“Do not laugh, Goethe,” murmured Philip Moritz. “I will tell you, a dream has tormented and alarmed me; a dream that has returned to me for three successive nights. I see Marie lying on her couch at the point of death, her cheeks pale and hollow, her eyes dim and fixed; old Trude kneels at her side wringing her hands, and a voice cries in my ear in heart-rending tones: ‘Philip, my beloved Philip, come! Let me die in your arms.’ This is the dream that has haunted me for three nights; these are the words that have each time awakened me from sleep, and they still resound in my ear when I am fully aroused.”
“Dreams amount to nothing,” said Goethe, shrugging his shoulders, “and your faith in them proves only that Cupid transforms even the most sensible men into foolish children, and that the wanton god can make even sages irrational.”
“I would he made you so, you mocker at love and marriage,” rejoined Moritz, grimly. “I would like to see you a victim of this divine madness. I trust that Cupid, whom you deride, will send an arrow into your icy heart and melt it in the flames of infinite love-pains and heaven-storming longings! I hope to see you, the sage who has fled from all the living beauties, from all the living women here in Italy, as though they were serpents of Eden—I hope to see you compelled by one of them to eat of the apple, and experience the dire consequences! I hope—”
“Hold, rash mortal!” said Goethe, interrupting him, with a smile. “You know that children and fools often speak the truth, and that their prophecies often become realities. It is to be hoped an all-kind Providence will preserve me from a new love, from new flames. No, the fires of love have been extinguished in my heart; in the warm ashes of friendship that still remain, a spark may sometimes glimmer sufficiently to enable me to read the name of my beloved friend, Charlotte von Stein, engraven therein.”
“Warm ashes of friendship, indeed!” observed Moritz, in mocking tones. “A sorry tenant for the heart of the poet of Werther.”
“Really,” cried Goethe, “I believe this fellow would be capable of imploring the gods to visit a ‘Werthercade’ upon me.”
“I not only would be capable of doing so, but I really will do so,” rejoined Moritz. “I entreat the gods to bless and curse you with a heaven-storming, bliss-conferring and annihilating love, for that is all that is wanting to drive the last vestiges of humanity out of you, and make of you a demi-god with a halo of love-flames around your semi-divine head. Yes, Wolfgang Goethe, poet by the grace of God, to whom the immortal have vouchsafed the honor of creating an ‘Iphigenia’ and an ‘Egmont’—yes, I hope that a glowing, flaming, and distracting love, may be visited upon you!”
“That you should not do,” said Goethe, gently, “let me make a confession, Moritz: I believe that I am not capable of such a love—am not capable of losing my own individuality in that of another. I am not capable of subjecting all other thoughts, wishes, and cravings, to the one thought, wish, and craving of love. Perhaps this was at one time my condition, perhaps my Werther spoke of my own life, and perhaps this tragedy was written with the blood of my heart, then bleeding for Charlotte Kästner. But you perceive that I did not shoot myself like Werther. I have steeled my heart since then to enable it to rely on its own strength, and to prevent its ever being carried away by the storm of passion. I am proof against this, and will ever be so!”
“To be in Rome!” exclaimed Moritz, “in Rome, with a heart void of all save the ashes of friendship for Charlotte von Stein, and to remain cold and indifferent to the most beautiful women in the world!”
“That is not true, that is calumny!” said Goethe, smiling. “My heart is not cold, but glows with admiration and love for the noblest and loveliest woman, for the goddess of beauty, chastity, and virtue. She was my first love in Rome, and will be my only love. I yearned for her until she at last yielded to my entreaties, and took up her abode in my poor house. Yes, I possess her, she is mine! No words can give an idea of her, she is like one of Homer’s songs!”[36]