But if the “many-sided Göethe”—wanting, as he certainly did, one important side of humanity, namely, the moral side—could not appreciate the genius of Richter fully, there was one who did—that, as we have already intimated, was Herder. This great man, as his intelligent wife has left on record, “valued Richter’s genius—his rich, overflowing, poetic Spirit—far above the soulless productions of the times, that contended for the poetic form only. He named them brooks without water; and often said that Richter stood, as opposed to them, on a high elevation; and that he would exchange all artistical forms for his living virtue, his feeling heart, his perennial creative genius. He brings new fresh life, truth, virtue, reality, into the declining and misunderstood vocation of the poet.” Such was Herder’s estimate of Paul; and herein precisely lies his true grandeur. A perfect Titan as an author, in the common relations of social and domestic life he is a god. Aiming at the highest things, he lives happy among the smallest. Soaring habitually among the loftiest ideas, he is “sympathising and attentive to the smallest little things, and to all the actual of life.” This is the testimony of his wife—not every wife of a literary man, great or small, in these times, can give such a testimony. It has been a fashion with men of a certain fashion of genius to fall in love furiously, and to be ecstatically moved in the licentious roving of the eyes; but to shrink from the joining of hands, to hate marriage, and to damn the fireside. But Richter was of a different—of a more healthy, and a more happy humour. Did St Paul ever bear a nobler testimony to the “honourable” condition of marriage than the following?—
“That the brightest and purest fountain of love to mankind takes nothing from love to the individual, I learn from my Caroline. Every day it becomes more expansive. Rare as beautiful is her adoration of the spiritual of poetry and nature; wonderful her disinterestedness and complete abnegation of self. There is nothing that she would not do for me, or others. World-long cares are to her nothing, as her industry and love of duty are infinite. As she loves me, she loves all my clothes, and would make them all herself.
“As yet we have had nothing, or only very little, to irritate. I cannot say that I am satisfied, but I am certainly blest. Ah, see her! What are words! Marriage has made me love her more romantically, deeper, infinitely more than before!”
Richter, therefore, was a domestic man in the highest sense of the word. Would you know what domestic happiness means? Take the following—’tis from a daughter:—
“I love to represent the dear friendly man, with brown study-coat and socks hanging down, as he entered our mother’s chamber the first thing in the morning to greet her. The hound springs on before him, and the children hang about him, and seek, when he leaves the room, to thrust their little feet into the slippers behind, when he raises his feet a little, so as to hang on him more securely. One springs before, (at that time my blessed brother lived,) the other two hang on his coat-skirts until he reaches his own chamber-door; where all leave him, for only the dog must enter there.
“When we were very small, we lived in a two-story house; my father worked above, in the attic. We crept on our hands and feet over the stairs, and hammered on the door till the father himself arose and opened it, and after our noisy ingress, closed it again—then he took from an old chest a trumpet and a fife, with which we made noisy music while he continued writing. We ventured in again many times in the day to play with a squirrel that he had at that time, and that in the evening he took out with him in his pocket, and always made one of the family circle.
“He had, usually, animals that he tamed, about him. Sometimes a mouse; then a great, white, cross spider, that he kept in a paper box, with a glass top. There was a little door beneath, by which he could feed his prisoner with dead flies. In the autumn he collected the winter food for his little tree frog and his tame spider.
“The father was good to every thing: he could not bear to witness the least pain, not even in the lowest animals. Thus, he never went out without opening the cage of his canary birds, to indemnify the poor animals, who would be melancholy in his absence. He took at one time the most sedulous care of a dog, who came in one evening after the loss of the poor dead Alert, as he knew in the morning he should exchange him for another, and he would have no opportunity to feed him again. You will smile at the connexion, but he did the same for a departing servant maid: providing every thing for her convenience the day before, and delighting the poor girl in the most unusual degree.
“The children were permitted all sorts of practical jokes towards him. ‘Father, dance once;’ then he would make some leaps; or he must speak French, in which he placed wonderful value on the nasal sound, which no one made as well as he. It sounded, indeed, curiously and made my mother laugh.
“In the twilight he told us stories; or spake of God and other worlds; or he would tell us of our grandfather, and other splendid things. We ran to gain the wager, which of us should get nearest to him on the sofa. The old money-box, hooped with iron, with a hole in the cover, that two mice might conveniently pass through, was the stepping-stone by which we jumped over the back of the sofa, for in front it was difficult to press between the table and the repertory for papers. We all three crowded between the back of the sofa and the father’s out-stretched legs; above, at his head, lay the sleeping dog. At last, when we had pressed our limbs into the most inconvenient postures, the story began.
“The father knew how to create for himself many little pleasures. Thus, he made all the boxes for his tame animals, after his half-hour’s nap in the afternoon. It was a special satisfaction to him to prepare ink, which he did much oftener than was necessary, for Otto wrote long years after with the rejected part. He could never wait to perfect it, but tried it an hour after it was made. If it was already black, he would come joyfully to us, and say,—‘Now, if it be black already, what will it be to-morrow, or after fourteen days?’
