occasions we find him always manifesting a clear insight, and a real regard.

The Frankfurter Gelehrten Anzeigen was a point of reunion, bringing Goethe into relation with many persons of ability. It also afforded him an opportunity of exercising himself in criticism. Thirty-five of the articles he wrote for this journal have been collected into his works, where the curious student will seek them. Thus engaged, the time flew swiftly. He had recommenced horse and sword exercise, and Klopstock having made skating illustrious, it soon became the amusement of our friends. Goethe was never tired; all day long and deep into the night he was to be seen wheeling along; and as the full moon rose above the clouds over the wide nocturnal fields of ice, and the night wind rushed at his face, and the echo of his movements came with ghostly sound upon his ear, he seemed to be in Ossian's world.

It has before been hinted that Sturm und Drang, as it manifested itself in the mind and bearing of the young doctor, was but very moderately agreeable to the old Rath Goethe; and whatever sympathy we may feel with the poet, yet, as we are all parents, or hope to be, let us not permit our sympathy to become injustice; let us admit that the old Rath had considerable cause for parental uneasiness, and let us follow the son to Wetzlar without flinging any hard words at his father.

P194

CHAPTER II.

GÖTZ VON BERLICHINGEN.

ALTHOUGH Götz was not published until the spring of 1773, it was written in the winter of 1771, or, to speak more accurately, the first of the three versions into which the work was shaped, was written at this time. We must bear in mind that there are three versions: the first is entitled the Geschichte Gottfriedens von Berlichingen mit der eisernen Hand, dramatisirt,* which was not published until very many years afterwards. The second is entitled Götz von Berlichingen, Schauspiel,t and is the form in which the work was originally published. The third is an adaptation of this second piece, with a view to stage representation, which adaptation was made with Schiller during the efforts to create a national stage at Weimar.‡

The first form is the one I most admire, and the one which, biographically, has most interest. While he is on his way to Wetzlar we will open his portfolio, and take out this manuscript for closer scrutiny, instead of waiting till he publishes the second version. From a letter to Salzmann we learn that it was written in November, 1771. My whole genius is given to an undertaking which

* Werke, vol. xxxiv, of the edition of 1840.

Werke, vol. ix.

Werke, vol. xxxv.

makes me forget Shakespeare, Homer, everything; I am dramatizing the history of the noblest of Germans, to rescue the memory of a brave man ; and the labor it costs me kills time here, which is at present so necessary for me.' He gives the following account of its composition, in the Autobiography: An unceasing interest in Shakespeare's works had so expanded my mind, that the narrow compass of the stage and the short time allotted to a representation, seemed to me insufficient for the development of an important idea. The life of Götz von Berlichingen, written by himself, suggested the historic mode of treatment; and my imagination took so wide a sweep, that my dramatic construction also went beyond all theatrical limits in seeking more and more to approach life. I had, as I proceeded, talked the matter over with my sister, who was interested heart and soul in such subjects; and I so often renewed this conversation, without taking any step towards beginning the work, that at last she impatiently and urgently entreated me not to be always talking, but, once for all, to set down upon paper that which must be so distinct before my mind. Moved by this impulse, I began one morning to write, without having made any previous sketch or plan. I wrote the first scenes, and in the evening they were read aloud to Cornelia. She greatly applauded them, but doubted whether I should go on so; nay, she even expressed a decided unbelief in my perseverence. This only incited me the more; I wrote on the next day, and also on the third. Hope increased with the daily communications, and step by step everything gained more life as I mastered the conception. Thus I kept on, without interruption, looking neither backwards nor forwards, neither to the right nor to the left; and in about six weeks I had the pleasure of seeing the manuscript stitched."

*

Gottfried von Berlichingen, surnamed of the Iron Hand, was a distinguished predatory Burgrave of the 16th century; one of the last remains of a turbulent, lawless race of feudal barons, whose personal prowess often lends the lustre of romance to acts of brigandage. Gottfried with the Iron Hand was a worthy type of the class. His loyalty was as unshakeable as his courage. Whatever his revered emperor thought fit to do, he thought right to be done. Below the emperor he acknowledged no lord. With his fellow barons he waged continual war. Against the Bishop of Bamberg, especially, he was frequently in arms; no sooner was a peace arranged with him, than the Bishop of Mainz was attacked. War was his element. With something of Robin Hood chivalry, he was always found on the side of the weak and persecuted; unless when the Kaiser called for his arm, or unless when tempted by a little private pillage on his own account. To his strong arm the persecuted looked for protection. A tailor owes two hundred florins, and cannot pay them; he goes to Götz with a piteous tale; instantly the Iron Hand clutches the two first Cologne merchants travelling that way, and makes them pay the two hundred florins.

It was a tempting subject for a poet of the eighteenth century, this bold chivalrous robber, struggling single-handed against the advancing power of civilization, this lawless chieftain making a hopeless stand against the Law, and striving to perpetuate the feudal spirit. Peculiarly interesting to the poet of that age was the consecration of individual greatness in Götz. Here was a man not great by Privilege but by Nature; his superiority given him by

*Scott by an oversight makes him flourish in the fifteenth century. He was born in 1482, and thus reached man's estate with the opening of the sixteenth century.

no Tradition, by no Court Favor, but by favor only of his own strong arm and indomitable spirit. And was not the struggle of the whole eighteenth century a struggle for the recognition of individual worth, of Rights against Privileges, of Liberty against Tradition? Such also was the struggle of the sixteenth century. The Reformation was to Religion what the Revolution was to Politics: a stand against the Tyranny of Tradition - a battle for the rights of individual liberty of thought and action, against the absolute prescriptions of privileged classes.

In the Chronicle of Götz von Berlichingen his deeds. are recorded by himself with unaffected dignity. There Goethe found materials, such as Shakespeare found in Holingshed and Saxo-Grammaticus; and used them in the same free spirit. He has dramatized the Chronicle made it live and move before us; but he has dramatized a Chronicle, not written a drama. This distinction is drawn for a reason which will presently appear.

Viehoff has pointed out the use which has been made of the Chronicle, and the various elements which have been added from the poet's own invention. The English reader cannot be expected to feel the same interest in such details as the German reader does; it is enough, therefore, to refer the curious to the passage,* and only cite the characters invented by Goethe; these are Adelheid, the glorious, voluptuous, fascinating demon; Elizabeth, the noble wife, in whom Goethe's mother saw herself; Maria, a reminiscence of Frederika; Georg, Franz Lerse, Weislingen, and the Gypsies. The death of Götz is also new.

Götz was a dramatic Chronicle, not a drama. It should never have been called a drama, but left in its original shape with its original title. This would have prevented

* Geothe's Leben, vol. ii. pp. 77-79.