"Friedrich Nicolai's Leben und sonderbare Meinungen. Ein Beitrag zur Literatur-Geschichte des vergangenen und zur Pädagogik des angehenden Jahrhunderts, von Johan Gottlieb Fichte. Herausgegeben von A. W. Schlegel: Tubingen, 1801, 8o, pp. 130."
There certainly is no ground for the charge that Fichte attacked Nicolai when he was too old to reply. Nicolai was born in 1733, and died in 1811; so that he was sixty-eight when this pamphlet was published. His Leben Sempronius Gundiberts was published in 1798; and your correspondent H. C. R. (Vol. vii., p. 20.) partook of his hospitality in Berlin in 1803.
As to the provocation, Fichte (at p. 82.) gives an account of attacks on his personal honour; the worst of which seems to be the imputation of seeking favourable notices in the Literary Gazette of Jena. In Gundibert Fichte's writings were severely handled, but no personal imputation was made. I do not know what was said of him in the Neue Deutsche Bibliothek, but I can hardly imagine any justification for so furious an attack
as this on Nicolai. I also concur with Madame de Staël in thinking the book dull: "Non est jocus esse malignum." It begins with an attempt at grave burlesque, but speedily degenerates into mere scolding. Take one example:
"Es war sehr wahr, dass aus seinen (Nicolais) Händen alles beschmutzt und verdreht herausging; aber es war nicht wahr, das er beschmutzen und verdrehen wollte. Es ward ihm nur so durch die Eigenschaft seiner Natur. Wer möchte ein Stinkthier beschuldigen, dass es bohafter Weise alles was es zu sich nehme, in Gestank,—oder die Natter, das sie es in Gift verwandle. Diese Thiere sind daran sehr unschuldig; sie folgen nur ihrer Natur. Eben so unser Held, der nun einmal zum literarischen Stinkthier und der Natter des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts bestimmt war, verbreitete stank um sich, und spritze Gift, nicht aus Bosheit, sondern lediglich durch seine Bestimmung getrieben."—P. 78.
The charge of defiling all he touched will be appreciated by those who have read Sebaldus Nothanker and Sempronius Gundibert, two of the purest as well as of the cleverest novels of the last century.
H. B. C.
U. U. Club.