 ceremony; but this ceremony was no hateful abju- 
 ration, but a very innocent conjugation. In short, 
 
286 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 after being married according to the civil law, I 
 also invoked the sanction of the Church, because 
 my wife, who is a strict Catholic, would not have 
 considered herself properly married in the eyes of 
 God without such a ceremony; and for no con- 
 sideration would I shake this dear being's belief 
 in the religion which she has inherited. 
 
 As a general rule, it is well that women should 
 be religious. Whether there is more fidelity among 
 wives of the evangelic faith, I shall not attempt 
 to discuss. But the Catholicism of the wife cer- 
 tainly saves the husband from many annoyances. 
 When Catholic women have committed a fault, 
 they do not secretly brood over it, but confess to 
 the priest, and as soon as they have received abso- 
 lution they are again as merry and light-hearted 
 as before. This is much pleasanter than spoiling 
 the husband's good spirits or his soup by down- 
 cast looks or grieving over a sin for which they 
 hold themselves in duty bound to atone during 
 their whole lives by shrewish prudery. The con- 
 fessional is likewise useful in another respect. The 
 sinner does not keep her terrible secret preying on 
 her mind; and since women are sure, sooner or 
 later, to babble all they know, it is better that they 
 should confide certain matters to their confessor 
 than that they should, in some moment of over- 
 powering tenderness, talkativeness, or remorse, 
 blurt out to the poor husband the fatal confession. 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 287 
 
 Skepticism is certainly dangerous in the married 
 state, and, although I myself was a free-thinker, I 
 permitted no word derogatory to religion to be 
 spoken in my house. In the midst of Paris I lived 
 like a steady, commonplace townsman; and there- 
 fore when I married I desired to be wedded under 
 the sanction of the Church, although in this coun- 
 try the civil marriage is fully recognized by so- 
 ciety. My free-thinking friends were vexed at me 
 for this, and overwhelmed me with reproaches, 
 claiming that I had made too great concessions to 
 the clergy. Their chagrin at my weakness would 
 have been still greater had they known the other 
 concessions that I had made to the hated priest- 
 hood. As I was a Protestant wedding a Catholic, 
 in order to have the ceremony performed by a 
 Catholic priest it was necessary to obtain a special 
 dispensation from the archbishop, who in these 
 cases exacts from the husband a written pledge 
 that the offspring of the marriage shall be educated 
 in the religion of the mother. 
 
 * * * I will crown my confessions by admitting 
 that, if at that time it had been necessary in order 
 to obtain the dispensation of the archbishop, I 
 would have bound over not only the children but 
 myself. But the ogre of Rome, who, like the mon- 
 ster in the fairy-tales, stipulates that he shall have 
 for his services the future births, was content with 
 the poor children who were never born. And so 
 
288 CONFESSIOiYS. 
 
 I remained a Protestant, as before, — a protesting 
 Protestant; and I protest against such reports, 
 which, without being intended to be defamatory, 
 may yet be magnified so as to injure my good 
 name. 
 
 * * * There is not a particle of unkindly feel- 
 ing in my breast against the poor ogre of Rome. 
 I have long since abandoned all feuds with Cathol- 
 icism, and the sword which I once drew in the 
 service of an idea, and not from private grudge, 
 has long rested in its scabbard. In that contest I 
 resembled a soldier of fortune, who fights bravely, 
 but after the battle bears no malice either against 
 the defeated cause or against its champions. 
 
 Fanatical enmity towards the Catholic Church 
 cannot be charged against me, for in me there was 
 always lacking the self-conceit which is necessary 
 to sustain such an animosity. I know too well my 
 own intellectual calibre not to be aware that with 
 my most furious onslaughts I could inflict but little 
 injury on a colossus such as the Church of St. 
 Peter. I could only be a humble worker at the 
 slow removal of its foundation-stones, a task which 
 may yet require centuries. I was too familiar with 
 history not to have recognized the gigantic nature 
 of that granite structure. Call it, if you will, the 
 bastille of intellect; assert, if you choose, that it is 
 now defended only by invalids ; but it is therefore 
 not the less true that the bastille is not to be easily 
 
CONFESSIOArs. 
 
