"If those letters of Brutus thou hast in thy Cicero's letters,
Thou, whom consolers of schools, deck'd out in magnificent bindings,
Soothe from their well plan'd shelves—yet more by the outside than
inside,
Thou, who from gods art descended, or Goths, or from origin filthy,[1]
Goethe, send them to me."
It was not polite, indeed, that he should allow himself this jest on my name; for a man's name is not like a mantle, which merely hangs about him, and which, perchance, may be safely twitched and pulled; but is a perfectly fitting garment, which has grown over and over him like his very skin, at which one cannot scratch and scrape without wounding the man himself.
The first reproach, on the contrary, was better founded. I had brought with me to Strasburg the authors I had obtained, by exchange, from Langer, with various fine editions from my father's collection besides, and had set them up on a neat book-case, with the best intentions of using them. But how should my time, which I split up into an hundred different activities, suffice for that? Herder, who was most attentive to books, since he had need of them every moment, perceived my fine collection at his first visit, but soon saw, too, that I made no use of them. He, therefore, as the greatest enemy to all false appearances and ostentation, was accustomed, on occasion, to rally me upon the subject.
Another sarcastic poem occurs to me, which he sent me one evening, when I had been telling him a great deal about the Dresden gallery. I had, indeed, not penetrated into the higher meaning of the Italian school; but Dominico Feti, an excellent artist, although a humorist, and therefore not of the first rank, had interested me much. Scripture subjects had to be painted. He confined himself to the New Testament parables, and was fond of representing them with much originality, taste, and good-humour. He brought them altogether into every-day life, and the spirited and naïve details of his compositions, recommended by a free pencil, had made a vivid impression upon me. At this, my childish enthusiasm for art, Herder sneered in the following fashion:—
"From sympathy,
The master I like best of all
Dominico Feti they call.
A parable from Scripture he is able
Neatly to turn into a crazy fable
From sympathy:—thou crazy parable!"
I could mention many jokes of the kind, more or less clear or abstruse, cheerful or bitter. They did not vex me, but made me feel uncomfortable. Yet since I knew how to value highly everything that contributed to my own cultivation, and as I had often given up former opinions and inclinations, I soon accommodated myself, and only sought, as far as it was possible for me from my point of view, to distinguish just blame from unjust invectives. And thus no day passed over that had not been, in the most fruitful manner, instructive to me.
I was made acquainted by him with poetry from quite a different side, in another light than heretofore, and one, too, which suited me well. The poetic art of the Hebrews, which he treated ingeniously after his predecessor Lowth—popular poetry, the traditions of which in Alsace he urged us to search after; and the oldest records existing as poetry—all bore witness that poetry in general was a gift to the world and to nations, and not the private inheritance of a few refined, cultivated men. I swallowed all this, and the more eager I was in receiving, the more liberal was he in giving, so that we spent the most interesting hours together. The other natural studies which I had begun, I endeavoured to continue, and as one always has time enough, if one will apply it well, so amongst them all I succeeded in doing twice or thrice as much as usual. As to the fulness of those few weeks during which we lived together, I can well say that all which Herder has gradually produced since, was then announced in the germ, and that I thereby fell into the fortunate condition that I could completely attach to something higher, and expand all that I had hitherto thought, learned, and made my own. Had Herder been methodical, I should have found the most precious guide for giving a durable tendency to my cultivation; but he was more inclined to examine and stimulate, than to lead and conduct. Thus he at first made me acquainted with Hamann's writings, upon which he set a very great value. But instead of instructing me as to these, and making the bias and drift of his extraordinary mind intelligible to me, it generally only served him for amusement when I behaved strangely enough, in trying to get at the meaning of such sibylline leaves. However, I could well feel that something in Hamann's writings appealed to me; and to this I gave myself up, without knowing whence it came or whither it was leading me.
Herder's Departure.