Nearer to me, in point of age, was his brother George, who had again returned from Treptow, from the service of the Duke Eugene of Würtemberg. While he had advanced in knowledge of the world and in practical talent, he had not remained behindhand in a survey of German and foreign literature. He liked, as before, to write in all languages; but did not further excite me in this respect, as I devoted myself exclusively to German, and only cultivated other languages so far as to enable me, in some measure, to read the best authors in the original. His honesty showed itself the same as ever; nay, his acquaintance with the world may have occasioned him to adhere with more severity and even obstinacy to his well-meaning views.
Merk.
Through these two friends, I very soon became acquainted with Merck, to whom I had not been unfavourably announced by Herder, from Strasburg. This strange man, who had the greatest influence on my life, was a native of Darmstadt. Of his early education I can say but little. After finishing his studies, he conducted a young man to Switzerland, where he remained for some time, and came back married. When I made his acquaintance, he was military paymaster at Darmstadt. Born with mind and understanding, he had acquired much elegant knowledge, especially in modern literature, and had paid attention to all times and places in the history of the world and of man. He had the talent of judging with certainty and acuteness. He was prized as a thorough, decisive man of business, and a ready accountant. With ease he gained an entrance everywhere, as a very pleasant companion for those to whom he had not rendered himself formidable by sarcasms. His figure was long and lean; a sharp prominent nose was remarkable; light blue, perhaps grey eyes, gave something tiger-like to his glance, which wandered attentively here and there. Lavater's Physiognomy has preserved his profile for us. In his character there was a wonderful contradiction. By nature a good, noble, upright man, he had embittered himself against the world, and allowed this morbid whim to sway him to such a degree, that he felt an irresistible inclination to be wilfully a rogue, or even a villain. Sensible, quiet, kind at one moment, it might strike him in the next—-just as a snail puts out his horns—to do something which might hurt, wound, or even injure another. Yet as one readily associates with something dangerous when one believes oneself safe from it, I felt so much the greater inclination to live with him, and to enjoy his good qualities, since a confident feeling allowed me to suspect that he would not turn his bad side towards me. While now, by this morally restless mind,—by this necessity of treating men in a malignant and spiteful way, he on one side destroyed social life, another disquiet, which also he very carefully fostered within himself, opposed his internal comfort; namely he felt a certain dilettantish impulse to production, in which he indulged the more readily, as he expressed himself easily and happily in prose and verse, and might well venture to play a part among the beaux esprits of the time. I myself still possess poetical epistles, full of uncommon boldness, force, and Swift-like gall, which are highly remarkable from their original views of persons and things, but are at the same time written with such wounding power, that I could not publish them, even at present, but must either destroy them or preserve them for posterity as striking documents of the secret discord in our literature. However, the fact that in all his labours he went to work negatively and destructively, was unpleasant to himself, and he often declared that he envied me that innocent love of setting forth a subject which arose from the pleasure I took both in the original and the imitation.
For the rest, his literary dilettantism would have been rather useful than injurious to him, if he had not felt an irresistible impulse to enter also into the technical and mercantile department. For when he once began to curse his faculties, and was beside himself that he could not, with sufficient genius, satisfy his claims to a practical talent, he gave up now plastic art, now poetry, and thought of mercantile and manufacturing undertakings, which were to bring in money while they afforded him amusement.
In Darmstadt there was besides a society of very cultivated men. Privy Councillor von Hess, Minister of the Landgrave, Professor Petersen, Rector Wenk, and others, were the naturalized persons whose worth attracted by turns many neighbours from other parts, and many travellers through the city. The wife of the privy councillor and her sister, Demoiselle Flachsland, were ladies of uncommon merit and talents; the latter, who was betrothed to Herder, being doubly interesting from her own qualities and her attachment to so excellent a man.
Pauvre crane vide, que me veux tu dire avec ton grincement hideux? par Eugène Delacroix (Détail. Source: Faust, tragédie de M. de Goethe, traduite en français par M. Albert Stapfer. C. Motte (Paris) 1828 - Gallica Bnf)