 289 
 
 captured, and many a young recruit will break his 
 head against its walls. 
 
 As a thinker and as a metaphysician, I was 
 always forced to pay the homage of my admiration 
 to the logical consistency of the doctrines of the 
 Roman Catholic Church, and I may also 'take 
 credit to myself that I have never by witticism or 
 ridicule attacked its dogmas or its public worship. 
 Too much and too little honor has been vouch- 
 safed me in calling me an intellectual kinsman of 
 Voltaire. I was always a poet; and hence the 
 poesy which blossoms and glows in the symbolism 
 of Catholic dogma and culture must have revealed 
 itself more profoundly to me than to ordinary ob- 
 servers, and in my youthful days I was often 
 touched by the infinite sweetness, the mysterious, 
 blissful ecstasy and awe-inspiring grandeur of that 
 poetry. There was a time when I went into rap- 
 tures over the blessed Queen of Heaven, and in 
 dainty verse told the story of her grace and good- 
 ness. My first collection of poems shows traces 
 of this beautiful Madonna period, which in later 
 editions I weeded out with laughable anxiety. 
 
 The time for vanity has passed, and every one 
 is at liberty to smile at this confession. 
 
 It will be unnecessary for me to say that, as no 
 
 blind hate against the Catholic Church exists in 
 
 me, so also no petty spite against its priests rankles 
 
 in my heart. Whoever knows my satirical vein 
 
 25* 
 
290 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 will surely bear witness that I was always lenient 
 and forbearing in speaking of the human weak- 
 nesses of the clergy, although by their attacks they 
 often provoked in me a spirit of retaliation. But 
 even at the height of my wrath I was always 
 respectful to the true priesthood ; for, looking 
 back into the past, I remembered the benefits 
 which they had once rendered me; for it is Cath- 
 olic priests W'hom I must thank for my first in- 
 struction ; it was they who guided the first steps 
 of my intellect. 
 
 Pedagogy was the speciality of the Jesuits, and 
 although they sought to pursue it in the interest 
 of their order, yet sometimes the passion for peda- 
 gogy itself, the only human passion that was left 
 in them, gained the mastery ; they forgot their 
 aim, the repression of reason and the exaltation of 
 faith, and, instead of reducing men to a state of 
 childhood, as was their purpose, out of the children 
 they involuntarily made men by their instruction. 
 The greatest men of the Revolution were educated 
 in Jesuit schools. Without the training there 
 acquired, that great intellectual agitation would 
 perhaps not have broken out until a century 
 later. 
 
 Poor Jesuit fathers ! Ye have been the bugbear 
 and the scapegoat of the liberals. The danger 
 that was in you was understood, but not your 
 merits. I could never join in the denunciations 
 
CONFESSIONS. 2 9 1 
 
 of my comrades, who at the mere mention of Loy- 
 ola's name would always become furious, like bulls 
 when a red cloth is held before them. It is cer- 
 tainly noteworthy, and may perhaps at the assizes 
 in the valley of Jehoshaphat be set down as an ex- 
 tenuating circumstance, that even as a lad I was 
 permitted to attend lectures on philosophy. This 
 unusual favor was exceptional in my case, because 
 the rector Schallmeyer was a particular friend of 
 our family. This venerable man often consulted 
 with my mother in regard to my education and 
 future career, and once advised her, as she after- 
 wards related to me, to devote me to the service 
 of the Catholic Church and send me to Rome to 
 study theology. He assured her that through his 
 influential friends in Rome he could advance me to 
 an important position in tlie Church. But at that 
 time my mother dreamed of the highest worldly 
 honors for me. Moreover, she was a disciple of 
 Rousseau, and a strict deist. Besides, she did not 
 like the thought of her son being robed in one of 
 those long black cassocks, such as are worn by 
 German priests, and in which they look so plump 
 and awkward. She knew not how differently, how 
 gracefully, a Roman abbate wears such a cassock, 
 and how jauntily he flings over his shoulders the 
 black silk mantle, which in Rome, the ever-beauti- 
 ful, is the uniform of gallantry and wit. 
 
