Any one at all acquainted with the productions of the Romantic School in Germany or France will understand this. Goethe's object not being to write a drama but to dramatise a picture of the times, local colour was of primary importance; and because he made it so attractive, others have imitated him in departments where it is needless. Nay, critics are so persuaded of its importance, that they strain every phrase to show us that Shakespeare was also a great painter of times: forgetting that local colouring is an appeal to a critical and learned audience, not an appeal to the heart and imagination. It is history, not drama. Macbeth in a bag-wig, with a small sword at his side, made audiences tremble at the appalling ruin of a mind entangled in crime. The corrected costume would not make that tragedy more appalling, had we not now grown so critical that we demand historical "accuracy," where, in the true dramatic age, they only demand passion. The merest glance at our dramatic literature will suffice to show the preponderating (and misplaced) influence of History, in the treatment, no less than in the subjects chosen.

Götz," as a picture of the times, is an animated and successful work; but the eighteenth century is on more than one occasion rudely thrust into the sixteenth; and on this ground Hegel denies its claim to the highest originality. “An original work appears as the creation of one mind, which, admitting of no external influence, fuses the whole work in one mould, as the events therein exhibited were fused. If it contains scenes and motives which do not naturally evolve themselves from the original materials, but are brought together from far and wide, then the internal unity becomes necessarily destroyed, and these scenes betray the author's subjectivity. For example, Goethe's 'Götz' has been greatly lauded for originality, nor can we deny that he has therein boldly trampled under foot all the

rules and theories which were then accepted: but the execution is notwithstanding not thoroughly original. One may detect in it the poverty of youth. Several traits, and even scenes, instead of being evolved from the real subject, are taken from the current topics of the day. The scene, for example, between Götz and brother Martin, which is an allusion to Luther, contains notions gathered from the controversies of Goethe's own day, when - especially in Germany people were pitying the monks because they drank no wine, and because they had passed the vows of chastity and obedience. Martin, on the other hand, is enthusiastic in his admiration of Götz, and his knightly career: When you return back laden with spoils, and say, such a one I struck from his horse ere he could discharge his piece; such another I overthrew, horse and man; and then returning to your castle, you find your wife.' . . . Here Martin wipes his eyes and pledges the wife of Götz. Not so not with such thoughts did Luther begin, but with quite another religious conviction!"

"In a similar style," Hegel continues, "Basedow's pedagogy is introduced. Children, it was said, learn much that is foolish and unintelligible to them; and the real method was to make them learn objects, not names. Karl thus speaks to his father just as he would have spoken in Goethe's time from parrot-memory: Jaxt-hausen is a village and castle upon the Jaxt, which has been the property and heritage for two hundred years of the Lords of Berlichingen.' 'Do you know the Lord of Berlichingen?' asks Götz; the child stares at him, and from pure erudition knows not his own father. Götz declares that he knew every pass, pathway, and ford about the place, before he knew the name of the village, castle, or river." 1

Considered with reference to the age in which it

1 Hegel's "Vorlesungen über die Esthetik," i. p. 382.

was produced, "Götz von Berlichingen" is a marvellous work a work of daring power, of vigour, of originality; a work to form an epoch in the annals of letters. Those who now read it as the work of the great Goethe may be somewhat disappointed; but at the time of its appearance no such "magnificent monster" had startled the pedantries and proprieties of the schools ; — " a piece," said the critic in the Teutsche Mercur of the day, "wherein the three unities are shamefully outraged, and which is neither a tragedy nor a comedy, and is, notwithstanding, the most beautiful, the most captivating monstrosity."

The breathless rapidity of movement renders a first reading too hurried for proper enjoyment; but on recurring to the briefly indicated scenes, we are amazed at their fulness of life. How marvellous, for example, is that opening scene of the fifth act (removed from the second version), where Adelheid is in the gipsies' tent! Amid the falling snow shines the lurid gleam of the gipsy fire, around which move dusky figures; and this magnificent creature stands shuddering as she finds herself in the company of an old crone who tells her fortune, while a wild-eyed boy gazes ardently on her and alarms her with his terrible admiration; the whole scene lives, yet the touches which call it into life are briefer than in any other work I can remember.

CHAPTER III.

WETZLAR.

In the spring of 1772 he arrived at Wetzlar with "Götz" in his portfolio, and in his head many wild, unruly thoughts. A passage in the Autobiography amusingly illustrates his conception of the task he had undertaken in choosing to inform the world of his early history. Remember that at Wetzlar he fell in love with Charlotte, and lived through the experience which was fused into Werther," and you will smile as you hear him say: "What occurred to me at Wetzlar is of no great importance, but it may receive a higher interest if the reader will allow me to give a cursory glance at the history of the Imperial Chamber, in order to present to his mind the unfavourable moment at which I arrived." This it is to write autobiography when one has outlived almost the memories of youth, and lost sympathy with many of its agitations. At the time he was in Wetzlar he would have looked strangely on any one who ventured to tell him that the history of the Imperial Chamber was worth a smile from Charlotte; but at the time of writing his meagre account of Wetzlar, he had, perhaps, some difficulty in remembering what Charlotte's smiles were like. The biographer has a difficult task to make any coherent story out of this episode.1

1 Fortunately, during the very months in which I was writing this work, there appeared an invaluable record in the shape of the correspondence between Goethe and Kestner, so often alluded to

Wetzlar is a picturesque town, the effect of which is striking as one approaches it through the avenue of lime-trees on the banks of the Fulda; its ancient church, of a reddish hue, rearing over the gray roofs of the houses, has a fine effect, especially when a declining sun lights up the ruined castle on the summit of the bold hill, the Kalsmunt which fronts the town. One finds oneself in the old German world on entering its quiet humpbacked streets, through which the river meanders; and naturally one's first visit is to the now dilapidated, but deeply interesting, teutsche Haus, at the extremity of the town, lured there by the image of Werther's Lotte even more than by any historical curiosity, though this also has its attraction.

Das teutsche Haus was one of the remnants of the ancient institution of the Teutsche Ritter, or Teutonic Order of Knighthood, celebrated in German mediæval history. The student is familiar with the black armour and white mantles of these warrior-priests, who fought with the zeal of missionaries and the terrible valour of knights, conquering for themselves a large territory, and still greater influence. But it fared with them as with the knights of other Orders. Their strength lay in their zeal; their zeal abated with success. Years brought them increasing wealth, but the spiritual wealth and glory of their cause departed. They became what all corporations inevitably become; and at the time now written of they were reduced to a level with the Knights of Malta. The Order still possessed property in various parts of Germany, and in certain towns there was a sort of steward's house, where rents

by literary historians, but so imperfectly known ("Goethe und Werther. Briefe Goethe's meistens aus seiner Jugendzeit." Herausgegeben von A. Kestner: 1854). This book, which is very much in need of an editor, is one of the richest sources to which access has been had for a right understanding of Goethe's youth; and it completes the series of corroborative evidence by which to control the Autobiography.