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French language in consequence . His father requiring him ix > learn the modern languages , in order to diminish the tedium of elementary learning , he invented a story , in which six brothers and sisters , travelling into different countries , had occasion to write in French , Italian , English , Latin , and a sort of barbarous Hebrew-German . The Bible being the chief object of his
interest , he first exercised himself in invention by the compositioa of a prose epic on the history of Joseph . At the same time , he tried his hand at Anacreontic songs , and spiritual odes . The peace of Hubertsberg at length took place , and this was followed by the coronation of Joseph II ., in the year 1764 . To these solemnities Goethe had easy access , and his account of them is a model of animated description . But his enjoyment was
embittered by a perplexing adventure , into which his literary talents and nascent susceptibility had drawn him . vSome young people of habits of low intrigue , and disreputable connexions , had flattered his passionate desire to be doing something , by engaging him to write occasional poems ; such as Epithalamia , elegies , &c , and his first rude sense of female beauty was excited by the
charms of the sister of one of them . From the peril of such a connexion he was saved by the detection of some acts of dishonesty . The knot of adventurers was broken up ; Goethe ' s personal acquaintance were the least culpable of the set ; he was recognized as being only the dupe , and the girl being compelled to leave the city , he escaped the snare .
In the meanwhile , he had resolved to devote himself to philology ; and he was very desirous of going to the university of Gb ' ttingen , but in obedience to his stern father he went to Leipsic , where he adopted jurisprudence as his profession , but seems to have studied with an omniverous eagerness every branch of knowledge ; at the same time that he was at the head of every joyous adventure among the students .
Poetry held a principal place in his affections ; and to the German , who is fully aware of what even then he was , it excites a smile to read of his exercises being corrected by Gellert , a writer of great popularity in his day ; being a sort of compound of Gay and Dr . Watts . So early was his character formed , that speaking of himself while at Leipsic , he says , * Thus my mind received a direction , from which I could never deviate ; namely , that whatever occupied my rnind , whether it delighted or tormented me , I turned into an image , into poetry ; by which means I succeeded both in obtaining repose for myself , and in correcting my notions of external things . All I have yet published , are
to be considered as fragments of a great confession , to complete which is the hazardous attempt of this work . ' The greater number of his early writings , founded' on personal occurrences , are lost ; the earliest of those that are to be met with among his works , is a pastoral drama , in imitation of the French , and in
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Goethe . 29 & :
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1832, page 293, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1812/page/5/
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