 Oh, what a happy mortal is such a Roman ab- 
 
2Q2 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 bate ! He serves not only the Church of Christ, 
 but also Apollo and the Muses, whose favorite he 
 is. The Graces hold his inkstand for him when 
 he indites the sonnets which, with such delicate 
 .cadences, he reads in the Accademia degli Arcadi. 
 He is a connoisseur of art, and needs only to 
 taste the lips of a young songstress in order to 
 be able to foretell whether she will some day be a 
 celeberrima cantatrice, a diva, a world-renowned 
 prima donna. He understands antiquities, and will 
 write a treatise in the choicest Ciceronian Latin 
 concerning some newly-unearthed torso of a Gre- 
 cian Bacchante, reverentially dedicating it to the 
 supreme head of Christendom, to the Pontifex 
 Maximus, for so he addresses him. And what a 
 judge of painting is the Signor Abbate, who visits 
 the painters in their ateliers and directs their atten- 
 tion to the fine points of their female models ! 
 The writer of these pages had in him just the 
 material for such an abbate, and was just suited 
 for strolling in delightful dolcc far nicntc through 
 the libraries, art-galleries, churches, and ruins of 
 the Eternal City, studying among pleasures, and 
 seeking pleasures while studying. I would have 
 read mass before the most select audiences, and 
 during Holy Week I would have mounted the 
 pulpit as a preacher of strict morality, — of course 
 even then never degenerating into ascetic rudeness. 
 The Roman ladies, in particular, would have been 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 293 
 
 greatly edified by me, and through their favor and 
 my own merit I would, perhaps, have eventually 
 risen to high rank in the hierarchy of the Church. 
 I would, perhaps, have become a monsignore, a 
 violet-stocking ; perhaps even a cardinal's red hat 
 might have fallen on my head. The proverb says : 
 
 " There is no priestling, how small soe'er he be, 
 That does not wish himself a Pope to be." 
 
 And so it might have come to pass that I should 
 attain the most exalted position of all, for, although 
 I am not naturally ambitious, I would yet not have 
 refused the nomination for Pope, had the choice of 
 the conclave fallen on me. It is, at all events, a 
 very respectable office, and has a good income 
 attached to it; and I do not doubt that I could 
 have discharged the duties of my position with 
 the requisite address. I would have seated myself 
 composedly on the throne of St. Peter, presenting 
 my toe for the kisses of all good Christians, the 
 priests as well as the laity. With a becoming dig- 
 nity I would have let myself be carried in triumph 
 through the pillared halls of the great basilica, and 
 only when it tottered very threateningly would I 
 have clung to the arms of the golden throne, which 
 is borne on the shoulders of six stalwart camerieri 
 in crimson uniform. By their side walk bald- 
 headed monks of the Capuchin order, carrying 
 burning torches. Then follow lackeys in gala- 
 
294 
 
 CO.VFESSIONS. 
 
 dress, bearinf^ aloft immense fans made of pea- 
 cocks' feathers, with which they gently fan the 
 Prince of the Church. It is all just like Horace 
 Vernet's beautiful painting of such a procession. 
 With a like imperturbable sacerdotal gravity — for 
 I can be very serious if it be absolutely necessary 
 — from the lofty Lateran I would have pronounced 
 the annual benediction over all Christendom. Here, 
 standing on the balcony, arrayed in the pontifical- 
 ibus and with the triple crown upon my head, 
 surrounded by my scarlet-hatted cardinals and 
 mitred bishops, priests in suits of gold brocade, 
 and monks of every hue, I would have presented 
 my holiness to the view of the swarming multi- 
 tudes below, who, kneeling and with bowed heads, 
 extended farther than the eye could reach ; and I 
 would composedly have stretched out my hands 
 and blessed the city and the world. 
 
 But, as thou well knowest, gentle reader, I have 
 not become a Pope, nor a cardinal, nor even a papal 
 nuncio. In the spiritual as well as in the worldly 
 hierarchy I have attained neither office nor rank ; 
 I have, as people say, accomplished nothing in 
 this beautiful world; nothing has become of me, 
 — nothing but a poet. 
 
