The Prose Writings of Heinrich Heine

by Heinrich Heine

Later I shall speak of the new poets who grew up during the Goethean imperialism. They constitute a forest of young trees, whose true magnitude 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 Saint Boniface, and with consecrated axe 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 a carmagnole danced beneath it. But the public at large honoured 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 wonderful tree.

It is true, the opposition against Goethe began with the appearance of the so-called pseudo Wanderjahre, which was published by Gottfried Basse of Quedlinburg, under the title of Wilhelm Meister's Wanderjahre, in 1821; that is, soon after the downfall of the Schlegels. Goethe had announced a sequel to his Wilhelm Meister's Lehrjahre, under this title, and very strangely it appeared simultaneously with its literary double, in which not only was Goethe's style imitated, but the hero of Goethe's original novel was represented as the leading personage. This parody evinced much talent, and still greater tact, for as the author managed to maintain his anonymity for a considerable period, baffling all endeavours to discover his personality, public interest was artificially stimulated. Finally it transpired that the author was a hitherto unknown village parson, by the name of Pustkuchen, which translated into French would be omelette soufflée, a name which aptly describes the very essence of his book. It was nothing else than the old, stale, sour dough of the pietists, æsthetically kneaded over. In this book it was cast up to Goethe, as a reproach, that his poems had no moral aim; that he could create no lofty characters, but only low, vulgar creatures; that Schiller, on the contrary, had produced the most ideal and exalted conceptions, and that therefore the latter was a greater poet.

That Schiller was a greater poet than Goethe was the special point which Pustkuchen's book sought to establish, and for which it was written. It became the fashion to institute comparisons between the writings of the two poets, and the public divided into partisan camps. The admirers of Schiller enthusiastically praised the purity and nobility of a Max Piccolomini, of a Thekla, of Posa, and other of Schiller's dramatic heroes; on the other hand, they stigmatised Goethe's Philine, Käthchen, Clärchen, and the like pretty creatures, as immoral jades. Goethe's adherents would smilingly admit that neither Goethe's heroes nor his heroines could be called moral, but they claimed that the promotion of morality in nowise came within the province of art. In art, asserted they, as in the universe itself, there is no ulterior purpose; it is only man who introduces the conceptions of end and means. Art, like the universe, said they, exists for itself alone. Although the opinions of mankind concerning the universe are continually changing, the universe itself remains ever the same; so also must art remain uninfluenced by the temporary views of mankind. Art must be kept especially independent of systems of morality, for these change on earth as often as a new religion arises, and supersedes an older faith. In fact, as after the lapse of a number of centuries a new religion always makes its appearance, influences the customs, and thus makes itself felt as a new system of morality, so in every period the art works of the past would be branded as heretical and immoral, were they to be judged by the temporary standard of morality. We have, in truth, lived to see good Christians, who condemn the flesh as of Satan, experience a feeling of anger at sight of the Greek mythological statues. Chaste monks have put an apron on the antique Venus; the ridiculous custom of bestowing a fig leaf on nude figures has continued even up to the present. A pious Quaker went so far as to sacrifice his whole fortune in buying up and burning Giulo Romano's most beautiful mythological paintings; truly he deserves for his pains to reach heaven, and there to be flogged daily. A religion which should recognise God in matter only, and should regard the flesh only as divine, would, when it had impressed itself upon the customs of men, give rise to a system of morality, according to which those works of art which glorify the flesh would be alone deemed worthy of praise; and on the contrary, those Christian art works which depict the nothingness of the flesh would be considered as immoral. The works of art which are accepted as moral in one land would be considered immoral in another country, where a different religion had generated different customs. Thus, our pictorial arts awaken the disgust of a strict Mahometan, while much that in the harems of the Orient is regarded as quite innocent would be an abomination in the eyes of Christians. In India the occupation of a Bayadere is not regarded as dishonourable; hence, the drama of "Vasantasena," the heroine of which is a courtesan, is there not at all considered immoral. If, however, the Théâtre Français ventured to produce this play, the whole pit would raise the cry of "immorality"—the same pit that witnesses with delight plays whose plots are amorous intrigues, and whose heroines are young widows who remarry at the end of the play, instead of having themselves burned to death on their deceased husband's funeral pyre, as required by Hindoo morality.

