Scarcely had I made some progress in this, than Oberlin directed me to the monuments of the middle ages, and made me acquainted with the ruins and remains, the seals and documents, which those times have left behind them; nay, sought to inspire me with an inclination for what we called the Maine-singers and heroic poets. To this good man, as well as to Herr Koch, I have been greatly indebted; and if things had gone according to their wish, I should have had to thank them for the happiness of my life. The matter stood thus:—
Schöpflin, who for his whole lifetime had moved in the higher sphere of political law, and well knew the great influence which such and kindred studies are likely to procure for a sound head, in courts and cabinets, felt an insuperable, nay, unjust aversion from the situation of a civilian, and had inspired his scholars 'with the like sentiments. The above-mentioned two men, friends of Salzmann, had taken notice of me in a most friendly manner. My impassioned grasping at external objects, the manner in which I continued to bring forward their advantages, and to communicate to them a particular interest, they prized higher than I did myself. My slight, and I may say, my scanty occupation with the civil law, had not remained unobserved by them; they were well enough acquainted with me to know how easily I was to be influenced; I had made no secret of my liking for an academical life, and they therefore thought to gain me over to history, political law, and rhetoric, at first for a time, but after wards more decidedly. Strasbourg itself offered advantages enough. The prospect of the German Chancery at Versailles, the precedent of Schöpflin, whose merits, indeed, seemed to me unattainable, were to incite to emulation, if not to imitation; and perhaps a similar talent was thus to be cultivated, which might be both profitable to him who could boast of it, and useful to others who might choose to employ it on their own account. These, my patrons, and Salzmann with them, set a great value on my memory and my capacity for apprehending the sense of languages, and chiefly by these sought to further their views and plans.
I now intend to describe, at length, how all this came to nothing, and how it happened that I again passed over from the French to the German side. Let me be allowed, as hitherto, some general reflections, by way of transition.
There are few biographies which can represent a pure, quiet, steady progress of the individual. Our life, as well as all in which we are contained, is, in an incomprehensible manner, composed of freedom and necessity. Our will is a prediction of what we shall do, under all circumstances. But these circumstances lay hold on us in their own fashion. The what lies in us, the how seldom depends on us, after the wherefore we dare not ask, and on this account we are rightly referred to the quia.
The French tongue I had liked from my youth upwards; I had learned to know the language through a bustling life, and a bustling life through the language. It had become my own, like a second mother-tongue, without grammar and instruction—by mere intercourse and practice. I now wished to use it with still greater fluency, and gave Strasburg the preference, as a second university residence, to other high schools; but, alas! it was just there that I had to experience the very reverse of my hopes, and to be turned rather from than to this language and these manners.
The French, who generally aim at good behaviour, are indulgent towards foreigners who begin to speak their language; they will not laugh any one out of countenance at a fault, or blame him in direct terms. However, since they cannot endure sins committed against their language, they have a manner of repeating, and, as it were, courteously confirming what has been said with another turn, at the same time making use of the expression which should properly have been employed; thus leading the intelligent and the attentive to what is right and proper.
Difficulty with the French Language.
Now although, if one is in earnest—if one has self-denial enough to profess oneself a pupil, one gains a great deal, and is much advanced by this plan, one nevertheless always feels in some degree humiliated; and, since one talks for the sake of the subject-matter also, often too much interrupted, or even distracted, so that one impatiently lets the conversation drop. This happened with me more than with others, as I always thought that I had to say something interesting, and, on the other hand, to hear something important, and did not wish to be always brought back merely to the expression,—a case which often occurred with me, as my French was just as motley as that of any other foreigner. I had observed the accent and idiom of footmen, valets, guards, young and old actors, theatrical lovers, peasants, and heroes; and this Babylonish idiom was rendered still more confused by another odd ingredient, as I liked to hear the French reformed clergy, and visited their churches the more willingly, as a Sunday walk to Bockenheim was on this account not only permitted but ordered. But even this was not enough; for as in my youthful years, I had always been chiefly directed to the German of the 16th century, I soon included the French also of that noble epoch among the objects of my inclination. Montaigne, Amyot, Rabelais, Marot, were my friends, and excited in me sympathy and delight. Now all these different elements moved in my discourse chaotically one with another, so that for the hearer the meaning was lost in the oddity of the expression; nay an educated Frenchman could no more courteously correct me, but had to censure me and tutor me in plain terms. It therefore happened with me here once more as it had happened in Leipzig, only that on this occasion I could not appeal to the right of my native place to speak idiomatically, as well as other provinces; but being on a foreign ground and soil, was forced to adapt myself to traditional laws.
Perhaps we might even have resigned ourselves to this, if an evil genius had not whispered into our ears that all endeavours by a foreigner to speak French would remain unsuccessful; for a practised ear can perfectly well detect a German, Italian, or Englishman under a French mask. One is tolerated, but never received into the bosom of the only church of language.
Only a few exceptions were granted. They named to us a Herr von Grimm; but even Schöpflin, it seemed, did not reach the summit. They allowed that he had early seen the necessity of expressing himself in French to perfection; they approved of his inclination to converse with every one, and especially to entertain the great and persons of rank; they praised him, that living in the place where he was, he had made the language of the country his own, and had endeavoured as much as possible to render himself a Frenchman of society and orator. But what does he gain by the denial of his mother-tongue, and his endeavours after a foreign one? He cannot make it right with anybody. In society they are pleased to deem him vain; as if any one would or could converse with others without some feeling for self and self-complacency! Then the refined connoisseurs of the world and of language assert that there is in him more of dissertation and dialogue than of conversation, properly so called. The former was generally recognised as the original and fundamental sin of the Germans, the latter as the cardinal virtue of the French. As a public orator he fares no better. If he prints a well-elaborated address to the king or the princes, the Jesuits, who are ill-disposed to him as a Protestant, lay wait for him, and show that his terms of expression are not French.