 But no, I will not feign a hypocritical humility, 
 I will not depreciate that name. It is much to be 
 a poet, especially to be a great lyric poet, in Ger- 
 many, among a people who in two things — in phi- 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 295 
 
 losophy and in poetry — have surpassed all other 
 nations. I will not with a sham modesty — the 
 invention of worthless vagabonds — depreciate my 
 fame as a poet. None of my countrymen have 
 won the laurel at so early an age; and if my col- 
 league, Wolfgang Goethe, complacently writes that 
 '* the Chinese with trembling hand paints Werther 
 and Lotte on porcelain," I can, if boasting is to 
 be in order, match his Chinese fame with one still 
 more fabulous, for I have recently learned that 
 my poems have been translated into the Japanese 
 language. 
 
 But at this moment I am as indifferent to my 
 Japanese fame as to my renown in Finland. Alas! 
 fame, once sweet as sugared pine-apple and flattery, 
 has for a long time been nauseous to me ; it tastes 
 as bitter to me now as wormwood. With Romeo, 
 I can say, " I am the fool of fortune." The bowl 
 stands filled before me, but I lack a spoon. What 
 does it avail me that at banquets my health is 
 pledged in the choicest wines, drunk from golden 
 goblets, if at the same time I, with all that makes 
 life pleasant denied to me, may only wet my lips 
 with an insipid, disagreeable, medicinal drink ? 
 What benefit is it to me that enthusiastic youths 
 and maidens crown my marble bust with laurel- 
 wreaths, if meanwhile the shriveled fingers of an 
 aged hired nurse press a blister of Spanish flies to 
 the back of my head? What does it avail me that 
 
296 
 
 CONFESSIOA'S. 
 
 all the roses of Sharon tenderly glow and bloom 
 for me? Alas! Sharon is two thousand miles 
 away from the Rue d'Amsterdam, where I in the 
 dreary solitude of my sick-room have nothing to 
 smell, unless it be the perfume of warmed-over 
 poultices. 
 
 Alas ! the irony of Heaven weighs heavily 
 upon me ! The great Author of the universe, the 
 celestial Aristophanes, wished to show the petty, 
 earthly, so-called German Aristophanes how his 
 most trenchant satires are only clumsy patch- 
 work compared with His, and how immeasurably 
 he excels me in humor and in colossal wit. 
 
 Verily the mockery which the Master has poured 
 out over me is terrible, and horribly cruel is his 
 sport. Humbly do I acknowledge his superiority, 
 and I prostrate myself in the dust before him. But, 
 although I lack such supreme creative powers, 
 yet in me also the eternal flame of reason burns 
 brightly, and I may summon even the wit of God 
 before its forum and subject it to a respectful criti- 
 cism. And here I venture to offer most submis- 
 sively the suggestion that methinks the sport 
 which the Master has inflicted on the poor pupil 
 is rather too long drawn out : it has already lasted 
 over six years, which after a time becomes monot- 
 onous. Moreover, if I may take the liberty to say 
 it, in my humble opinion the jest is not new, and 
 the great Aristophanes of heaven has already used 
 
CONFESSIONS. 
 
 297 
 
 it on a former occasion, and has therefore been 
 guilty of plagiarism on his own exalted self In 
 order to prove this assertion, I will quote a passage 
 from the Chronicle of Liineburg. This chronicle 
 is very interesting for those who seek information 
 concerning the manners and customs in Germany 
 during the Middle Ages. As in a fashion-journal, 
 it describes the wearing-apparel of both sexes 
 which was in vogue at each particular period. It 
 also imparts information concerning the popular 
 ballads of the day, and even quotes the opening 
 lines of several of them. Among others, it records 
 that during the year 1480 there were whistled and 
 sung throughout all Germany certain songs, which 
 for sweetness and tenderness surpassed any pre- 
 viously known in German realms. Young and old, 
 and the women in particular, were quite bewitched 
 by these ballads, which might be heard the livelong 
 day. But these songs, so the chronicle goes on to 
 say, were composed by a young priest who was af- 
 flicted with leprosy and lived a forlorn, solitary life, 
 secluded from all the world. 
 