“The mere thought of destruction was painful to him, especially the loss of the work of man’s mind. He never burned a letter; yes, he treasured even the most insignificant. ‘All loss of life,’ he said, ‘may be restored again, but the creations of these heads, these hearts, never! The name should be erased, but the soul that speaks its most intimate sentiments in letters, should live.’ He had also thick books written full of the remarks and the habits and peculiarities of his children.
“At meals he was very cheerful, and listened to every thing we told him with the greatest sympathy, and always made something out of the smallest relation; so that the narrator was always wiser for what he had said.
“In eating and drinking he was extremely moderate. He never gave us direct instruction, and yet he taught us always. Our evening table he called a French table-d’hote, that he furnished with twelve dishes taken from the arts and sciences. We tasted of all without being satiated with any, and we all ventured to utter any joke to the father about himself or his entertainment.
“His punishments for us girls were rather passive than active; they consisted in refusing some request, or in a severe word; but my brother sometimes received corporal punishment. My father would say—‘Max, this afternoon, at three o’clock, come to me to receive your whipping.’ He went punctually, and suffered it without a sound.”
But we become diffuse. There are many scenes in the quiet life of Richter, that, like the above, are perfect domestic idyls—but we must hasten to the last; ’tis like those which preceded it, surpassing lovely. Never have we encountered, in the wide world of biographic books, a death-bed scene, so full of love, and joy, and peace, as the death-bed of Jean Paul Frederick Richter. Nothing more, however, than one might have expected; for men generally—so experienced clergymen observe—die as they live. One thing only we must remark, before giving our last extracts; towards the close of his career, the bright, sun-gazing genius of Richter was struck, like Milton’s, not with celestial, but with terrestrial blindness. For some space before he died, his favourite world of flowers and green fields was already a blank to him. In the month of October 1823, his nephew, Otto Spazier, to whom we are indebted for the principal part of these biographical details, shortly before his death, being called to visit the blind old poet, writes as follows:—
“‘Such a call from the immortal old man, as it entered my solitary apartment,’ says his nephew, ‘filled me with delight. The reverend image of his beautiful old age, a just reward for a holy life, rose before me, and with joyful haste I travelled through the wet days of October, and entered his study on the evening of the twenty-fourth of that month. The same joyful tremor affected me as formerly, when, at the twilight hour, I had listened here with his family to the voice of wisdom. The windows of his room looked towards the rising sun, and far over the garden and over scattered trees and houses, towards the Flichtelgebirge, that bounded the horizon. A mingled perfume of flowers and grapes led the fancy to southern climes, to beautiful blue June days, or to the vintage on the Rhine. His sofa, where he usually read in a reclining posture, was opposite this window, and before it his writing table, upon which appeared a regular confusion of pens, paper of all colours, glasses, flowers, books, among which last were the small English editions of Swift and Sterne. At the other window stood a small piano, and near this a smaller table. Depending from the cage of his birds was a little ladder, that led to his own work-table, where the birds were permitted to roam among the confusion, sprinkling with water from the flower glass the sheet upon which the poet was writing. Often was Paul seen to stop in his most excited passages, to let his little canary, with her young, travel, undisturbed, over the page, where the water she scattered from her feathers mingled with the ink from his pen. In the corner of the room was a door by which, unobserved, Richter could descend the steps into the garden, and on a cushion near it rested his white, silky-haired poodle. A hunting pocket and rosewood staff hung near. All three had often been the companions of his wandering, when, on beautiful days, he went through the chestnut avenue to the little Rolwenzell cottage.
“‘All in the room retained its usual position, but the ruling hand appeared to have been absent. The light was shaded, and the windows hung with green curtains; the robust form that in former years, even before the snowdrop had loosened the icy crust of winter, had worked long hours with uncovered breast in the open air, lay supported with cushions, and shrouded in furs upon the sofa; his body drawn together, and eyes for ever closed. ‘Heaven,’ said he, ‘chastens me with a double rod, and one is a heavy cudgel! (meaning his blindness); but I shall be well again now. Ah! we have so much to say and to do. But we shall have a thousand hours—at least, minutes.’ His voice was weaker, his words slower, and it cut me to the heart to hear him speak of himself. It was late—and soon his wife, ever watchful, called me away, to return to him again in the morning.’
“Early next morning he began a complete revision of his works. The nephew read aloud, and Paul inserted his alterations. When Spazier thought one necessary, he indicated it by pausing, to draw his attention. With great mildness and patience Paul listened to every objection; and himself related, explained, praised, and blamed. He reconsidered and over-lived thus his whole spiritual life in his works. In the comparisons scattered through his sixty-four volumes, of which indeed every page is filled, he found only two or three were repeated.”
On the 14th November of the same year the curtain was drawn. How calmly—how beautifully!—Read:—
“Noon had by this time arrived. Richter, thinking it was night, said—‘It was time to go to rest!’ and wished to retire. He was wheeled into his sleeping apartment, and all was arranged as if for repose; a small table near his bed, with glass of water, and his two watches; common one and a repeater. His wife now brought him a wreath of flowers that a lady had sent him, for every one wished to add some charm to his last days. As he touched them carefully, for he could neither see nor smell them, he seemed to rejoice in the images of the flowers in his mind, for he said repeatedly to Caroline—‘My beautiful flowers, my lovely flowers!’
