If, in what has hitherto been described, only external contingent causes and personal peculiarities are found, the French literature had in itself certain qualities which were rather repulsive than attractive to an aspiring youth. It was advanced in years and genteel; and by neither of these qualities can youth, which looks about for enjoyment of life and for freedom, be delighted.
Since the sixteenth century, the course of French literature had never been seen to be completely interrupted; nay, the internal and religious disturbances, as well as the external wars, had accelerated its progress; but, as we heard generally maintained, it was a hundred years ago that it had existed in its full bloom. Through favourable circumstances, they said, an abundant harvest had at once ripened, and had been happily gathered in, so that the great talents of the eighteenth century had to be moderately contented with mere gleanings.
In the meanwhile, however, much had become antiquated: first of all comedy, which had to be freshened up to adapt itself, less perfectly, indeed, but still with new interest, to actual life and manners. Of the tragedies, many had vanished from the stage, and Voltaire did not let slip the important opportunity which offered of editing Corneille's works, that he might show how defective his predecessor had been, whom, according to the general voice, he had not equalled.
Voltaire.
And even this very Voltaire, the wonder of his time, had grown old, like the literature, which, for nearly a century, he had animated and governed. By his side still existed and vegetated many littérateurs, in a more or less active and happy old age, who one by one disappeared. The influence of society upon authors increased more and more; for the best society, consisting of persons of birth, rank, and property, chose for one of their chief recreations literature, which thus became quite social and genteel. Persons of rank and littérateurs mutually cultivated and necessarily perverted each other; for the genteel has always something excluding in its nature; and excluding also was the French criticism, being negative, detracting, and fault-finding. The higher class made use of such judgments against the authors; the authors, with somewhat less decorum, proceeded in the same manner against each other, nay, against their patrons. If the public was not to be awed, they endeavoured to take it by surprise, or gain it by humility; and thus—apart from the movements which shook church and state to their inmost core—there arose such a literary ferment, that Voltaire himself stood in need of his full activity, and his whole preponderance, to keep himself above the torrent of general disesteem. Already he was openly called an old capricious child; his endeavours, carried on indefatigably, were regarded as the vain efforts of a decrepid age; certain principles, on which he had stood during his whole life, and to the spread of which he had devoted his days, were no more held in esteem and honour; nay, his Deity, by acknowledging whom he continued to declare himself free from atheism, was not conceded him; and thus he himself, the grandsire and patriarch, was forced, like his youngest competitor, to watch the present moment, to catch at new power—to do his friends too much good, and his enemies too much harm; and under the appearance of a passionate striving for the love of truth, to act deceitfully and falsely. Was it worth the trouble to have led such a great active life, if it was to end in greater dependence than it had begun? How insupportable such a position was, did not escape his high mind, his delicate sensibility. He often relieved himself by leaps and thrusts, gave the reins to his humour, and carried a few of his sword-cuts too far,—at which friends and enemies, for the most part, showed themselves indignant; for every one thought he could play the superior to him, though no one could equal him. A public which only hears the judgment of old men, becomes over-wise too soon; and nothing is more unsatisfactory than a mature judgment adopted by an immature mind.
To us youths, before whom, with our German love of truth and nature, honesty towards both ourselves and others hovered as the best guide both in life and learning, the factious dishonesty of Voltaire and the perversion of so many worthy subjects became more and more annoying, and we daily strengthened ourselves in our aversion from him. He could never have done with degrading religion and the sacred books, for the sake of injuring priestcraft,[4] as they called it, and had thus produced in me many an unpleasant sensation. But when I now learned that, to weaken the tradition of a deluge, he had denied all petrified shells, and only admitted them as lusus naturæ, he entirely lost my confidence; for my own eyes had, on the Baschberg, plainly enough shown me that I stood on the bottom of an old dried-up sea, among the exuviæ of its original inhabitants. These mountains had certainly been once covered with waves, whether before or during the deluge did not concern me; it was enough that the valley of the Rhine had been a monstrous lake, a bay extending beyond the reach of the eyesight; out of this I was not to be talked. I thought much more of advancing in the knowledge of lands and mountains, let what would be the result.
French literature, then, had grown old and genteel in itself, and through Voltaire. Let us devote some further consideration to this remarkable man.
From his youth upwards, Voltaire's wishes and endeavours had been directed to an active and social life, to politics, to gain on a large scale, to a connexion with the heads of the earth, and a profitable use of this connexion, that he himself might be one of the heads of the earth also. No one has easily made himself so dependent, for the sake of being independent. He even succeeded in subjugating minds; the nation became his own. In vain did his opponents unfold their moderate talents, and their monstrous hate; nothing succeeded in injuring him. The court he could never reconcile to himself, but by way of compensation, foreign kings were his tributaries; Katharine and Frederic the Great, Gustavus of Sweden, Christian of Denmark, Peniotowsky of Poland, Henry of Prussia, Charles of Brunswick, acknowledged themselves his vassals; even popes thought they must coax him by some acts of indulgence. That Joseph the Second had kept aloof from him did not at all redound to the honour of this prince, for it would have done no harm to him and his undertakings, if, with such a fine intellect and with such noble views, he had been somewhat more practically clever,[5] and a better appreciator of the mind.
What I have here stated in a compressed form, and in some connexion, sounded at that time as a cry of the moment, as a perpetual discord, unconnected and uninstructive, in our ears. Nothing was heard but the praise of those who had gone before. Something good and new was required: but the newest was never liked. Scarcely had a patriot exhibited on the long inanimate stage national-French, heart-inspiring subjects,—scarcely had the Siege of Calais gained enthusiastic applause, than the piece, together with all its national comrades, was considered empty, and in every sense objectionable. The delineations of manners by Destouches, which had so often delighted me when a boy, were called weak; the name of this honest man had passed away; and how many authors could I not point out, for the sake of whom I had to endure the reproach that I judged like a provincial, if I showed any sympathy for such men and their works, in opposition to any one who was carried along by the newest literary torrent.
Thus, to our other German comrades we became more and more annoying. According to our view,—according to the peculiarity of our own nature, we had to retain the impressions of objects, to consume them but slowly, and if it was to be so, to let them go as late as possible. We were convinced that by faithful observation, by continued occupation, something might be gained from all things, and that by persevering zeal we must at last arrive at a point where the ground of the judgment may be expressed at the same time with the judgment itself. Neither did we fail to perceive that the great and noble French world offered us many an advantage and much profit; for Rousseau had really touched our sympathies. But if we considered his life and his fate, he was nevertheless compelled to find the great reward for all he did in this—that he could live unacknowledged and forgotten at Paris.