 You are surely aware, gentle reader, what a hor- 
 rible disease leprosy was during the Middle Ages, 
 and how the wretched beings afflicted with this in- 
 curable malady were driven out from all society 
 and from the abodes of men, and were forbidden 
 to approach any human being. Living corpses, 
 they wandered to and fro, muffled from head to 
 
 26 
 
298 
 
 CONFESSIONS. 
 
 foot, a hood drawn over the face, and carr}'ing in 
 the hand a bell, the Lazarus-bell, as it was called, 
 through which they were to give timely warning 
 of their approach, so that every one could avoid 
 their path. The poor priest whose fame as a lyric 
 poet the chronicle praised so highly was such a 
 leper; and while all Germany, shouting and jubi- 
 lant, sang and whistled his songs, he, a wretched 
 outcast, in the desolation of his misery sat sorrowful 
 and alone. 
 
 Oh, that fame was the old, familiar mockery of 
 Heaven, the cruel jest of God, the same as in my 
 case, although there it appears in the romantic 
 garb of the Middle Ages. The wise King of 
 Judea said rightly, there is nothing new under the 
 sun. Perhaps that sun itself, which now beams so 
 imposingly, is only an old warmed-over jest. 
 
 Sometimes among the gloomy phantasms that 
 visit me at night I seem to see before me the poor 
 priest of the Luncburg Chronicle, my brother in 
 Apollo, and his eyes, telling their sorrowful. tale of 
 suffering, stare strangely from out his Capuchin 
 hood ; but almost at the same moment it van- 
 ishes, and, faintly dying away, like the echo of a 
 dream, I hear the jarring tones of the Lazarus- 
 bell. 
 
 I 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Action, men of, 145. 
 Actors and acting, 85, 203, 204. 
 ^schylus, 81. 
 Angelo, Michael, 81, 166. 
 Apollo, 218. 
 Architecture, 117, 164. 
 Aristocrats, 176, 260. 
 Aristophanes, 126, 296. 
 Art, 56-82, 135, 156-205, 272. 
 Atheists and atheism, 34, 93, 260. 
 Authorship, 21, 36, 168, 195, 206, 
 272. 
 
 B. 
 
 Bacchus, 162, 219. 
 
 Berlin, 18, 200, 275. 
 
 Berlioz, 36, 123. 
 
 Bible, the, 33, 50, 107, 132, 143, 
 
 271, 274, 276. 
 Birch-Pfeifer, Madame, 203. 
 Bohain, Victor, 257. 
 Borrowing, 13. 
 Brocken, the, 122. 
 Burger's Lenore, 62. 
 Burns, 41. 
 Byron, 19, 41. 
 
 Calderon, 170. 
 Campe, Julius, 206, 
 Cathedrals, 117, 125, 164. 
 Catholicism, 57, 62, 80, 110-165, 
 
 285, 288. (See also Philosophy 
 
 and Religion.) 
 
 Censor, the, 21, 132. 
 
 Cervantes. 127, 202. 
 
 Charles the First, 74. 
 
 Charon, 228. 
 
 Christianity, 47, 99, 110-155, 158, 
 
 194, 275. (See also Philosophy 
 
 and Religion.) 
 Communism, 261. 
 Copyright, 247. 
 Conde, arrest of. 65. 
 Convictions, change of, 33, 106, 
 
 269. 
 Criticism, 77; self-criticism, 248. 
 Cromwell, 74. 
 Crusades, the, 62. 
 
 Daniel, Book of, 107. 
 
 Dante, 81, 161. 
 
 Death, 64, 75, 98, 185. 
 
 Death-bed conversions, 33. 
 
 Decamps, 57. 
 
 Deism and the Deity, 93, 102, 137, 
 144, 266-299. (See also Phi- 
 losophy and Religion.) 
 
 Delacroix, 57, 67, 
 
 Delaroche, 57, 73. 
 
 Desmouhns, Camille, 66. 
 
 Diana, 120. 
 
 Don Quixote, 15, 38, 202. 
 
 Dreams, 98, 99. 
 
 Eating, 84, loi. 
 Egypt, 273. 
 
