Those who so thought, were then the spiritual leaders of the people, the scholars and followers of Leibnitz, Thomasius, and Wolf,--estimable, good, and perhaps very learned men; and also the maidens and wives of the best families. It was certainly an ancient German custom to subordinate the individual; in this most important concern of life, to the judgment and interests of the family; undoubtedly marriage was considered more especially the great business of life which was to be arranged with strict adherence to duty, and not according to the delusive ideas of the fancy. But these sober, sensible views were beginning in 1750 to give way to the higher requirements of the individual Already were men inclined to indulge themselves with a richer mental life and greater independence. When Caroline Lucius modestly but firmly declined the offered hand of the Precentor of Thomas's Church, Gellert felt a little ashamed that he had judged his correspondent by the ordinary criterion, and in his letters afterwards a sincere respect may be observed.
But, however frequently the wooing was deficient in the magic of the most beautiful of earthly passions, the marriages, as far as we can judge, were not on that account the less happy. That one must suit oneself in life is a very popular rule of wisdom. The man who proposed to share a respectable position and a certain income with the object of his choice, offered her much, according to the views of that time; she was to show her gratitude by unceasing faithful service, and to lighten his arduous, laborious life--nay, already had a more exalted feeling taken root in the souls of women, which we may well call the poetry of home. The amount of knowledge acquired by a German woman was on the whole small. If people of rank could not spell, this may be explained by the fluctuations in education between French and German,--by a mongrel culture which spoilt the style even of men, not only of Frederic II. and other rulers, but also of the highest officials, like the Imperial ambassador who wrote to Gellert, and begged him to send back his letter with corrections, that he might thereby learn the secret of good writing. But even the German trained daughter of a well-educated citizen family was generally deficient both in style and correctness of writing. Many women, indeed, learnt French, and in Protestant Germany Italian was more frequently studied than at present; even the students of Halle, under the guidance of their teacher, caused Italian treatises to be printed. In other respects education appears to have done little for women; even instruction in music, beyond the practice of light airs on the harpsichord, was rare.
But so much the more was the practice of house duties inculcated. To look after the welfare and comfort of those around them, of parents and brothers, and afterwards of husbands and children, was the task of the grown-up daughters. That this should be the object of their life was unceasingly impressed upon them; it was understood according to every one's own views. And this care was no longer limited, as in the sixteenth century, to giving orders in the kitchen, the preparation of electuaries, and the arrangements of the linen: women were, during the last century, brought imperceptibly into a worthier position with respect to their husbands--they had become their friends and confidants. Although with perhaps scanty knowledge, many of them could boast of firm minds, clear judgment, and depth of feeling; concerning some of these, information has accidentally remained to us. We find it, also, in the wives of simple artisans. If the men, under the influence of the State and of Pietism, became more timid and less independent, the women of the same period were manifestly more elevated. We will draw a comparison with the past. Let us remember Kate Bora, who begged of the laborious Luther to suffer her to be near him. She sits there for hours silent, holds his pen for him, and gazes with her large eyes on the mysterious head, of her husband; and, anxiously gathering, together in her own mind all her poor knowledge, suddenly breaks out with the question, which, transposing it into the position of 1750, would run thus: "Is the Elector of Brandenburg brother to the King of Prussia?" and when Luther laughingly replies, "He is the same man," his feeling, notwithstanding all his affection, is--"poor simplicity."[[86]]
On the other hand, in 1723, Elizabeth Gesner, sits opposite her husband in the sitting-room of the Conrectorat at Weimar; he is working at his "Chrestomathie des Cicero," and writes with one hand while he rocks the cradle with the other. Meanwhile Elizabeth industriously mends the clothes of her children, and playfully disputes with the little ones, who object to the patches, till at last the mother proposes to them to cut out the new pieces as sun, moon, and stars, and to sew them on in this beautiful form. The bright light which then shone from the heart of the housewife through the poorly furnished room, and the cheerful smile that played on the countenance of the husband, may be discovered from his account. When she died, after a long and happy union, the grey-headed scholar said: "One of us must remain alone, and I had rather be the forlorn one myself than that she should be so." He followed her a few months later. Again, soon after 1750, we find Frau Professorin Semlerin at Halle, sitting with her industrious husband, some feminine work in her hand; both rejoice that they are together, that he uses his study only as a receptacle for his books, and that she considers all society as a separation from her husband. He has so accustomed himself to work in her presence, that neither the play and laughter, nor even the loud noise, of his children disturb him; he has an unbounded respect for the discretion and judgment of his wife. She rules with unlimited sway in her household; if the excitable man is disquieted by any adverse occurrence, she knows how to smooth it down quickly, in her gentle way. She is his true friend and his best counsellor, even in his relations with the University; his firm support, always full of love and patience, yet she has learnt little, and her letters abound in errors of writing. There will be farther notice of her.
Similar women, simple, deep-feeling, pious, clear-headed, firm and decided, sometimes also with extraordinary vigour and cheerfulness, were at this period so frequent that we may truly reckon them as characteristic of the time. They are the ancestresses and mothers, to whose worth the literary men, poets, and artists who have sprung up in the following generations may attribute a portion of their success. It was not able men, but good housewives,--not the poetry of passion, but the home life of the family,--to which we owe our training during the first half of the last century.
