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Untitled Article
and purposed to embody it in a work of imagination . He says that he could find no other frame for such a work than an elaborate novel in the style of Richardson , and from that he was diverted by other tasks . We cannot allow ourselves to enlarge on the childhood and
youth of Goethe ^ deterred by the profusion , not by the dearth of materials * . From his family he possessed all the means of instruction which the numerous masters usually found in a large and wealthy commercial city supply ; and the depth of his character led him to anticipate the lessons of the school . Like most children of deep feelings , he seems to have received religious impressions very early .
In his sixth year , his excited imagination had been directed towards the rites of the Jewish church , so that he erected an altar out of a music-desk and toys , at which he performed his infantine devotions . When he was seven years old , the seven years ' war broke out , which brought dissension into the family . His grandfather was attached to the emperor , but his father was a partisan of Frederick of Prussia , who had also won the child's
heart . Before he was ten years old , a Count Thorane , a French Lieutenant du Roi , was billetted in the house , who was attracted by the talents of the boy , whom he admitted into his apartments . He was a patron of artists , and a collector of works of art ; and Groethe became very early , in consequence , an amateur , and a connoisseur . At the same time , he became distinguished among his playfellows for his talents as a story-teller . French plays were introduced into the city , and he became master of the
* Goethe published in 1811-14 three volumes of autobiography , which terminate soon , after his entry into the service of the Duke of Saxe Weimar , in 1785 . To this work he has given the singular title of ' Aus meinem leben Dichtung und WahrheilJ i . e . From my Life , Poetry and Truth . ' He expresses his regret that he had delayed the task till after the death of his mother : — I should , myself have stood nearer those infantine scenes , and the lofty power of her memory would have Supplied my deficiencies ; now I must laboriously call back these vanished spirits ,
and apply a sort of magical apparatus to render obvious the development of a child who had become important under given circumstances . I must do this in conformity with the laws known to the intelligent student of the human mind . It was therefore that , executing this work with scrupulous fidelity , I entitled it ' Dichtung und WahrheitJ deeply convinced that man can pourtray external nature , when present , and still more when absent , only according to the peculiarities of his own nature . ' So rich , a repository of psychological facts is no where else to be found , and
the book will be inestimable to all who make the mind of man their study , —a very contrast to the Confessions of Rousseau , in which we have the mournful brooding of a diseased intellect over the excesses of diseased passions and appetites . We have here . a cheerful and philosophical review , in advanced life , of all the healthful elements of our sensible , moral , and intellectual nature , as they developed themselves In early life . A multitude of incidents seemingly puerile and frivolous , but really significant , develope the growth of every passion and every faculty . For our purpose , we can only notice those occurrences which , with rare felicity , seem to have excited even in Goethe ' s childhood and early youth , every one of those manifold talents and tastes , in the exercise and gratification of which he spent his ) ang life , and of which the results will fill so large a space in the future literary history of modern Europe .
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$$ & Goethe .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1832, page 292, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1812/page/4/
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