 299 
 
300 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 England and the English, 235, 279. 
 Ense, Varnhagen von, 19. 
 Erasmus, 129. 
 
 F. 
 Fame, 295. 
 
 Fanaticism, 34, 260, 278. 
 Faust (Ary vScheffer's), 58, 
 Fichte, 94, 149. 
 Folk-songs, 187. 
 Fontenelle, 145. 
 
 Fouque, Baron de la Motte, 199. 
 France and the French, 54, 57, 
 
 no, 121, 126, 144, 146, 152, 158, 
 
 167, 190. 
 
 G. 
 
 Germany and the Germans, 53, 
 
 61, 110-212, 246, 255, 259, 279, 
 
 283. 
 Ghosts and spectres, 118. 122. 132, 
 
 146, 190. (See also Mythology 
 
 and Witchcraft.) 
 Gnostics, the, 113, 120, 130. 
 Goethe. 19, 49, 60, 80, 149, 157, 
 
 174. 295. 
 Gottingen, 18. 
 Greece and the Greeks, 81, 134, 
 
 165, 272. 
 Gretchen (Ary Scheffer's), 58. 
 Gulliver's Travels, i^. 
 
 H. 
 
 Hahn-Hahn, Countess, 250. 
 
 Hamburg, 16, 83. 
 
 Harz-Reise, 25. 
 
 Hegel, 34, 107, 208, 263, 268, 270, 
 
 276. 
 Heine, Solomon, 16, 17, 26. 
 Hcnrv IV., 275. 
 Herder. 168. 
 History, 77, 180. 
 I lochstraatcns, the, 277. 
 Hohenstauffen, Elise von, 19. 
 Holland and the Dutch, 90, 101, 
 
 230. 234. 
 Homer, 134, 162, 183. 
 
 I. 
 
 Ideas, 51, 112, 144, 194, 
 Ingratitude, 190. 
 Irving, Washington, 25. 
 Italv and the Italians, 56, loi, 163, 
 166. 
 
 J. 
 
 Jansenism, 126. 
 
 Jealousy, loi. 
 
 Jean Paul. (See Richter.) 
 
 Jesuits, the, 12, 126. 290. 
 
 Jews, the, 16, 25, 43, 84, 95, 99, 
 
 132, 137, 160. 272. 276, 283. 
 Judith and Holofernes, Vernet's, 
 
 63. 
 Jupiter, 150, 184, 237, 
 
 K. 
 
 Kant, Imnianuel, 143, 276. 
 I Kepler, 208. 
 I Kerner, Justinus, 209. 
 ' Klopstock, 255. 
 
 Klotz, 255. 
 
 Latin, 13. 
 
 Leibnitz, 276. 
 
 Lenau, 211. 
 
 Lenore, Scheffer's, 61 ; Burger's, 
 
 62. 
 Leo X., 124, 165. 
 Lessing, 139, 167. 
 Lessore, 57. 
 Leyden. 90. 
 Liberty, 55, 76, 283. 
 Liberty, goddess of, 69. 
 Literature, history of, 168, 193. 
 Louis XVI.. 75. 
 Ludovico, 166. 
 
 Ludwig, King of Bavaria, 211, 
 Luther, 123, 127, 276. 
 
 M. 
 
 Madonna, the, 112, 162, 163, 
 Magic Horn, The, 184. 
 
 290. 
 
 I 
 
INDEX. 
 
 301 
 
 Manicheans, the, 113. 
 
 Mars, 218. 
 
 Massmann, 36, 
 
 Melanchthon, 129. 
 
 Mendelssohn, Moses, 138. 
 
 Menzel, 79, 212. 
 
 Mercury, 234. 
 
 Merlin, 32. 
 
 Methodists, the, 126, 
 
 Middle Ages, the, 62, 110-155, 
 
 160, 170, 202. 
 Millennium, the. 115. 
 Missionary Society, the British, 
 
 278. 
 Mnemonics, 15, 96, 
 Moliere, 126. 
 Moses, 272, 281, 283. 
 Murat, 209. 
 Mythology, 14, 119, 134, 155, 181, 
 
 216-244. 
 
 N. 
 