And if we, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of those who lived when Goethe and Schiller grew up, smile at the constraint of the feelings which appears in the wooings and betrothals of 1750; at the want of genuine tenderness, in spite of the general yearning for tender and pathetic feelings; and at the incapacity to give full expression in language and demeanour to the most exquisite of passions, we must remember, that just then the nation stood at the portals of a new time which was to change this poverty into wealth. The reign of Pietism had introduced a mild sentimentality into the nation; the philosophy of mathematics had spread over language and life a calm brightness, and the following fifty years of intense political activity and powerful productiveness in every realm of science were to bring the nation a richer development of the mental life. After this took place, the German was so far fortified by the good spirit of his home, that, even after the most horrible devastation and destruction, his soul was strengthened, through the interests of private life, for greater tasks and more manly labours. After Spener, Wolf, and Goethe came the volunteers of 1813.
But here we will verify what has been said of the condition, character, and wooing of Germans about the year 1750 by the record of a contemporary. He who speaks has already been mentioned several times in the preceding pages; he is one of whom science will ever preserve a kindly remembrance. Johann Salomo Semler, Professor of Theology at Halle, who lived from 1725 to 1791, was one of the first who broke loose from the orthodox faith of the Protestant Church; and, following their own investigations, ventured, with the help of the scientific culture of the period, to form a judgment on the origin and changes of the church dogmas. His youth was passed in struggle with Pietism, but at the same time, under its dominion, his warm heart clung, as long as it continued to beat, like Luther and the Pietists, to the child-like relation to his God and Father; but, as a scholar, this same man who, in respect to the daily occurrences of life, was so often yielding, uncertain, and dependent on those around him, became bold, decided, and sometimes radical. With him began the criticism of holy traditions; he was the first who ventured to handle systematically the historical development and changes of Christianity, and exhibited theology as an historical process, and as a momentum in the gradual development of the human mind, not logically, and with very deficient understanding of ancient times, but yet according to the laws of science. He veiled from himself the opposition between his faith and his researches in science, by making a rigid distinction, like the Pietists, betwixt religion and theology--betwixt the eternal cravings of human nature, which were satisfied by the old revered forms of revealed faith, and the eternal impulse of the mind to understand every earthly phenomenon. He has been called the Father of Rationalism; in truth he was only an enlightened Pietist, one of those who seem called to prepare, by the union of opposite conceptions, a new life. He was born in Saalfeld, the son of an ecclesiastic, a scholar at Halle of the learned Baumgarten; then for a year the rédacteur of the newspaper at Coburg, and for a year professor of history and poetry at the Nuremberg University of Altorf. He was called back by Baumgarten to Halle, where he, for nearly forty years, combated the old Pietists victoriously, and died one of the most worthy heads of the great University. The following is the account which he himself gives of his love and wooing; it cannot be given here without some small alteration in the language, for Semler has--what is characteristic of him--little in his style of the broad, sure method of his philosophical contemporaries, but much of the indistinct mode of speech of the Pietists. He does not use figurative language nor primitive phrases, but he loves, like them, a certain mysterious circumlocution and remote allusions, that sometimes make the meaning almost incomprehensible and require slow reading. Yet it is necessary to remember one thing, that the following narrative may not disappoint expectation: he who here narrates was in fact a man of worth and refined feeling, who rightly enjoyed the full esteem and veneration of those who lived with him.
Semler has gone through the separation from the family of Baumgarten, has returned as Master of Arts from Halle to his father's house at Saalfeld, and has there renewed his acquaintance with a young lady friend. He relates thus:--
"My residence in Saalfeld did not last long, but was not quite satisfactory to me. I saw, it is true, that worthy friend very often, and we enjoyed ourselves together as much as with our virtuous gravity we could; but there was nothing in it of the rapture or of the great joy which our new contemporaries[[87]] describe as superhuman in so many novels, or, still more, paint poetically and represent quite sentimentally. It was truly as if we anticipated that this rare harmony of two souls and characters was something too elevated for such a union to fail to our lot. This improbability seemed to me to arise from her situation; to her, from mine, from very different grounds. My prospects were remote, as I could not attain the great happiness of becoming 'Conrector,' to which position even, she was prepared to lower herself. I saw also that I must shortly incur some debts which I could not mention to so estimable a person. Thus I found myself unavoidably dependent, as it were, on any chance prospect. But her parents were rather old, and her brothers and sisters entirely unprovided for: how could she think of pledging herself to me on an uncertainty, and, by making it known, render herself inaccessible to more fortunate admirers? Meanwhile, with tender sadness, we promised each other everything we could, and were convinced of our mutual integrity, but also determined not to place each other in a difficult position.
"My father had written to an old friend at Coburg, Kammerrath, Fick, and begged of him to make some friendly efforts for getting me a situation. This he did honourably and with the best intentions."--(Semler travelled to Coburg, obtained there the title of professor, but without salary; became editor of the "Coburg State and Literary Gazette," and lodged with the widow of Doctor Döbnerin, a cheerful, lively woman, who was glad to converse with him, and put many theological and historical questions to him. It was a quiet, respectable household: one daughter, the Demoiselle Döbnerin, was still at home, about whom the professor, who had much work and little income, concerned himself little. Thus he lived for a year; then he learnt from an acquaintance that a professor was wanted at the University of Altorf, which he could easily obtain, but he must present himself there. This information excited him much; he was powerfully attracted towards the University; he had seen no possibility of it; now a prospect was open to him, but he had no money for the journey--nay, he was in debt to his landlady for rent and board; he long pined away in silence.)