Starting with this idea, the Goetheans viewed art as a separate, independent world, which they would rank so high, that all the changing and changeable doings of mankind, their religions and systems of morality, should surge far below it. I cannot unconditionally endorse 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 followed 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 heart's 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 Don Carlos blossoms forth like a field of flowers. 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 suffered 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 indifferentism was to a certain extent the result of his pantheistic views. Alas! we must confess that pantheism has often led men into indifferentism. They reasoned thus: if everything is God; if everything is divine, then it is indifferent whether man occupies himself with clouds or ancient gems; with folk-songs or the anatomy of apes; with real human beings or play-actors. But that is just the mistake. Everything is not God, but God is everything. He does not manifest himself equally in all things, but He shows himself in different degrees according to the various matters. Everything bears within itself an impulse to strive after a higher degree of divinity, and that is the great law of progress throughout all nature. The recognition of this law, which has been most profoundly revealed by the disciples of St. Simon, now makes pantheism a cosmic, universal theory, which not only does not lead to indifferentism, but, on the contrary, induces the most self-sacrificing endeavours. No, 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 himself with art, anatomy, theories of colour, botanical studies, and observations of the clouds. No, God is manifest in some things to a greater degree than in others. He lives in motion, in action, in time. His holy breath is wafted through the pages of history, which is God's true book of record. Frederic 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. Christian zeal was odious to him, and he angrily turned from it; and the enthusiasm for philosophy, which is characteristic of our epoch, he either could not understand or purposely avoided understanding, for fear of ruffling his customary tranquillity of mind; so he treated all enthusiasm objectively and historically; as a datum, as a subject to be written about. In his hands the living spirit became dead matter, and he invested it with a lovely and pleasing form. He became thus the greatest artist of our literature, and all that he wrote was a finished work of art.

The example of the master misled the disciples, 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 German people. At the same time, I by no means deny the intrinsic worth of the Goethean masterpieces. 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 Pygmalion wrought was a beautiful woman, and even the sculptor himself fell in love with her. His kisses warmed her into life, but, so far as we know, she never bore children. I believe a similar idea has been suggested by Charles Nodier, and 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, expressionless eyes, a mysterious melancholy in their stony smiles. Perhaps they are haunted by sad memories 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 liberate 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.

These few hints will explain the publicly-expressed opposition of the various parties in Germany to Goethe. The orthodox were highly incensed against the great heathen, as Goethe was generally called in Germany; they feared his influence upon the people, whom he indoctrinated with his manner of viewing the world through merry verses, even through the simplest and most unpretentious ballads. They saw in him the most dangerous foe of the Cross, which, as he expressed himself, was as odious to him as vermin, garlic, and tobacco; at least, that is about the purport of the Xenie which Goethe dared to publish in Germany, the very country where vermin, garlic, tobacco, and the Cross form a holy alliance, and are supreme over all. But it was not this that displeased us, the party of action. As previously stated, we found fault with Goethe for the barrenness of his writings; for the engrossing devotion to art, which through him was diffused over Germany; for his influence in creating among the German youth an apathy which was a hindrance to the political regeneration of our fatherland. Hence the indifferentist and pantheist was assailed from the most diverse sides. To use an illustration from French parliamentary life, the extreme right and the extreme left formed an alliance against him. While the cassocked priests brandished the crucifix over him, furious sans-culottes simultaneously assaulted him with the pike.

Wolfgang Menzel, who had carried on the war against Goethe with a display of talent worthy of a better cause, evinced in his polemics that he was not merely a one-sided spiritualistic Christian, or a discontented patriot; he rather based a portion of his attacks on the latest remark of Frederic Schlegel, who, after his fall, from the recesses of his Catholic cathedral, gave utterance to his woe concerning Goethe; Goethe, "whose poetry lacked a central point." Menzel went still further, and showed that Goethe was not a man of genius, but only of talent; Schiller, however, was a genius, etc. This was some time before the July Revolution; Menzel was at that time a great admirer of the middle ages, of mediæval art as well as of institutions; he was incessantly attacking Johann Heinrich Voss, and praising Joseph Görres with an enthusiasm hitherto unheard of. These facts prove that Menzel was sincere in his hatred of Goethe, and that he did not write against him merely to make himself conspicuous, as many thought. Although I, myself, was at that time an opponent of Goethe, yet I was displeased at the harshness with which Menzel criticised him, and I complained of this want of respect. I said, Goethe is nevertheless the king of our literature, and in applying the knife of criticism to such a one, it always behoves us to show a proper courtesy, just as the executioner who was to behead Charles I., before performing the duties of his office, knelt before the king and begged his royal forgiveness.