“Although his friends sat around the bed, as he imagined it was night, they conversed no longer; he arranged his arms as if preparing for repose, which was to be to him the repose of death, and soon sank into a tranquil sleep.
“Deep silence pervaded the apartment. Caroline sat at the head of the bed, with her eyes immovably fixed on the face of her beloved husband. Otto had retired, and the nephew sat with Plato’s Phaedon in his hand, open at the death of Socrates. At that moment a tall and beautiful form entered the chamber; and, at the foot of the bed, with his hands raised to heaven, and deeply moved, he repeated aloud the prayer of his Mosaic faith. It was Emanuel, and next to Otto, the most beloved of Richter’s friends.
“About six o’clock the physician entered. Richter yet appeared to sleep; his features became every moment holier, his brow more heavenly, but it was cold as marble to the touch; and as the tears of his wife fell upon it, he remained immovable. At length his respiration became less regular, but his features always calmer, more heavenly. A slight convulsion passed over the face; the physician cried out—‘That is death!’ and all was quiet. The spirit had departed!
“All sank, praying, upon their knees. This moment, that raised them above the earth with the departing spirit, admitted of no tears!
“‘Thus Richter went from earth, great and holy as a poet, greater and holier as a man!’
“Involuntarily we recall the deathbed of another great poet, on that delicious summer’s day when the windows were all open, and the only sound the ripple of the Tweed upon its stony bed. Here, in the midst of winter, a deeper repose must have consecrated the deathbed of Richter, as if Nature herself stood reverently still, when her worshipper and interpreter laid down the garment in which he had ministered in her temple.
“Richter was buried by torch light: the unfinished manuscript of Selina[5] borne upon his coffin, and the noble ode of Klopstock— ‘Thou shalt arise, my soul!’
was sung by the students of the Gymnasium at the burial vault.”
Thus have we, by favour of your attention, kind reader, endeavoured to open up to the British eye, a few sunny glimpses of one of the choicest spirits whom “the Fatherland” delighteth to honour. Jean Paul, der einzige—the unique, is the received designation of Richter in Germany; a title in his case as deservedly earned by literary labour, as military and political services have earned it likewise, in his proper sphere, for the great Frederick. Pity only that it is by no means such an easy matter to render the works of the author’s genius as appreciable to general admiration, as the actions of the soldier and the policy of the king. Guns and trumpets make a noise over the wide world, from the Arctic circle to the Antarctic, pretty much the same; and, provided the stages of their explosion be large and open enough, the actors will not fail to be noted of all men, and admired. But the voices of wise and good men in books, are of a more curious and delicate melody; and sometimes even the rarest of them cannot be made to vibrate in their full harmonious chords, otherwise than to the nicely-fitted structure of the national ear. This is the case with the French Beranger, and in an eminent degree with our own Burns. The translators, we know, have tried their hands with these men—as what will they not try?—but let them carve and polish as they will, the Frenchman will still limp awkwardly in his Wellington boots, and the Scotsman, though he may retain his warmth, will lose the finest tints of his colour in Deutschland. So even more strikingly is the stamp of indelible nationality imprinted on all the writings of Jean Paul; and it will require peculiarly skilful handling indeed, to take away the point from the French lady’s criticism above quoted, and make all or any one of Richter’s works, like Schiller’s “Wallenstein,” or Göethe’s “Faust,” a familiar occupant of a cultivated Englishman’s shelves. These works consist almost exclusively of novels or fictitious tales, and these of two kinds: the philosophical or ideal novel—for which, even in its most perfect character, John Bull has no peculiar faculty; and the novel of common life, in which department the same most unphilosophical Bull has attained such an admirable mastership, that to his practical eye the most manful feats of a purely German genius like Richter, are apt to appear puerile and even apish. Nevertheless, we do by no means despair of a selection being made from this great man’s works, such as will not, indeed, popularise him on British ground—for popular in the widest sense he is not even in Germany—but such as may command the ear of all educated men for whom the higher departments of imaginative literature have a charm. Such a collection to our knowledge has not yet been made in this country. When it shall be made, every thing depends on the workman. Richter cannot be translated at random: nor can he be simply transposed, as many a decent sentence-monger may, line after line, and paragraph after paragraph; he is freakish, and will confound a methodical wit lamentably. One decided advantage, however, by way of an introduction to the English Richter, has been gained by the appearance of the present biography. We have learnt to know the man; and the man in this case is as good, perhaps better, than his works. No well-conditioned person, we are convinced, will lay down the biography of Richter without an earnest desire to know something more of such a man. He will be convinced also that the novels of such a writer will not be made up of mere playful arabesques to amuse, of mere pepper and spices to stimulate; he will have felt the breath of a moral regeneration in these pages, and that a novel of Jean Paul is in fact a sermon; an evangelic address, where the gospel is preached, as wit is vented in the old drama, oftentimes by a clown. Next to a mind of extensive culture, and a heart of wide sympathies, a moral preparation of this kind is the grand key to the writings of Frederick Richter.