"Furthermore, we shall all gradually advance from a Christianity of word and faith to one of feeling and action."
The conversation next turned on the question how far God is influencing the great natures of the present world. Said Goethe, "If we notice how people talk, we might almost believe them to be of opinion that God had withdrawn into silence since that old time before Christ, and that man was now placed on his own feet, and must see how he can get on without God. In religious and moral matters a divine influence is still admitted, but in matters of science and art it is insisted that they are merely earthly, and nothing more than a product of pure human powers.
"But now let anyone only attempt with human will and human capabilities to produce something comparable with the creations that bear the names of Mozart, Raphael, or Shakespeare. I know right well that these three noble men are not the only ones, and that in every department of art innumerable excellent minds have laboured, who have produced results as perfectly good as those mentioned. But, if they were as great as those, they transcended ordinary human nature, and were in just the same degree divinely gifted."
Goethe was silent, but I cherished his great and good words in my heart.
THOMAS GRAY
Letters
Thomas Gray, the poet and author of the "Elegy written in a Country Churchyard," was born on December 26, 1716, in London, and was the only survivor of twelve children. At Eton he formed friendships with Horace Walpole, Thomas Ashton, and Richard West, who were later his chief correspondents. At Cambridge, where Gray took no degree, he began to make experiments in poetry. In 1739 and 1740 he travelled in Europe, and in 1742 he had established himself at Peterhouse, Cambridge, without University position or recognition of any kind. Here he plunged into the study of classical literature, and began to work on the "Elegy," which was published in 1751. He was a shy, sensitive man of very wide learning. Couched in graceful language, the letters are typical of the best in the best age of letter-writing, and not only are they fascinating for the tender and affectionate nature they reveal, but also for the gleam of real humour which Walpole declared was the poet's most natural vein. He died on July 30, 1771.
I.--The Student's Freedom
TO RICHARD WEST