 Napoleon, 15, 25,75, 171. 184, 250. 
 Nature, 117. 
 Nebuchadnezzar, 107. 
 Neptune, 235. 
 Niebuhr, 13. 
 North Sea, the, 52. 
 
 O. 
 
 Ocean, the, 55. 
 Odyssey, the, 162. 
 Old Age, 87, 89. 
 
 P. 
 
 Painting and Painters, 56-82, 166. 
 Pantheism, 35, 120, 137, 149, 179. 
 Paris and the Parisians, 29, 67, 71, 
 
 191. 253- 
 Patriotism, 54. 
 
 Paul, Emperor of Russia, 183. 
 Perier, Casimir, 71. 
 Pfizer, Gustav, 213. 
 Phidias, 81. 150. 
 Philosophy, German, 93, 110-155, 
 
 259, 276. 
 
 Physicians, 37, 84. 
 
 Pietists, 51, 126, 150, 177. 
 
 Pluto, 235. 
 
 Pope and the Papacy, the, 64, 136, 
 
 293-. 
 Posterity, 115. 
 Printing, 85, iii. 
 Protestantism, 85, 110-155, 165, 
 
 274, 276, 284. 
 
 R. 
 Rahel, 19. 
 Raphael, 161. 
 Raupach, 203. 
 Reason, 'jj , 267, 296. 
 Reformation, the. (See Protest- 
 
 antistn and Luther.) 
 Religion, 24, 33, 110-155, 171, 196, 
 
 266. 
 Religious prejudice, 23. 
 Remigius, Dr. Nicolai, 123. 
 Reputation, 63. 
 Reuchlinus, 277. 
 
 Revolution, French, of 1789, 66, 
 III. 
 French, of 1830, 28, 
 
 68. 
 French, of 1848, 265. 
 German, 133, 152. 
 Revolutions, 66. 
 Rhine, the, 44, 254. 
 Richelieu, Delaroche's, 73. 
 Richter, Jean Paul, 195. 
 Robert, L., 57, 71. 
 Robespierre, Maximilian, 145, 147, 
 
 148. 
 Romano, Giulio, 166. 
 Romanticism, 149, 156-205, 247. 
 Rome and the Romans, 13, 114, 
 
 159, 282, 292. 
 Rousseau, 138, 145, 248. 
 
 St. Denis, 254. 
 Schallmever, 12, 291. 
 Scheffer, Ary, 58." 
 Schelling, 207. 
 Schiller, 60, 178, 182, 207, 251. 
 
302 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Schlegel, A. W., 157, i6g, 173. 
 Schlegel, Frederic, 169, 173. 
 Schnetz, 57. 
 Scliool-days. 13. 
 Schwab. Gustav. 209. 
 Scotch Protestants, 280. 
 Scott, Walter, 18. 
 Shakspeare, 169, 183, 198. 
 Spandau, 253. 
 Spinoza, 150. 
 Stars, the, 87, 89. 263. 
 Sterne, Laurence, 198. 
 Strauss, David, 208. 
 
 T. 
 Tacitus. 158. 
 Talmud, the, 139. 
 Tannhauser, 120. 
 Tartuffe. 51, 126. 
 Tetzel, 124. 
 Thought, men of. 145. 
 Tieck, Ludvvig, 199, 204. 
 Titian, 166. 
 
 U. 
 
 Uhland, 200, 202. 
 
 Uncle Tom, 271. 
 Undine, Fouque's, 201. 
 
 V. 
 
 Venice, 65. 
 
 Venus, 32, 120. 
 
 Vernet, Horace, 57, 63, 294, 
 
 Veronese, Paul, 65. 
 
 Virgil, 161. 
 
 Virtue, 125, 130, 280. 
 
 Voltaire, iii, 112, 127, 257, 260, 
 
 289. 
 Voss, 175. 
 
 W. 
 
 Wandering Jew, the, 25. 
 Werner, Zacharias, 170. 
 Witchcraft, 121. 
 
 Women, 48, 104, 108, 250, 251, 
 286. 
 
 Young Germany School, the, 48, 
 
 196. 
 Youth, 87, 89. 
 
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